The board is acting crazy for me right now. I'll try to post this again.
Aussie Queens @aussiequeens 25m
REVIEW: GO ALONG AND SEE IT by Ian Harrison
My name is Ian Harrison, and I like Queen. I've been a fan for... fb.me/1gMVX210J
REVIEW: GO ALONG AND SEE IT by Ian Harrison
by Ian Harrison
(Allphones Arena. Sydney, Day 1 + 2)
My name is Ian Harrison, and I like Queen. I've been a fan for decades, have all their albums, most of their singles and side-projects, many bits of merchandise, and various framed pieces of memorabilia hanging in my house. During Brian May's previous solo tour (he's the guy with long grey curly hair who plays guitar), in 1998, I was fortunate enough to meet him twice, and experienced four of his six concerts as he travelled around the country. So this is my background in writing this review and so I cannot help but be biased.
First things first - "Queen", as a live band, ceased to exist after the Knebworth gig in 1986, and it's more than possible to hit up JB Hi-fi, eBay or Youtube and fill your boots with old live material. I never really got into the Queen / Paul Rodgers experiment and apart from avidly listening to the collaboration album during its month of release, his Bluesy influence has proven too different for my lasting tastes. This extended to live shows he joined Roger and Brian on; I skip certain songs on my iPod. Granted, had they have come to Australia during this time, I'd have been first in the queue to empty my wallet.
So in 2011-2, enter Adam Lambert, a talented performer with his own following for sure. (This was very evident this week and his performance inspired my fiancee to pick up one of his t-shirts.)
No-one wanted a Freddie impersonator. Those guys are everywhere - I mean that literally. On Tuesday evening, I saw two people (a man and a woman) separately sporting THAT yellow jacket and adhesive moustache. Had I wanted a tribute show, it'd only be a matter of time before one hits up the local RSL, and I've seen plenty of them.
Adam knew the fans weren't there (by and large) for him - the draw was the two blokes in their respective seventh decades on stage, still tearing it up in a non-stop two and a half hour hit-packed extravaganza. He knew full well that he was walking into a lion's den full of grumpy old Queen fans like me, with only a few "Glamberts" and recent converts fighting his corner. And so he never tried to mimic Freddie - nor did he set himself up to. He even took a moment, in his words, to "thank us for suspending disbelief" for a couple of hours, and left the stage from time to time, so we could experience the original members of this still-great band.
And then he bounced back on stage, holding nothing back for the final soaring stanza of "Somebody To Love".
In, as Lambert termed it, "Cray-cray little thing called love", I laughed. He had the sneer on and wasn't trying to channel Freddie. This was an honest-to-goodness Elvis impersonation. And it worked. Everything worked. From the little-known album tracks, to the medley of memorable bass-lines, strung effortlessly together in Neil Fairclough's bass solo. On Wednesday, when he switched from standard bass guitar to upright bass and the sound-guy was a half-second late turning up the fader, when Neil repeated the riff, he left the first note out, making it sound syncopated and intentional. John Deacon was not forgotten despite his lack of physical presence. Spike's been on the ivories live since the mid-80's and didn't miss a trick. The show was utterly professional.
The sound was crisp and for the first gig in a long time, I didn't feel pressed into my seat each time Roger kicked that bass drum. (Wednesday was a different story... they found an extra 20% from somewhere and it was in places a bit uncomfortable.) Tuesday, though, I went to bed with a little more of my old companion tinnitus but it wasn't that swooping swirling buzz that makes sleep impossible. Lambert was buried in the mix for the first song on Tuesday, and the lighting guy hit the strobe button during the opener and went to the toilet for ten minutes. Both issues were soon rectified.
I was fortunate enough to see Brian and Roger play a few songs together in 2006, after a special "Happy 60th birthday, Freddie" performance of the "We Will Rock You" musical in London's West End, and had that have been the only time I'd experienced these two together live, I'd have happily taken it.
Well, these concerts were completely satisfying. Both May and Taylor were in fine form and even though Brian had a bit of a tough time convincing shy Sydneysiders to help him out with "Love of My Life", the big-screen Freddie jumped in and Roger chimed in on "'39", stepping out on lead vocals for "A Kind of Magic"; apparently the first time this tour they've played it. It didn't seem that way; the playing ensemble of five at that moment, as tight as ever. (Lambert took regular costume-change breaks to allow Brian and Roger centre-stage.)
Another nice touch was Roger's son, Rufus, playing percussion and taking over on the main kit when Roger played front-man. They dueled solos at one point, livening up the cliche'd drum solo, while proving that drumming prowess didn't skip this generation.
Now, these all may be the musings of an old romantic fan, swept up in a nostalgic mist for a band he never managed to see for himself at the height of their powers, but Lambert won me over, and Queen won Jacqui over. Lady Gaga joined in for "Another One Bites the Dust" on Wednesday, sending pockets of the audience into raptures. She did a good job but it wasn't really her crowd.
Over the world tour, the set list has been massaged and it would've been nice, perhaps, for one or two of the lesser-known album tracks to again make way for songs like "Don't Stop Me Now", that featured earlier in the tour, but when you're seeing Queen, there can always be that sense of "they didn't play xx" or "I can't believe they didn't do yy".
To sum up, by (necessarily) leaving out a little of xx and yy, they've done (probably) the right thing of hitting the stage for over two hours of hits and memories, leaving the crowd (tragics and new fans alike) wanting more. If you don't have a ticket yet, this may well be the last go-around. Brian May lingered for a very long time after the final bow on Wednesday night. So if this tour may be thought of as "Queen by the numbers", Adam Lambert more than made up the numbers. If you still have the opportunity, go along and see it!
Thank you for much, Ian Harrison (https://www.facebook.com/ianh74?fref=ts) for a heartfelt review! - AQ
I feel her pain. There must be thousands of really wonderful pictures of this tour alone. 
nica575, LindaG23, shimoli710 
