Let's talk about Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy

So which lyrics imply that this song is about a gay relationship? IMO there are two perspectives in the lyrics: 1. the loverboy himself and 2. a group of outsiders during the chorus -- they are asking THE LOVERBOY, "What you doing tonight, hey boy?"

I don't see the lyrics as being about a gay relationship necessarily. (And if they are, who cares?) However, anything that's Noel Cowardesque should come off as gay to some degree. :)

There are a lot of posts in these forums speculating as to the "gayness" of Freddie's lyrics -- particularly that Bohemian Rhapsody is all about the homosexual man killing off his heterosexual side. It's all a load of rubbish to me . . . to me . . . to meeeeeeeee!

I agree, I don't see what the whole gay thing has to do with the music. 'thelmpossibleman' seems to be a little on the homophobe side judging by some of his posts, but ignorance of some people never seems to amaze me. "lover boy" is the style of queen that seperated them from the average rock band, if it wasn't for this style queen they would have been just another rock band with little originality. I love this style of 20's meets 70's rock. Only freddie could write such gems!

I love this song! I think it's flawless...but hey that's just my opinion

I personally think it's a great song and a classic in the Queen catalog. I've always felt that it was aimed at being more "gay" related than not. It's very rare to have a love song that doesn't express the notion of being about the opposite sex which this song has none of. It does however loosely speak both to and from a boys perspective. I suppose there is nothing completely defining this song as being gay-related which does give it a sort of universal appeal but I've always assumed a gay theme to it. I don't understand why it would shock or annoy anyone to consider the possiblities since clearly Freddie did have those sort of feeling towards men and chances are likely that in Freddies mind he was singing this to another guy.

BTW, who is Mike Stone and why does he get additional vocal credits on this song in the studio? Did he ever sing on any other Queen or Freddie songs? Is it possible that maybe he's the good old-fashioned lover boy being refered to? just a guess...

billycat wrote:

BTW, who is Mike Stone and why does he get additional vocal credits on this song in the studio? Did he ever sing on any other Queen or Freddie songs?

Great question. I know Mike Stone was their long-time engineer but I don't imagine he is the lover boy being referred to. . . but I always wondered, with Queen being the great vocalists they were, why they bothered having Mike Stone sing on this one?

I think I can pick out his voice clearly on the lines "Hey, boy, where'd you get it from. Hey, boy, where did you go"?

I also love Brian's psuedo clarinet trio all done with overdubbed guitars throughout the song . . and the little guitar "hiccup" Brian does during the solo. What a nice touch. I always thought Brian's genius always shined brightest on Freddie's songs.

I dont think he was talking about gay sex in GOFLB...but I think he was in "Get down make love" If you read the lyrics you know that he was...but theres nothing wrong with that, lol!!

Koolkikiland wrote:

but I always wondered, with Queen being the great vocalists they were, why they bothered having Mike Stone sing on this one?

I always thought the additional vocal credit was odd for the same reason.

I also love Brian's psuedo clarinet trio all done with overdubbed guitars throughout the song . . and the little guitar "hiccup" Brian does during the solo. What a nice touch. I always thought Brian's genius always shined brightest on Freddie's songs.

While Brian has definitely written and recorded plenty of great songs on his own I would have to agree that a lot of his moments he had in Freddies songs stood out in a more catchy and memorable way. Though the psuedo clarinet sounds on GOFLB are like a continuation of the stuff he did on his song, Good Company. I wonder how he got those sounds. I've never heard anything quite like it from a guitar.

and yeah, that little "hiccup" bit is just too clever and cool.

I half-ditched this song for a while, but its recently grown on me again.
A very upbeat catchy over-the-top (in a good way) tune, with a very well constructed guitar solo

Musically, it's fabulous. I get shivers down my spine when i try to play it on piano.
I don't know if all of you know, but it's not the easiest song to play! ;)

Lyrically, it's very funny.
Is it gay? Well, like Millionaire Waltz.. I guess they are as gay as they could be, but who cares??? Both are brilliant!

In a whole, a masterpiece.

It might be my dirty mind, but I always thought it was about a guy boasting to his mates how he was going to charm his partner with all the romance stuff to get him/her into bed!! ????

I love the song, one of Brians best solo's IMO too... am I the only one though that thinks the first verse lead vocals are so low in comparison to everything else in the mix?

I love the solo as well. Probably my favourite 70's solo.

RobbyBloodshed wrote:

am I the only one though that thinks the first verse lead vocals are so low in comparison to everything else in the mix?

I think that too.

About the guitar solo, there's a bit around 1:58 - 2:00 that reminds me of another bit in the Bo Rhap solo.

Wonderful song that encapsulated so much of what 70's Queen were. The other thing is that It sits within the ADATR album on an equal footing with the other songs.

Nothing on that album is outshone or outshines anything else, perfect album imo.

Another cool thing about the song is their TOTP appearance as I features the only time Brian was filmed using his Greco guitar.

Right,

I came to this thread because I thought along the same line with TheImpossibleMan and i'm going slight mad... that the lyric could be perceived as suggesting a man-to-man relationship (an old old thread though it is! :)). It could be the entire opposite for other people, though, but I happen to perceive the lyric this way and not that it's an issue to me personally. I love the song, I love the complexity of mixtures of styles and layers in the composition but that's beside the point.

I simply found this intriguingly an ambiguous and cheeky song since Freddie has always been reluctant to confirm his sexual orientation (whichever way it went) publicly. So...maybe it's one of his braver times or it's simply accidental and it's really about general love regardless of the orientation. It's got nothing to do with homophobia though.