by Mark Blake
In December, Queen released another live album, Live Magic. Bafflingly, several songs, including ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’, were edited down to ensure that they fitted on the record. While some followers echoed the Hungarian Queen Fan Club president’s complaint (‘Queen only want the money now’), they bought it anyway, giving the band a number 3 album in time for Christmas.
Considering the speculation now raging about his private life, there was something apt about Freddie Mercury singing ‘The Great Pretender’. ‘“The Great Pretender” is a great title for what I do because I am The Great Pretender,’ he said. The public agreed, giving him a Top 5 single in February. In the meantime, Freddie’s praise for Montserrat Caballé on Spanish TV had found its way back to the opera star. Queen’s Spanish promoter Pino Sagliocci was organising a TV music show, Ibiza 92, to celebrate Spain being announced as the host nation for the 1992 Olympic Games. He desperately wanted Freddie Mercury to sing with Montserrat.
Sagliocci brokered a meeting, and in March, Mercury flew to Spain, bringing Mike Moran for moral support, for a lunch date with Caballé at Barcelona’s Ritz Hotel. The then 53-year-old soprano was revered throughout her native Spain and throughout the world of opera. Watching her sweep in to the hotel, surrounded by courtiers (‘like the Queen of Sheba,’ said Moran), Mercury realised that he was no longer the most important person in the room. ‘I was nervous,’ he admitted. ‘I didn’t know how to behave or what to say to her.’
Lunch was a slightly stilted affair, but Mercury had come prepared, and played Montserrat a recording of an operatic song he’d co-written with Moran titled ‘Exercises in Free Love’. ‘This is me pretending to be you,’ he told the diva, before offering her the song. To his surprise, she accepted, informing the pair that she would perform their song the following month during her concert at the Covent Garden Opera House. She then tapped a shocked Moran on the shoulder and told him that he would play with her.
Later, after the Covent Garden performance, a deal was struck: Freddie would write a brand-new song for the two of them to perform on Sagliocci’s TV special and they would record an album of duets together. ‘I thought, “My God!”’ said Mercury. ‘“What am I going to do now?”’ A further distinction between the worlds of rock and opera was made when Montserrat informed Freddie that she had just three days available for their album recording session.
Despite the time restraints, Mercury put plans for another solo record on the back burners and began writing with a duets album in mind, collaborating with Mike Moran and, for one song, lyricist Tim Rice. They would eventually compose eight new songs, including ‘Barcelona’, a piece honouring the Olympic Games’ new host city. With English and Spanish lyrics, it gave both the great diva and her untutored rock star partner the chance to shine. Caballé loved it. Yet her schedule was still an issue, and the tapes, on which Freddie improvised her vocals, had to be couriered to the diva for her approval.
When Caballé finally flew to London for a recording session, Mercury became increasingly flustered. ‘Freddie’s nerves made us more nervous,’ says John Brough, Townhouse Studios’ in-house engineer. ‘Montserrat had only ever been recorded live before. So David Richards and I were like, “We’ve never recorded an opera singer before. What sort of microphone would she use?” Then we realised she had probably never worn headphones before, so we set up a couple of speakers either side of her.’
Mercury had identified another problem prior to Montserrat’s arrival at Townhouse: the state of the women’s lavatories. ‘Freddie suddenly asked, “Is there a Ladies here? I have only seen the Gents!”’ laughs Brough. ‘Someone showed him the Ladies, and he decided it was rather drab and asked the studio manager to get it tidied up. He offered to pay, although considering how much money Queen spent at Townhouse, he didn’t have to. When Montserrat finally arrived it was fine and everyone relaxed, but before then we were all on edge.’ What would become Mercury and Caballé’s Barcelona album wouldn’t be completed until June the following year. By then, Freddie’s life would be in turmoil.
In early April, Queen were honoured at the Ivor Novello Awards for their Outstanding Contribution to British Music. But it was the only good news that month. At some point between mid-April and early May 1987 Mercury received the news that he had been dreading. According to Jim Hutton, it was during the Easter holiday that Freddie told him he had undergone a biopsy, with his doctor taking a sample of tissue from his shoulder. Days later, Mercury told him he had tested HIV positive.
