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Bohemian Rhapsody

March 31, 2023

For other uses, see Bohemian Rhapsody (disambiguation).

"Bohemian Rhapsody" is a song by the British rock band Queen, released as the lead single from their fourth album, A Night at the Opera (1975). Written by lead singer Freddie Mercury, the song is a six-minute suite,[4] notable for its lack of a refraining chorus and consisting of several sections: an intro, a ballad segment, an operatic passage, a hard rock part and a reflective coda.[5] It is one of the few progressive rock songs of the 1970s to achieve widespread commercial success and appeal to a mainstream audience.[6]

"Bohemian Rhapsody"
Single by Queen
from the album A Night at the Opera
B-side"I'm in Love with My Car"
Released31 October 1975 (1975-10-31)
Recorded24 August–October 1975[1][2][3]
Studio
Genre
Length5:55
LabelEMI
Songwriter(s)Freddie Mercury
Producer(s)
Queen singles chronology
"Now I'm Here"
(1975) 		"Bohemian Rhapsody"
(1975) 		"You're My Best Friend"
(1976)
Music video
"Bohemian Rhapsody" on YouTube

Mercury referred to "Bohemian Rhapsody" as a "mock opera" that resulted from the combination of three songs he had written. It was recorded by Queen and co-producer Roy Thomas Baker at five studios between August and September 1975. Due to recording logistics of the era, the band had to bounce the tracks across eight generations of 24-track tape, meaning that they required nearly 200 tracks for overdubs. The song parodies elements of opera with bombastic choruses, sarcastic recitative, and distorted Italian operatic phrases. Lyrical references include Scaramouche, the fandango, Galileo Galilei, Figaro, and Beelzebub, with cries of "Bismillah!"

Although critical reaction was initially mixed, "Bohemian Rhapsody" became regarded as one of the greatest rock songs of all time and is often regarded as the band's signature song. The promotional video is credited with furthering the development of the music video medium.[7][8] It has appeared in numerous polls of the greatest songs in popular music,[9] including a ranking at number 17 on Rolling Stone's list of "the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.[10] A Rolling Stone readers' poll ranked Mercury's vocal performance as the greatest in rock history.[11]

"Bohemian Rhapsody" topped the UK Singles Chart for nine weeks (plus another five weeks following Mercury's death in 1991) and remains the UK's third best-selling single of all time. It also topped the charts in countries including Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, and the Netherlands, and sold over six million copies worldwide. In the United States, the song peaked at number nine in 1976, but reached a new peak of number two after appearing in the 1992 film Wayne's World. In 2004, the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.[12] Following the release of the 2018 biopic Bohemian Rhapsody, it became the most streamed song from the 20th century.[13] In 2021, it was certified Diamond in the US for combined digital sales and streams equal to 10 million units.

History and recording

It was basically three songs that I wanted to put out, and I just put the three together.

— Freddie Mercury[14]

According to Mercury's friend Chris Smith (a keyboard player in Smile), Mercury first started developing "Bohemian Rhapsody" in the late 1960s; Mercury used to play parts of songs he was writing at the time on the piano, and one of his pieces, known simply as "The Cowboy Song", contained lyrics that ended up in the completed version produced years later, in 1975, specifically, "Mama ... just killed a man."[15] Producer Roy Thomas Baker, who began working with Queen in 1972, related how Mercury once played the opening ballad section on the piano for him in Mercury's flat:

He played the beginning on the piano, then stopped and said, "And this is where the opera section comes in!" Then we went out to eat dinner.

Guitarist Brian May said the band thought that Mercury's blueprint for the song was "intriguing and original, and worthy of work".[16] According to May, much of Queen's material was written in the studio, but this song "was all in Freddie's mind" before they started.[17]

Queen spent a month rehearsing at Ridge Farm Studio in Surrey in mid-1975, and drummer Roger Taylor recalled that "Bohemian Rhapsody" was one of the songs the band worked on while they were there.[18] Recording began on 24 August 1975 at Rockfield Studio 1 near Monmouth, South Wales, after a three-week rehearsal at Penrhos Court, near Kington, Herefordshire. During the making of the track, four additional studios – Roundhouse, Sarm Studios, Scorpio Sound, and Wessex Sound Studios – were used.[19] According to some band members, Mercury mentally prepared the song beforehand and directed the band throughout.[17]

Mercury used a C. Bechstein concert grand piano, which he played in the promotional video and the UK tour. Due to the elaborate nature of the song, it was recorded in various sections.[20] The piano was allegedly the same one Paul McCartney had used to record the Beatles' song "Hey Jude",[4] as well as the same one Rick Wakeman used on David Bowie's 1971 album Hunky Dory.[21][dubious – discuss]

Baker recalled in 1999:

"Bohemian Rhapsody" was totally insane, but we enjoyed every minute of it. It was basically a joke, but a successful joke. [laughs] We had to record it in three separate units. We did the whole beginning bit, then the whole middle bit and then the whole end. It was complete madness. The middle part started off being just a couple of seconds, but Freddie kept coming in with more "Galileos" and we kept on adding to the opera section, and it just got bigger and bigger. We never stopped laughing ... It started off as a ballad, but the end was heavy.[22]

 
Recording track sheet (replica)

May, Mercury, and Taylor reportedly sang their vocal parts continually for 10 to 12 hours a day.[17] The entire piece took three weeks to record, and in some sections featured 180 separate overdubs.[20] Since the studios of the time only offered 24 track analogue tape, it was necessary for the three to overdub themselves many times and "bounce" these down to successive sub-mixes. In the end, eighth-generation tapes were used.[19] The various sections of tape containing the desired sub-mixes had to be spliced (cut and assembled in the correct sequence). May recalled placing a tape in front of the light and being able to see through it, as the tape had been used so many times.[23]

A similar story was told in 1977 by Taylor regarding the elaborate overdubs and sub-mixes for "The March of The Black Queen" for the album Queen II. At that time, the band was using 16 track equipment.[24]

Producer Baker recalls that May's solo was done on only one track, rather than recording multiple tracks. May stated that he wanted to compose "a little tune that would be a counterpart to the main melody; I didn't just want to play the melody". The guitarist said that his better material stems from this way of working, in which he thought of the tune before playing it: "The fingers tend to be predictable unless being led by the brain."[17] According to Baker,

... the end of the song was much heavier because it was one of the first mixes to be done with automation ... If you really listen to it, the ballad starts off clean, and as the opera section gets louder and louder, the vocals get more and more distorted. You can still hear this on the CD. They are clearly distorted.[22]

Composition and analysis

"Bohemian Rhapsody" has been affiliated to the genres of progressive rock (sometimes called symphonic rock),[6][25][26] hard rock,[27][28] art rock,[29] and progressive pop.[30] The song is highly unusual for a popular single in featuring no chorus, combining disparate musical styles, and containing lyrics which eschew conventional love-based narratives, and instead make allusions to murder and nihilism.[5]

Music scholar Sheila Whiteley suggests that "the title draws strongly on contemporary rock ideology, the individualism of the bohemian artists' world, with rhapsody affirming the romantic ideals of art rock".[31] Commenting on bohemianism, Judith Peraino said,

Mercury intended ... [this song] to be a 'mock opera', something outside the norm of rock songs, and it does follow a certain operatic logic: Choruses of multi-tracked voices alternate with aria-like solos, the emotions are excessive, the plot confusing.[32]

"Bohemian Rhapsody" begins with an introduction, then goes into a piano ballad, before a guitar solo leads to an operatic interlude. A hard rock part follows this and it concludes with a coda. The song is in the keys of B♭ major, E♭ major, A major and F major, and is predominantly in 4
4 meter. This musical format of writing a song as a suite with changes in style, tone, and tempo throughout was uncommon in most mainstream pop and rock music, but common in progressive rock, a genre which had reached its artistic and commercial zenith between 1970 and 1975 in the music of British bands such as Jethro Tull, Yes, Genesis, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Gentle Giant, Van der Graaf Generator, and Curved Air.[33] The music of progressive rock was characterised by dramatic contrasts, frequent shifts in tempo and in rhythmic character from one section of a composition to the next.[34] Bands from the genre blended rock with classical music, including its structural features, compositional practices, and instrumentation.[35] Queen had embraced progressive rock as one of their many diverse influences.[36]

"Bohemian Rhapsody" parodies many different elements of opera by using bombastic choruses, sarcastic recitative, and distorted Italian operatic phrases.[37] An embryonic version of this style had already been used in Mercury's earlier compositions for the band's "My Fairy King" (1973) and "The March of the Black Queen" (1974).

Intro (0:00–0:49)

The song begins with a close five-part harmony a cappella introduction in B♭ major—as evidenced by the presence of a V–I cadence (F7–B♭) multi-track recordings of Mercury although the video has all four members lip-syncing this part. The lyrics question whether life is "real" or "just fantasy caught in a landslide" before concluding that there can be "no escape from reality".

After 20 seconds, the grand piano enters, the song modulates briefly to E♭ major via another perfect cadence (B♭7–E♭) and Mercury's voice alternates with the other vocal parts. The narrator introduces himself as "just a poor boy" but declares that he "needs no sympathy" because he is "easy come, easy go" and then "little high, little low" (when heard in stereo, the words "little high" come from the left speaker and "little low" comes from the right, the other respective speaker plays the piano at the same time); chromatic side-slipping on "easy come, easy go" highlights the dream-like atmosphere. The end of this section is marked by the bass entrance and the cross-handed piano vamp in B♭.

Ballad (0:49–2:37)

 
"Mama, just killed a man"
This sample features the distinctive piano phrase in B♭ and the first line of the first verse.
Problems playing this file? See media help.

The piano begins in B♭ major along with the entrance of John Deacon's bass guitar, marking the onset of this section. After it plays twice, Mercury's vocals enter. Throughout the section, the vocals evolve from a softly sung harmony to an impassioned solo performance by Mercury. The narrator explains to his mother that he has "just killed a man", with "a gun against [the man's] head" and in doing so, has thrown his life away. This "confessional" section, Whiteley comments, is "affirmative of the nurturant and life-giving force of the feminine and the need for absolution".[31] In the middle of the verse (1:19), Taylor's drums enter, and a descending chromatic run leads to a temporary modulation to E♭ major (up one fourth). The narrator makes the second of several invocations to his "mama" in the new key, continuing the original theme. The narrator explains his regret over "mak[ing] you cry" and urging "mama" to "carry on as if nothing really matters". A brief, descending variation of the piano phrase connects to the second verse.

Then the piano intro plays, marking the start of the second verse. As the ballad proceeds into its second verse, the speaker confesses how ashamed he is by his act of murder (as May enters on guitar and mimics the upper range of the piano at 1:50). May imitates a bell tree during the line "sends shivers down my spine", by playing the strings of his guitar on the other side of the bridge. The narrator bids the world goodbye announcing he has "got to go" and prepares to "face the truth" admitting "I don't want to die / I sometimes wish I'd never been born at all". This is where the guitar solo enters.

Guitar solo (2:37–3:05)

Towards the end of the ballad section, the band builds in intensity, incorporating a guitar solo (in E♭ major) played and composed by Brian May. The intensity continues to build, but once the bass line completes its descent establishing modulation to the new key (A major), the entire band cuts out abruptly at 3:03 except for quiet, staccato A major quaver (eighth-note) chords on the piano, marking the start of the "Opera" section.

Opera (3:05–4:07)

 
"Scaramouche, Scaramouche, will you do the fandango?"
The operatic segment enters immediately as May's solo abruptly concludes. This vast shift in style is just one example of how the song rapidly changes throughout its running time.
Problems playing this file? See media help.

A rapid series of rhythmic and harmonic changes introduces a pseudo-operatic midsection, which contains the bulk of the elaborate vocal multi-tracking, depicting the narrator's descent into hell. While the underlying pulse of the song is maintained, the dynamics vary greatly from bar to bar, from only Mercury's voice accompanied by a piano to a multi-voice choir supported by drums, bass, piano, and timpani. The choir effect was created by having May, Mercury, and Taylor repeatedly sing their vocal parts, resulting in 180 separate overdubs. These overdubs were then combined into successive submixes. According to Roger Taylor, the voices of May, Mercury, and himself combined created a wide vocal range: "Brian could get down quite low, Freddie had a powerful voice through the middle, and I was good at the high stuff." The band wanted to create "a wall of sound, that starts down and goes all the way up".[17] The band used the bell effect for lyrics "Magnifico" and "let me go". Also, on "let him go", Taylor singing the top section carries his note on further after the rest of the "choir" have stopped singing.

Lyrical references in this passage include Scaramouche, the fandango, Galileo Galilei, Figaro, and Beelzebub, with cries of "Bismillah! [Arabic: "In the name of God!"] We will not let you go!", as rival factions fight over his soul, some wishing to "let [him] go" and "spare him his life from this monstrosity", with others sending him "thunderbolts and lightning – very, very frightening [to him]". In Freddie Mercury: The Definitive Biography, Lesley-Ann Jones theorises that it is also a figurative representation of the four members: Mercury, May, Taylor, and Deacon respectively. The section concludes with a full choral treatment of the lyric "Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me!", on a block B♭ major chord. Roger Taylor tops the final chord with a falsetto B♭ in the fifth octave (B♭5).

