PRETENTIOUS EVEN...

The role of publicist was at its most crucial during the Seventies. Channels ofexposure for new artists like videos, regional commercial radio stations and rocktelevision programmes had still to be properly maximised, so the only realopportunities for new artists in particular came via Radio 1 and the all-powerfulUK weekly music press. In 1973 Melody Maker was on a roll, occasionally selling asmany as 200,000 copies a week, with New Musical Express not far behind. Unliketoday, with its coverage marginalised, its circulation down to around 50.000 andits power diluted by competition, a positive story about a new act on Melody -Maker’s front page in the early Seventies was more or less guaranteed to push their Ialbum into the Top Ten.

It was therefore vitally important that Queen solicited support from the press Iand in August 1973 Jack Nelson enlisted the services of publicist Tony Brainsby, ione of the most respected on the scene. His client base included Paul McCartney’s |new band Wings, Cat Stevens. Thin Lizzy, The Strawbs, Steeleye Span and Wizzard, |and he was the consummate choice to drown the chorus of hype and actively |’break’ the band. §.

Highly animated, Tony Brainsby was a bespectacled, copper-haired live-wire on the pop scene and invitations to parties at his Earl’s Court home-curn-office in’ Edith Grove were much sought after. He was perpetually surrounded by attractive girls, many of whom worked for him, and stories circulated in the music business about one particular party at which a girl on LSD reposed naked in a bathtub filled with liquid jelly which set around her.

Brainsby was astounded by Queen’s innate understanding of the business of promoting music. More usually much of his time was spent shaping a band’s image but this aspect of his job was at least, in his words, ‘half done’ when he took on Queen. «They knew what their identity was, they had the logo, they knew how they wanted to look on pictures,» he said. «They came out at a hippy time but they were the opposite of it. They were almost glam rock, they had elements of it, but it was on a higher, much more sophisticated level. Freddie already knew that he was a star and it was just a case of me helping Queen make their dreams come true that little bit quicker. As soon as 1 met Freddie I knew he was something very special… that the guy was a star. I have only had that feeling once or twice in my life.».

A publicist’s first task with a new client is to write a biography for release to the press. The 500 or so words have to epitomise the artist, in terms of both prose style and the detail either included or omitted. Tony Brainsby had two immediate ‘angles’ on which to base his narrative, and they were both to recur with monotonous regularity down the years. In short, Queen - unlike most rock bands -were highly intelligent chaps with university degrees (or the equivalent), and Brian May had made his own guitar from a fireplace.

Another singular feature of Queen was that they already had a certain ‘buzz’, a tentative ground swell of support. Usually Tony Brainsby had to create this for his clients but with Queen, «the buzz was there from the word go. They had an amazing following for what I thought was an unknown group. We immediately started getting phone calls from people who stud they were fans, and some of them were in their thirties and forties. I remember thinking. ‘How on earth has this happened?’ They already had this aura about them.»

Queen’s early exposure came through the teen pin-up press. One of the first publications to carry a colour shot of their celestial features, colourful clothes and soft tresses was the girls’ magazine Jackie. Queen, at this stage, had no qualms about where they were featured, but they were stringent over the release of pictures and information; tt had to carry their official approval. Freddie Mercury was sensitive about his protruding teeth, and would scrutinise contact sheets to ensure no photographs were released showing them in a particularly bad light.

Mercury did some early press interviews but did not enjoy them and seemed to be the most hurt by negative press criticism. «Freddie was always very sensitive about the reviews,» said Tony Brainsby. «He would read them through carefully and be bothered about something really small, like a full stop in the wrong place. Freddie was better at being seen, heard, but not known. I am iure that his not doing interviews made him more enigmatic, at least on a sub-conscious level, and he would have been aware of that. The others were happy to do them, so we only used Freddie when there was a new product or major tour to promote. We had hit records more or less from the word go so journalists were happy to speak to any member of the band. As long as they had a slice of the action they weren’t really bothered that it wasn’t Freddie in particular.’.

Queen quickly acquired a deep mistrust of the press, and it evolved to a paranoic level. Brian May’s lament in a magazine article in 1983 summarised their basic viewpoint: «We have never really got on with the press and have a lot of enemies there… just about everyone in the press was against us. and quite blatantly so.» Even so, it was May and Roger Taylor who would undertake most of the press interviews throughout Queen’s career. Freddie Mercury was too sensitive about being misquoted, while John Deacon maintained an almost total disregard, possibly even contempt, for the press, and was seldom called upon at interview time.