Interviewed in 2000, Mary Austin gave a different account. Mary recalled an urgent telephone call from Freddie’s GP, concerned that his phone messages to Mercury were being ignored. Mary urged Freddie to get in touch with his doctor. When the GP called again, as Mercury still hadn’t responded, Austin, in her own words, ‘pursued it, until the GP told me why he needed to speak to Freddie … My heart fell through my boots.’
As Peter Freestone explained, ‘Nobody can say for certain who gave who what’, but both he and Queen’s photographer Mick Rock have suggested that Mercury was likely to have become infected during his hard-partying times in New York (Freestone: ‘In the early eighties, anything went in America”). Once he discovered he was ill, Mercury displayed the same pragmatism that had seen him through every other crisis in his life. He told Jim Hutton that he understood if he wanted to end the relationship (Jim refused). He then informed Queen’s business manager Jim Beach of his condition. His staff at Garden Lodge, Joe Fanelli and Peter Freestone, would also be made aware of his illness. But it would be some time before he shared the news with the rest of Queen. In the meantime, everyone was sworn to secrecy.
Yet there was more bad news to come. In 1985, Paul Prenter had been laid off from his job in the Queen office. Mercury agreed to employ Prenter himself, but a year on, the work had dried up and Paul was running out of money. In a further display of what Peter Hince calls ‘Freddie’s misguided loyalty’, Prenter was given the keys to Mercury’s flat at Stafford Lodge and, according to Jim Hutton, ‘Freddie gave him money so he could go out as much as he wanted over the Christmas holiday.’ ‘The way I remember it, Prenter had some party at Stafford Terrace and the place got trashed,’ continues Hince. ‘So Freddie sacked him. Paul started ranting, “I’m gonna do this!” and “I’m gonna do that!” And that is exactly what he did …’
The 4 May 1987 edition of the Sun ran a lurid front-page headline: ‘AIDS KILLS FREDDIE’S TWO LOVERS’, showing photographs of the singer with Tony Bastin and an airline steward named John Murphy (though Peter Freestone would later insist that Mercury and Murphy were never actually lovers). The story continued inside the newspaper. Under the headline ‘4 A.M. PHONE CALL OF TERROR’ ‘the singer’s right-hand man Paul Prenter’ revealed that on 29 April, Freddie had telephoned him in the early hours, and told him that he was terrified he was dying of AIDS. Elsewhere, Prenter claimed that Mercury had enjoyed sex with ‘hundreds of homosexuals’.
The Sun’s exposé would be eked out over the next few days, with Prenter detailing Mercury’s cocaine binges with other rock stars; how Michael Jackson had caught him taking the drug, and the truth behind Freddie’s falling-out with his friend Kenny Everett (apparently, the DJ enjoyed snorting Mercury’s cocaine but never paid for it). The newspaper gained great mileage out of the drug revelations, as years before, Freddie had told the Evening Standard, not entirely truthfully, that Queen were ‘probably the straightest band around’. The final chapter in Prenter’s story ran on 7 May, with the newspaper running numerous photographs from his private collection: Freddie with Winnie Kirchberger, Freddie with ‘Vince the Barman’ … Prenter disclosed that Mercury’s ideal male was the actor Burt Reynolds, and outed Jim Hutton as Freddie’s live-in lover.
Prenter was rumoured to have pocketed as much as £32,000 from the Sun. He later telephoned Garden Lodge to claim that the newspaper had pressured him into selling the story. Mercury refused to take his calls. On 10 May, the News of the World ran a short statement, pu
rporting to be from Freddie, in which he denounced Prenter for ‘making money out of the dead’ and pointing out that ‘he [Prenter] did all the things I did … and more.’
By the end of May, Mercury had fled to Ibiza for a holiday and to perform at the Ibiza 92 Festival. Pino Sagliocci’s wish had come true: Freddie and Montserrat Caballé would perform ‘Barcelona’ in front of 6,000 invited guests at San Antonio’s Ku Club. Also guesting on the show would be movie star Harrison Ford, Argentinian footballer Diego Maradona, Chris Rea, Duran Duran, Spandau Ballet and Marillion. Freddie and his entourage had set up base at Pike’s Hotel, an exclusive resort away from prying eyes. In the light of the Sun’s recent allegations, and in the presence of his peers and rivals, Mercury knew he was under scrutiny.