Using the 24-track technology available at the time, the "opera" section took about three weeks to finish.[16] Producer Roy Thomas Baker said, "Every time Freddie came up with another Galileo, I would add another piece of tape to the reel."[19] Baker recalls that they kept wearing out the tape, which meant having to do transfers.[16]

Hard rock (4:07–4:54)

The operatic section leads into a rock interlude with a guitar riff written by Mercury. At 4:15, a quadruple-tracked Mercury (in stereo, the four parts are panned two on the left and two on the right) sings angry lyrics addressed to an unspecified "you", accusing them of betrayal and abuse and insisting "can't do this to me, baby", before the final lines conclude that the singer "just gotta get right outta" an unspecified "here". Three ascending guitar runs follow. Mercury then plays a similar B♭ run on the piano, as the song builds up to the finale with a ritardando.

Outro (4:54–5:55)

After Mercury plays ascending octaves of notes from the B♭ mixolydian mode (composed of the notes from the E♭ scale), the song then returns to the tempo and form of the introduction, initially in E♭ major, before quickly modulating to C minor, only to soon go through an abrupt short series of modulations, bringing it back to C minor again in time for the final "nothing really matters" section. A guitar accompanies the chorus "ooh, ooh yeah, ooh yeah". A double-tracked twin guitar melody is played through an amplifier designed by John Deacon, affectionately nicknamed the "Deacy Amp". Mercury's line "Nothing really matters ..." appears again, "cradled by light piano arpeggios suggesting both resignation (minor tonalities) and a new sense of freedom in the wide vocal span".[38] After the line "nothing really matters" is repeated multiple times, the song finally concludes in the key of E♭ major, but then changes again to F major just before it ends. The final line, "Any way the wind blows", is followed by the quiet sound of a large tam-tam that finally expels the tension built up throughout the song.

Lyrics

The New York Times commented that "the song's most distinct feature is the fatalistic lyrics". Mercury refused to explain his composition other than to say it was about relationships; the band is still protective of the song's secret.[16] Brian May supports suggestions that the song contained veiled references to Mercury's personal traumas. He recalls "Freddie was a very complex person: flippant and funny on the surface, but he concealed insecurities and problems in squaring up his life with his childhood. He never explained the lyrics, but I think he put a lot of himself into that song."[39] May, though, says the band had agreed that the core of a lyric was a private issue for the composer.[16] In a BBC Three documentary about the making of "Bohemian Rhapsody", Roger Taylor maintains that the true meaning of the song is "fairly self-explanatory with just a bit of nonsense in the middle".[17]

It's one of those songs which has such a fantasy feel about it. I think people should just listen to it, think about it, and then make up their own minds as to what it says to them ... "Bohemian Rhapsody" didn't just come out of thin air. I did a bit of research although it was tongue-in-cheek and mock opera. Why not?

— Freddie Mercury[40]

Despite this, critics, both journalistic and academic, have speculated over the meaning behind the song's lyrics. Some believe the lyrics describe a suicidal murderer haunted by demons or depict events just preceding an execution. The latter explanation points to Albert Camus's novel The Stranger, in which a young man confesses to an impulsive murder and has an epiphany before he is executed, as probable inspiration. When the band released a Greatest Hits cassette in Iran, a leaflet in Persian was included with translation and explanations.[41] In the explanation, Queen states that "Bohemian Rhapsody" is about a young man who has accidentally killed someone and, like Faust, sold his soul to the devil. On the night before his execution, he calls for God saying, "Bismillah" ("In the name of God" in Arabic), and with the help of angels, regains his soul from Shaitan (the devil in Arabic).[42]

Other critics interpreted the lyrics as Mercury's way of dealing with personal issues.[16] Music scholar Sheila Whiteley observes that Mercury reached a turning point in his personal life in the year he wrote "Bohemian Rhapsody".[31] He had been living with Mary Austin for seven years but had just embarked on his first love affair with a man. She suggests that the song provides an insight into Mercury's emotional state at the time, "living with Mary ('Mamma', as in Mother Mary) and wanting to break away ('Mamma mia let me go')".[38] Others suggest it as a veiled reference to coming out, and dealing with the repercussions of the sodomy laws of the time.[43] In addition, the song can be interpreted as coming from the perspective of a person on death row, reflecting on their life and preparing for their last moments.

Still others believe the lyrics were only written to fit with the music, and had no intended meaning; the D.J., television entertainer, and comedian Kenny Everett, who played an influential role in popularising the single on his radio show on Capital Radio, quoted Mercury as claiming the lyrics were simply "random rhyming nonsense".[39]

Release

 
One of Side-A labels of the US single release

When the band wanted to release the single in 1975, various executives suggested to them that due to its length of 5 minutes and 55 seconds, it was too long and would never be a hit.[44] The song was played to other musicians who commented the band had no hope of it ever being played on radio.[17] According to producer Roy Thomas Baker, he and the band bypassed this corporate assessment by playing the song for Capital Radio D.J. Kenny Everett:

"we had a reel-to-reel copy but we told him he could only have it if he promised not to play it. 'I won't play it,' he said, winking ..."[19]

The plan worked — Everett teased his listeners by playing only parts of the song. Audience demand intensified when Everett played the full song on his show 14 times in 2 days.[16] Hordes of fans attempted to buy the single the following Monday, only to be told by record stores that it had not yet been released.[19] The same weekend, Paul Drew, who ran the RKO General stations in the U.S, heard the track on Everett's show in London. Drew managed to get a copy of the tape and started to play it in the U.S, which forced the hand of Queen's US label, Elektra. In an interview with Sound on Sound, Baker observed that "it was a strange situation where radio on both sides of the Atlantic was breaking a record that the record companies said would never get airplay!"[19]

Eventually the unedited single was released, with "I'm in Love with My Car" as the B-side. Following Everett's escapade in October 1975, Eric Hall, a record plugger, gave a copy to David "Diddy" Hamilton to play on his weekday Radio One show. Hall stated "Monster, Monster! This could be a hit!"[45]

The song became the 1975 UK Christmas number one, holding the top position for nine weeks.[38] "Bohemian Rhapsody" was the first song ever to get to number one in the UK twice with the same version,[46] and is also the only single to have been Christmas number one twice with the same version. The second was upon its re-release (as a double A-side single with "These Are the Days of Our Lives") in 1991, following Mercury's death, staying at number one for five weeks.[47] The re-released version sold 673,000 copies in 1991 in the UK.[48]

In the US, the single was also a success, although initially to a lesser extent than in the UK. The single, released in December 1975, reached number nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America for sales of one million copies.[49]

In a retrospective article, Anthony DeCurtis of Rolling Stone explained why the song performed less strongly in the US charts by saying that it is "the quintessential example of the kind of thing that doesn't exactly go over well in America".[17] Its chart run of 24 weeks, however, placed it at number 18 on Billboard's year-end chart, higher than some number 1s of the year.[50] With the Canadian record-buying public, the single fared better, reaching number one in the RPM national singles chart for the week ending 1 May 1976.[51]

In the US, "Bohemian Rhapsody" was re-released as a double A-side cassette single with "The Show Must Go On" in January 1992, two months after the death of Freddie Mercury, with proceeds going to the Magic Johnson Foundation for AIDS research. The song re-entered the Billboard Hot 100 chart after 16 years, reaching number two, and spending 17 weeks on the chart.[52] After the release of the Queen biopic named after the song, it re-entered the charts for a third time at number 33, marking 26 years since it last charted.[53]

In March 2021 it was certified Diamond (10× platinum) in the US for combined digital sales and streams equal to 10 million units.[54] It had sold 4.4 million digital copies in the US as of September 2017.[55]

Promotional video

Though some artists had made video clips to accompany songs (including Queen themselves; for example, their earlier singles "Keep Yourself Alive", "Liar", "Seven Seas of Rhye" and "Killer Queen" already had "pop promos", as they were known at the time), it was only after the success of "Bohemian Rhapsody" that it became a regular practice for record companies to produce promotional videos for artists' single releases.[56] The Guardian stated it "ensured videos would henceforth be a mandatory tool in the marketing of music".[8] These videos could then be shown on television shows around the world, such as the BBC's Top of the Pops, without the need for the artist to appear in person. A promo video also allowed the artist to have their music broadcast and accompanied by their own choice of visuals rather than dancers such as Pan's People. According to May, the video was produced so that the band could avoid miming on Top of the Pops, since they would have looked off miming to such a complex song.[39] He also said that the band knew they would be set to appear at Dundee's Caird Hall on tour, a date which clashed with the programme, thus a promo would solve the issue.[17] The video has been hailed as launching the MTV age.[17][57]

 
The "Bohemian Rhapsody" music video was shot at Elstree Studios in November 1975

The band used Trillion, a subsidiary of Trident Studios, their former management company and recording studio. They hired one of their trucks and got it to Elstree Studios in Hertfordshire, where the band were rehearsing for their tour. The video was directed by Bruce Gowers, who had directed a video of the band's 1974 performance at the Rainbow Theatre in London, and was recorded by cameraman Barry Dodd and assistant director/floor manager Jim McCutcheon. The video was recorded in just four hours on 10 November 1975, at a cost of £4,500.[20] Gowers reported that the band was involved in the discussion of the video and the result, and "was a co-operative to that extent, but there was only one leader."[17]

It became the first record to be pushed into the forefront by virtue of a video. Queen were certainly the first band to create a 'concept' video. The video captured the musical imagery perfectly. You cannot hear that music without seeing the visuals in your mind's eye.

— Rock DJ Tommy Vance.[58]

The video opens with a shot of the four band members standing in diamond formation with their heads tilted back in near darkness as they sing the a cappella part.[59] The lights fade up, and the shots cross-fade into close-ups of Mercury. The composition of the shot is the same as Mick Rock's cover photograph for their second album Queen II. The photo, inspired by a photograph of actress Marlene Dietrich, was the band's favourite image of themselves.[17] The video then fades into them playing their instruments. In the opera section of the video, the scene reverts to the Queen II standing positions, after which they perform once again on stage during the hard rock segment. In the closing seconds of the video Roger Taylor is depicted stripped to the waist, striking the tam tam in the manner of the trademark of the Rank Organisation's Gongman, familiar in the UK as the opening of all Rank film productions.[60]

All of the special effects were achieved during the recording, rather than editing. The visual effect of Mercury's face cascading away (during the echoed lines "Magnifico" and "Let me go") was accomplished by pointing the camera at a monitor, giving visual feedback, a glare analogous to audio feedback. The honeycomb illusion was created using a shaped lens. The video was edited within five hours because it was due to be broadcast the same week in which it was taped. The video was sent to the BBC as soon as it was completed and aired for the first time on Top of the Pops in November 1975.[17]

Critical reception

Although the song has become one of the most revered in popular music history,[61] the initial critical reaction was mixed. The UK music papers reacted with bemusement, recognising that the song was original and technically accomplished, but they mostly remained indifferent. Pete Erskine of NME observed that, "It'll be interesting to see whether it'll be played in its entirety on the radio. It's performed extremely well, but more in terms of production than anything else... Someone somewhere has decided that the boys' next release must sound 'epic'. And it does. They sound extremely self-important."[62]

Allan Jones of Melody Maker was unimpressed, describing the song as "a superficially impressive pastiche of incongruous musical styles" and that Queen "contrived to approximate the demented fury of the Balham Amateur Operatic Society performing The Pirates of Penzance... 'Bohemian Rhapsody' is full of drama, passion and romance and sounds rather like one of those mini-opera affairs that Pete Townsend [sic] used to tack on to the end of Who albums", before concluding, "The significance of the composition eludes me totally, though I must admit to finding it horrifically fascinating. It's likely to be a hit of enormous proportions despite its length."[63] Ray Fox-Cumming of Record Mirror was also left unmoved, saying, "It has no immediate selling point whatsoever: among its many parts. there's scarcely a shred of a tune and certainly no one line to latch onto. There's no denying that it's devilishly clever, encompassing everything from bits of operatic harmonies to snatches that sound like Sparks and David Cassidy, but, in the end the whole adds up to less than the sum of its parts." He did, however, say that it was "unthinkable" that it wouldn't be a hit.[64] The most positive review came from Sounds, which called it "impossibly disjointed and complex, but a dazzlingly clever epic from the fevered mind of Freddie Mercury".[65] Cash Box called it "a softly sung ode to the prospect of moving on from staid ways" with "good singing" and "good production."[66] Record World called it "a majestic vocal performance that takes on operatic proportions."[67]

Legacy

Musical impact

 
The Queen Extravaganza performing the song at the Fox Theatre, Detroit in 2012

In 1976, when asked for his opinion on "Bohemian Rhapsody", the Beach Boys' leader Brian Wilson praised the song as "the most competitive thing that's come along in ages" and "a fulfillment and an answer to a teenage prayer—of artistic music".[68] Producer Steve Levine said the track broke "all sonic production barriers" in a fashion similar to the Beach Boys' "Good Vibrations" (1966), Phil Spector's "Be My Baby" (1963), and 10cc's "I'm Not in Love" (1975).[69] Greg Lake, whose song "I Believe in Father Christmas" was kept from number one in the UK by "Bohemian Rhapsody" when it was released in 1975, acknowledged that he was "beaten by one of the greatest records ever made", describing it as "a once-in-a-lifetime recording".[70]

Addressing the song's enduring popularity, author and music lecturer Jochen Eisentraut wrote in 2012: "A year before punk made it unfashionable, progressive rock had an astounding success with the theoretically over-length (nearly 6-minute) single 'Bohemian Rhapsody' which bore many of the hallmarks of the 'prog' genre". He said it was "unique at this point to hear a hit single in this style", it was "more accessible than other music of the genre" and was "able to communicate beyond the usual confines of the style".[6] Author and progressive rock historian Stephen Lambe called it a "remarkable" single and said it "provides a neat but coincidental bridge between prog in its prime and the move to more aggressive songwriting", suggesting the song "feels like a grotesque (although probably unintentional) parody of progressive rock".[61] The New Rolling Stone Album Guide described it as "either a prog-rock benchmark or the most convoluted novelty song ever recorded".[71] Writing for the BBC in 2015, the Chicago Tribune's music critic Greg Kot called it a "prog-rock pocket operetta" and said the song's "reign as a work of wigged-out genius rather than a dated gimmick testifies to its go-for-broke attitude—one that has resonated across generations".[25]

