walking upstream…
Queen
Formed in London in 1970 around the unlikely pairing of Freddie Mercury's operatic voice and Brian May's homemade Red Special guitar, Queen refused to settle into one genre — bouncing from music-hall pastiche to arena thrash to disco to stadium anthem, sometimes within a single side of vinyl. Their 1975 six-minute mini-opera "Bohemian Rhapsody" proved a pop single could ignore every rule of radio and still become a phenomenon, and their 1985 Live Aid set is still cited as the greatest festival performance ever filmed. Mercury's death from AIDS-related complications in 1991 closed the band's most vital chapter, though May, Taylor, and a rotating cast of guest vocalists have kept the songs on arena stages ever since.
the sound in question
1975
Bohemian RhapsodyQueen
walk the tributaries ↓
Jimi Hendrix1960s · Rock / Blues rock / Psychedelic rock
Mercury called Hendrix "my idol" and reportedly saw him play live more than a dozen times; May has cited Hendrix's use of guitar feedback as formative to his own tone, most audibly in the extended, effects-drenched solos he built into Queen's live arrangements.
listen: upstream & here
1968
Voodoo Child (Slight Return)Jimi Hendrix
1974
Brighton RockQueen
listen forFollow "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)" with "Brighton Rock": both hand the spotlight to a single guitar pushing feedback and delay past the edge of the song, turning the solo into its own extended showcase.
The Beatles1960s · Rock / Pop rock
Brian May has said the White Album "built our bible as far as musical composition, arrangement and production went" — the Beatles taught Queen that a studio could be an instrument for stitching wildly different musical fragments into a single track.
listen: upstream & here
1968
Happiness Is a Warm GunThe Beatles
1975
Bohemian RhapsodyQueen
listen forPlay "Happiness Is a Warm Gun" back to back with "Bohemian Rhapsody": both refuse to sit still in one tempo or style, jump-cutting through miniature movements before resolving somewhere far from where they started.
Led Zeppelin1970s · Hard rock / Blues rock
Early Queen's sound was pegged by critics as "Led Zeppelin meets Yes," and Mercury called Led Zeppelin "the greatest" rock band and Robert Plant his favorite singer — that admiration shows up directly in Queen II's heavy, fantasy-drenched material.
listen: upstream & here
1971
Stairway to HeavenLed Zeppelin
1974
Ogre BattleQueen
listen forSet "Stairway to Heaven" against "Ogre Battle": both stack a slow-building, riff-driven arrangement under mythic, sword-and-sorcery imagery, letting the song grow heavier as the story escalates.