Someone I plan on meeting after I die...

Freddy Mercury

A good childhood friend of mine used to let me listen to his music whenever we got together. In the summer 1981, he let me listen to a record from some movie that came out the previous year I never got to see…Flash Gordon.

It was awesome. He told me it was by a band called Queen, and he showed me some of the other albums he had by the same group: A Night at the Opera, A Day at the Races, and News of the World.

  

I had nightmares for a week thanks to that last cover.

Then he showed me a video (back in the days of actual videotape) that had Queen music videos on it (back when bands actually made music videos). It had "We Will Rock You", "We Are the Champions", "Bohemian Rhapsody" and others. I noticed the lead singer wore nail polish and my friend told me that he was gay. I thought “oookay, but his music’s still awesome!”

I was 10 years old.

I went back home, and as soon as I could I bought my first Queen music ever – Greatest Hits…on cassette.

I almost wore that thing out.

Fast forward to 1986. I’m fourteen, and I buy the latest Queen release, a soundtrack for another movie I never get to see in the theatre – Highlander – also on cassette.

Another one bites the dust.

I also catch them live for the first and only time in my life on tv…during something called Live Aid.

Fast forward again to 1991. I’m nineteen and in college. I buy the band’s latest release – Innuendo. A masterpiece. I’m in heaven.

Then I go home for Thanksgiving break and get the news:

Freddy Mercury, dead at age 45

First they said it was pneumonia. Then they said it was due to complications from AIDS.

I didn’t care what he died from; a great man with a great voice had left us, and I was stunned. I never heard "The Show Must Go On", or all of Innuendo for that matter, the same way again.

I was fortunate enough to get The Great Pretender…yes, on cassette…in 1992. If you ever get the chance, buy it. His version of the title song is tragically epic.

People remember the day Elvis died. They remember the day John Lennon died. Buddy Holly. Ritchie Valens. The Big Bopper. I was either too young or not born yet when such talented people passed on.

But I will always remember Freddy Mercury.

So yeah, I’ll have my ticket in hand to see anything Freddy’s doing when I catch up with him...because the show is still going on.