In 2009, The Guardian's music critic, Tom Service, examined the song's relationship with the traditions of classical music, describing its popularity as "one of the strangest musical phenomena out there":

The precedents of "Bohemian Rhapsody" are as much in the 19th-century classical traditions of rhapsodic, quasi-improvisational reveries—like, say, the piano works of Schumann or Chopin or the tone-poems of Strauss or Liszt—as they are in prog-rock or the contemporary pop of 1975. That's because the song manages a sleight of musical hand that only a handful of real master-musicians have managed: the illusion that its huge variety of styles—from intro, to ballad, to operatic excess, to hard-rock, to reflective coda—are unified into a single statement, a drama that somehow makes sense. It's a classic example of the unity in diversity that high-minded musical commentators have heard in the symphonies of Beethoven or the operas of Mozart. And that's exactly what the piece is: a miniature operatic-rhapsodic-symphonic-tone-poem.[5]

A comparison was also made between the song and Led Zeppelin's 1971 epic "Stairway to Heaven" by music writers Pete Prown and HP Newquist. They observed both songs were "a slow, introspective beginning and gradual climb to a raging metal jam and back again", with the notable distinction being "while Zeppelin meshed folk influences with heavy metal, Queen opted for the light grandeur of the operetta as part of its hard rock". They said "for sheer cleverness alone, not to mention May's riveting electric work, 'Bohemian Rhapsody' rightfully became one of the top singles of 1975 and established Queen in the elite of seventies rock bands".[27]

In 2015, The Economist described it as "one of the most innovative pieces of the progressive rock era". It wrote "though Led Zeppelin's John Paul Jones and the Beatles' Paul McCartney had experimented with symphonic elements, and Roger Waters of Pink Floyd and Pete Townshend of the Who had created narrative albums with distinct 'movements', none had had the audacity to import a miniature opera into rock music."[28]

Wayne's World

In 1992, the song enjoyed renewed popularity in the United States after being featured in a scene in the film Wayne's World, in which the titular character and his friends headbang in a car to the rock part near the end of the song.[72] The film's director, Penelope Spheeris, was hesitant to use the song, as it did not entirely fit with the lead characters, who were fans of less flamboyant hard rock and heavy metal. Mike Myers insisted that the song fit the scene.[73] According to music scholar Theodore Gracyk, by 1992, when the film was released, even "classic rock" stations had stopped playing the almost six-minute song. Gracyk suggests that beginning the tape in the middle of the song after "the lyrics which provide the song's narrative ... forces the film's audience to respond to its presence in the scene without the 'commentary' of the lyrics".[74] Helped by the song, the soundtrack album of the film was a major hit.[75]

In connection with this, a new video was released, interspersing excerpts from the film with footage from the original Queen video, along with some live footage of the band. Myers was horrified that the record company had mixed clips from Wayne's World with Queen's original video, fearing that this would upset the band. He said, "they've just whizzed on a Picasso." He asked the record company to tell Queen that the video was not his idea and that he apologised to them. The band, though, sent a reply simply saying, "Thank you for using our song." This astonished Myers, who responded, "Thank you for even letting me touch the hem of your garments!"[76]

The Wayne's World video version of "Bohemian Rhapsody" won Queen its only MTV Video Music Award for "Best Video from a Film".[77] When remaining members Brian May and Roger Taylor took the stage to accept the award, Brian May was overcome with emotion and said that "Freddie would be tickled." In the final scene of the video, a pose of the band from the video from the original "Bohemian Rhapsody" clip morphs into an identically posed 1985 photo, first featured in the "One Vision" video.

In the 2018 Queen biopic feature film Bohemian Rhapsody, Myers makes a cameo as a fictional record executive who pans the song and refuses to release it as a single, proclaiming that it is too long for radio and that it is not a song that "teenagers can crank up the volume in their car and bang their heads to", a reference to the aforementioned scene in Wayne's World.[78]

Achievements and accolades

The song has won numerous awards and has been covered and parodied by many artists. At the 19th Annual Grammy Awards in February 1977, "Bohemian Rhapsody" received two Grammy Award nominations for Best Pop Vocal Performance by a Duo, Group or Chorus and Best Arrangement for Voices.[79][80] In October 1977, only two years after its release, the British Phonographic Industry named "Bohemian Rhapsody" as the best British single of the period 1952–77.[74] It is a regular entry in greatest-songs polls, and it was named by the Guinness Book of Records in 2002 as the top British single of all time.[16] The song is also listed in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.[81]

In 2004, the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.[12] As of 2004, "Bohemian Rhapsody" is the second most-played song on British radio, in clubs and on jukeboxes collectively, after Procol Harum's "A Whiter Shade of Pale".[82] On 30 September 2007 for BBC Radio 1's 40th birthday, it was revealed on The Radio 1 Chart Show that "Bohemian Rhapsody" had been the most played song since Radio 1's launch.[83]

In December 2018, "Bohemian Rhapsody" officially became the most-streamed song from the 20th century, surpassing Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and Guns N' Roses' "Sweet Child o' Mine".[13][84] "Bohemian Rhapsody" also became the most-streamed classic rock song of all time.[13] The number of downloads of the song and original video exceeded 1.6 billion downloads across global on-demand streaming services.[84] The video surpassed one billion views on YouTube in July 2019, making it the oldest music video to reach one billion on the platform, and the first pre-1990s song to reach that figure.[85][86]

In 2022, the single was selected by the U.S. Library of Congress for preservation in the National Recording Registry as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."[87]

Polls

In a 2001 poll of more than 50,000 readers of The Observer newspaper and viewers of British TV's Channel 4 for the 100 best number-one singles of all time, the song came second to John Lennon's "Imagine".[88] In a 2002 poll of more than 31,000 people conducted for Guinness World Records' British Hit Singles, "Bohemian Rhapsody" was voted Britain's favourite single, beating Lennon's "Imagine" to the top spot.[89]

In 2002, it came in 10th in a BBC World Service poll to find the world's favourite song.[90] It has been in the top five of the Dutch annual "Top 100 Aller Tijden" ("All-Time Top 100 [Singles]") since 1977, reaching number one on eight occasions, more than any other artist.[91] In 1999, the annual "Top 2000" poll commenced to find the best songs ever made, and "Bohemian Rhapsody" has been ranked number one in all but five years (2005, 2010, 2014, 2015 and 2020 when it was number two).[92] In a 2012 readers poll conducted by Rolling Stone magazine, "Bohemian Rhapsody" was voted the best vocal performance in rock history.[93] In 2010, the song ranked at 166 on Rolling Stone's "500 Greatest Songs of All Time" list,[94] and was re-ranked at number 17 in 2021.[10]

In 2012, the song topped an ITV poll in the UK to find "The Nation's Favourite Number One" over 60 years of music, ahead of Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean" (number two), Adele's "Someone like You" (number three), Oasis' "Don't Look Back in Anger" (number four) and The Beatles' "Hey Jude" (number five).[9] The song was also ranked number five in RadioMafia's list of "Top 500 Songs".[95]

Cover versions

 
Robbie Williams on stage in Poland in 2015 performing the song with the Queen image in the background
See also: List of Bohemian Rhapsody cover versions

Over two dozen artists have recorded or performed cover versions of "Bohemian Rhapsody", including charted single releases by:

  • Bad News – a 1986 spoof version produced by Brian May which reached UK number 44
  • The Braids – an R&B version recorded for the soundtrack to the 1996 film High School High and which peaked at UK number 21, US number 42, and Canada number 13[96]
  • Panic! at the Disco – a version recorded for the soundtrack of the 2016 film Suicide Squad and which peaked at UK number 80, US number 64 and Canada number 47[97]

A video cover featuring The Muppets also went viral[98] and was subsequently released as a single in late 2009, peaking at number 32 in the UK.[99]

"Weird Al" Yankovic's 1993 album Alapalooza includes a version of the song entitled "Bohemian Polka", which is a rearrangement of the entire song as a polka.[100][101]

40th anniversary

To mark the 40th anniversary of "Bohemian Rhapsody", the song was released on a limited edition 12" vinyl with the original B-side "I'm In Love With My Car" on 27 November 2015 for Record Store Day 2015. Queen also released A Night At The Odeon, Live At Hammersmith 75, on CD, DVD-Video and Blu-ray. This includes the first live "professionally" recorded performance of "Bohemian Rhapsody".[102] However, the very first recording and live performance of "Bohemian Rhapsody" was the performance on 14 November 1975 in Liverpool.[103]

Live performances

 
"Bohemian Rhapsody" live at Milton Keynes Bowl (1982)
In live performances, the operatic segment would be played from tape as it was too complicated for the band to perform live. As the heavy rock segment followed, the band would return to the stage.
Problems playing this file? See media help.

The a cappella opening was too complex to perform live, so Mercury tried various ways of introducing the song. When "Mustapha" became a live favourite, Mercury would often sub in that song's a cappella opening, which was easier to reproduce live as it was only one voice—this combination features in their 1979 live album Live Killers.[104] During their 1982 Hot Space Tour, and occasionally at other times, Mercury would do a piano improvisation (generally the introduction to "Death on Two Legs") that ended with the first notes of the song. Often, the preceding song would end, and Mercury would sit at the piano, say a quick word, and start playing the ballad section. At Live Aid where "Bohemian Rhapsody" was their opening song, Mercury commenced with the ballad section.[105]

 
From left to right: Deacon, Taylor and May in concert in Hanover in 1979. Behind the drum kit is the tam-tam used at the end of "Bohemian Rhapsody".

Initially following the song's release, the operatic middle section proved a problem for the band. Because of extensive multi-tracking, it could not be performed on stage.[106] The band did not have enough of a break between the Sheer Heart Attack and A Night at the Opera tours to find a way to make it work live, so they split the song into three sections that were played throughout the night. The opening and closing ballads were played as part of a medley, with "Killer Queen" and "March of the Black Queen" taking the place of the operatic and hard rock sections. In 1976 concerts where the same medley was played, the operatic section from the album would be played from tape as the introduction to the setlist. During this playback, Mercury would appear briefly to sing live for the line, "I see a little sillhouetto of a man".[107] As the song segued into the hard rock section, the band would emerge on the smoke-filled stage—the playback would end at this point, and the hard rock section would be performed live (without the final ballad section, which appeared later in the set).

 
Footage of Mercury singing "Magnifico" in the operatic section of the "Bohemian Rhapsody" music video during a Queen + Adam Lambert concert at the United Center, Chicago, June 2014.

Starting with the A Day at the Races Tour in 1977, the band adopted their lasting way of playing the song live. The opening ballad would be played on stage, and after May's guitar solo, the lights would go down, the band would leave the stage, and the operatic section would be played from tape, while coloured stage lights provided a light show based around the voices of the opera section.[106] Most playings of the opera section from the tape would often be accompanied by a portion of the song's music video containing the footage used for the operatic portion of the song. Other playings would be played over montages of footage filmed from the band members' other experiences throughout their daily lives. A blast of pyrotechnics after Taylor's high note on the final "for me" would announce the band's return for the hard rock section and closing ballad. Queen played the song in this form all through the Magic Tour of 1986. This style was also used for the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert, with Elton John singing the opening ballad and then after the taped operatic section, Axl Rose singing the hard rock section. John and Rose sang the closing ballad part together in a duet.[108]

"Bohemian Rhapsody" was performed by Queen + Paul Rodgers throughout their tours, accompanied by a video of Mercury.[109] Footage from the Live at Wembley '86 was used for the 2005–06 tour, and the 1981 Montreal performance used for the Rock the Cosmos Tour. As with the Queen tours, the band went backstage for the operatic section, which was accompanied by a video tribute to Freddie Mercury. When the hard rock section began, the lights came back up to the full band on stage, including Rodgers, who took over lead vocals. Rodgers duetted with the recording of Mercury for the "outro" section, allowing the audience to sing the final "Nothing really matters to me", while the taped Mercury took a bow for the crowd. Rodgers would then repeat the line, and the final line ("Any way the wind blows") was delivered with one last shot of Mercury smiling at the audience. Commenting upon this staging, Brian May says that they "had to rise to the challenge of getting Freddie in there in a way which gave him his rightful place, but without demeaning Paul in any way. It also kept us live and 'present', although conscious and proud of our past, as we logically should be."[16]

Since 2012, May and Taylor have toured with former American Idol contestant Adam Lambert under the name Queen + Adam Lambert (following two one-off performances together in 2009 and 2011), with "Bohemian Rhapsody" regularly included at the end of their set.[110][111]

Charts

Sales and certifications

Region Certification Certified units/sales
Australia (ARIA)[209] 8× Platinum 560,000 
Canada (Music Canada)[210] 7× Platinum 560,000 
Denmark (IFPI Danmark)[211] 2× Platinum 180,000 
Germany (BVMI)[212] Gold 250,000 
Italy (FIMI)[213] 4× Platinum 200,000 
Japan (RIAJ)[214] Gold 100,000*
New Zealand (RMNZ)[215] 2× Platinum 60,000 
Portugal (AFP)[216] 4× Platinum 160,000 
Spain (PROMUSICAE)[217] 3× Platinum 150,000 
United Kingdom (BPI)[219] 4× Platinum 2,540,604[218]
United States (RIAA)[49]
Physical 		Gold 1,000,000^
United States (RIAA)[49]
Digital 		10× Platinum 10,000,000 
Streaming
Greece (IFPI Greece)[220] Platinum 2,000,000 

* Sales figures based on certification alone.
^ Shipments figures based on certification alone.
  Sales+streaming figures based on certification alone.
  Streaming-only figures based on certification alone.

