World of Chig   

11.11.02


"Bismillah! No!"

#4 Bohemian Rhapsody / These Are The Days Of Our LivesQueen


[382] and [672]
#1 for 9 weeks from 29 Nov 75 and 5 weeks from 21 Dec 91


So, the secret's out. It may have won with me AND the UK's voters in another place, but it doesn't quite cut the mustard with you lot. I can't say I'm TOO disappointed though, because now there will be FEVERISH speculation what the top three are. (Won't there?! Oh please, please be feverish...)

Our number four is by four people, one of whom made it to the BBC’s top 100 Great Britons list, despite not being British. It’s the only single in our Top 50 which has been number one twice, clocking up 14 weeks in total. ‘My Sweet Lord’ didn’t make it.

It’s not libellous to say that Freddie Mercury knocked off both Elton John AND George Michael, but not necessarily in a Burrell & Barrymore kinda way, it’s just that their duet was #1 for two weeks before Queen’s re-release deposed them.

‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ was an easy choice for me as my top number one of all time. I think of it as a desert island disc – if I could only hear one song for the rest of my life, it would have to be this, simply because it is so many different songs all cobbled together. Different tempos, different tones of voice and different emotions. It’s a mini operetta, and like all good opera, after all these years, I haven’t a friggin’ clue what it’s about.

Just like The Human League’s ‘Don’t You Want Me’, this is a single which nearly never was, as the band thought it too long to be played on the radio. It’s also the song that’s often credited with having the first promo video, but that’s not really true; The Beatles had been making them in the sixties.

It’s Dan’s #4; “It's been played to death, but it's still a goodie.”

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