emrabt
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Post by emrabt on Oct 20, 2024 10:55:10 GMT
A few pointers as to why the Miracle video stage couldn’t be mistaken for a full scale stage and lighting design. The stage area is small. There is no space for Freddie’s piano. There is no keyboard area for Spike. There is no available width for Brian and John’s backline. At stage left there is no space for the monitor/foldback desk. There is no easy access to the stage for crew members or the band. Because this is a video shoot the stage (deck) is low. Normally it would be between 4 and 6 ft high (higher for outdoor shows) There is no evidence in the video (nor would there have to be) of any PA. This would be drawn into any full stage plan. PA wings to build the speaker stacks on for outdoor shows or space either side of the lighting rig to hang the bars to fly PA bins for indoor shows. These would also be visible on any full stage plans. Lighting wise this rig (in terms of Queen or any arena production) is small. Also it uses PAR 36 Cans (lamps) which in general are not physically big enough or powerful enough to light a big stage. The bulk of every Queen rig was always PAR 64 Cans. The rig is hung very low, 12 maybe 15ft above the stage. At this hight in an arena half the seated audience would be looking down at the top of the lighting rig! The towers either side of the drums serve no purpose and would hide Roger from the view of a large number of audience members viewing from the seating at the sides of an arena and those standing at floor level on the left and right close to the stage. Apart from these and a few minor points that I haven’t included it would be obvious to anyone looking at a set of plans what the plans were and I don’t think live production plans could be mistaken for anything else. Fair points, I'm not sure how raised the stage area actually is, it's higher than it looks in the finished video. You can see here at 30 seconds as Ross climbs the side it's quite the drop. m.youtube.com/watch?v=tE3tgL_yBRQThe towers are also at the very far back, it's hard to see the depth in the finished video, but you can get the full size drum kit and the half size one up there, and still have room for the adults to run around it. I would ask if you've actually seen the finished video recently, because they actually have a small stienway on stage at the start. As you say it probably wouldn't fool a professional Into think it was for a tour.... Would it fool a snooping journalist? 😄 Realisticly It's probably not how the rumour started, but as threads go isn't this great? Using what we know to talk through and debunk theories. |
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Dimitris
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Post by Dimitris on Oct 20, 2024 11:15:58 GMT
Queen were protecting their friend, as it was mentioned in 80-90s HIV was a very difficult situation, they faced fear, racism etc Moreover the treatment was on very early stages. They were liars for good reason. The energetic and high cost videos was a good answer to the press and fans that everything is ok. The video were played everywhere, especially in Europe and the album sold huge amounts. Many 80s videos were done with big budget, Queen were not expection. As many said before, a video is more easy to be done ,for obvious reasons. No tour was ever planned. Only a promoter from Holland asked them for a big concert. Queen declined. agreed with almost all of this ^. Just curious about the racism? What would that have to do with Freddie being able/unable to perform? I was reffering the AIDS situation in 80s where many HIV positive were facing. There were cases like "witch hunting", asked them to move out from their homes etc. Queen protected Freddie from press and not risked his fragile health by touring. |
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bomo
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Post by bomo on Oct 20, 2024 12:21:06 GMT
A kind of 'Queen unplugged' format could have worked in summer '89 perhaps, but would have needed to have been very carefully managed and choreographed. Three or four songs from new album, stripped down. But I'm not sure that format existed for another couple of years.
