Friday, September 23, 2011

Canadian front runner in Queen Extravaganza contest





It appears as though Canadian Marc Martel is the front runner to be Freddie in the Queen Extravaganza contest that’s going on right now on YouTube.

I was first tipped off to Marc’s video audition yesterday when a Facebook friend of mine shared the YouTube link on my wall. I watched it and thought that he did indeed have a strong voice reminiscent of Freddie, and he has a physical resemblance to match. Marc was obviously doing his homework because he is even holding the microphone in a manner similar to what Freddie would have done.

The comments under his YouTube video are overwhelming supportive as are the comments on the Queen Extravaganza YouTube page. To be honest, I did think that the clip of this dude singing STL is also pretty strong but he didn’t quite have the physical resemblance to help garner votes. And the fact that he put “winning” in his video title probably didn’t earn him any sympathy likes.

It’s a little bit ironic that Marc is a singer in a Christian rock band and that his dad is a minister in a MontrĂ©al church. Obviously Marc himself doesn’t have a problem with Freddie but I wonder what his church fans are going to think about his portrayal of a gay singer?



Monday, September 5, 2011

A Googlicious birthday for Freddie


Media Moment: Google Doodle 
Queen-related: Freddie’s 65th birthday is commemorated

Although the Queen community finds their own way of paying tribute to Freddie on this, his birthday, the folks at Google have gone all out in commemorating his legacy by posting what it probably the most elaborate Google Doodle they’ve produced. It appeared on their home page across the globe last night at midnight, except in the United States where the Labor Day holiday is being observed, then the Freddie Doodle will be posted tomorrow (September 6th).

If you haven’t seen it by now, here it is:



The choice of song was appropriate, in my opinion, since the melody of Don’t Stop Me Now captures the fun-loving spirit that Freddie embodied. And the visual interpretation of the lyrics offered the Doodle designer a lot to work with. Not only is it a music video for the song in many ways, it does a great job at distilling down Freddie’s key moments with Queen into the small details throughout. The depiction of Brian’s guitar is completely wrong, which is surprising given the attention to other band details.

What I thought would be a neat tie-in was some kind of reference to Freddie’s visual arts training. It would have been an interesting parallel to the use of hand illustrations in creating Doodles.

I find the Google Doodle coincides nicely with the Freddie For a Day event, the release of the remastered albums, the photo exhibition, and even the lengthy debate about who is going to portray Freddie in the upcoming film about his life. 

In many ways, as Brian commented to the Google people, Freddie’s presence is more potent now that it’s ever been.

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