Queen’s early reviews were mixed, but they were no more pernicious or intolerant than those amassed by most bands of consequence. Queen were dispensing a vividly defined image and sound, and it ivts unlikely that critics would be ambiguous in their response. A recurring criticism of Queen was their earnest, po-faced attitude to themselves. Their reluctance to bear press censure (or, at its most extreme, contemptuous ridicule) with dignity only served to magnify this image of superciliousness. By the Eighties Queen had learned to relax and often mocked themselves with several videos based heavily on self parody. It helped to counter much of the earlier ponderous solemnity.

Tony Brainsby remained at Queen’s side until shortly after the release of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’. He received a weekly retainer of about C20 from Trident and during his time with the band he gained a real insight. «I look back on those days fondly,» said Brainsby. «The whole band gelled together perfectly, there wasn’t a spare part. Freddie and Roger did their thing while John Deacon was solid, there, the equivalent of Bill Wyman in The Rolling Stones or John Entwistle in The Who. Roger Taylor was a party animal. Roger was so pretty and he handled it really well, he played it down rather than playing it up. I had no problems with Trident, their cheques didn’t bounce. I was Queen’s PR man so the business side didn’t really have a lot to do with me. I still admired the band’s strength to come through all that though.».

Queen relinquished the services of Tony Brainsby when their deal with Trident ended in 1975. Their new manager, John Reid, had his own public relations staff and preferred them to handle Queen’s press campaigns. «I worked with John Reid for a few weeks but it was bloody hard work.» said Brainsby «I was very much part of the old Queen - Trident, Jack Nelson and everything. I think John Reid wanted a clean sweep and I had no problem with that. The band tried to drag me through but John made life very difficult.» Tony Brainsby returned to the fold briefly in 1978 to handle the band’s notoriously flawed strategy on the double A-sided single ‘Fat Bottomed Girls’ and ‘Bicycle Race’.

EMI appeared to agree with Queen that their released output was trailing behind their natural musical development. Instead of asking the group to promote their debut album, which would have been the customary tactic, EMI allowed them to start work immediately on their next album. During the summer of 1973. just a few weeks after the first album’s release. Queen were back in Trident studios laying down tracks for ‘Queen II*. They no longer had to record during down time and had full use of the studio.

Queen’s return to live performance was on September 13 at Golders Green Hippodrome in London. They had been invited to play by Radio 1 as part of its In Concert series. The show was recorded and broadcast a month later and gave a fitting showcase to Queen’s efficacy in performance. The concert opened with a tape of an atmospheric piece of music before the band broke into ‘Procession’, Freddie Mercury introduced the next track, ‘Father To Son’ with the address: «A word in your ear, from father to son». In their nail varnish, satin trousers and loose blouses, Queen were starting to form their own unique brand of delivery. The set was still somewhat leaden, two drum solos - in ‘Liar’ and ‘Keep Yourself Alive’ - for example, but their panache relieved even these unnecessary interludes.

In September 1973 Jack Nelson contacted an acquaintance of his. Bob Hirschmann, who was managing Mott The Hoople. A fellow American. Hirschmann was a former saxophone player who had once had a small part in a film starring Spencer Tracey. Mott The Hoople had been signed to Island Records for three years and established themselves as an anarchic and popular live attraction, but only lately had they enjoyed four Top Twenty hits, the first of which, ‘All The Young Dudes’, was written and produced by David Bowie the previous year. They were planning a UK tour taking in twenty prestigious venues and with their latest single. All The Way From Memphis’, a Top Ten hit, the dates were almost sure to sell out. Queen, with one flop single behind them, were unlikely to boost ticket sales, so Nelson, or Trident to be more specific, was forced to ‘buy’ Queen on to the tour. They paid £3,000 for the privilege of allowing Queen to support Mott The Hoople.

Ostensibly this money was to be used as a contribution to the on-the-road costs, but it was in practical terms a fee, and an exorbitant one too. It was precisely the kind of covert, but essential, assistance Queen required. It might technically have fallen within the broad definition of ‘hype’ but it was endemic within the industry and still is today.