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BrƎИsꓘi
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Post by BrƎИsꓘi on Oct 20, 2024 12:39:52 GMT
agreed with almost all of this ^. Just curious about the racism? What would that have to do with Freddie being able/unable to perform? I was reffering the AIDS situation in 80s where many HIV positive were facing. There were cases like "witch hunting", asked them to move out from their homes etc. Queen protected Freddie from press and not risked his fragile health by touring. but that's just straight out discrimination - it ain't racism. Racism would only apply if HIV only ever happened to people of a specific racial type. |
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Dimitris
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Post by Dimitris on Oct 20, 2024 16:56:32 GMT
I was reffering the AIDS situation in 80s where many HIV positive were facing. There were cases like "witch hunting", asked them to move out from their homes etc. Queen protected Freddie from press and not risked his fragile health by touring. but that's just straight out discrimination - it ain't racism. Racism would only apply if HIV only ever happened to people of a specific racial type. It could apply in some cases, when there was a belief that AIDS was a homosexual only disease. If you do a research you will see even violence to kids,(documentaries),because one of their parents was hiv positive. I remember the 80s and early 90s even the adverts for awareness were very fearful. Before 15 years in my work environment was a HIV posive, when he openly spoke about it and how he was treated, before the awareness in his work environment, it was night and day. I dont know why you think there was racism against specific hiv positives in early 80s , unless you were a kid back then so didn't see it. |
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emrabt
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Post by emrabt on Oct 20, 2024 17:04:55 GMT
but that's just straight out discrimination - it ain't racism. Racism would only apply if HIV only ever happened to people of a specific racial type. It could apply in some cases, when there was a belief that AIDS was a homosexual only disease. If you do a research you will see even violence to kids,(documentaries),because one of their parents was hiv positive. I remember the 80s and early 90s even the adverts for awareness were very fearful. Before 15 years in my work environment was a HIV posive, when he openly spoke about it and how he was treated, before the awareness in his work environment, it was night and day. I dont know why you think there was racism against specific hiv positives in early 80s , unless you were a kid back then so didn't see it. I think the issue here is a slight translation error. You are using the word "Racism" when you mean "discrimination". Racism is a type discrimination based on someone's race (White, Indian, black and so on). There can be an involvement of racism when discussing AIDs, usually around Africans. But this is way off the topic of the thread at this point |
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Dimitris
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Post by Dimitris on Oct 20, 2024 17:19:57 GMT
There is a possibility of lost in translation here, I remember Africa and homosexual only disease back then.
From my discussion with my colleague, he told me how Freddie gave courage with his fight and how his death helped the world to have a better understanding about Aids positive people.
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eiricd
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Post by eiricd on Oct 20, 2024 17:30:21 GMT
in a combination of careful planning / luck, perhaps they could have done a one off gig in a more controlled environment compared to the 86 tour?
Looking at the Breakthru video, there's no doubt that Freddie must have had a very good day/period. How many hours of work went into that particular video shoot? Even with long breaks etc, that must have been a draining day for him.
How does that compare to a 90 min set, say in a soundtage set up? Who knows....
As for touring / multiple dates? As someone pointed out earlier - no insurance company would sign off on it.
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vh
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Post by vh on Oct 20, 2024 21:50:18 GMT
A few pointers as to why the Miracle video stage couldn’t be mistaken for a full scale stage and lighting design. The stage area is small. There is no space for Freddie’s piano. There is no keyboard area for Spike. There is no available width for Brian and John’s backline. At stage left there is no space for the monitor/foldback desk. There is no easy access to the stage for crew members or the band. Because this is a video shoot the stage (deck) is low. Normally it would be between 4 and 6 ft high (higher for outdoor shows) There is no evidence in the video (nor would there have to be) of any PA. This would be drawn into any full stage plan. PA wings to build the speaker stacks on for outdoor shows or space either side of the lighting rig to hang the bars to fly PA bins for indoor shows. These would also be visible on any full stage plans. Lighting wise this rig (in terms of Queen or any arena production) is small. Also it uses PAR 36 Cans (lamps) which in general are not physically big enough or powerful enough to light a big stage. The bulk of every Queen rig was always PAR 64 Cans. The rig is hung very low, 12 maybe 15ft above the stage. At this hight in an arena half the seated audience would be looking down at the top of the lighting rig! The towers either side of the drums serve no purpose and would hide Roger from the view of a large number of audience members viewing from the seating at the sides of an arena and those standing at floor level on the left and right close to the stage. Apart from these and a few minor points that I haven’t included it would be obvious to anyone looking at a set of plans what the plans were and I don’t think live production plans could be mistaken for anything else. Fair points, I'm not sure how raised the stage area actually is, it's higher than it looks in the finished video. You can see here at 30 seconds as Ross climbs the side it's quite the drop. m.youtube.com/watch?v=tE3tgL_yBRQThe towers are also at the very far back, it's hard to see the depth in the finished video, but you can get the full size drum kit and the half size one up there, and still have room for the adults to run around it. I would ask if you've actually seen the finished video recently, because they actually have a small stienway on stage at the start. As you say it probably wouldn't fool a professional Into think it was for a tour.... Would it fool a snooping journalist? 