The Greatest Frontman of All Time

Ok, enough of this personal drama shit.
Thanks for putting up with it. Back to the good stuff.

I'm going to get tons of shit for this...

Whenever someone makes a bold, absolute statement, you going to get people disagreeing with you. And by disagree, I mean fire bombing your car.

But I am going to do it. I declare, in front of my cat and all you fine people, that Freddy Mercury is the greatest frontman of all time!

Bon Scott? One trick pony.
David Lee Roth? Don't make me laugh. No wait, I'm already laughing.
Mick Jagger? Sorry skeleton boy, no can do.
Jim Morrison? He was hot and brilliant but fucking crazy. (and stinky)

No, I'm talking Freddie Freakin' Mercury. He was electric, charismatic. He wasn't all that pretty

but his presence on stage made you think he was a god. This man was an openly gay man fronting a band named Queen, preforming in lycra spandex and leather and still rednecks from Podunk county in rural Wisconsin loved them. That's power. He had a flare for the dramatic and it showed in his stage shows.

His voice was so unique and stong he could pull off lines like "Gunpowder, Gelatine/Dynamite with a laser beam /Guaranteed to blow your mind" and "I am a satellite Im out of control/ I am a sex machine ready to reload/ Like an atom bomb about to/ Oh oh oh oh oh explode"

He sang about a superhero named Flash, a classy whore, a battle between good and evil, the game of love and big ass women. Diverse, strange and always stiring.

Their sound is pulled from so many places, from glam rock, do wop, progressive, psychodelic and on and on. They could do anything they wanted, play any style, whatever sounded good and people loved it, ate it up. I mean, Bowie looked up to for crying out loud!

He play Live Aid at Wembley in front of over 70,000 people and his 20 minute performance was

voted "Greatest Live Gig of All Time". TWENTY minutes. By '06 the Greatest Hits albums was the number one selling album in Britin. In 2001 they were inducted into the Hall of Fame, two years later in the Songwriter's Hall of Fame(the one and only band ever to be enter into it, rather than just an individual), numerous Guinness Book World Records, Grammy Hall of Fame, and it just keeps going.

Farrokh Bulsara was born Sept. 5 1946 in Tanzania and went to school near Bombay wh

ere he discovered his love of music. The band as we know it formed 1970. Their first big hit was 'Killer Queen' in 1974. Freddie's life was full of ups and downs. The media hounded him about his sexual orientation and health. He had a steady girlfriend Mary Austin who he called his only true friend, but also had a long term relationship with hairdresser Jim Hutton who was with him when he died. There were constant rumors he had AIDS and was on death's door, to which he always replied were false.

You have to remember this was the late 80's/early 90's. People still weren't educated about HIV/AIDS. They thought is was a 'gay disease', that you could get it just by being near someone who had it. The sad truth was that Freddie did have AIDS; he was diagnosed in 1987. By 1991, it was obvious something was very wrong. The already svelte Mercury was even thinner, pale and wasn't seen in public very often.

The last song he recorded was "These Are The Days Of Our Lives". The video for the single was shot on May 30th, 1991. They chose to film in black and white to hide Freddie overall weakened look.

Freddie died on November 24, 1991 at the age of 45, 24 hours after releasing his statement to the public that he was indeed sick. He was the first major rock star to die of the disease.

Tribute statue in Switzerland

There are tributes every year to Freddie. At home in his native Tanzania (where some officals have problems paying tribute to a gay man), in Switzerland (where he recorded much of his music) to his adopted homeland England to his massive fan base in America.

Personally, I love this man. My brother and I would drive our parents crazy listening to the same Greatest Hits tape over and over again. We knew all the words by the time we were in kindergarden. My dad would make us laugh by goofing around to "Fat Bottom Girls". And when Freddie died, I didn't really understand what was going on, just that he was on the news a lot and they played his music videos much more on MTV, which I liked. I miss him. I wish he were still with us.

Can you just imagine the amazing music we might have today if he were?