How I discovered Freddiepoos, the monstrous genius who betrayed me
The amazing story of how one of the world’s best-loved rock bands made it big — by the man who signed them
IWAS sitting in my office one day in 1971 when I got a call from my brother Barry down in the studio. ‘Norman, come down and have a listen to something,’ he said. John Anthony, Trident’s A&R man, had discovered a band called Smile. At the start, the lead guitarist was an astrophysics student called Brian May, the bassist and singer was an art student called Tim Staffell, and the drummer was a biology student called Roger Taylor.
It turned out that they’d now reshaped the band. Staffell had been replaced by this little Indian-looking guy with a big, operatic voice and they had a new bass player.
John had asked for their demo. It was raw but there was definitely something there. I’d opened Trident Studios in 1968 in Soho, London. Its cutting-edge facilities and happening vibe were attracting the greatest talents of the era, from The Beatles and Elton John to David Bowie and Marc Bolan.
The four guys who came into my office a couple of weeks later were an intriguing mix of characters. Roger Taylor was a really goodlooking kid, with long blond hair and charm. Brian May was tall with a mane of curls and a little introverted but clearly very intelligent. The bass player, John Deacon, was also quiet. I could tell right away that the fourth member was going to be high maintenance.
His real name was Farokh Bulsara. He was born in Zanzibar and educated in India. The family had emigrated to England when he was a teenager. He’d gone to Ealing Art College in London to study art and graphic design. He was a gifted singer and pianist.
When he joined the band, he immediately gave himself a more rock ’n’ roll name: Freddie Mercury. He was charming, acted a bit shy and reserved at times and spoke in quite a posh, mannered voice. When he relaxed he had a very sharp sense of humour and spoke at a hundred miles an hour. They’d rightly decided to ditch Smile as their name.
I nearly choked on my coffee when I heard their new one: Queen. The world wasn’t as enlightened then as it is today. We were worried that it would be a real turn- off, especially given the band’s look. Freddie apparently had a girlfriend but we were pretty certain he was gay.
But the name wasn’t up for negotiation. I agreed to offer the Queenies, as we christened them, a loose kind of arrangement. There were times when the studio was ‘dark’, usually at 2am. So we said: ‘We’ll give you this downtime in the studio to see what you can do.’ They turned out to be every bit as good — and demanding — as we’d expected. Things had to be 100 per cent right, otherwise they wouldn’t be happy. They’d spend days and nights working on the harmonies.
Arguments would start about the tiniest detail. They’d start screaming and chucking things. Sometimes it would blow over in a few minutes, but at other times they’d stew on it, not talking to each other for a day or two. They’d always sort it out, however. It wasn’t personal; it was about the work.
Freddie used to say there was no question in his mind that Queen would be a success. ‘There was never a doubt, darling, never,’ he’d say with an imperious wave of his hand.
The title of their first album was simply Queen. Another suggestion had been Dearie Me, Freddie’s catchphrase, which was quite funny but the band were a hard-enough sell as it was. They spent ages arguing about the album sleeve. The front cover was a single i mage of Freddie on stage, with two spotlights in the background. For the back cover the boys put together a collage of snaps of themselves. Freddie had driven everyone to distraction fretting over whether he looked ‘gorgeous enough’ in them.
By the end of the year they were on the road with Mott the Hoople, but Queen were getting more encores and bigger cheers than the headliners.
They were due to go to Australia for a gig when Brian suddenly developed a really high fever. His arm had swollen up to the size of a football and doctors diagnosed gangrene.
At one point it was touch-and-go whether he would lose it. Luckily the crisis eased and he was allowed to fly.
However, the gig was a disaster. The local DJ introducing them had clearly taken against them because he introduced them as ‘stuck-up Pommies’. When they got on stage, the crowd turned against them, too.
The boys were mightily relieved when they got on a plane back to London. For some bizarre reason, the British press had been tipped off that the Queen of England was arriving at Heathrow. So when they saw four knackered musicians emerging through customs, they weren’t too happy.
On their first tour of America, Brian’s health was deteriorating. Our worst fears were confirmed when doctors announced he had hepatitis. The rest of the tour had to be cancelled. It was a disaster, professionally and personally. Then, when they came back to London in August, he had to have an emergency operation for an ulcer.
