Queen: The Complete Works (109 page)

Just to prove that Queen’s commercial success with
The Game
and its singles hadn’t changed critics’ assessments of them and the transition from rock band to pop band,
Record Mirror
dragged them across the coals, criticizing the precision of their show in Paris: “Clearly [Queen are] just in it for the money. Cynical? You should have heard what Freddie had to say to the kids who’d mortgaged an arm and a leg to be there: ‘It’s very nice to see you all in this shithole tonight. What the fuck are we doing here?’ Indeed, Freddie, what? Your usual pre-gig huddle with accountants, managers and promoters revealed that only 6,000 out of a possible 15,000 tickets had been sold for the first-ever show in this Le Bourget aircraft hangar. That’s still a bob or two, Fred, but I don’t suppose those lights come cheap, not that they could even rescue this distressing debacle.”
Sounds
was more complimentary: “Almost too perfect was the timing, too seemingly effortless the delivery of a set which covered the entire span of Queen’s output to date, from ‘Keep Yourself Alive’ to
Flash Gordon
... Undoubtedly the sovereign of UK pomp rock, Freddie strutted, posed and preened himself through two hours of it, helped along by a spectacular light show and a few carefully placed pyrotechnics.”

1981

THE GAME JAPANESE DATES

12 TO 18 FEBRUARY 1981

Musicians:
John Deacon
(bass guitar)
, Brian May
(guitar, vocals, acoustic guitar on ‘Love Of My Life’ and ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’, piano on ‘Save Me’, piano and synthesizer on ‘Flash’s Theme’)
, Freddie Mercury
(vocals, piano, acoustic guitar on ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’, synthesizer on ‘Vultan’s Theme (Attack Of The Hawkmen)’)
, Roger Taylor
(drums, vocals, lead vocals on ‘I’m In Love With My Car’, timpani)

Repertoire:
‘Jailhouse Rock’, ‘We Will Rock You’
(fast)
, ‘Let Me Entertain You’, ‘Play The Game’, ‘Mustapha’ / ‘Death On Two Legs (Dedicated to......’ / ‘Killer Queen’ / ‘I’m In Love With My Car’ / ‘Get Down, Make Love’, ‘Save Me’, ‘Now I’m Here’ / ‘Dragon Attack’ / ‘Now I’m Here’
(reprise)
, ‘Fat Bottomed Girls’, ‘Love Of My Life’, ‘Keep Yourself Alive’, ‘Instrumental Inferno’, ‘Battle Theme’, ‘Flash’s Theme’, ‘The Hero’, ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’, ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’, ‘Tie Your Mother Down’, ‘Another One Bites The Dust’, ‘Sheer Heart Attack’, ‘We Will Rock You’, ‘We Are The Champions’, ‘Teo Torriatte (Let Us Cling Together)’, ‘God Save The Queen’, ‘Vultan’s Theme (Attack Of The Hawkmen)’, ‘Need Your Loving Tonight’, ‘Rock It (Prime Jive)’

Itinerary:

February 12/13, 16–18: Budokan Hall, Tokyo

After the completion of their brief European tour in December 1980, the band flew home on 19 December 1980, the break lasting until 8 February, when they went to Tokyo to commence rehearsals for an even more abbreviated stint in Japan. On the 10th, they attended the Japanese premiere of
Flash Gordon
, performing for the first time two days later.

These five dates – all at the same venue, so hardly constituting a tour – can be seen as a warm-up for the upcoming South American shows. The set list remained similar to the previous two tours, though ‘Vultan’s Theme (Attack Of The Hawkmen)’, with Freddie on synthesizer, was introduced to the set for the first time; surprisingly, ‘Teo Torriatte (Let Us Cling Together)’ wasn’t performed every night, and when it was, it was only half a verse and three choruses. Surprisingly, on the final night, the band performed the song after ‘We Are The Champions’, in an unprecedented third encore.

The band were clearly pleased with these five dates. “It’s the best tour we’ve done there,” Brian recalled later that year, “and we’ve done four tours, and it was clearly hysterical. Our audience is changing a bit from a kind of teeny-bop audience into a more rock audience in Japan. Japan was one of the few places where we had a young audience, but now it’s more in line with how it is in the States and Europe.”

