THE HISTORY OF ROCK- 1976 (PART 3)
The set at the Playhouse Theatre in Edinburgh the other week was further proof of Queen following this logic, when they took it a step further than last year’s British tour. For the duration of the set, dry ice is used to create a hazy mist on stage, so that the band are given a sort of obscure presence that captures the attention of onlookers.
Individually, songs are treated with whatever effects they need to transmit the feeling in them: smoke bombs in the battle sequence of “Ogre Battle’’; dry ice to create a cloud effect on “In The Lap Of The Gods”. Queen’s stage act is a show in the true sense of the word.
However, the general criticism of this show is that Queen couId do a lot more to recreate the sound of their records, and that the “separate entity” statement is a lame excuse, an easy cop-out to save them from a lot of bother. 10cc, people wilI say, go on stage and recreate their recorded sound, using tapes and whatever else is needed (an extra musician), quite comfortably. Why not Queen?
Taylor: “We couId never do what we do on record. We try to get as near as we can. We’ve never used any outside musicians either on stage or on record. It’s not because of any strict policy, more due to personal satisfaction, by dragging it out of ourselves. We like experimenting with instruments and voices to get the effect on record that we want. We don’t really try to recreate the sound on stage. I mean, you can’t do a thing like “Prophet’s Song” like the record on stage. It’s like a six-part harmony, and there’s only three singers. There’s no way that you can do it.
“Those are problems that we’ve got to solve ourselves, but if it sounds good, I don’t think anybody can have cause for complaint. If it doesn’t sound good, fair enough.
“All you can do is do either medium to the best of your ability at the time, and in the studio, you have so much time and so many different things, you have all the advantages - so why not make it as perfect as you can, even if it does make the stage act a harder thing to do?
“You say about using tapes, as 10cc do; well, I don’t agree with that. When an audience comes to a concert, they come to hear music played live, not to hear backing tapes.
“All I can say is that we do the best we can within both mediums, and we’re honest in both. I don’t think that saying we treat recording and playing live as separate entities is a cop-out; I think that’s honest. If we wanted to cop out we’d use lots of tapes on stage. The harmonies on stage are us singing, they’re not tape-loops.
“When we go on stage, we want to make people enjoy themselves, to lift them. We’re certainly not being political in anyway at the moment. Perhaps a bit later on in all this, we’ll want to say something real about the things that really matter, poverty or whatever, but at the moment it’s not the right time or place to say it.
“For one thing, we’re not influential enough. It would only damage ourselves to do it and it wouldn’t have much effect on people, and possibly we’re not even mature enough to know how to say it yet. I hope we say something on those lines after we’ve done something on purely musical lines and entertainment lines, which is what we’re trying to do now.
“What John Lennon was trying to do after he left The Beatles was amazing. He was just being himself. Some of his statements might have been naive, especially in retrospect, but what a brave, honest way to do it. I’ve got unreachable heights of admiration for him.”
Back to the stage act, and Queen involving their audience.
“What we want to do as soon as we start our set is to create an immediate atmosphere, if possible, of excitement, expectation and, ultimately, enjoyment. It’s involvement and lifting them out of going home and listening to The Archers or watching So It Goes. That’s what makes the live work as good as the recorded work. The rewards of working live are so much more immediate, because of the feedback.
“We really enjoy touring when we get into it, but we sell so many more records than we play to people that it’s a much more far-reaching thing. Why the hell go on stage with backing tapes behind you and pretend you can do it like the record? I mean, you can give them something else. You can give them a visual spectacle, your live presence thing, and an excitement and an involvement that you don’t get by listening to the record. I think we get pretty near on a lot of things.
“But the live show really is all about atmosphere. That’s what rock’n’roll is all about, even though it’s a show.”
The flashness of Queen’s live show is a mere extension of the individual personalities of the band. John Deacon, who always manages to dress in a comparatively sober fashion, Mercury and Taylor, in particular, and May on stage don distinctive uniforms.
Taylor: "The stage show has always been a show, and always will be a little different. The emphasis is on ‘the show’. People are paying money to come and see you, so we want to give them something that’s pretty entertaining. You can do it with just music, but doing the visual and audio thing is much better. The Rolling Stones have always done that.
"All we ever did was reflect our personalities, and that’s all we’re doing now. It’s just that we can afford to do it in a more sort of lavish way now, but hopefully without becoming too showbusiness, which is always a danger. I wouldn’t like it to become showbusiness because, quite simply, it’s still rock’n’roll. I think we could very easily go over the top now if we’re not careful.
“People seem to think we don’t try enough on stage, but when we come off we are totally wiped out, exhausted. A lot of them seem to resent the fact that it’s entertaining. They say that we’ve got no sense of humour, which is ridiculous. How could we have no sense of humour with the things that Freddie is wearing these days? Nobody could wear those without having a sense of humour.
“People say that we’ve kept above our audience, but I don’t really think that’s true. It is these days a bit, but only through necessity, because the organisation is so hig. But I can rememher the first two or three tours we did: we always used to try and let anybody who wanted to come into the dressing room. But we can’t do that now, obviously.
“We don’t think we’re above anybody. We might think we’re a better band than most, but we don’t consider ourselves to be above our audience.”
IN THE PAST year, Queen have entered a class of their own. This rise coincided with the arrival of a new manager, John Reid, who’d already made his name by handling Elton John. When he plotted the course for his first year with Queen, Reid decided that they should spend a substantial period cracking America wide open. The result was that the band are now one of the biggest rock acts in the States and, nine months after its release, A Night At The Opera is still in the charts there.
The feedback from the American success has opened many English eyes, and has given both Queen and Reid the confidence to stage the free show in Hyde Park.
May: “I’m staggered by the past year. I’m amazed. I suppose now we’re conscious of having to live up to something, whereas before we weren’t, so that’s an additional strain. I will be happy as long as I feel that we do live up to people’s opinion of us. If I think we justify it, then I’m happy. I’m always striving to see that we do.
“We’re certainly not resting on our laurels in anyway. We’re always pushing on to new things. In a way, it would change us less than most people, because we’ve always had those attitudes really. We always went for perfection in the face of financial disaster.”
⬅PREVIOUS: PART 2 https://melisa-may-taylor72.tumblr.com/post/695926471504658432/the-history-of-rock-1976-part-2-of-all-four
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