Queen’s rise to eminence coincided with a particularly dissolute period in the music business. The independent sector was still awaiting its genesis via punk rock, so in the absence of this healthy competition, a handful of major labels regularly resorted to dirty tricks to escalate sales. The charts, for example, were easy to manipulate. Most of the major labels knew the location of the few chart return shops and they employed teams to buy up stock the reps had often given to the retailer free of charge. Without the public even noticing, records went into the shop, out again, and, as a consequence, into the charts. Only then, would an artist’s true popularity be measured.

Queen’s first live performance outside the UK was in Frankfurt, Germany, on October 13, 1973, followed by a show the day afterwards at Le Blow Up Club in Luxembourg. EMI had organised several European radio and television interviews and many key people were invited to the shows. Radio Luxembourg planned to record the concert at Le Blow Up but there were technical problems and nothing was put down on to tape.

As a warm-up for the Mott The Hoople tour, Queen appeared at Imperial College on November 2. It was an undeniable coming of age celebration for Queen. The show was completely sold out, and many of their friends who arrived just a few minutes before they took the stage were unable to get in. They played three encores and it was plain that Queen, the ambitious but gauche ‘pet band’ of Imperial College, were no more; they were now tight, confident, and in their white satin shirts with pleated, billowing sleeves they were more stellar than anyone had noticed before.

Queen began their career as a bona fide touring rock group on November 12, 1973, when they opened for Mott The Hoople at Leeds Town Hall. It had been nearly a decade since all four members had first considered life in a pop group and started out in their respective teenage bands, The Opposition, The Reaction, 1984 and The Hectics. They had, individually and collectively, worked towards November 12, 1973, with incredible perseverance. There had been adversity and fiasco, providence and frolic, but, now, on the brink of real opportunity, their determination was fantastic.

The audiences up and down the UK, from The Central in Chatham, to the Apolio Theatre in Glasgow, adored Queen. Their set had been designed to elicit instant appeal. It was 45 minutes long and usually contained just six of their own songs, the final number given over to a rock’n’roll medley which they elongated or abridged depending on the crowd’s response. Freddie Mercury, this unknown spidery figure in silk and Lycra, stalked the stage and dropped every ounce of himself into the performance. The band were tight, driving new life into songs they had been playing for years. The music press, understandably perhaps, considered it far too brazen and pantomime, but the word of mouth when Mott The Hoople fans were back at school, college or work the next day was that Queen were the business.

During the tour the band sometimes complained that they were not getting enough coverage in the press and Chris Poole, Tony Brainsby’s assistant, had to placate them. «I had a good time with them but they were not an easy band,» Poole stressed. «On the Mott The Hoople tour they were quite annoyed because they didn’t get as much press as they figured they should have got They may have been a support group, but they already had the mentality of stars.».

By the final dates of the tour at Peterborough Town Hall and Liverpool’s Top Rank Club, sales of Queen’s debut album had increased markedly. Eventually it reached number 24 and spent more than four months in the charts, no mean achievement for a new act at a time when competition was fierce.

Queen’s appearance at the Top Rank in Liverpool was in support of lOcc and had been organised by Ken Testi, who had remained in close contact. Ken’s own group, Great Day, were first on the bill and featured Freddie Mercury’s first songwnting partner from Ibex, Mike Bersin. After the show, Ken Testi was travelling in the back of the van with Queen when they had to slow down as they passed the scene of a road accident near Huyton. «It was clearly a substantial accident, there was someone on a stretcher.» said Ken Testi. «I made some remark to lighten the moment, with no disrespect intended. Brian and Roger were in the front. Roger was ashen, and they both reacted against the lightness of my remark. They were very sensitive people. Roger comes across with a lot of bravado but I know for a fact that there is a very sensitive side to Roger.»

The New Year of 1974 started well for Queen when they were voted third ‘best new band’ by the readers of Sounds. They trailed the Scottish group Nazareth who had already scored three hits, and Blue, a trio whose self-tilled debut album had been warmly received, though it was to take them lour years to register their one and only hit, ‘Gonna Capture Your Heart’.

Queen’s records had made only a negligible impact on Australasia, so two performances at Australia’s celebrated Sunbury Music Festival in Melbourne in January 1974 were an ideal opportunity to infiltrate a growing market. However, only hours after receiving a series of injections necessary to travel to the sub-continent, Brian May’s arm began to swell. He was in great pain and after a few days he was told he had gangrene in his arm, probably caused by a dirty needle.