Queen comments on the song

I always wanted to do something operatic. I wanted something with a mood setter at the start, going into a rock type of thing which completely breaks off into an opera section, a vicious twist and then returns to the theme. I don't really know anything about opera myself. Just certain pieces. I wanted to create what I thought Queen could do. It's not authentic... certainly not. It's no sort of pinch out of Magic Flute. It was as far as my limited capacity could take me.[221]

— Freddie Mercury, 1976

I'm going to shatter some illusions, it was just one of those pieces I wrote for the album: just writing my batch of songs. In its early stages I almost rejected it, but then it grew. We started deciding on a single about halfway through. There were a few contenders—we were thinking of "The Prophet's Song" at one point—but then "Bohemian Rhapsody" seemed the one. There was a time when the others wanted to chop it around a bit, but I refused. If it was going to be released, it would be in its entirety. We knew it was very risky, but we had so much confidence in that song—I did anyway. I felt, underneath it all, that if it was successful it would earn a lot of respect. People were all going, You're joking, they'll never play it, you'll only hear the first few bars and then they'll fade it out. We had numerous rows. EMI were shocked—a six-minute single? You must be joking! The same in America—oh, you just got away with it in Britain.[222]

— Freddie Mercury, 1976

When we finished the album, the Night at the Opera album, that was the track on it that we thought we were gonna release as a single in the UK first. And when we released it in Britain we didn't necessarily think it'd be released in America, cause we know even over here, you know, the AM tastes are even more [hesitates] stricter. Anyway we did have thoughts about even in the UK, perhaps editing it down at all, but we listened to it over and over again and there was no way we could edit it. We tried a few ideas, but if you edited it, you always lost some part of the song, so we had to leave it all in. And luckily it took off anyway.[223]

— John Deacon, 1977

The vocal harmonies was something we wanted to do from the beginning, as we are always keen to do that kind of thing. We wanted to be a group that could do the heaviness of hard rock, but also have harmonies swooping around all over the place. We thought there was some real power and emotion in that combination. The guitar solo was pretty much off the cuff, except I think I had plenty of time to think about that one. I remember playing along with it in the studio for a while when other things were being done. I knew what kind of melody I wanted to play.[224]

— Brian May, 1982

Personnel

Source:[17]

See also

Citations

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  2. ^ Queen Chronology/Bohemian Rhapsody. Patrick Lemieux, Adam Unger. 11 April 2018. p. 24. ISBN 9781926462103. Retrieved 6 January 2023. Early September: Bohemian Rhapsody – the backing track is recorded during this time along with other "Opera" backing tracks
  3. ^ Queen Chronology/Bohemian Rhapsody. Patrick Lemieux, Adam Unger. 11 April 2018. p. 24. ISBN 9781926462103. Retrieved 6 January 2023. Mid September -- November: following Rockfield sessions, Queen continues working on their 4th album in London
  4. ^ a b Horton, Matthew (24 June 2015). "Queen: 20 Things You Probably Never Knew About 'Bohemian Rhapsody'". NME. from the original on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 24 August 2015. a masterful, if ludicrous, six-minute suite of operatic cock-rock
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  6. ^ a b c Eisentraut, Jochen (2012). The Accessibility of Music: Participation, Reception, and Contact. Cambridge University Press. p. 111. ISBN 978-1107024830. progressive rock had an astounding success with the theoretically over-length (nearly 6 minute) single 'Bohemian Rhapsody' which bore many of the hallmarks of the 'prog' genre
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General references

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  • Pope, Rob (2002). The English Studies Book: An Introduction to Language, Literature and Culture. Routledge. ISBN 0-415-25709-3.
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  • Directed by Carl Johnston (4 December 2004). The Story of Bohemian Rhapsody (Television production). BBC.
  • Peraino, Judith (2005). Listening to the Sirens: Musical Technologies of Queer Identity from Homer to Hedwig. University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-21587-7.
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External links

