The solo album he made based on sex, champagne and cocaine in Munich

“This album is dedicated to my Jerry cat; also to Tom, Oscar and Tiffany, and all the lovers of cats throughout the universe; and to hell with everyone else,” the credits that Freddie Mercury prepared for His only solo album.

Although it also made simple notable and a pop-lírico crossover with its admired Monserrat Caballé, This forty years are turned on Tuesday 29 of the output of Mr Bad Guy worldwide except England, where it was launched in May. It was his debut and farewell as a soloist.

Although he signed with the CBS one of the most lucrative contracts of the ’80s, Mercury never wanted to have a solo career. At that time, He refused to fill a blank check To the tycoon David Geffen. The ironic is that Mr Bad Guy was A decent event in Europe but a resounding failure in the United States:

At that time, Queen came there from a fallen layer since 1982 And he did not recover even, paradoxically, after Freddie’s death and the iconic scene with the hit Rapsodia Bohemia In comedy THE WORLD ACCORDING TO WAYNEof 1992.

The main successes of Mr. Bad Guy They would arrive posthumously, they were in danceable remixes or prosecuted by the rest of Queen in Made in Heaven (1995); name that for a moment Mercury had considered as a title for Mr. Bad Guand. But of course; An album called Paradise Maybe that tapa where Freddie looks at us suggestively shielded in some Ray-Ban would have invalidated.

Before Mr. Bad GuyMercury could also have integrated two plethoric projects in pop stars. On the one hand, He got excited about a possible supertrío along with Rod Stewart and Elton Johnto be baptized according to physical characteristics of each one: nose, Teeth & Hair (nose, teeth and hair). Of course, Freddie wanted “teeth” to head the formula.

A meeting that did arrive in studies was Mercury’s with Michael Jackson. They collaborated in three songs. Of those, it was only published There Must Be More to Life Than Thisan issue that Mercury re -recorded in Mr. Bad Guy Without before trying with Jackson’s home in Encino, California.

“All that money and no good taste, dear. What wasted,” Freddie complained after a session. In 2014. May and Taylor completed the version of Mercury and Jackson and edited it.

There are three possible versions of why Mercury/Jackson society broke. One was that Jackson disgusted by finding Mercury snorting cocaine. Two more bizarre sources but no less plausible point out the omnipresence of Louie, Michael’s little flame in the middle of the study. And the best hypothesis: Bubbles, Jackson’s chimpanzee, sitting between him and Freddie and being consulted about each voice taking.

Mr Bad Guy came out in 1985, The same day Queen ended in Sydney a fortnight of shows in Oceania. But Mercury had taken almost two years accommodating the album on his agenda, writing it, recording all the voices and most keyboards, in addition to producing with the then engineer and co -producer of Queen, Reinhold Mack, in the Musicland Studios of Munich, Germany.

In this case, Mack was the only creative input in replacement of Queen. “Special thanks to Brian, Roger and John for not interfering” Mr. Bad Guy. The sessionists were predominantly local musicians.

During its realization, Mercury first stopped at the Arabellahaus hotel: a favorite place for suicides. Freddie annoyed the persistent aroma of Arabic cuisine, but at least he was part of the complex where the recording studio was.

But Mercury’s patience lasted little and moved to the apartment of one of his partners, the gastronomic businessman Winnie Kirchberger (grateful in the credits for “lodging and meals”). Neither Winnie nor Freddie knew the languages ​​of the other. Like those plus that highlights the Airbnb notices, The department was in the gay bars that Freddie liked to frequentlike Frisco and New York. They were nights of excesses, with champagne, cocaine and sex.

Mercury, little type adept to interviews, had no choice but to do the promotional work alone. “It is much more oriented towards the rhythm than Queen’s music, although it also has very moving ballads,” he explained. “I wanted to try things like reggae rhythms, and a couple of issues (sic) with a symphonic orchestra.”

In his eponymous theme, Mr. Bad Guy For the first time an orchestra would have in a project linked to Queen: very shortly after they would do the same with Who Wants To Live Forever.

How does this album fit in Mercury’s work? A part could have been Queen’s contemporary material, like post ballads Play the Game (1980): Made in Heaven (Not for anything re -recorded by the rest of Queen), the one already named There Must Be More to Life Than This and the closure Love Me Like There’s No Tomorrowdedicated to a fetish actress of German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Barbara Valentin; Given on the album for “big tits and misconduct.” She had an extended relationship with Freddie, who then opted in friendship.

Man Made Paradise He has only Brian May, but with vocal games where Mercury moves with all his rank, closer to the lyric than pop, as he would repeat on his side B of 1987 Excercises in Free Love.

The opening Let’s Turn It On es pure technopophow Living on My Ownwith a scat far from the games with which Freddie entertained the audience in Queen’s shows. Foolin’ Around has a keyboards that sound like 1999 Prince in antidepressants. My Love Is Dangerous It flirts with reggae.

Your Kind of Lover Start remembering the glories of You Take My Breath Away (1976) until it changes completely in every way. As unequivocal as the forbidden in Argentina Get Down Make Love (1977) o Body Language (1982), is one of the songs with a one-A-one gay on an album that could be classified as its themes as Turning bisexual.

Although Mercury never militated the issue, letters like those of Mr. Bad Guy They are not a small thing when two years before David Bowie denied from the Rolling Stone cover had ever been Gay, as part of a series of gestures to conquer the US market.

Three songs from the album had their video clips, all filmed in Munich. The most infamous is that of Living on My Owntheme about who has everything and does not stop being alone. He was registered on Mercury’s 40th birthday on September 5. A party of cross-dressing by rigorous invitation: men dressed as a woman and vice versa. Brian May appeared as a witch. Mercury did not fulfill its own rule: Military jacket with nothing below, with its naked torso and shoes.

The CBS introduced Mercury with a tail piano -shaped cake. Freddie paid the best champagne and the best cocaine. But the minting video was not even broadcast in the United States, still with the fresh memory of the debacle of I Want to Break Free In 1984. While the Drag is an ancient form of British humor, for half plus a reacanist was little less than a perversion. Worse, in England the simple of Living on My Own It did not pass from position 50.

Mr. Bad Guy reached number six in England, and it was Top 10 for two weeks, but The album was one of CBS’s great failures: Post 159 in Billboard. The first single, the Europop I Was Born to Love You He walked well (and in 1995 it was also Queenized); But the next three sank.

Ironically, Living on My Own It would be an English number in 1993, remixed for the tracks. The same can be said of the topics refloated by Queen in 1995 for Made in Heaven. While the 1992 compilation The Freddie Mercury Album It was double platinum in his country and great success in Argentina (where he was sneaking into tv curtains), Mr. Bad Guy Languned discontinued almost two decades. Today it is easily achieved, unnecessary reminds of the entire album included.

At the time, Mercury was no problem: it was a pleasure that wanted to give, and he did not have to return the money to the CBS. In September, Queen was back working in Musicland. But It was the end of an era. After 1985, Freddie would not step on Munich again and, more than say, his days would not be the same.