Brian May recovered more quickly than expected and made the arduous journey with the band. Australia, with its known enmity to most things British, especially when it involved men dressed as women (as they doubtlessly saw Queen), was hardly ready for them, and Queen’s needless ostentation served merely to hone the hostility. They hired gleaming white limousines to carry them from their hotel to the concert. Also, during the day of the concert, Queen’s lighting crew had rowed with the local crew who couldn’t understand why their services weren’t required. The promoters placed Queen higher on the bill than several established Australian bands and this caused further animosity.

Queen took the stage - Freddie with an ear infection and Brian with a sore arm -only to face an unsympathetic compere: «Well, we’ve got another load of limey bastards here tonight. They’re probably going to be useless, but let’s give them something to think about,» At that, the DJ took down his trousers and showed his bare backside to the crowd before shouting into the microphone that Queen were: ‘Stuck up pommies.’ During Queen’s performance the lighting rig broke down, which their crew believed to be sabotage, and so, suitably disillusioned by Australia. Queen pulled the scheduled second performance on February 3 and fiew back to the UK.

Their luck changed significantly when strenuous behind-the-scenes efforts led to a stroke of providence in February, 1974. EMI’s head of promotio,. Ronnie Fowler, had taken on Queen as a personal crusade. He had been smitten by the track ‘Liar’ but generally had an unconditional love of the band. The other new act he was charged with breaking was Steve Harley’s Cockney Rebel but his commitment to Queen was such that Harley often grumbled about what he considered a bias towards Queen. Ronnie Fowler ran up expenses close to £20.000 on Queen alone. A large proportion of it went on meals and treats for key people as he undertook his almost evangelical mission.

On February 18 Ronnie Fowler’s wheedling paid off handsomely when he received a phone call from Robin Nash, the producer of Top Of The Pops. He was told David Bowie was unable to appear on the show to perform ‘Rebel Rebel’ and a replacement was needed urgently. Robin Nash knew that Fowler would automatically suggest Queen, and they were indeed booked for the show two days later. The call to appear on the programme had come at a ‘dead spot1 for Queen when no single release was actually scheduled. EMI quickly activated its resources and in the space of a few hours a new Queen single was announced -’Seven Seas Of Rhye’.

In the mid-Seventies Top Of The Pops was a tremendous, unrivalled shop window for the music industry. Its Thursday night spot was an institution and wonderfully timed to generate Saturday sales, the day when shops sold as many records as they did on all the other days of the week combined. Queen, through their debut album and Mott The Hoople tour, had already established themselves as a laudable rock group, but Top Of The Pops was the ultimate vehicle for their commercial edge. They might well have broken without this early television exposure but it accelerated their acceptance.

EMf responded brilliantly to the opportunity and rush-released the single on February 23, just five days after the television appearance was confirmed. It entered the national charts two weeks later at number 45 and EMI, with its powerful network of pluggers and sales reps, was able to maintain the momentum and carry the single upwards. It eventually reached number 10 and spent more than two months in the charts. Royalties did not teem in for the band, and would not do so for some time yet, but Freddie felt secure enough to close his part-time stall at Kensington Market, Ronnie Fowler, who had done so much to propel the band, left EMI soon afterwards to join Elektra Records. «Roy Featherstone called me into his ofiice when I finally left and threatened to sell my expense account to Steven Spielberg as a science fiction epic!» he said.

The success of ‘Seven Seas Of Rhye’ was fortuitously timed since it came on the eve of Queen’s first headlining tour. They rehearsed for the planned twenty-three-date tour at Ealing film studios and decided to close their set for the first time without resorting to rock’n’roll numbers like ‘Jailhouse Rock’ and ‘Shake Rattle And Roll’. In itself it was only a minor amendment but it showed a growing confidence in their own material. Freddie insisted, though, that ‘Big Spender’ remained in their canon and the number, effectively included for light relief, stayed for a good number of years.

Queen were writing new songs at a rapid pace, still tripping over themselves in terms of their recorded and live work. They had completed ‘Queen II’ in the space of a month at the end of the summer of 1973, yet in rehearsal they were running through songs like ‘Now I’m Here’, ‘Killer Queen’. ‘Bring Back That Leroy Brown’ and «In The Lap Of The Gods’, tracks which would not be released until the ‘Sheer Heart Attack’album at the end of 1974.