😄 Realisticly It's probably not how the rumour started, but as threads go isn't this great? Using what we know to talk through and debunk theories. Yes I’ve seen the video countless times through the years. Something to think about is that the video set staging is sized roughly to match the general size of the kids staring in it. The piano (although not a full sized concert grand) still takes up about a third of the stage width (including the piano stool) in fact the piano took up so much room it was only used for the intro sequence. This thread is quite good. Maybe one day more of the story will be told by official sources. |
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Post by angusscrimm on Oct 21, 2024 11:09:33 GMT
I know it's just a "what if" type of thread and that this is a discussion forum and people like to speculate, but I think this sort of thing is pretty fruitless and, sorry to say, bordering on the tasteless. We know he was ill. We know the strain he was under. History is what it is. Speculating on whether we could have squeezed one last show from a dying man who had already given his all and who has left us an amazing legacy (with hopefully more archival releases and surprises to come) just doesn't sit right with me. Leave him be.
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emrabt
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Post by emrabt on Oct 21, 2024 14:15:48 GMT
I actually thought it had kept the focus on the possible cancelled projects really well, without stepping over too much on health specifically. It's also clearly titled if you don't like where these threads tend to lead.
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vh
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Post by vh on Oct 21, 2024 14:34:10 GMT
. . . . . Speculating on whether we could have squeezed one last show from a dying man. . . . . That is not what this thread asked. Those are your words, not the words of anyone participating in this thread. The thread asks a perfectly valid question. There are several possible answers and reasons behind them including the obvious. |
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emrabt
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Post by emrabt on Oct 21, 2024 14:49:30 GMT
The 1988 fan club meetup (The Cross plus John and Brian as guests) was a bit of a missed opportunity.
Did Freddie ever attend the fanclub meet ups?
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dcw70h
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Post by dcw70h on Oct 21, 2024 16:52:12 GMT
I’ve been to many of the fan club events - Freddie never attended them. But then it was rare for the other band members as well.
Roger and the Cross played the Christmas Parties in 88 and 90. The Christmas Cracker in 92 was more of a gig than a FC event as I recall. Jacky sold the tickets but I don’t recall it being billed as a fan club event.
Generally Brian would make a guest appearance with the Cross and played at all three of the events above. He also appeared at an another FC event in 94 (as TE Conway) and one in the late 90s (Reading).
John appeared just once in 88.
Most of the events were in the period where none of them could play live as there was no Queen activity. Roger was obviously happy to take the opportunity for The Cross to play - UK gigs were rare after the Shove It! Tour. I’d guess Brian also looked at these as an opportunity to play in front of audience in a fairly supportive and low key way.
Had he been 100% fit, would Freddie have attended and joined the others on stage in 88. Highly unlikely. I’d go as far to say that the other members of the group would not have appeared were they still able to perform as Queen. From Knebworth to Hammersmith Palias in 2 years - the question would never have been asked.
Given that he was unwell. The risks were too great. From cross infection to general security. They did set a table up for Roger, Brian and John to do a meet and greet but it became too risky with everyone jostling for position so that didn’t really happen in the end.
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nickip
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Post by nickip on Oct 21, 2024 18:22:22 GMT
I don’t remember the table for a meet and greet but I do remember being let into the upstairs room where they all were with my best friend…
Doesn’t add anything to the conversation but a great memory
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emrabt
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Post by emrabt on Oct 21, 2024 18:49:40 GMT
would Freddie have attended and joined the others on stage in 88. Highly unlikely I agree with you that Freddie wouldn't have attended regardless of health, especially now knowing he hadn't before. Obviously they didn't 100% know they wouldn't play live again, it must have been on their minds as a possibility though. But hindsight is sometimes a terrible thing isn't it, if there was ever a point it COULD have happened I think that was it, Freddie was still doing appearances, the album had been completed, the audience was small, it was a few minutes on stage. |
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dcw70h
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Post by dcw70h on Oct 21, 2024 18:49:51 GMT
Excellent memory, we were in the same room! I won a raffle prize and it included the backstage pass from the Magic tour they were using.