SOUTH AMERICA BITES THE DUST TOUR

28 FEBRUARY TO 21 MARCH 1981

Musicians:
John Deacon
(bass guitar)
, Brian May
(guitar, vocals, acoustic guitar on ‘Love Of My Life’ and ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’, piano on ‘Save Me’)
, Freddie Mercury
(vocals, piano, acoustic guitar on ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’)
, Roger Taylor
(drums, vocals, lead vocals on ‘I’m In Love With My Car’, timpani)

Repertoire:
‘We Will Rock You’
(fast)
, ‘Let Me Entertain You’, ‘Play The Game’, ‘Somebody To Love’, ‘Mustapha’ / ‘Death On Two Legs (Dedicated to......’ / ‘Killer Queen’ / ‘I’m In Love With My Car’ / ‘Get Down, Make Love’, ‘Need Your Loving Tonight’, ‘Save Me’, ‘Now I’m Here’ / ‘Dragon Attack’ / ‘Now I’m Here’
(reprise)
, ‘Fat Bottomed Girls’, ‘Love Of My Life’, ‘Keep Yourself Alive’, ‘Instrumental Inferno’, ‘Flash’ / ‘The Hero’, ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’, ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’, ‘Tie Your Mother Down’, ‘Another One Bites The Dust’, ‘Sheer Heart Attack’, ‘We Will Rock You’, ‘We Are The Champions’, ‘God Save The Queen’, ‘Rock It (Prime Jive)’, ‘Jailhouse Rock’

Itinerary:

February 28/March 1: Estadio José Amalfitani, Buenos Aires, Argentina

March 4: Estadio José María Minella, Mar del Plata, Argentina

March 6: Estadio Mundialista Gigante de Arroyito, Rosario, Argentina

March 8: Estadio José Amalfitani, Buenos Aires, Argentina

March 20/21: Estádio Cícero Pompeu de Toledo, São Paulo, Brazil

Queen were always open to performing in new countries, with South America proving an attractive proposition given that the live version of ‘Love Of My Life’ had been in the singles chart there for over twelve months. When the itinerary was announced, fans and critics alike were shocked: bands as big as Queen didn’t travel to South America (though The Rolling Stones came close in 1975) due to the logistical nightmares involved. Promoter José Rota, for example, was approached by the Argentinean intelligence service and presented with various hypothetical situations, one of which involved a terrorist strolling on stage, holding a gun to Freddie’s head and ordering him to say “Viva Perón.” Rota replied with an impassioned speech lamenting the fact that thousands of Queen fans couldn’t come together for a few hours just to enjoy a rock concert. His ruse worked, and the tour went ahead.

While the band was in Japan, Jim Beach flew over to Rio de Janeiro with Gerry Stickells to organize everything. “There was no one at all in South America who had the experience to promote anything as huge as a Queen tour,” Beach explained in
As It Began
, “so I personally flew down to Rio and set up a temporary production office at the Rio Sheraton Hotel for three months. From there I could easily commute to Buenos Aires to keep an eye on the proceedings.” The band’s production manager, Chris Lamb, flew into Argentina in February and duly had his cases searched at customs. The passes for the tour were discovered: two naked young ladies, one Japanese and one South American, sharing a banana in a suggestive pose. Lamb had to spend the next few hours covering the women’s chests with a black marker.

There were also equipment problems: to fly twenty tons of gear from Tokyo to Buenos Aires was exorbitant in price and also lengthy (nearly thirty-six hours). Additionally, forty tons of equipment were flown in from Miami as well as additional artificial turf to cover the countries’ coveted football fields, plus sixteen tons of stage scaffolding from Los Angeles and five tons of lights. In the bustle of transportation, an oversized, forty-foot container fell from its truck and remained in the street for forty-eight hours before a crane large enough to accommodate the container’s size could be located.

When Queen arrived in Argentina on 23 February, the country virtually exploded in a frenzy: when the band emerged from their plane, the airport’s sound system broadcast Queen music non-stop, and the band’s every move was transmitted on local television. Never before had a country embraced Queen so warmly, with the possible exception of Japan. On the first night of the tour at the Velez Sarfield in Buenos Aires, the band went down a storm, though special
mention should be given to the audience who sang so vociferously that Freddie willingly stopped singing to let them carry on. No one was prepared for the performance of ‘Love Of My Life’, though: the opening chords were obscured by the din of the 54,000-strong audience cheering and applauding, which quickly died down in time for the vocals so that every fan could sing each word perfectly.

The set list for this tour changed little from the previous one, though ‘Somebody To Love’ had been rightly reinstated: only occasional performances of ‘Rock It (Prime Jive)’ and ‘Jailhouse Rock’ peppered the set list, while ‘Need Your Loving Tonight’ was common to all seven shows. The show on 1 March was broadcast live on national television, bringing in 35 million viewers in both Argentina and Brazil; the show on 8 March was also transmitted live.

In common with shows booked for Cordoba on 4 March and Rio de Janeiro on the 27th, a concert scheduled for Porto Alegre on the 13th was cancelled, giving the band nearly two weeks of rest. They were invited to meet General Viola, President Designate of Argentina, an offer accepted by everyone except Roger. “I didn’t want to meet him because that would have been playing into their hands,” he explained. “We were playing for the people. We didn’t go there with the wool pulled over our eyes. We know fully what the [political] situation is like in some of those countries. But for a time we made thousands of people happy. Surely that must count for something?”