Their first headlining tour began inauspiciously at the Winter Gardens, Blackpool, on March 1, when the truck carrying Queen’s lighting rig broke down some distance from the venue. The concert ran late and the next night, at Friar’s in Aylesbury, Queen had to cut short their set when Brian May was in too much pain from his arm to continue.

Queen were joined the next night at the Plymouth Guild Hall by the support group, Nutz, who were to play with them through the rest of the tour. The two bands had been effectively married together by John Anthony. The producer had been called in to produce Nutz’s debut album for A&M Records after earlier attempts to lay their soft rock on to tape had been a calamity. «John Anthony came along and rescued the first album for us,» said Dave Lloyd, the singer with Nutz. «John went for thick sounding guitars and layered harmonies. 1 think he’d learned a little bit from Brian May.».

The members of Nutz - Dave Lloyd (vocals/guitar), Mick Devenport (lead guitar), Keith MulhoHand (bass) and John Mylett (drums) - had first been introduced to Queen at their rehearsal base in Ealing. «These guys came out in nail varnish and fur coats and we thought how different they were from us.» said Dave Lloyd. «They seemed very sensitive and had a kind of grand plan and we were four crazy scousers.».

The two groups complemented each other well and Nutz soon developed a high regard for Queen. «They were great, really friendly guys.» said Dave Lloyd. «They had no airs and graces. Freddie was always liable to fly off the handle if things weren’t going to plan. We played The Rainbow and Freddie stormed off to the band’s camper van. The rest of them carried on with the sound check and Brian shouted into the microphone, ‘Come back Freddie, you old tart.’ Freddie was sometimes very nervous about going on stage. He was sick with nerves on the first night.».

Queen took a benevolent attitude towards their support band and though they were only really novices themselves, they were keen to help. Freddie heard that Nutz were staying in low-grade guest houses and berated their management for being miserly; Nutz were usually invited back to Queen’s hotel after the shows. «They did not take any nasty liberties and they were quite good about the whole thing of us being their support band.» said Dave Lloyd. «They tried to get us a longer soundcheck and things hke that.» Freddie Mercury, though he has often been portrayed, as a prima donna, had a spirited view to performance, even in adversity, as Dave Lloyd discovered. «We were due to play at Aberystwyth University and it was one of those formal balls. They had a steel band in one room and it didn’t feel like a proper concert at all. I remember telling Freddie all this in the hotel and he just said. ‘Oh David, you can be such a cunt, we’ll do well tonight’.»

The tour was another resounding success for Queen, but it featured the usual assortment of drama: the lighting crew walked out in Glasgow over internal arguments: two people were stabbed in a brawl at Stirling; a power cut interrupted the performance at London’s Rainbow Theatre; Dave Lloyd streaked across the stage in Birmingham during Queen’s set: thieves raided Queen’s van in Manchester; the audience sang ‘God Save The Queen’ spontaneously at Plymouth -all standard rock ‘n’ roll fare.

‘Queen II’ was delayed when the band spotted a spelling mistake on the sleeve. It meant that its release on March 8, 1974, came when the tour to promote the record was already under way. The artwork for the sleeve had been devised by photographer Mick Rock. He was given a vague brief: it would be a gatefoid sleeve in black and white, otherwise it was an open canvas. Rock had recently befriended a collector of Hollywood stills called John Kobal who had given htm copies of hjs treasured prints. «Among them was one I had never seen before of Marlene Dietrich from the film Shanghai Express,» said Rock. «Her arms were folded and she was wearing black against a black background, and it was exquisitely lit. Her tilted head and hands seemed to be floating. I saw the connection immediately. It was one , of those visceral, instinctive things. Very strong. Very clear. Glamorous, mysterious and classic. I would transpose it into a four-headed monster. They had to go for it. So I went to Freddie. He saw it too. He understood. He loved it immediately. And he sold the rest of the band on it. ‘I shall be Marlene,’ he laughed.».

The image conceived by Mick Rock was to become indelibly linked with the band and had a momentous impact as a ‘branding’ of the group - perhaps rivalled only by Freddie Mercury’s Live Aid persona. Surprisingly, apart from Freddie, the other band members were initially sceptical about the portrait. «There was some concern that the photos might be almost too strong, pretentious even, to some eyes,» said Rock. «And they had a point. Fortunately Freddie was never scared of pretension- He loved to quote Oscar Wilde. So he wore the others down and the right decision was made.».

