Daily thoughts by a guy that doesn't like to think deeply too often!

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Queen


My buddy EP Graves posted a Blog about Freddy Mercury today (I'm still not sure if it's spelled "Freddie" or "Freddy"- I'll just call him Fred for now). I've been thinking about the songs that he produced and the memories that I have attached to each of the songs. Some were from my high school years- "We are the Champions" was played at every football game! Some were from my elementary school days~ "Another One Bites the Dust" and invoke memories of the Murdered and Missing Children spree that scarred most of the Atlanta kids in my age bracket to death. When I hear "Bohemian Rhapsody", "Fat Bottomed Girls" and "Bicycle", I'm reminded of Russell Hall dormitory at UGA in 1984- there were probably 1000 guys living in the dorm and all of us had that album. You'd hear these Queen songs coming from most of the rooms as you walked through the hallways of the dorm. In those days there was no such thing as CDs, so more than likely the sounds were coming from actual record players or cassettes (possibly even 8 tracks!).


Fred became an icon to the gay male community. They all started dressing like him- growing thick mustaches, wearing their shirts mostly unbuttoned to reveal a hairy chest, opting to not wear underwear in hopes that other gay men would notice the buldge. He became what everyone pictures as the stereotypical gay man... the fantasy guy that a lot of us that were kids in those days deemed the ideal and began to search for when we grew up and started searching for partners, or husband material.


Soon after his death, Fred was replaced with the likes of Boy George, Madonna and Cyndi Lauper-- the girls (and some of the guys!) started dressing like them and Fred was soon forgotten- although once in a while I'll spot a 50 or 60 year old guy wearing the Fred Mercury costume and sporting the Fred Mercury look and not even realizing that the times have changed. They are like living time capsules- a tribute to the late Fred.
Thanks again for the memories, EP Graves!

1 Comments:

Blogger epgraves said...

I knew that you had to remember the Missing and Murdered children days when the DJ dedicated Another one Bites The Dust to the victims and got fired for it. Strange how that song always brings that up in my memory.

I may get in trouble by saying this but you might can relate... Talking about Freddie's looks.... Everytime I see Jim Newman (a local that you know)I always think "Freddie!"

9:53 AM

 

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