March 31, 2023
bohemian, rhapsody, other, uses, disambiguation, song, british, rock, band, queen, released, lead, single, from, their, fourth, album, night, opera, 1975, written, lead, singer, freddie, mercury, song, minute, suite, notable, lack, refraining, chorus, consisti. For other uses see Bohemian Rhapsody disambiguation Bohemian Rhapsody is a song by the British rock band Queen released as the lead single from their fourth album A Night at the Opera 1975 Written by lead singer Freddie Mercury the song is a six minute suite 4 notable for its lack of a refraining chorus and consisting of several sections an intro a ballad segment an operatic passage a hard rock part and a reflective coda 5 It is one of the few progressive rock songs of the 1970s to achieve widespread commercial success and appeal to a mainstream audience 6 Bohemian Rhapsody Single by Queenfrom the album A Night at the OperaB side I m in Love with My Car Released31 October 1975 1975 10 31 Recorded24 August October 1975 1 2 3 StudioRockfield Monmouthshire Roundhouse London Sarm London Scorpio Sound London Wessex Sound LondonGenreProgressive rock hard rock progressive pop art rockLength5 55LabelEMISongwriter s Freddie MercuryProducer s Roy Thomas Baker QueenQueen singles chronology Now I m Here 1975 Bohemian Rhapsody 1975 You re My Best Friend 1976 Music video Bohemian Rhapsody on YouTubeMercury referred to Bohemian Rhapsody as a mock opera that resulted from the combination of three songs he had written It was recorded by Queen and co producer Roy Thomas Baker at five studios between August and September 1975 Due to recording logistics of the era the band had to bounce the tracks across eight generations of 24 track tape meaning that they required nearly 200 tracks for overdubs The song parodies elements of opera with bombastic choruses sarcastic recitative and distorted Italian operatic phrases Lyrical references include Scaramouche the fandango Galileo Galilei Figaro and Beelzebub with cries of Bismillah Although critical reaction was initially mixed Bohemian Rhapsody became regarded as one of the greatest rock songs of all time and is often regarded as the band s signature song The promotional video is credited with furthering the development of the music video medium 7 8 It has appeared in numerous polls of the greatest songs in popular music 9 including a ranking at number 17 on Rolling Stone s list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time 10 A Rolling Stone readers poll ranked Mercury s vocal performance as the greatest in rock history 11 Bohemian Rhapsody topped the UK Singles Chart for nine weeks plus another five weeks following Mercury s death in 1991 and remains the UK s third best selling single of all time It also topped the charts in countries including Canada Australia New Zealand Ireland and the Netherlands and sold over six million copies worldwide In the United States the song peaked at number nine in 1976 but reached a new peak of number two after appearing in the 1992 film Wayne s World In 2004 the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame 12 Following the release of the 2018 biopic Bohemian Rhapsody it became the most streamed song from the 20th century 13 In 2021 it was certified Diamond in the US for combined digital sales and streams equal to 10 million units Contents 1 History and recording 2 Composition and analysis 2 1 Intro 0 00 0 49 2 2 Ballad 0 49 2 37 2 3 Guitar solo 2 37 3 05 2 4 Opera 3 05 4 07 2 5 Hard rock 4 07 4 54 2 6 Outro 4 54 5 55 3 Lyrics 4 Release 5 Promotional video 6 Critical reception 7 Legacy 7 1 Musical impact 7 2 Wayne s World 7 3 Achievements and accolades 7 3 1 Polls 7 4 Cover versions 7 5 40th anniversary 8 Live performances 9 Charts 9 1 Weekly charts 9 2 Year end charts 9 3 Decade end charts 9 4 All time charts 10 Sales and certifications 11 Queen comments on the song 12 Personnel 13 See also 14 Citations 15 General references 16 External linksHistory and recording EditIt was basically three songs that I wanted to put out and I just put the three together Freddie Mercury 14 According to Mercury s friend Chris Smith a keyboard player in Smile Mercury first started developing Bohemian Rhapsody in the late 1960s Mercury used to play parts of songs he was writing at the time on the piano and one of his pieces known simply as The Cowboy Song contained lyrics that ended up in the completed version produced years later in 1975 specifically Mama just killed a man 15 Producer Roy Thomas Baker who began working with Queen in 1972 related how Mercury once played the opening ballad section on the piano for him in Mercury s flat He played the beginning on the piano then stopped and said And this is where the opera section comes in Then we went out to eat dinner Guitarist Brian May said the band thought that Mercury s blueprint for the song was intriguing and original and worthy of work 16 According to May much of Queen s material was written in the studio but this song was all in Freddie s mind before they started 17 Queen spent a month rehearsing at Ridge Farm Studio in Surrey in mid 1975 and drummer Roger Taylor recalled that Bohemian Rhapsody was one of the songs the band worked on while they were there 18 Recording began on 24 August 1975 at Rockfield Studio 1 near Monmouth South Wales after a three week rehearsal at Penrhos Court near Kington Herefordshire During the making of the track four additional studios Roundhouse Sarm Studios Scorpio Sound and Wessex Sound Studios were used 19 According to some band members Mercury mentally prepared the song beforehand and directed the band throughout 17 Mercury used a C Bechstein concert grand piano which he played in the promotional video and the UK tour Due to the elaborate nature of the song it was recorded in various sections 20 The piano was allegedly the same one Paul McCartney had used to record the Beatles song Hey Jude 4 as well as the same one Rick Wakeman used on David Bowie s 1971 album Hunky Dory 21 dubious discuss Baker recalled in 1999 Bohemian Rhapsody was totally insane but we enjoyed every minute of it It was basically a joke but a successful joke laughs We had to record it in three separate units We did the whole beginning bit then the whole middle bit and then the whole end It was complete madness The middle part started off being just a couple of seconds but Freddie kept coming in with more Galileos and we kept on adding to the opera section and it just got bigger and bigger We never stopped laughing It started off as a ballad but the end was heavy 22 Recording track sheet replica May Mercury and Taylor reportedly sang their vocal parts continually for 10 to 12 hours a day 17 The entire piece took three weeks to record and in some sections featured 180 separate overdubs 20 Since the studios of the time only offered 24 track analogue tape it was necessary for the three to overdub themselves many times and bounce these down to successive sub mixes In the end eighth generation tapes were used 19 The various sections of tape containing the desired sub mixes had to be spliced cut and assembled in the correct sequence May recalled placing a tape in front of the light and being able to see through it as the tape had been used so many times 23 A similar story was told in 1977 by Taylor regarding the elaborate overdubs and sub mixes for The March of The Black Queen for the album Queen II At that time the band was using 16 track equipment 24 Producer Baker recalls that May s solo was done on only one track rather than recording multiple tracks May stated that he wanted to compose a little tune that would be a counterpart to the main melody I didn t just want to play the melody The guitarist said that his better material stems from this way of working in which he thought of the tune before playing it The fingers tend to be predictable unless being led by the brain 17 According to Baker the end of the song was much heavier because it was one of the first mixes to be done with automation If you really listen to it the ballad starts off clean and as the opera section gets louder and louder the vocals get more and more distorted You can still hear this on the CD They are clearly distorted 22 Composition and analysis Edit Bohemian Rhapsody has been affiliated to the genres of progressive rock sometimes called symphonic rock 6 25 26 hard rock 27 28 art rock 29 and progressive pop 30 The song is highly unusual for a popular single in featuring no chorus combining disparate musical styles and containing lyrics which eschew conventional love based narratives and instead make allusions to murder and nihilism 5 Music scholar Sheila Whiteley suggests that the title draws strongly on contemporary rock ideology the individualism of the bohemian artists world with rhapsody affirming the romantic ideals of art rock 31 Commenting on bohemianism Judith Peraino said Mercury intended this song to be a mock opera something outside the norm of rock songs and it does follow a certain operatic logic Choruses of multi tracked voices alternate with aria like solos the emotions are excessive the plot confusing 32 Bohemian Rhapsody begins with an introduction then goes into a piano ballad before a guitar solo leads to an operatic interlude A hard rock part follows this and it concludes with a coda The song is in the keys of B major E major A major and F major and is predominantly in 44 meter This musical format of writing a song as a suite with changes in style tone and tempo throughout was uncommon in most mainstream pop and rock music but common in progressive rock a genre which had reached its artistic and commercial zenith between 1970 and 1975 in the music of British bands such as Jethro Tull Yes Genesis Emerson Lake amp Palmer Gentle Giant Van der Graaf Generator and Curved Air 33 The music of progressive rock was characterised by dramatic contrasts frequent shifts in tempo and in rhythmic character from one section of a composition to the next 34 Bands from the genre blended rock with classical music including its structural features compositional practices and instrumentation 35 Queen had embraced progressive rock as one of their many diverse influences 36 Bohemian Rhapsody parodies many different elements of opera by using bombastic choruses sarcastic recitative and distorted Italian operatic phrases 37 An embryonic version of this style had already been used in Mercury s earlier compositions for the band s My Fairy King 1973 and The March of the Black Queen 1974 Intro 0 00 0 49 Edit The song begins with a close five part harmony a cappella introduction in B major as evidenced by the presence of a V I cadence F7 B multi track recordings of Mercury although the video has all four members lip syncing this part The lyrics question whether life is real or just fantasy caught in a landslide before concluding that there can be no escape from reality After 20 seconds the grand piano enters the song modulates briefly to E major via another perfect cadence B 7 E and Mercury s voice alternates with the other vocal parts The narrator introduces himself as just a poor boy but declares that he needs no sympathy because he is easy come easy go and then little high little low when heard in stereo the words little high come from the left speaker and little low comes from the right the other respective speaker plays the piano at the same time chromatic side slipping on easy come easy go highlights the dream like atmosphere The end of this section is marked by the bass entrance and the cross handed piano vamp in B Ballad 0 49 2 37 Edit Mama just killed a man source source track This sample features the distinctive piano phrase in B and the first line of the first verse Problems playing this file See media help The piano begins in B major along with the entrance of John Deacon s bass guitar marking the onset of this section After it plays twice Mercury s vocals enter Throughout the section the vocals evolve from a softly sung harmony to an impassioned solo performance by Mercury The narrator explains to his mother that he has just killed a man with a gun against the man s head and in doing so has thrown his life away This confessional section Whiteley comments is affirmative of the nurturant and life giving force of the feminine and the need for absolution 31 In the middle of the verse 1 19 Taylor s drums enter and a descending chromatic run leads to a temporary modulation to E major up one fourth The narrator makes the second of several invocations to his mama in the new key continuing the original theme The narrator explains his regret over mak ing you cry and urging mama to carry on as if nothing really matters A brief descending variation of the piano phrase connects to the second verse Then the piano intro plays marking the start of the second verse As the ballad proceeds into its second verse the speaker confesses how ashamed he is by his act of murder as May enters on guitar and mimics the upper range of the piano at 1 50 May imitates a bell tree during the line sends shivers down my spine by playing the strings of his guitar on the other side of the bridge The narrator bids the world goodbye announcing he has got to go and prepares to face the truth admitting I don t want to die I sometimes wish I d never been born at all This is where the guitar solo enters Guitar solo 2 37 3 05 Edit Towards the end of the ballad section the band builds in intensity incorporating a guitar solo in E major played and composed by Brian May The intensity continues to build but once the bass line completes its descent establishing modulation to the new key A major the entire band cuts out abruptly at 3 03 except for quiet staccato A major quaver eighth note chords on the piano marking the start of the Opera section Opera 3 05 4 07 Edit Scaramouche Scaramouche will you do the fandango source source track The operatic segment enters immediately as May s solo abruptly concludes This vast shift in style is just one example of how the song rapidly changes throughout its running time Problems playing this file See media help A rapid series of rhythmic and harmonic changes introduces a pseudo operatic midsection which contains the bulk of the elaborate vocal multi tracking depicting the narrator s descent into hell While the underlying pulse of the song is maintained the dynamics vary greatly from bar to bar from only Mercury s voice accompanied by a piano to a multi voice choir supported by drums bass piano and timpani The choir effect was created by having May Mercury and Taylor repeatedly sing their vocal parts resulting in 180 separate overdubs These overdubs were then combined into successive submixes According to Roger Taylor the voices of May Mercury and himself combined created a wide vocal range Brian could get down quite low Freddie had a powerful voice through the middle and I was good at the high stuff The band wanted to create a wall of sound that starts down and goes all the way up 17 The band used the bell effect for lyrics Magnifico and let me go Also on let him go Taylor singing the top section carries his note on further after the rest of the choir have stopped singing Lyrical references in this passage include Scaramouche the fandango Galileo Galilei Figaro and Beelzebub with cries of Bismillah Arabic In the name of God We will not let you go as rival factions fight over his soul some wishing to let him go and spare him his life from this monstrosity with others sending him thunderbolts and lightning very very frightening to him In Freddie Mercury The Definitive Biography Lesley Ann Jones theorises that it is also a figurative representation of the four members Mercury May Taylor and Deacon respectively The section concludes with a full choral treatment of the lyric Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me on a block B major chord Roger Taylor tops the final chord with a falsetto B in the fifth octave B 5 Using the 24 track technology available at the time the opera section took about three weeks to finish 16 Producer Roy Thomas Baker said Every time Freddie came up with another Galileo I would add another piece of tape to the reel 19 Baker recalls that they kept wearing out the tape which meant having to do transfers 16 Hard rock 4 07 4 54 Edit The operatic section leads into a rock interlude with a guitar riff written by Mercury At 4 15 a quadruple tracked Mercury in stereo the four parts are panned two on the left and two on the right sings angry lyrics addressed to an unspecified you accusing them of betrayal and abuse and insisting can t do this to me baby before the final lines conclude that the singer just gotta get right outta an unspecified here Three ascending guitar runs follow Mercury then plays a similar B run on the piano as the song builds up to the finale with a ritardando Outro 4 54 5 55 Edit After Mercury plays ascending octaves of notes from the B mixolydian mode composed of the notes from the E scale the song then returns to the tempo and form of the introduction initially in E major before quickly modulating to C minor only to soon go through an abrupt short series of modulations bringing it back to C minor again in time for the final nothing really matters section A guitar accompanies the chorus ooh ooh yeah ooh yeah A double tracked twin guitar melody is played through an amplifier designed by John Deacon affectionately nicknamed the Deacy Amp Mercury s line Nothing really matters appears again cradled by light piano arpeggios suggesting both resignation minor tonalities and a new sense of freedom in the wide vocal span 38 After the line nothing really matters is repeated multiple times the song finally concludes in the key of E major but then changes again to F major just before it ends The final line Any way the