Like all The Beatles members, John Lennon was also born in Liverpool, England and he was the oldest founding member of the band. By the time the band came to an end in 1970 he was only 29 and during that decade the music business changed quickly with many new groups appearing creating new sub-genres.
During the 70s he focused on his solo career and collaborated with many new artists like Elton John, David Bowie and Harry Nilson who were good friends. He talked about many new artists during that decade and one of them was the British band Queen who released many famous records around that time.
What was John Lennon’s opinion on Queen
Almost every Rock band that appeared from the mid-60s on was influenced by The Beatles, including Queen. Formed in 1970 by Brian May, Freddie Mercury and Roger Taylor, the band released their self-titled debut album three years later in 1973. When John Lennon was killed on December 8, 1980 at the age of 40, Queen already had eight successful albums on their discography but until 1975, he still hadn’t heard them.
In an interview with Spin magazine in 1975 he was asked if his son Julian liked The Beatles. However, Lennon revealed that one of his favorite bands at the time was Queen. “I think he likes Paul better than me. I have the funny feeling he wishes Paul was his dad. But unfortunately he got me. It must be hard to be the son of anybody. He is a bright kid and he’s into music. I didn’t encourage him, but he’s already got a band in school. But they sing rock’n’roll songs, ’cause their teacher is my age. So he teaches them ‘Long Tall Sally’ and a couple of Beatles numbers. He likes Barry White and he likes Gilbert O’ Sullivan. (Julian) likes Queen, though I haven’t heard them yet. He turns me on to music.”
He continued:
I call him and he says, ‘Have you heard Queen?’ and I say “No, what is it?” I’ve heard of them. I’ve seen the guy … the one who looks like Hitler playing a piano … Sparks? I’ve seen Sparks on American TV. So I call him and say, ‘Have you seen Sparks? Hitler on the piano?’ and he says, ‘No. They are alright. But have you seen Queen?’ and I say ‘What’s Queen?’ and then he tells me. His age group is hipper to music … at 11 I was aware of music, but not too much,” John Lennon said.
Lennon said Beatles’ fans should listen to Queen and Slash
During a conversation with David Sheff in 1980, shortly before his death, Lennon said that Beatles’ fans should like to the music was being made at the time. He used Queen and The Clash as an example of music his fans shoul like.
“Listen to the Beatles records, but dig Queen or Clash or whatever is going on now. And for the ones who want to relive it, ‘Resurrect The Beatles’ and all, for those who didn’t understand The Beatles and the ’60s in the first place, what the f*ck are we going to do for them now? Do we have to divide the fish and the loaves for the multitudes again?” John Lennon said.
Freddie Mercury said that John Lennon was the greatest
As all the members of Queen, the late legendary singer Freddie Mercury was also a huge fan of the Fab Four. In an interview in 1985 for Japanese television (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage).
“I would never like to put me with any kind of parallel with John Lennon at all. Because he was just the greatest as far as I was concerned. Is not a matter of less talent or more talent. It’s just that certain people are capable of doing certain things better than somebody else.”
“I just feel that I’m not equipped to do certain things that John Lennon did and I don’t think that anybody should, because John Lennon was just unique and the one-off.”
Mercury continued:
“That’s the way it is. I just admire John Lennon very much and that’s far as I want to go. I just want to think about myself and put myself across in the way I want to think. In terms of peace messages I’m not it. So I don’t wanna do it,” Freddie Mercury said.
During the same conversation he also revealed how he felt when he discovered that Lennon was assassinated. “Oh, I was shocked, I was just dumbfounded and what you do? I mean, it’s just something that you think will always happen to somebody or you whatever and it just happened. It’s one of those things ‘What can you do?’. I was shocked and disbelief, it was disbelief,” Freddie Mercury said.
They sadly didn’t have the opportunity to collaborate, but many decades later in 2002 Paul McCartney and a part of Queen performed together. It was during the party to celebrate the Golden Jubilee of Elizabeth II and McCartney invited several artists who were there that day to perform a few songs, including “All You Need is Love”. Besides Queen’s Roger Taylor and Brian May, were also on stage Joe Cocker, Brian Wilson, Rod Stewart and Eric Clapton.