The critical response to ‘Queen 2’ was again varied. Sounds said it ‘captured them in their finest hours» while Record Mirror claimed Queen were the ‘dregs of glam rock.’ The Record Mirror review was written by Chris Poole, Tony Brainsby’s former assistant who had moved into journalism. Queen considered Poole’s article an act of betrayal and their response was decisive. «I didn’t like the album, slagged it off, and they never forgave me,» said Chris Poole. «We didn’t talk for eight years and it has only been in the last six years that they have spoken to me.» While Poole’s review lacked discretion, it hardly merited Queen’s zealous retort, and again revealed their sometimes rather austere, unforgiving demeanour.

Brian May considered ‘Queen II’ the first real testament to Queen’s distinctive sound. «Led Zeppelin and The Who are probably in there somewhere because they were among our favourite groups, but what we were trying to do different from either of those groups was this sort of layered sound,» said Brian May. «To me. ‘Queen II’ was the sort of emotional music we’d always wanted to be able to play, although we couldn’t play most of it on stage because it was too complicated. We were trying to push studio techniques to a new limit for rock groups - it was fulfilling all our dreams because we didn’t have much opportunity for that on the first album. It went through our minds to call the album, ‘Over The Top’.

Despite its profuse arrangements and erratic metre, ‘Queen II’ sold much better than the debut album and reached number 5, spending most of the rest of the year in the chart. By September 1974 it had sold more than 100,000 copies in the UK, earning the band a silver disc which they marked with a party at London’s Cafe Royal. It was a grandiosely ambitious record, a Rubik’s cube for the ears, but it was a record Queen needed to make, if only to help them expunge their over-complex, progressive leanings. They had demonstrated their aesthetic musicianship and were now free to hone it down to indispensable pop singles.

Elektra had done some excellent ground work in the United States without the band having played there or undertaken any real promotion. The debut album had made number 83 and ‘Queen II’ just shaded into the Top Fifty - two extremely encouraging showings for a non-Amencan band with a relatively low profile. It was evident that Queen had a core of support in the US, so the offer to support Mott The Hoople there in the spring of 1974 was relished.

After a show in Louisiana, their sixth of the tour, Brian May complained of feeling unwell, He played on for three more weeks but after Queen’s sixth consecutive performance supporting Mott at New York’s Uris Theater, he collapsed and was diagnosed as having hepatitis. Queen pulled out of the tour, their place taken by Kansas, who were about to release their debut album, ‘Masque’.

Brian May spent most of the summer of 1974 recovering while the rest of the band began recording their third album. ‘Sheer Heart Attack’, at Rockfield Studios in Wales. He visited intermittently to record his guitar parts but in August he was again rushed to hospital, this time suffering a duodenal ulcer. The second illness meant that a tour of the US scheduled for the autumn had to be scrapped. From his sick bed Brian May wrote lyrics and strummed his guitar when he could, and fully completed a song which was later a hit. ‘Now I’m Here’. The sessions for ‘Sheer Heart Attack’ were finished at Trident and the band were appreciative of Roy Thomas-Baker’s ability to lay Brian May’s guitar parts and vocal harmonies on to the half-finished tracks.

The public’s first taste of Queen’s new material came on October 11, 1974, with the release of the double A-sided single ‘Killer Queen’/’Flick Of The Wrist’. It was the most important record of the band’s career, establishing them as a genuine pop force. Hitherto, the issue had been somewhat fudged. They were perceived as a rock group, but missed the phlegmatic intensity of. say, Black Sabbath or Deep Purple. Queen, like all great groups, were fundamentally original and the melodic, debonair ‘Killer Queen’ was the counter-balance to the laboured complexity of tracks like «Ogre Battle’ or The Fairy Feller’s Masterstroke’. «People are used to hard rock, energy music from Queen, yet this single, you almost expect Noel Coward to sing it,» explained Freddie Mercury. «It’s one of those bowler hat, black suspender belt numbers - not that Noel Coward would wear that.».