wind blows is followed by the quiet sound of a large tam tam that finally expels the tension built up throughout the song Lyrics EditThe New York Times commented that the song s most distinct feature is the fatalistic lyrics Mercury refused to explain his composition other than to say it was about relationships the band is still protective of the song s secret 16 Brian May supports suggestions that the song contained veiled references to Mercury s personal traumas He recalls Freddie was a very complex person flippant and funny on the surface but he concealed insecurities and problems in squaring up his life with his childhood He never explained the lyrics but I think he put a lot of himself into that song 39 May though says the band had agreed that the core of a lyric was a private issue for the composer 16 In a BBC Three documentary about the making of Bohemian Rhapsody Roger Taylor maintains that the true meaning of the song is fairly self explanatory with just a bit of nonsense in the middle 17 It s one of those songs which has such a fantasy feel about it I think people should just listen to it think about it and then make up their own minds as to what it says to them Bohemian Rhapsody didn t just come out of thin air I did a bit of research although it was tongue in cheek and mock opera Why not Freddie Mercury 40 Despite this critics both journalistic and academic have speculated over the meaning behind the song s lyrics Some believe the lyrics describe a suicidal murderer haunted by demons or depict events just preceding an execution The latter explanation points to Albert Camus s novel The Stranger in which a young man confesses to an impulsive murder and has an epiphany before he is executed as probable inspiration When the band released a Greatest Hits cassette in Iran a leaflet in Persian was included with translation and explanations 41 In the explanation Queen states that Bohemian Rhapsody is about a young man who has accidentally killed someone and like Faust sold his soul to the devil On the night before his execution he calls for God saying Bismillah In the name of God in Arabic and with the help of angels regains his soul from Shaitan the devil in Arabic 42 Other critics interpreted the lyrics as Mercury s way of dealing with personal issues 16 Music scholar Sheila Whiteley observes that Mercury reached a turning point in his personal life in the year he wrote Bohemian Rhapsody 31 He had been living with Mary Austin for seven years but had just embarked on his first love affair with a man She suggests that the song provides an insight into Mercury s emotional state at the time living with Mary Mamma as in Mother Mary and wanting to break away Mamma mia let me go 38 Others suggest it as a veiled reference to coming out and dealing with the repercussions of the sodomy laws of the time 43 In addition the song can be interpreted as coming from the perspective of a person on death row reflecting on their life and preparing for their last moments Still others believe the lyrics were only written to fit with the music and had no intended meaning the D J television entertainer and comedian Kenny Everett who played an influential role in popularising the single on his radio show on Capital Radio quoted Mercury as claiming the lyrics were simply random rhyming nonsense 39 Release Edit One of Side A labels of the US single release When the band wanted to release the single in 1975 various executives suggested to them that due to its length of 5 minutes and 55 seconds it was too long and would never be a hit 44 The song was played to other musicians who commented the band had no hope of it ever being played on radio 17 According to producer Roy Thomas Baker he and the band bypassed this corporate assessment by playing the song for Capital Radio D J Kenny Everett we had a reel to reel copy but we told him he could only have it if he promised not to play it I won t play it he said winking 19 The plan worked Everett teased his listeners by playing only parts of the song Audience demand intensified when Everett played the full song on his show 14 times in 2 days 16 Hordes of fans attempted to buy the single the following Monday only to be told by record stores that it had not yet been released 19 The same weekend Paul Drew who ran the RKO General stations in the U S heard the track on Everett s show in London Drew managed to get a copy of the tape and started to play it in the U S which forced the hand of Queen s US label Elektra In an interview with Sound on Sound Baker observed that it was a strange situation where radio on both sides of the Atlantic was breaking a record that the record companies said would never get airplay 19 Eventually the unedited single was released with I m in Love with My Car as the B side Following Everett s escapade in October 1975 Eric Hall a record plugger gave a copy to David Diddy Hamilton to play on his weekday Radio One show Hall stated Monster Monster This could be a hit 45 The song became the 1975 UK Christmas number one holding the top position for nine weeks 38 Bohemian Rhapsody was the first song ever to get to number one in the UK twice with the same version 46 and is also the only single to have been Christmas number one twice with the same version The second was upon its re release as a double A side single with These Are the Days of Our Lives in 1991 following Mercury s death staying at number one for five weeks 47 The re released version sold 673 000 copies in 1991 in the UK 48 In the US the single was also a success although initially to a lesser extent than in the UK The single released in December 1975 reached number nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America for sales of one million copies 49 In a retrospective article Anthony DeCurtis of Rolling Stone explained why the song performed less strongly in the US charts by saying that it is the quintessential example of the kind of thing that doesn t exactly go over well in America 17 Its chart run of 24 weeks however placed it at number 18 on Billboard s year end chart higher than some number 1s of the year 50 With the Canadian record buying public the single fared better reaching number one in the RPM national singles chart for the week ending 1 May 1976 51 In the US Bohemian Rhapsody was re released as a double A side cassette single with The Show Must Go On in January 1992 two months after the death of Freddie Mercury with proceeds going to the Magic Johnson Foundation for AIDS research The song re entered the Billboard Hot 100 chart after 16 years reaching number two and spending 17 weeks on the chart 52 After the release of the Queen biopic named after the song it re entered the charts for a third time at number 33 marking 26 years since it last charted 53 In March 2021 it was certified Diamond 10 platinum in the US for combined digital sales and streams equal to 10 million units 54 It had sold 4 4 million digital copies in the US as of September 2017 update 55 Promotional video EditThough some artists had made video clips to accompany songs including Queen themselves for example their earlier singles Keep Yourself Alive Liar Seven Seas of Rhye and Killer Queen already had pop promos as they were known at the time it was only after the success of Bohemian Rhapsody that it became a regular practice for record companies to produce promotional videos for artists single releases 56 The Guardian stated it ensured videos would henceforth be a mandatory tool in the marketing of music 8 These videos could then be shown on television shows around the world such as the BBC s Top of the Pops without the need for the artist to appear in person A promo video also allowed the artist to have their music broadcast and accompanied by their own choice of visuals rather than dancers such as Pan s People According to May the video was produced so that the band could avoid miming on Top of the Pops since they would have looked off miming to such a complex song 39 He also said that the band knew they would be set to appear at Dundee s Caird Hall on tour a date which clashed with the programme thus a promo would solve the issue 17 The video has been hailed as launching the MTV age 17 57 The Bohemian Rhapsody music video was shot at Elstree Studios in November 1975 The band used Trillion a subsidiary of Trident Studios their former management company and recording studio They hired one of their trucks and got it to Elstree Studios in Hertfordshire where the band were rehearsing for their tour The video was directed by Bruce Gowers who had directed a video of the band s 1974 performance at the Rainbow Theatre in London and was recorded by cameraman Barry Dodd and assistant director floor manager Jim McCutcheon The video was recorded in just four hours on 10 November 1975 at a cost of 4 500 20 Gowers reported that the band was involved in the discussion of the video and the result and was a co operative to that extent but there was only one leader 17 It became the first record to be pushed into the forefront by virtue of a video Queen were certainly the first band to create a concept video The video captured the musical imagery perfectly You cannot hear that music without seeing the visuals in your mind s eye Rock DJ Tommy Vance 58 The video opens with a shot of the four band members standing in diamond formation with their heads tilted back in near darkness as they sing the a cappella part 59 The lights fade up and the shots cross fade into close ups of Mercury The composition of the shot is the same as Mick Rock s cover photograph for their second album Queen II The photo inspired by a photograph of actress Marlene Dietrich was the band s favourite image of themselves 17 The video then fades into them playing their instruments In the opera section of the video the scene reverts to the Queen II standing positions after which they perform once again on stage during the hard rock segment In the closing seconds of the video Roger Taylor is depicted stripped to the waist striking the tam tam in the manner of the trademark of the Rank Organisation s Gongman familiar in the UK as the opening of all Rank film productions 60 All of the special effects were achieved during the recording rather than editing The visual effect of Mercury s face cascading away during the echoed lines Magnifico and Let me go was accomplished by pointing the camera at a monitor giving visual feedback a glare analogous to audio feedback The honeycomb illusion was created using a shaped lens The video was edited within five hours because it was due to be broadcast the same week in which it was taped The video was sent to the BBC as soon as it was completed and aired for the first time on Top of the Pops in November 1975 17 Critical reception EditAlthough the song has become one of the most revered in popular music history 61 the initial critical reaction was mixed The UK music papers reacted with bemusement recognising that the song was original and technically accomplished but they mostly remained indifferent Pete Erskine of NME observed that It ll be interesting to see whether it ll be played in its entirety on the radio It s performed extremely well but more in terms of production than anything else Someone somewhere has decided that the boys next release must sound epic And it does They sound extremely self important 62 Allan Jones of Melody Maker was unimpressed describing the song as a superficially impressive pastiche of incongruous musical styles and that Queen contrived to approximate the demented fury of the Balham Amateur Operatic Society performing The Pirates of Penzance Bohemian Rhapsody is full of drama passion and romance and sounds rather like one of those mini opera affairs that Pete Townsend sic used to tack on to the end of Who albums before concluding The significance of the composition eludes me totally though I must admit to finding it horrifically fascinating It s likely to be a hit of enormous proportions despite its length 63 Ray Fox Cumming of Record Mirror was also left unmoved saying It has no immediate selling point whatsoever among its many parts there s scarcely a shred of a tune and certainly no one line to latch onto There s no denying that it s devilishly clever encompassing everything from bits of operatic harmonies to snatches that sound like Sparks and David Cassidy but in the end the whole adds up to less than the sum of its parts He did however say that it was unthinkable that it wouldn t be a hit 64 The most positive review came from Sounds which called it impossibly disjointed and complex but a dazzlingly clever epic from the fevered mind of Freddie Mercury 65 Cash Box called it a softly sung ode to the prospect of moving on from staid ways with good singing and good production 66 Record World called it a majestic vocal performance that takes on operatic proportions 67 Legacy EditMusical impact Edit The Queen Extravaganza performing the song at the Fox Theatre Detroit in 2012 In 1976 when asked for his opinion on Bohemian Rhapsody the Beach Boys leader Brian Wilson praised the song as the most competitive thing that s come along in ages and a fulfillment and an answer to a teenage prayer of artistic music 68 Producer Steve Levine said the track broke all sonic production barriers in a fashion similar to the Beach Boys Good Vibrations 1966 Phil Spector s Be My Baby 1963 and 10cc s I m Not in Love 1975 69 Greg Lake whose song I Believe in Father Christmas was kept from number one in the UK by Bohemian Rhapsody when it was released in 1975 acknowledged that he was beaten by one of the greatest records ever made describing it as a once in a lifetime recording 70 Addressing the song s enduring popularity author and music lecturer Jochen Eisentraut wrote in 2012 A year before punk made it unfashionable progressive rock had an astounding success with the theoretically over length nearly 6 minute single Bohemian Rhapsody which bore many of the hallmarks of the prog genre He said it was unique at this point to hear a hit single in this style it was more accessible than other music of the genre and was able to communicate beyond the usual confines of the style 6 Author and progressive rock historian Stephen Lambe called it a remarkable single and said it provides a neat but coincidental bridge between prog in its prime and the move to more aggressive songwriting suggesting the song feels like a grotesque although probably unintentional parody of progressive rock 61 The New Rolling Stone Album Guide described it as either a prog rock benchmark or the most convoluted novelty song ever recorded 71 Writing for the BBC in 2015 the Chicago Tribune s music critic Greg Kot called it a prog rock pocket operetta and said the song s reign as a work of wigged out genius rather than a dated gimmick testifies to its go for broke attitude one that has resonated across generations 25 In 2009 The Guardian s music critic Tom Service examined the song s relationship with the traditions of classical music describing its popularity as one of the strangest musical phenomena out there The precedents of Bohemian Rhapsody are as much in the 19th century classical traditions of rhapsodic quasi improvisational reveries like say the piano works of Schumann or Chopin or the tone poems of Strauss or Liszt as they are in prog rock or the contemporary pop of 1975 That s because the song manages a sleight of musical hand that only a handful of real master musicians have managed the illusion that its huge variety of styles from intro to ballad to operatic excess to hard rock to reflective coda are unified into a single statement a drama that somehow makes sense It s a classic example of the unity in diversity that high minded musical commentators have heard in the symphonies of Beethoven or the operas of Mozart And that s exactly what the piece is a miniature operatic rhapsodic symphonic tone poem 5 A comparison was also made between the song and Led Zeppelin s 1971 epic Stairway to Heaven by music writers Pete Prown and HP Newquist They observed both songs were a slow introspective beginning and gradual climb to a raging metal jam and back again with the notable distinction being while Zeppelin meshed folk influences with heavy metal Queen opted for the light grandeur of the operetta as part of its hard rock They said for sheer cleverness alone not to mention May s riveting electric work Bohemian Rhapsody rightfully became one of the top singles of 1975 and established Queen in the elite of seventies rock bands 27 In 2015 The Economist described it as one of the most innovative pieces of the progressive rock era It wrote though Led Zeppelin s John Paul Jones and the Beatles Paul McCartney had experimented with symphonic elements and Roger Waters of Pink Floyd and Pete Townshend of the Who had created narrative albums with distinct movements none had had the audacity to import a miniature opera into rock music 28 Wayne s World Edit In 1992 the song enjoyed renewed popularity in the United States after being featured in a scene in the film Wayne s World in which the titular character and his friends headbang in a car to the rock part near the end of the song 72 The film s director Penelope Spheeris was hesitant to use the song as it did not entirely fit with the lead characters who were fans of less flamboyant hard rock and heavy metal Mike Myers insisted that the song fit the scene 73 According to music scholar Theodore Gracyk by 1992 when the film was released even classic rock stations had stopped playing the almost six minute song Gracyk suggests that beginning the tape in the middle of the song after the lyrics which provide the song s narrative forces the film s audience to respond to its presence in the scene without the commentary of the lyrics 