But on October 11, 1974, EMI put out Killer Queen, from their third album, Sheer Heart Attack. Within weeks it had given the boys the thing they’d most wanted — a No.1 single.
As Queen hit the road again, this time as a headline act in their own right, it was clear they were on the verge of major success. But the more adulation Freddie received on stage, the harder he became to work with offstage.
The tour came to an end at the legendary Rainbow Theatre in London. The day before the gig, Freddie was being even more pedantic than usual. ‘Oh, stop being such a tart, Freddie,’ Brian said. Freddie was outraged. He tossed back his head, waved his arms and stormed off in a strop.
WHEN it was time for the s oundcheck, Brian turned the mic on. ‘ Freddiepoos, where are you?’ he shouted. Freddie appeared immediately with a face like thunder. He flounced on stage, gave Brian a vicious look and then just got on with it. That’s what they always did.
In 1975 they went to Japan and found 3,000 fans waiting for them, all chanting the band’s name. It was like Beatlemania. Freddie had finally found the acclaim he’d craved all his life. He felt like a god. Unfortunately, he soon started behaving like one, too.
The more successful they became, the more agitated Queen had grown about money. One of the most heated rows came when John got married.
In the run- up to the wedding John announced he wanted me to spring £10,000 (about €104,000 in 2013 values) for him to buy a house. I didn’t react too well.
Then Freddie demanded a grand piano. When I turned him down, he banged his fist on my desk. ‘I have to get a grand piano,’ he said.
I wasn’t being mean. We knew there was a huge amount of money due to come flooding our way from Queen’s success. I explained that some of it was already coming in but the vast majority of it hadn’t arrived yet. ‘ But we’re stars. We’re selling millions of records,’ Freddie said, ‘and I’m still living in the same flat I’ve been in for the past three years.’
The amount of money we’d invested in the
Freddie stamped his feet and raised his voice: ‘I’m not prepared to wait. I want it all. I want it now’
band was huge. We’d advanced them equipment and salaries right at the beginning and had continued to pour money into them for four years. The fact the band owed Trident close to £200,000 (€2million today) didn’t seem to register with Freddie. I can remember the conversation. ‘The money will come in December,’ I said, ‘so wait.’ Then came a phrase he would make famous around the world in years to come, although no one would have known where it was born.
Freddie stamped his feet and raised his voice: ‘ No, I am not prepared to wait any longer. I want it all. I want it now.’
By late 1975 I was hearing that they were making all sorts of derogatory comments about Trident.
THEN I heard a track, from their album A Night At The Opera, called Death On Two Legs. The opening two lines summed up what was to come: ‘You suck my blood like a leech/you break the law and you breach,’ then, ‘Do you feel like suicide?’ it went on, ‘I think that you should’. It was some kind of nasty hate mail from Freddie to me.
Soon Bohemian Rhapsody roared to the top of the charts and stayed there for nine weeks. A bittersweet moment, it came as news was beginning to leak that we had split from Queen.
We should have talked more. And I should have been more attentive to their feelings. By the time I realised things were badly wrong, it was too late.
In March 1977, the company settled with the band for the sale of all of its future rights, the rights to the old albums and the settlement of the management debt.
Freddie’s dream finally came true and he became a very wealthy man. When he died in 1991, no one was sadder than me. He may have been a monster to deal with but he was also a genius.
I did see him once, in the years following our fallout, in 1986 when I took the family to their Knebworth concert. He was friendly, as if the rows of the past were forgotten.
It turned out to be their last live concert, which meant I was at their first and last.
Years later, after his death, I went to the Freddie Mercury Memorial Concert at Wembley, where I saw the three remaining members being photographed.
John Deacon pointed at me and said: ‘And if it hadn’t been for that man we wouldn’t be here.’ Brian and Roger looked at me and nodded. That gesture went a long way towards exorcising the ghosts of the past.
Extracted from Life On Two Legs: Set The Record Straight by Norman J Sheffield, out now in bookshops and online priced €17.27 paperback and €30.14 for a limitededition hardback.
For more images and a look back at Trident see facebook.com/lifeontwolegs