The single entered the chart at number 5 before spending two weeks at number 2 where it was held off the top spot by David Essex’s ‘Gonna Make You A Star’. The tour to promote the single and forthcoming album was designed on a lavish scale, the band adding a new lighting rig and various pyrotechnic effects to the stage show. Queen were supported by Hustler, another group who, like Nutz before them, were signed to A&M but failed to record a hit.

The tour, with tickets priced at £1.30 began at the Palace Theatre. Manchester. The set was longer than ever before, featuring almost twenty songs, and it ended with a version of the National Anthem recorded beforehand by the band. After the second concert, at Leeds University. Roger Taylor had to be taken to hospital with a foot injury. His stage monitor had failed and afterwards he had thrown a temper tantrum and kicked the dressing-room wall.

‘Sheer Heart Attack’ was released on November 8 and reached number 2 in the charts. The reviews, even in previously hostile quarters like the NME, were favourable. ‘A feast. No duffers.’ summarised its reviewer. Paradoxically, Brian May’s illness might well have focused the writing and recording of the album, sparing it the indulgences of the previous two. Brian May appeared to acknowledge the fact in a magazine interview: «We weren’t going for a hit. because we always thought of ourselves as an albums group, but we did think that perhaps we’d dished up a bit too much for people to swallow on ‘Queen II» «.

The I’K tour closed at the Rainbow Theatre in London. Tickets sold out in just two days so another date was added and they played two consecutive nights on November 19 and 20. The second performance was filmed and later edited down to a 30-minute film. It was later screened in British cinemas as a support film to Led Zeppelin’s The Song Remains The Same.

Queen’s hectic schedule continued with their first European tour which began just three days after the performance at the Rainbow Theatre. Opening in Gothenburg, they played ten shows in six countries before finishing on December 10 in Barcelona. All the shows were completely sold out and in Barcelona 6.000 tickets had been sold in one day.

John Deacon returned to Oadby to spend the Christmas of 1974 with his friends and family. ‘Killer Queen’ had slipped out of the charts and John’s friend, Dave Williams, barely noticed when the intro broke forth from a juke-box in a pub where they were drinking a few days before Christmas. «John said something like, ‘Oh no, here we go’ and 1 wondered what he meant.» Dave recalls. «I didn’t think anyone really knew who he was or had recognised him, but right away people started coming over asking for autographs. He tried to keep his head down but he had to sign a few.»

On another occasion John Deacon collected his old friend from The Opposition, Nigel Bullen, in a Jensen Healey sports car and they drove deep into the countryside purposely to avoid John being recognised. They arrived at The Wheel and Compass pub in Weston-by-Welland near to Market Harborough. Nigel Bullen noticed that his friend no longer drank beer and had ordered gin and tonics; he also introduced Nigel to Chablis («I remember it cost about a fiver which was a tot those days.»). Inevitably, John Deacon was spotted and was soon asked for his autograph. Nigel Bullen had expected as much since John was wearing a Queen tour jacket. «He hated being recognised, he was really embarrassed about it,» he said. «Once we were out and he refused to sign any autographs. I don’t remember what I thought about that. I think Queen might have had a policy at the time of not doing them.”

Of the gang left behind in Oadby, Nigel Bullen was undoubtedly the closest to John Deacon, and few were surprised when John asked him to be the Best Man at his wedding on January 18, 1975. «I was absolutely bricking it, knowing I’d have to do my speech in front of all those performers and his management people.» he said.

John Deacon had been dating Veronica Tetzlaff since his early days at university. Sheffield-born of Polish ancestry, Veronica had studied at the Maria Assumpta Teacher Training College before starting work as a nanny. Nigel Bullen’s wife, Ruth, got to know her quite well through their husbands’ friendship. «She’s a very normal, very quiet devout Catholic,» she said. «She didn’t wear any make-up and wore fairly plain clothes; she wasn’t into the glamorous life at all. She is a lovely person, completely unpretentious. I’ve got the impression down the years that their children are the most important things to her.»

Ruth Bullen recalls Veronica’s response when, early in their marriage, John Deacon bought her a new Mini car. «She was thrilled to bits with it. A lot would have bought something top of the range, but she did not come from money and was just happy to have a car. It took her a few years to realise she could have practically anything she wanted. It was ages before she got a nanny to help her with the kids.».