74 Helped by the song the soundtrack album of the film was a major hit 75 In connection with this a new video was released interspersing excerpts from the film with footage from the original Queen video along with some live footage of the band Myers was horrified that the record company had mixed clips from Wayne s World with Queen s original video fearing that this would upset the band He said they ve just whizzed on a Picasso He asked the record company to tell Queen that the video was not his idea and that he apologised to them The band though sent a reply simply saying Thank you for using our song This astonished Myers who responded Thank you for even letting me touch the hem of your garments 76 The Wayne s World video version of Bohemian Rhapsody won Queen its only MTV Video Music Award for Best Video from a Film 77 When remaining members Brian May and Roger Taylor took the stage to accept the award Brian May was overcome with emotion and said that Freddie would be tickled In the final scene of the video a pose of the band from the video from the original Bohemian Rhapsody clip morphs into an identically posed 1985 photo first featured in the One Vision video In the 2018 Queen biopic feature film Bohemian Rhapsody Myers makes a cameo as a fictional record executive who pans the song and refuses to release it as a single proclaiming that it is too long for radio and that it is not a song that teenagers can crank up the volume in their car and bang their heads to a reference to the aforementioned scene in Wayne s World 78 Achievements and accolades Edit The song has won numerous awards and has been covered and parodied by many artists At the 19th Annual Grammy Awards in February 1977 Bohemian Rhapsody received two Grammy Award nominations for Best Pop Vocal Performance by a Duo Group or Chorus and Best Arrangement for Voices 79 80 In October 1977 only two years after its release the British Phonographic Industry named Bohemian Rhapsody as the best British single of the period 1952 77 74 It is a regular entry in greatest songs polls and it was named by the Guinness Book of Records in 2002 as the top British single of all time 16 The song is also listed in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame s 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll 81 In 2004 the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame 12 As of 2004 update Bohemian Rhapsody is the second most played song on British radio in clubs and on jukeboxes collectively after Procol Harum s A Whiter Shade of Pale 82 On 30 September 2007 for BBC Radio 1 s 40th birthday it was revealed on The Radio 1 Chart Show that Bohemian Rhapsody had been the most played song since Radio 1 s launch 83 In December 2018 Bohemian Rhapsody officially became the most streamed song from the 20th century surpassing Nirvana s Smells Like Teen Spirit and Guns N Roses Sweet Child o Mine 13 84 Bohemian Rhapsody also became the most streamed classic rock song of all time 13 The number of downloads of the song and original video exceeded 1 6 billion downloads across global on demand streaming services 84 The video surpassed one billion views on YouTube in July 2019 making it the oldest music video to reach one billion on the platform and the first pre 1990s song to reach that figure 85 86 In 2022 the single was selected by the U S Library of Congress for preservation in the National Recording Registry as being culturally historically or aesthetically significant 87 Polls Edit In a 2001 poll of more than 50 000 readers of The Observer newspaper and viewers of British TV s Channel 4 for the 100 best number one singles of all time the song came second to John Lennon s Imagine 88 In a 2002 poll of more than 31 000 people conducted for Guinness World Records British Hit Singles Bohemian Rhapsody was voted Britain s favourite single beating Lennon s Imagine to the top spot 89 In 2002 it came in 10th in a BBC World Service poll to find the world s favourite song 90 It has been in the top five of the Dutch annual Top 100 Aller Tijden All Time Top 100 Singles since 1977 reaching number one on eight occasions more than any other artist 91 In 1999 the annual Top 2000 poll commenced to find the best songs ever made and Bohemian Rhapsody has been ranked number one in all but five years 2005 2010 2014 2015 and 2020 when it was number two 92 In a 2012 readers poll conducted by Rolling Stone magazine Bohemian Rhapsody was voted the best vocal performance in rock history 93 In 2010 the song ranked at 166 on Rolling Stone s 500 Greatest Songs of All Time list 94 and was re ranked at number 17 in 2021 10 In 2012 the song topped an ITV poll in the UK to find The Nation s Favourite Number One over 60 years of music ahead of Michael Jackson s Billie Jean number two Adele s Someone like You number three Oasis Don t Look Back in Anger number four and The Beatles Hey Jude number five 9 The song was also ranked number five in RadioMafia s list of Top 500 Songs 95 Cover versions Edit Robbie Williams on stage in Poland in 2015 performing the song with the Queen image in the background See also List of Bohemian Rhapsody cover versions Over two dozen artists have recorded or performed cover versions of Bohemian Rhapsody including charted single releases by Bad News a 1986 spoof version produced by Brian May which reached UK number 44 The Braids an R amp B version recorded for the soundtrack to the 1996 film High School High and which peaked at UK number 21 US number 42 and Canada number 13 96 Panic at the Disco a version recorded for the soundtrack of the 2016 film Suicide Squad and which peaked at UK number 80 US number 64 and Canada number 47 97 A video cover featuring The Muppets also went viral 98 and was subsequently released as a single in late 2009 peaking at number 32 in the UK 99 Weird Al Yankovic s 1993 album Alapalooza includes a version of the song entitled Bohemian Polka which is a rearrangement of the entire song as a polka 100 101 40th anniversary Edit To mark the 40th anniversary of Bohemian Rhapsody the song was released on a limited edition 12 vinyl with the original B side I m In Love With My Car on 27 November 2015 for Record Store Day 2015 Queen also released A Night At The Odeon Live At Hammersmith 75 on CD DVD Video and Blu ray This includes the first live professionally recorded performance of Bohemian Rhapsody 102 However the very first recording and live performance of Bohemian Rhapsody was the performance on 14 November 1975 in Liverpool 103 Live performances Edit Bohemian Rhapsody live at Milton Keynes Bowl 1982 source source track In live performances the operatic segment would be played from tape as it was too complicated for the band to perform live As the heavy rock segment followed the band would return to the stage Problems playing this file See media help The a cappella opening was too complex to perform live so Mercury tried various ways of introducing the song When Mustapha became a live favourite Mercury would often sub in that song s a cappella opening which was easier to reproduce live as it was only one voice this combination features in their 1979 live album Live Killers 104 During their 1982 Hot Space Tour and occasionally at other times Mercury would do a piano improvisation generally the introduction to Death on Two Legs that ended with the first notes of the song Often the preceding song would end and Mercury would sit at the piano say a quick word and start playing the ballad section At Live Aid where Bohemian Rhapsody was their opening song Mercury commenced with the ballad section 105 From left to right Deacon Taylor and May in concert in Hanover in 1979 Behind the drum kit is the tam tam used at the end of Bohemian Rhapsody Initially following the song s release the operatic middle section proved a problem for the band Because of extensive multi tracking it could not be performed on stage 106 The band did not have enough of a break between the Sheer Heart Attack and A Night at the Opera tours to find a way to make it work live so they split the song into three sections that were played throughout the night The opening and closing ballads were played as part of a medley with Killer Queen and March of the Black Queen taking the place of the operatic and hard rock sections In 1976 concerts where the same medley was played the operatic section from the album would be played from tape as the introduction to the setlist During this playback Mercury would appear briefly to sing live for the line I see a little sillhouetto of a man 107 As the song segued into the hard rock section the band would emerge on the smoke filled stage the playback would end at this point and the hard rock section would be performed live without the final ballad section which appeared later in the set Footage of Mercury singing Magnifico in the operatic section of the Bohemian Rhapsody music video during a Queen Adam Lambert concert at the United Center Chicago June 2014 Starting with the A Day at the Races Tour in 1977 the band adopted their lasting way of playing the song live The opening ballad would be played on stage and after May s guitar solo the lights would go down the band would leave the stage and the operatic section would be played from tape while coloured stage lights provided a light show based around the voices of the opera section 106 Most playings of the opera section from the tape would often be accompanied by a portion of the song s music video containing the footage used for the operatic portion of the song Other playings would be played over montages of footage filmed from the band members other experiences throughout their daily lives A blast of pyrotechnics after Taylor s high note on the final for me would announce the band s return for the hard rock section and closing ballad Queen played the song in this form all through the Magic Tour of 1986 This style was also used for the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert with Elton John singing the opening ballad and then after the taped operatic section Axl Rose singing the hard rock section John and Rose sang the closing ballad part together in a duet 108 Bohemian Rhapsody was performed by Queen Paul Rodgers throughout their tours accompanied by a video of Mercury 109 Footage from the Live at Wembley 86 was used for the 2005 06 tour and the 1981 Montreal performance used for the Rock the Cosmos Tour As with the Queen tours the band went backstage for the operatic section which was accompanied by a video tribute to Freddie Mercury When the hard rock section began the lights came back up to the full band on stage including Rodgers who took over lead vocals Rodgers duetted with the recording of Mercury for the outro section allowing the audience to sing the final Nothing really matters to me while the taped Mercury took a bow for the crowd Rodgers would then repeat the line and the final line Any way the wind blows was delivered with one last shot of Mercury smiling at the audience Commenting upon this staging Brian May says that they had to rise to the challenge of getting Freddie in there in a way which gave him his rightful place but without demeaning Paul in any way It also kept us live and present although conscious and proud of our past as we logically should be 16 Since 2012 May and Taylor have toured with former American Idol contestant Adam Lambert under the name Queen Adam Lambert following two one off performances together in 2009 and 2011 with Bohemian Rhapsody regularly included at the end of their set 110 111 Charts EditWeekly charts Edit Chart 1975 1976 PeakpositionAustralia Kent Music Report 112 1Belgium Ultratop 50 Flanders 113 1Belgium Ultratop 50 Wallonia 114 7Canada Top Singles RPM 51 1Finland Suomen Virallinen 115 10Netherlands Dutch Top 40 116 1Netherlands Single Top 100 117 1New Zealand Recorded Music NZ 118 1Norway VG lista 119 4South Africa Springbok Radio 120 2Spain AFE 121 4Sweden Sverigetopplistan 122 18Switzerland Schweizer Hitparade 123 4UK Singles OCC 124 1US Billboard Hot 100 125 9US Cash Box 126 6West Germany Official German Charts 127 7Chart 1991 PeakpositionIreland IRMA 128 with These Are the Days of Our Lives 1UK Singles OCC 129 with These Are the Days of Our Lives 1Chart 1992 PeakpositionAustralia ARIA 130 5Austria O3 Austria Top 40 131 8Belgium Ultratop 50 Flanders 113 6Canada Top Singles RPM 132 18Canada Adult Contemporary RPM 133 36Denmark IFPI 134 3Europe Eurochart Hot 100 135 3Finland Suomen virallinen lista 115 17France SNEP 136 15Germany Official German Charts 137 with These Are the Days of Our Lives 16Netherlands Dutch Top 40 138 2Netherlands Single Top 100 117 1New Zealand Recorded Music NZ 118 16Switzerland Schweizer Hitparade 123 8US Billboard Hot 100 139 2US Cash Box 140 1Chart 2018 2019 PeakpositionAustralia ARIA 130 17Austria O3 Austria Top 40 131 30Belgium Ultratop 50 Flanders 113 3Czech Republic Singles Digital Top 100 141 1Canada Canadian Hot 100 142 26Canadian Digital Song Sales 143 6Colombia Promusica 144 12France SNEP Singles Telecharges 145 3France SNEP Megafusion 146 21France SNEP Streaming 147 27Greece International Digital Singles IFPI 148 8Hungary Single Top 40 149 4Hungary Stream Top 40 150 3Italy FIMI 151 10Japan Japan Hot 100 152 11Lithuania AGATA 153 4Malaysia RIM 154 8Netherlands Single Top 100 117 26New Zealand Recorded Music NZ 118 20Portugal AFP 155 21Slovakia Singles Digital Top 100 156 5Singapore RIAS 157 24Spain PROMUSICAE 158 26Sweden Sverigetopplistan 122 33Switzerland Schweizer Hitparade 123 21UK Singles OCC 159 45US Billboard Hot 100 160 33US Hot Rock amp Alternative Songs Billboard 161 2Chart 2020 2022 PeakpositionGlobal 200 Billboard 162 97 Year end charts Edit Chart 1975 PositionUK Singles BMRB 163 22Chart 1976 PositionAustralia Kent Music Report 164 165 2Belgium Ultratop Flanders 166 14Canada RPM Top 100 167 6Netherlands Dutch Top 40 168 9Netherlands Single Top 100 169 11UK Singles BMRB 170 171 35US Billboard Hot 100 50 18US Cash Box Singles 172 52Chart 1991 PositionUK Singles Gallup 173 2Chart 1992 PositionAustralia ARIA 174 59Belgium Ultratop 175 45Europe Eurochart Hot 100 176 34Netherlands Dutch Top 40 177 28Netherlands Single Top 100 178 24New Zealand RIANZ 179 41UK Singles Gallup 180 15US Billboard Hot 100 181 39US Cash Box Singles 182 22Chart 2006 PositionUK Singles OCC 183 199Chart 2018 PositionFrance SNEP 184 146Hungary Single Top 40 185 40Iceland Plotutidindi 186 97Portugal AFP 187 122US Hot Rock Songs Billboard 188 31Chart 2019 PositionAustralia ARIA 189 67Czech Albums CNS IFPI 190 7France SNEP 191 60Hungary Single Top 40 192 29Italy FIMI 193 73Japan Japan Hot 100 194 49Latvia LAIPA 195 75Portugal AFP 196 79Sweden Sverigetopplistan 197 95Switzerland Schweizer Hitparade 198 39UK Singles OCC 199 64US Hot Rock Songs Billboard 200 7US Rolling Stone Top 100 201 67Chart 2020 PositionFrance SNEP 202 158Chart 2021 PositionFrance SNEP 203 177Global 200 Billboard 204 87Portugal AFP 205 146Chart 2022 PositionGlobal 200 Billboard 206 75Decade end charts Edit Chart 1970 1979 PositionUK Singles OCC 207 7All time charts Edit Chart 2018 PositionUK Singles OCC 208 3Sales and certifications EditRegion Certification Certified units salesAustralia ARIA 209 8 Platinum 560 000 Canada Music Canada 210 7 Platinum 560 000 Denmark IFPI Danmark 211 2 Platinum 180 000 Germany BVMI 212 Gold 250 000 Italy FIMI 213 4 Platinum 200 000 Japan RIAJ 214 Gold 100 000 New Zealand RMNZ 215 2 Platinum 60 000 Portugal AFP 216 4 Platinum 160 000 Spain PROMUSICAE 217 3 Platinum 150 000 United Kingdom BPI 219 4 Platinum 2 540 604 218 United States RIAA 49 Physical Gold 1 000 000 United States RIAA 49 Digital 10 Platinum 10 000 000 StreamingGreece IFPI Greece 220 Platinum 2 000 000 Sales figures based on certification alone Shipments figures based on certification alone Sales streaming figures based on certification alone Streaming only figures based on certification alone Queen comments on the song EditI always wanted to do something operatic I wanted something with a mood setter at the start going into a rock type of thing which completely breaks off into an opera section a vicious twist and then returns to the theme I don t really know anything about opera myself Just certain pieces I wanted to create what I thought Queen could do It s not authentic certainly not It s no sort of pinch out of Magic Flute It was as far as my limited capacity could take me 221 Freddie Mercury 1976 I m going to shatter some illusions it was just one of those pieces I wrote for the album just writing my batch of songs In its early stages I almost rejected it but then it grew We started deciding on a single about halfway through There were a few contenders we were thinking of The Prophet s Song at one point but then Bohemian Rhapsody seemed the one There was a time when the others wanted to chop it around a bit but I refused If it was going to be released it would be in its entirety We knew it was very risky but we had so much confidence in that song I did anyway I felt underneath it all that if it was successful it would earn a lot of respect People were all going You re joking they ll never play it you ll only hear the first few bars and then they ll fade it out We had numerous rows EMI were shocked a six minute single You must be joking The same in America oh you just got away with it in Britain 222 Freddie Mercury 1976 When we finished the album the Night at the Opera album that was the track on it that we thought we were gonna release as a single in the UK first And when we released it in Britain we didn t necessarily think it d be released in America cause we know even over here you know the AM tastes are even more hesitates stricter Anyway we did have thoughts about even in the UK perhaps editing it down at all but we listened to it over