Marillion’s Fish had spent several late nights and early mornings with the singer on the Magic tour (‘nights of Stolly and Peruvian,’ he admits). ‘I went backstage at the Ku Club and it was all so very very different,’ he says. ‘The mood was very, very sombre. Everything had changed. The wall was up.’ Barbara Valentin had flown in from Munich, and knew immediately that her ex-lover was sick. According to an interview with the actress, Mercury needed extra make-up to camouflage the discolouration on his cheek that signified Kaposi’s Sarcoma. If so, the disguise worked. Freddie gave every impression of being in the rudest of health when he walked onstage that evening.
Mercury and Caballé were the headline act, both miming but accompanied by Mike Moran, a choir and an orchestra. They cut an unlikely couple: the regal diva dressed in a diaphanous black shawl, and Mercury, in his tuxedo, right leg twitching out of time, just as it did onstage with Queen.
Despite never having heard ‘Barcelona’ before, the audience gave the pair a standing ovation. In October, the single would give the duo a Top 10 UK hit. The implausible collaboration wasn’t lost on Freddie. It was another remarkable chapter in the Fred Bulsara story: after turning himself into a rock star in the 1970s, he had danced with the Royal Ballet, recreated himself again as a pop star in the 1980s, and was now adding opera to his repertoire. ‘It’s so ridiculous when you think about it,’ he pondered. ‘Her and me together. But if we have something musically together it doesn’t matter what we look like or where we come from.’
David Wigg of the Daily Express would join Mercury and friends in Ibiza that summer for Freddie’s forty-first birthday. Like others, he had his suspicions, but Freddie would not be drawn, informing those who asked that any signs of ill-health were down to drinking too much (‘It’s my liver, dear’). His Queen bandmates harboured their own suspicions, but, as Roger Taylor admitted, ‘For a long time we tried to tell ourselves it was other things.’
With Queen still on hiatus, The Magic Years documentary film would be the only Queen release of 1987. Queen Films proved their business acumen by splitting the documentary across three separate videos, finding a home for old promos, the behind-the-scenes footage of Queen making ‘One Vision’ and talking-head interviews with A-list fans such as Mick Jagger, Elton John and Paul McCartney.
Away from the band, Brian May’s personal life was fast resembling a soap opera. On Christmas Day 1986, over 30 million viewers had watched Anita Dobson’s EastEnders character Angie Watts served with divorce papers by her onscreen husband. In the real world, May and Dobson continued to deny an affair. But May was now writing and producing an album for Anita. Meanwhile, May’s protégés Bad News proved unsuccessful, when their raucous, comedy version of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’, produced by Brian, stiffed in the charts. While Deacon sang backing vocals on the single, not all of Queen were so enamoured of this reworking of their greatest hit.
Roger Taylor would spend his summer between studios in England, Switzerland and Italy, cutting tracks for another solo record. Having sung and played every instrument on the record himself, Taylor decided to form a band so he could go out and tour. ‘If Phil Collins can fit it all in … and acting, I can fit in two bands,’ he joked. ‘And Queen don’t really work much these days.’
With Queen’s blessing, Taylor placed two ads in the music press (‘Drummer of a top rock band looking for musicians’ and ‘If you think you’re good enough and you want to be a star, call this number’). Taylor was initially cautious about attracting Queen fans rather than genuine players. In the end, he settled on three young unknowns: drummer Josh Macrae, guitarist Clayton Moss and bass guitarist Peter Noone. Spike Edney was brought in to play keyboards, while Taylor handled rhythm guitar and lead vocals. Refusing to use the Roger Taylor brand-name, the band were christened simply The Cross.
Taylor cut a deal with Virgin, and what had begun as his third solo album became The Cross’s debut album, Shove It. Their first single, ‘Cowboys and Indians’, was released that September. ‘I’m just an accessory,’ Taylor told Sounds. ‘One part of a solid unit.’ But the truth was rather different. The Cross were due to appear on the Saturday morning TV show Number 73. John Brough was asked to mix the sound. ‘Roger announced that he’d travel to the studio in the mini-bus with the band,’ says Brough. ‘So me and “Crystal” [Chris Taylor] followed behind in Roger’s Bentley. When “Crystal” and I arrived at the studio, the concierge asked if we were the band. We had to say, “No, they’re behind us in the van” … That arrangement lasted a couple of days before Roger was back in the Bentley.’ Sadly, The Cross’s millionaire general, with his Aston Martin and Ibizan holiday home, was never going to be on the same level as his foot soldiers.