While the band performed for several thousands of ecstatic fans, it was the two dates in Brazil that saw them playing to their largest audiences there, with a capacity of 130,000 fans each night. All shows on this tour were either recorded for radio or filmed for television (or both), broadcast to fans who couldn’t make it to the shows – including a canceled gig in Rio on 19 March. A video and audio document of this tour is long overdue.

Having achieved a collective goal that was both exhausting and rewarding, the band went their separate ways in April: Roger and John flew back to London while Freddie travelled to New Orleans; only Brian stayed in Rio. During the lull, sessions for the follow-up to
The Game
commenced, while further shows in September and October, taking in Venezuela and Mexico, were finalized, and a Pacific Rim tour, to encompass Australia and New Zealand, was planned but ultimately scrapped.

GLUTTONS FOR PUNISHMENT TOUR

25 SEPTEMBER TO 18 OCTOBER 1981

Musicians:
John Deacon
(bass guitar)
, Brian May
(guitar, vocals, acoustic guitar on ‘Love Of My Life’ and ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’, piano on ‘Save Me’)
, Freddie Mercury
(vocals, piano, acoustic guitar on ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’)
, Roger Taylor
(drums, vocals, lead vocals on ‘I’m In Love With My Car’, timpani)

Repertoire:
‘We Will Rock You’
(fast)
, ‘Let Me Entertain You’, ‘Play The Game’, ‘Somebody To Love’, ‘Killer Queen’ / ‘I’m In Love With My Car’ / ‘Get Down, Make Love’, ‘Save Me’, ‘Now I’m Here’ / ‘Dragon Attack’ / ‘Now I’m Here’
(reprise)
, ‘Fat Bottomed Girls’, ‘Love Of My Life’, ‘Keep Yourself Alive’, ‘Instrumental Inferno’, ‘Flash’ / ‘The Hero’, ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’, ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’, ‘Tie Your Mother Down’, ‘Another One Bites The Dust’, ‘Sheer Heart Attack’, ‘We Will Rock You’, ‘We Are The Champions’, ‘God Save The Queen’, ‘Need Your Loving Tonight’, ‘Jailhouse Rock’, ‘Battle Theme’

Itinerary:

September 25-27: Poliedro de Caracas, Caracas, Venezuela

October 9: Estadio Universitaro de Monterrey, Monterrey, Mexico

October 17/18: Estadio Olimpico de beisbol Ignacio Zaragoza, Puebla, Mexico

In the summer of 1981, Queen went to their recently acquired studios in Montreux to lay down tracks for a follow-up to
The Game
. When it became apparent that sessions would take longer than expected, the band halted recording in order to honour a brief six-date tour of Venezuela and Mexico. Technically an extension of the South America Bites The Dust tour, the itinerary would be officially designated the Gluttons For Punishment tour.

The set list remained similar to the first leg, though ‘Battle Theme’ was performed occasionally, along with ‘Need Your Loving Tonight’ and ‘Jailhouse Rock’. Incidentally, portions of ‘Under Pressure’ and ‘I Go Crazy’ were inserted into Freddie’s vocal and Brian’s guitar showcases respectively, long before either song’s actual release date. Only ‘Death On Two Legs (Dedicated to.....’ would be dropped from the set.

The band flew to New Orleans on 15 September to start rehearsals before departing for Venezuela six days
later. The tour was supposed to be far longer than it actually was in the end, with five of the original eleven dates cancelled for various reasons. On 28 September, Brian, Roger and John appeared on Venezuela’s televised equivalent of
Top Of The Pops
. Recorded live, the atmosphere was especially chaotic, with no translator and an unexpected announcement of the death of Venezuela’s president, Romulo Ethancourt. With a two-minute silence called for, the band couldn’t understand what was going on, and were none the wiser when a counter-announcement was made to the effect that Ethancourt hadn’t died after all.

The next two concerts (two further appearances in Caracas) were cancelled when Ethancourt eventually did pass away; Venezuela essentially shut down in a state of mourning, including the airports. Nobody was sure what would happen next: most assumed a revolution would occur, but all were relieved when the period of mourning came to an end on 30 September. That day, the band flew back to New Orleans to undertake a further week of rehearsals before flying to Monterrey on 8 October. The band’s first show in Mexico took place on 9 October, with three further shows – one at the Estadio Universitaro de Monterrey, and two at an unknown venue in Guadalajara – cancelled for unknown reasons.

The final two shows at the Estadio Zaragoza in Puebla showed a less palatable side of the local audiences: the crowd started to throw rubbish – shoes, bottles, batteries etc – at the band during their performance. Brian was nailed with dirt during his guitar solo, and Freddie concluded the performance with an aggravated “Adios amigos, you motherfuckers!” and “Take your shoes back!” Roger was even more irritated, trashing a few cymbals and stands when it came time for the final bow. Unfortunately for personal manager Paul Prenter, a fan scored a direct hit with a battery on his head, knocking the roadie on his back and bringing about a loud cheer from the other crew members.