and over again and there was no way we could edit it We tried a few ideas but if you edited it you always lost some part of the song so we had to leave it all in And luckily it took off anyway 223 John Deacon 1977 The vocal harmonies was something we wanted to do from the beginning as we are always keen to do that kind of thing We wanted to be a group that could do the heaviness of hard rock but also have harmonies swooping around all over the place We thought there was some real power and emotion in that combination The guitar solo was pretty much off the cuff except I think I had plenty of time to think about that one I remember playing along with it in the studio for a while when other things were being done I knew what kind of melody I wanted to play 224 Brian May 1982Personnel EditSource 17 Freddie Mercury lead and backing vocals piano operatic vocals middle register Brian May electric guitar operatic vocals low register Roger Taylor drums timpani gong operatic vocals high register John Deacon bass guitar backing vocalsSee also EditList of Bohemian Rhapsody cover versions List of best selling singles in the United Kingdom List of best selling singles in the United StatesCitations Edit Lemieux Patrick Unger Adam 11 April 2018 Queen Chronology Bohemian Rhapsody p 24 ISBN 9781926462103 Retrieved 6 January 2023 August 24 Queen begins recording their fourth album with two weeks September 7th of sessions at Rockfield Studios Queen Chronology Bohemian Rhapsody Patrick Lemieux Adam Unger 11 April 2018 p 24 ISBN 9781926462103 Retrieved 6 January 2023 Early September Bohemian Rhapsody the backing track is recorded during this time along with other Opera backing tracks Queen Chronology Bohemian Rhapsody Patrick Lemieux Adam Unger 11 April 2018 p 24 ISBN 9781926462103 Retrieved 6 January 2023 Mid September November following Rockfield sessions Queen continues working on their 4th album in London a b Horton Matthew 24 June 2015 Queen 20 Things You Probably Never Knew About Bohemian Rhapsody NME Archived from the original on 24 September 2015 Retrieved 24 August 2015 a masterful if ludicrous six minute suite of operatic cock rock a b c Service Tom 8 December 2009 Bohemian Rhapsody Mamma we ve killed a song The Guardian London Archived from the original on 19 December 2015 Retrieved 23 August 2015 a b c Eisentraut Jochen 2012 The Accessibility of Music Participation Reception and Contact Cambridge University Press p 111 ISBN 978 1107024830 progressive rock had an astounding success with the theoretically over length nearly 6 minute single Bohemian Rhapsody which bore many of the hallmarks of the prog genre Sutherland Mark 30 October 2015 Party On Queen s Brian May Remembers Bohemian Rhapsody on 40th Anniversary Rolling Stone Archived from the original on 4 January 2016 Retrieved 4 January 2016 a b Hann Michael 12 June 2011 Queen herald the age of the music video The Guardian Archived from the original on 11 March 2017 Retrieved 17 December 2016 a b Queen s Bohemian Rhapsody voted the Nation s Favourite Number 1 Single Archived 28 May 2019 at the Wayback Machine Official Charts Company Retrieved 17 January 2012 a b Bohemian Rhapsody ranked 17 on Rolling Stone 500 Greatest Songs List Rolling Stone 15 September 2021 Retrieved 16 September 2021 Reader s Poll The Best Vocal Performances in Rock History Rolling Stone 5 September 2012 Archived from the original on 22 December 2017 Retrieved 19 December 2017 a b The Recording Academy 2004 a b c Thompson Simon Queen s Bohemian Rhapsody Is Officially The World s Most Streamed Song Forbes Archived from the original on 16 December 2018 Retrieved 16 December 2018 Freddie Mercury interview in Sydney 1985 1080p video 6 January 2014 Archived from the original on 2 March 2020 Retrieved 4 December 2018 via YouTube Smith Chris 2011 Queen Days of our Lives BBC a b c d e f g h i Chiu 2005 a b c d e f g h i j k l m n BBC 2004b Salter Jessica 26 February 2011 Roger Taylor remembers rehearsing with Queen in 1975 The Daily Telegraph Archived from the original on 12 July 2017 Retrieved 12 March 2019 a b c d e f Cunningham 1995 a b c Hodkinson 2004 p 192 Pegg Nicholas 2016 The Complete David Bowie Revised and Updated ed London Titan Books p 347 ISBN 978 1 78565 365 0 a b Clark Rick 1 April 1999 Roy Thomas Baker Taking chances and making hits Mix Archived from the original on 26 April 2005 Retrieved 28 August 2019 Classic Albums 2006 Chapman Phil July 2019 Guide to Queen This Day in Music s Guide This Day in Music Books p 209 ISBN 978 1 9995927 8 3 a b Kot Greg 24 August 2015 The strangest rock classic ever BBC Archived from the original on 27 April 2018 Retrieved 25 August 2015 The prog rock pocket operetta has sold more than 6 million copies worldwide Fowles Paul 2009 A Concise History of Rock Music Mel Bay Publications p 243 ISBN 978 0786666430 Bohemian Rhapsody could easily have been dismissed as a fitting farewell to the dying genre of symphonic rock had it not been for the fact that it was this record alone that elevated a previously middle ranking commercial rock band to superstar status a b Prown Pete Newquist H P 1997 Legends of Rock Guitar The essential reference of rock s greatest guitarists Hal Leonard Corporation p 106 ISBN 978 0793540426 Bohemian Rhapsody was akin to Led Zeppelin s Stairway to Heaven But while Zeppelin meshed folk influences with heavy metal Queen opted for the light grandeur of the operetta as part of its hard rock a b Bohemian Rhapsody s long legacy The Economist 27 November 2015 Archived from the original on 7 November 2017 Retrieved 6 November 2017 Swanson Dave 28 April 2012 No 7 Queen Bohemian Rhapsody Top 100 Classic Rock Songs Ultimate Classic Rock Retrieved 6 October 2022 This record truly defines the term art rock Breithaupt Don Breithaupt Jeff 2000 Night Moves Pop music in the late 70s St Martin s Press p 67 ISBN 978 0 312 19821 3 a b c Whiteley 2006 p 252 Peraino 2005 p 230 Cateforis Theo 2012 The Rock History Reader Routledge p 159 ISBN 978 0415892131 Macan Edward 1997 Rocking the Classics English progressive rock and the counter culture Oxford University Press p 193 ISBN 978 0195098884 John Covach Graeme M Boone eds 1997 Understanding Rock Essays in Musical Analysis Oxford University Press p 8 ISBN 978 0195100051 Erlewine Stephen Thomas Queen biography AllMusic Archived from the original on 7 September 2015 Retrieved 23 August 2015 McLeod Ken May 2001 Bohemian rhapsodies Operatic influences on rock music Popular Music Cambridge University Press 20 2 189 203 doi 10 1017 s0261143001001404 JSTOR 853651 S2CID 162432547 a b c Whiteley 2006 p 253 a b c Black 2002 Davis 1993 p 20 Translation and explanations may refer to a book published in Iran by Sarah Sefati and Farhad Arkani 2000 called The March of the Black Queen which included the whole biography of the band and complete lyrics with Persian translation BBC 2004a Is Queen s Bohemian Rhapsody actually about coming out Pitchfork 7 August 2018 Archived from the original on 7 August 2018 Retrieved 7 August 2018 Bohemian rhapsody celebrates 40 years 19 things you didn t know about the queen anthem Express online 30 October 2015 Archived from the original on 21 September 2016 Retrieved 28 September 2016 Jones Lesley Ann 2012 Freddie Mercury The Definitive Biography Hodder amp Stoughton p 151 ISBN 978 1 44473 369 3 BBC 2005 Queen s Bohemian Rhapsody voted the Nation s Favourite Number 1 Single Official Charts Company Retrieved 19 June 2021 Rob Copsey 21 May 2021 Official Top 40 best selling songs of 1991 Official Charts Retrieved 11 July 2021 a b c American single certifications Queen Bohemian Rhapsody Recording Industry Association of America Retrieved 27 March 2021 a b Singles Billboard Billboard s Talent in Action supplement 25 December 1976 p 6 a b Top RPM Singles Issue 4125a RPM Library and Archives Canada Billboard 25 July 1992 p 8 25 July 1992 Queen s Bohemian Rhapsody Makes Rare Third Visit to Billboard Hot 100 Billboard 13 November 2018 Archived from the original on 14 November 2018 Retrieved 13 November 2018 Queen s Bohemian Rhapsody becomes first song by a British band to be RIAA certified Diamond ABC News Retrieved 12 July 2021 Nielsen SoundScan charts Digital Songs Week Ending 09 14 2017 PDF Nielsen SoundScan Archived from the original PDF on 19 September 2017 Retrieved 19 September 2017 Muikku Jari 1990 On the role and tasks of a record producer Popular Music and Society 14 1 25 33 doi 10 1080 03007769008591381 Newcomb Alyssa 11 December 2018 And the most streamed song of the century is Bohemian Rhapsody NBC News Retrieved 27 September 2020 It s widely credited with being the first promotional music video for a song paving the way for the MTV generation Jones 2012 pp 150 151 Hamrogue Sasha Bottomley C 22 July 2004 Mick Rock Shooting Up VH1 Archived from the original on 8 August 2007 Retrieved 9 March 2019 Walden Joshua S 2013 Representation in Western Music Chapter 5 Video cultures Bohemian Rhapsody Wayne s World and beyond Cambridge University Press p 81 a b Lambe Stephen 2013 Citizens of Hope and Glory The Story of Progressive Rock Second ed The Hill Stroud Amberley Publishing p 58 ISBN 9781445607375 Retrieved 19 November 2014 Erskine Pete 1 November 1975 Platters NME p 19 Jones Allan 1 November 1975 All that glitters is not Melody Maker p 16 Fox Cumming Ray 1 November 1975 Singles Record Mirror amp Disc p 23 Singles Sounds 1 November 1975 p 26 CashBox Singles Reviews PDF Cash Box 20 December 1975 p 28 Archived PDF from the original on 9 October 2022 Retrieved 11 December 2021 Hits of the Week PDF Record World 20 December 1975 p 1 Retrieved 12 February 2023 Cromelin Richard 7 August 1976 Pet Sounds amp The California Consciousness Sounds Archived from the original on 6 June 2014 Retrieved 15 May 2014 Jones 2012 p 133 Mulholland Garry 19 December 2014 The Making Of Greg Lake s I Believe In Father Christmas Uncut Archived from the original on 10 September 2015 Retrieved 17 August 2015 Nathan Brackett Christian Hoard eds 2004 The New Rolling Stone Album Guide Simon amp Schuster Ltd p 668 ISBN 978 0743201698 Scapelliti Christopher 5 June 2017 Brian May Wayne s World Bohemian Rhapsody Scene Hit Close to Home Guitar World Archived from the original on 8 October 2019 Retrieved 7 November 2018 Gracyk 2007 p 64 a b Gracyk 2007 p 63 Gracyk 2007 p 65 Made in Heaven video documentary Champions of the World Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Mike Myers references Wayne s World during his Bohemian Rhapsody cameo NME Archived from the original on 12 November 2018 Retrieved 12 November 2018 Grammy Award Nominees 1977 Grammy Award Winners www awardsandshows com Retrieved 2 May 2017 Queen Artist 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Recording Registry Inducts Music from Alicia Keys Ricky Martin Journey and More in 2022 Library of Congress Retrieved 13 April 2022 Arlidge John 7 January 2001 Imagine top song ever The Observer Archived from the original on 30 March 2019 Retrieved 19 November 2018 Bohemian Rhapsody named favourite song The Guardian 8 May 2002 Archived from the original on 28 May 2019 Retrieved 27 May 2019 BBC 2002 Radio Veronica Top 2000 Lijst Archived 18 January 2015 at the Wayback Machine radio2 nl Retrieved 18 January 2015 1 Queen Bohemian Rhapsody Readers Poll The Best Vocal Performances in Rock History Rolling Stone 5 September 2012 Archived from the original on 6 February 2016 Retrieved 9 February 2016 500 Greatest Songs of All Time Rolling Stone Archived from the original on 16 August 2018 Retrieved 16 August 2018 Radiomafian Top 500 v 1995 Archived 29 June 2013 at the Wayback Machine in Finnish yle fi Accessed on 26 July 2013 Helligar Jeremy Music Single Review Bohemian Rhapsody Entertainment 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These Are the Days of Our Lives in German GfK Entertainment charts Nederlandse Top 40 week 2 1992 in Dutch Dutch Top 40 Queen Chart History Hot 100 Billboard Cash Box Top 100 Pop Singles Cash Box 16 May 1992 p 4 CNS IFPI in Czech Hitparada Digital Top 100 Oficialni IFPI Czech Republic Note Change the chart to CZ SINGLES DIGITAL TOP 100 and insert 201847 into search Retrieved 27 November 2018 Queen Chart History Canadian Hot 100 Billboard Retrieved 24 November 2018 Canadian Digital Song Sales Week 17 11 2018 Billboard 22 December 2014 Archived from the original on 14 November 2018 Retrieved 17 November 2018 Stream Rankings Semana del 09 11 18 al 15 11 18 in Spanish Promusica Colombia Retrieved 1 June 2022 Le Top de la semaine Top Singles Telecharges semaine du 9 novembre 2018 snepmusique com in French Archived from the original on 2 June 2019 Retrieved 21 January 2019 Le Top de la semaine Top Singles Telecharges Streaming semaine du 16 novembre 2018 snepmusique com in French Retrieved 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Singles in Malaysia PDF Recording Industry Association of Malaysia Archived PDF from the original on 12 December 2017 Retrieved 29 November 2018 Queen Bohemian Rhapsody AFP Top 100 Singles CNS IFPI in Slovak Hitparada Singles Digital Top 100 Oficialna IFPI Czech Republic Note Select SINGLES DIGITAL TOP 100 and insert 201847 into search Retrieved 27 November 2018 Singapore Top 30 Digital Streaming Chart Week 46 PDF Recording Industry Association Singapore Archived from the original PDF on 22 November 2018 Queen Bohemian Rhapsody Canciones Top 50 Official Singles Chart Top 100 Official Charts Company The Hot 100 the Week of November 17 2018 Billboard Archived from the original on 13 November 2018 Retrieved 25 November 2018 Queen Chart History Hot Rock amp Alternative Songs Billboard Retrieved 5 March 2019 Queen Chart History Global 200 Billboard Retrieved 19 January 2022 1975 Best Sellers Singles Record Mirror and Disc London England Spotlight Publications 10 January 1976 p 12 Kent David 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April 2022 Spanish single certifications Queen Bohemian Rhapsody El portal de Musica Productores de Musica de Espana Retrieved 30 April 2019 Copsey Rob 19 September 2017 The UK s Official Chart millionaires revealed Official Charts Company Archived from the original on 19 September 2017 Retrieved 19 September 2017 British single certifications Queen Bohemian Rhapsody British Phonographic Industry Retrieved 24 June 2022 IFPI Charts Digital Singles Chart International in Greek IFPI Greece Retrieved 26 October 2021 Turner Steve 11 March 1976 Four Queens Beat Opera Flush Rolling Stone p 17 Ingham Jonh 31 January 1976 Mercury rising Sounds pp 15 16 John Deacon 1977 interview with Jim Ladd for Innerview Brian May interview 1982 On the RecordGeneral references EditHodkinson Mark 2004 Queen The Early Years Music Sales Ltd ISBN 1 84449 012 2 Pope Rob 2002 The English Studies Book An Introduction to Language Literature and Culture Routledge ISBN 0 415 25709 3 Smashed Hits What is a Bohemian Rhapsody BBC News 15 June 2011 Retrieved 25 September 2017 Corn John 2005 Britain Since 1948 Folens Publishers ISBN 1 84303 985 0 Heatley Michael 2008 Massive Music Moments Collins and Brown ISBN 978 1 84340 493 4 Directed by Carl Johnston 4 December 2004 The Story of Bohemian Rhapsody Television production BBC Peraino Judith 2005 Listening to the Sirens Musical Technologies of Queer Identity from Homer to Hedwig University of California Press ISBN 0 520 21587 7 Chiu David 27 December 2005 Unconventional Queen Hit Still Rocks After 30 Years The New York Times Retrieved 12 April 2010 Allen Nick 3 December 2009 Muppets Bohemian Rhapsody takes YouTube by storm The Daily Telegraph London Archived from the original on 11 January 2022 Retrieved 10 April 2010 Davis Andy 1993 Queen s Bohemian Rhapsody Record Collector 167 20 Black Johnny 2002 The Greatest Songs Ever Bohemian Rhapsody Blender Archived from the original on 25 January 2010 Retrieved 12 April 2010 Queen album brings rock to Iran BBC News 24 August 2004 Retrieved 12 April 2010 Gracyk Theodore 2007 Listening to Popular Music Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Led Zeppelin University of Michigan Press ISBN 978 0 472 06983 5 Grammy Hall of Fame Award Grammy com 2004 Archived from the original on 24 December 2010 Retrieved 20 April 2010 Most Played Song On British Radio ClashMusic com 2009 Retrieved 12 April 2010 Cunningham Mark October 1995 Roy Thomas Baker amp Gary Langan The Making Of Queen s Bohemian Rhapsody SoundOnSound com Future Plc Retrieved 23 November 2021 Directed by Matthew Longfellow 21 March 2006 A Making of A Night at the Opera DVD Classic Albums 500 Greatest Songs of All Time Rolling Stone 2004 Archived from the original on 23 March 2013 Retrieved 12 April 2010 a href Template Cite magazine html title Template Cite magazine cite magazine a CS1 maint unfit URL link Irish song voted world s favourite BBC News 20 December 2002 Retrieved 12 April 2010 Top 100 Aller Tijden Radio Veronica Retrieved 12 April 2010 Buckley Peter 2003 The Rough Guide to Rock Rough Guides ISBN 1 85828 457 0 Whiteley Sheila 2006 Queering the Popular Pitch Routledge ISBN 0 415 97805 X Press Release Queen The Muppets Single BrianMay com 2009 Archived from the original on 7 August 2013 Retrieved 12 April 2010 Bohemian Rhapsody BBC Radio 2 April 2005 Retrieved 21 April 2010 Queen inducted in 2001 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Retrieved 23 April 2010 Chael David 13 October 2008 Review Queen and Paul Rodgers on tour The Daily Telegraph London Archived from the original on 11 January 2022 Retrieved 23 April 2010 Bohemian Rhapsody Chart Entries Tsort info Retrieved 20 April 2010 External links EditVideo on YouTube Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Bohemian Rhapsody amp oldid 1146386113, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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