‘Cowboys and Indians’ flopped, and Shove It was released the following February. May, Deacon and Mercury made guest appearances, with Freddie singing lead vocals on ‘Heaven For Everyone’, a song left over from A Kind Of Magic. The album was standard-issue eighties pop-rock, with a hint of one of Taylor’s favourite new groups INXS, but only his distinguishing rasp added any character. Shove It made it into the Top 50, but further singles offered more diminishing returns. It was another reminder of Queen being more than the sum of its parts. But The Cross offered Taylor something he could no longer get from Queen: the opportunity to play live. He would not give it up so easily.
That year, 1988, was a challenging year for all. In January, Taylor married Dominique Beyrand at Chelsea register office, with Mercury and Mary Austin as his witnesses. Just weeks later, he moved out of the family home and into a new pad with a 25-year-old model named Deborah Leng, whose recent TV ad appearance, biting into a phallic Cadbury’s Flake chocolate bar, had caused a stir among Daily Mail readers. Naturally, the press were fascinated by the drummer’s domestic arrangements; the whirlwind marriage fuelling the suspicion that rock stars did things differently from mere mortals. The wedding had, it seemed, been necessary to secure the financial stability of the couple’s two children after their parents split.
Odder still, in the same month John Deacon had a hit single. Almost. The bassist took a walk-on part in the video for the spoof hip hop song ‘Stutter Rap’ by Morris Minor and The Majors. The group included the comedian and writer Tony Hawks, who’d met Deacon on a Virgin Airlines junket to Miami. ‘We hung out together over a long and drunken weekend,’ said Hawks. ‘John struck me as someone who’d become a rock star by accident.’
No sooner had Taylor set up a new home than he was out on tour with The Cross. After arriving onstage at Newcastle Mayfair, one or two wags in the audience pelted him with Cadbury Flake bars. When the tour reached Germany, Taylor bowed to the promoter’s wishes, and posters for the gigs were amended to read: ‘Roger Taylor and The Cross’. Yet, as a further reminder of his role as ‘one part of the unit’, The Cross would only play one Queen song: ‘I’m in Love With My Car’.
Life in the day job was no less eventful. In January, Queen met at London’s Olympic Studios. An important decision was made: from now on, every new song would be credited collectively to all four members. ‘I wish we’d done it earlier,’ Brian May told Q magazine. ‘It’s the best decision we ever made. It does mean a sacrifice, letting your baby go, but once you actually do it, you
have a group working together on all fronts.’ ‘It meant that decisions would be made on artistic merit,’ added Roger Taylor, ‘rather than financial or ego grounds.’
According to May, it was Mercury who had originally suggested separate writer’s credits while making Queen’s first album. Over twenty years later, though, Freddie was willing to split the money. Similarly, the band took a collective decision to return to their earlier way of working, with all four together in the studio, rather than each working alone with just a synthesiser for company. Queen’s next album started out with the working title of The Invisible Man, but would become The Miracle just weeks before completion. The first song to emerge was a return to what Brian May called ‘old-school Queen’. Group credit or not, the mighty riff and mightier guitar solo of ‘I Want It All’ marked it out as a Brian May creation. The song’s petulant lyric was perfect for Freddie Mercury, but the title had apparently come from one of Anita Dobson’s popular sayings (May: ‘She’s a very ambitious girl’). May would later reveal that ideas for the song had been whizzing around his mind while he was digging up weeds in the garden of his second home in Los Angeles.
The Miracle was recorded in fits and starts between Olympic and Townhouse in London and Mountain in Switzerland. Mercury dashed between Queen and the Montserrat Caballé duets album, even fitting in a live appearance when he joined the cast of Time to perform four songs at London’s Dominion Theatre in April. It was a courageous move in the light of recent press scrutiny, with the show a fundraiser for the newly formed AIDS charity, the Terrence Higgins Trust. But still Mercury refused to discuss his health with the rest of Queen. Interviewed in Mojo in 1999, May later said: ‘We discovered about Freddie in 1987 or 1988.’ Yet speaking to The Times in 1992, May claimed that they had only been told ‘a few months before [Freddie’s] death’. Whatever the truth, the singer was not forthcoming. ‘We didn’t actually know what was wrong for a very long time,’ said Brian. ‘We never talked about it, and it was a sort of unwritten law that we didn’t because Freddie didn’t want to. He just told us that he didn’t feel up to doing tours, and that’s as far as it went.’
