Freddie Mercury established himself as a legendary frontman for Queen thanks to his booming vocals and stellar showmanship. He was tremendously talented and entertained audiences like many other music stars couldn’t. In rock history, several of Freddie Mercury’s best moments became enshrined, and Queen guitarist Brian May said one iconic moment was utterly spontaneous.
Freddie Mercury’s call-and-response during Queen’s Live Aid performance was improvised
While Queen delivered many excellent performances for audiences, their Live Aid performance at Wembley Stadium in 1985 is one of the most legendary concerts by any band. Live Aid had an excellent lineup that year, including acts such as Elton John, U2, The Who, Sting, David Bowie, and George Michael.
However, Queen stole the show, mainly due to Mercury’s determination to deliver his best performance ever. He had unstoppable energy and was belting every song at total volume. One moment saw him doing a call-and-response with the audience. He chanted “ayo” at various pitches and durations and would wait for the audience to yell back.
In an interview with The Guardian, Brian May was asked if that moment was planned. May confirmed that it was spontaneous, and he said Mercury just decided when it was the right moment to do it.
“We didn’t plan it. It was always up to Freddie, whether he wanted to do it, and he just felt confident that it was the right moment,” May shared. “Freddie did have an aptitude, it has to be said – he just could connect. He connected with everybody. As soon as he went, ‘Ey yo’, that was it – the place imploded. I can remember looking over at Roger, thinking, seems to have worked!”
The crowd roared during Queen’s performance and loved Freddie Mercury’s energy. However, May said they had no idea how well they did once their set ended.
“Absolutely no inkling whatsoever. You walk off things like that with a great feeling of exhilaration, but you’re also doing the postmortem: ‘Oh, God, I didn’t do that, I wish I’d done that, that went wrong,’” May continued. “It did feel different because it wasn’t a Queen audience – all of those tickets for Live Aid were sold before we were announced on the bill – yet they’d still reacted that way. The enormity of that did hit me: the ‘Radio Ga Ga,’ clap, clap. To see that happening sent big chills up my spine.”
Queen encouraged interacting with fans during shows
Queen has many songs that are easy for audiences to sing along to. However, the band wasn’t always on board with concertgoers shouting their lyrics back at them. In an interview with Total Guitar, May said the band was frustrated with this trend, but they decided to play along instead of fighting it. This led to one of their biggest hits: “We Will Rock You”.
“I said to Freddie, ‘maybe instead of fighting this, we should be encouraging it,’” May explained. “‘Maybe we should be harnessing this kind of energy which seems to be happening.’ […] If they can chant, what would they chant? And with that, I could hear it in my head: ‘We will, we will rock you!’
“I was hoping that this would become something that would catch on. We would have a song which would be led by the audience,” he added. “So that’s why there’s no drums on there. It was all aimed towards getting the audience involved… somehow it worked.”
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