Nigel Bullen travelled to London on the day before the wedding for a briefing from John Deacon. He lived in a flat close to Parsons Green Tube station in Fulham and their conversation was frequently interrupted by the tremor of Tube trains passing close by. They discussed the wedding arrangements over a bottle of Southern Comfort after a meal at a local restaurant.

The wedding took place at a Carmelite church in Kensington Church Street. Veronica’s family were members of this order of Catholicism, named after Mount Carmel in Palestine, and dedicated to a strictly orthodox application of the faith. Carmelite nuns, once inducted, had, until very recently, to maintain a vow of complete silence.

It was a long wedding service addressed by a friar, but the proceedings had been lightened beforehand by the arrival of Freddie Mercury. Nigel Bullen: «The doors burst open at the back of the church and all we could see was this silhouette of a figure with a girl on each arm, I think one of them was Mary Austin. At first I thought it was the bride, but then I realised it was Freddie! He was wearing a feather boa and everyone in the room turned to look. It was some entrance.».

The reception was to be held at Veronica’s flat in Hammersmith and Nigel, doing his utmost in torrid circumstances, was trying to get too many people into not enough cars. He suddenly hit upon an idea. «We only had a couple of cars and it was my job to make sure everyone got to the reception,» says Bullen. «Freddie was in this stretch limo, his own car I think, with these two girls. I stuck my head through the window and said. ‘Room for a few more?’ We crammed all these people in. He didn’t say anything, but his face was a picture and it was really comical. His feather boa must have got well crushed.».

Nigel Bullen remained fairly close to John Deacon in the mid-Seventies, often staying with him and Veronica, enjoying the dashes of affluence, like being driven to Queen’s London shows in a chauffeur driven Jaguar. Eventually, the two friends drifted apart. Nigel and Ruth Bullen watched impotently as a gauze was placed over John Deacon, fame spiriting him away like an apparition. Nigel would call on him whenever he was in London but John was never around. He was away, touring, or ‘cooking up business’ as Veronica would tell them. And when they were infrequently reunited it was compromised, a shade awkward, no longer the same as before; a few stolen moments backstage, John’s mind apparently on a thousand other things. The Bullens did not know how to respond, there was no formal training in maintaining a friendship altered by fame. If they chased him to ground they felt like sycophants, anxious to touch the cloth gluttons for glamour but if they ignored him they wondered whether John felt shunned his past deserting him.

Ruth Bullen used to sometimes see John Deacon’s mother, Molly Deacon, in Oadby and she told her that she was concerned about her son. “I think she used to worry about him a lot,” she said. She said all the pressure used to make him a bit ill. Veronica said when he came back off a tour he couldn’t revert to being a normal person, playing with the kids, taking them to the park and things. She said it was non-stop, he just couldn’t stop. I don t suppose you can live the life he has without paying a price”.

Finally, on Queens UK tour of 1985, Nigel Butlen accepted that the chasm between his own life dnd John Deacon’s was too vast to span. He attended the massively popular shows in Leeds, Birmingham and London and was astounded by how the behemoth of stardom now held his former school friend. “There was so much security it was unbelievable,” said Bullen. Even if you knew him, like his mum for example, she still had to go through all the security channels. I saw her waiting to be let backstage into certain places. Once we were in with him it was fine, we had a drink and a chat. He’d click his fingers and ask what we wanted and someone would get it for us. There were all these hangers-on just making sure he was OK. It was very unnatural. It was such a lot of organisation just to make sure that four men were kept happy all of the time. They were there for his every whim. He had changed from how I remembered him. He had lost some of that enthusiasm of the early Seventies, and had an attitude of, ‘Well we ve made it now.’ I don’t think you could possibly go through all that without changing though.”

After sampling the opulence of backstage Queen in 1985, Nigel Bullen inevitably found it an anti-climax to return to everyday life at his job in the textile industry. He was twice made redundant in the Eighties and now runs his own small textile company with Ruth on a draughty industrial estate just a few miles from Oadby. The Christmas cards from the Bullens to the Deacons and vice versa no longer pass in the post in December and the two friends have not met for nearly a decade. Nigel is nonchalant, he’s lost touch with others from his past, life goes on. As he looks out from under the sign ‘N. Bullen Textiles’, he s convinced that one of the other units, on the other side of the car park and the wire perimeter fence, could very well have been: ‘J Deacon Electronics’.

Date: 2015-02-16; view: 915