John was quite approachable that night as I recall.
I didn’t see the kerfuffle over the meet and greet. But overheard about it on the night and I believe it was also mentioned in the fan club magazine that followed.
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nickip
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Post by nickip on Oct 21, 2024 20:28:11 GMT
Excellent memory, we were in the same room! I won a raffle prize and it included the backstage pass from the Magic tour they were using. John was quite approachable that night as I recall. I didn’t see the kerfuffle over the meet and greet. But overheard about it on the night and I believe it was also mentioned in the fan club magazine that followed. Many of the pics in that issue of the magazine were taken by me - Jacqui wrote that they were better than the professional ones. Was a terrific night to be fair. What I would give to be 20 again 😂 |
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Post by angusscrimm on Oct 21, 2024 22:55:01 GMT
. . . . . Speculating on whether we could have squeezed one last show from a dying man. . . . . That is not what this thread asked. Those are your words, not the words of anyone participating in this thread. The thread asks a perfectly valid question. There are several possible answers and reasons behind them including the obvious. And that's why I opened with the line that I did. I know it's a discussion forum and people like to speculate - but I stand by my take on the discussion. There may well be several possible answers, as you've speculated. We're not privy to all of the facts on it, but the one we do know is the glaringly obvious - and that's the likeliest of the answers. I'm not trying to stifle discussion in any way (if this is your thing) so I'll say/read no more, but personally I don't think we really need to put the pieces together. It really is fruitless. |
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Post by coolcat27 on Oct 24, 2024 1:10:56 GMT
I think this is an interesting discussion.
I'm often quite fascinated by the things that didn't happen but could have.
I remember reading Roger's comments about the Miracle Pavilion. Either that was a ruse that was never going to happen or it was something they hoped might be possible if the stars aligned. Obviously, Freddie's health didn't allow for this.
Regarding whether Freddie could have performed live, maybe in a limited capacity. But Freddie was such an energetic showman that this would have worked against him. If Freddie was mostly standing still and kind of pale and skinnier and not doing all his wild stage theatrics, even if he was hitting the notes in 1989 there would have been speculation. Because that wasn't the Freddie the world knew. Freddie performing at that point may have made the thing they were trying to hide more obvious.
So what they did in concentrating on recording songs and making videos was probably the best move as to controlling the narrative and keeping the tabloid monsters mostly at bay.
It would be nice to hear from Roger or Brian on this because it was something that Roger talked about publicly. How close was it to happening?
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Post by bawnmore76 on Oct 26, 2024 15:38:19 GMT
There's no way he would've passed a medical to get insurance, full stop. But it sure is fun to imagine something otherwise.
But he managed to get insurance to do the Breakthru video was which did have an element of danger given how fast the train was going.
I was told by Jim Hutton the train wasn’t going very fast at all. |
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Post by snakecharmer on Nov 16, 2024 14:07:54 GMT
I was lucky enough to to meet & chat to Freddie when the band stayed at the " Haycock Hotel " 5 minutes away from the "Nene Valley" railway in June 1989 , whilst they were shooting the video for Breakthru . It took three days to complete the shoot , I don't know if this is longer than usual to shoot a video. Freddie seemed happy and he told me the shoot was going very well , he did not stay up late and had all his meals in his room with two rather big security guards outside his room when he was in his room. On the final evening after they had finished the video Queen , Anita Dobson , Deborah Lang [Rogers girlfriend at that time] plus a lot of other people had a lavish dinner party. Freddie partied with the rest of the band and was on the Vodka & Champagne most of the evening. Freddie I have to say looked thin and seemed to have make up on at the final nights dinner party. If my memory is correct Freddie retired at around 11pm whilst Brian ,Roger & John kept us busy probably until around 2am . I am not a doctor but I would say that Freddie looked under the weather.
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speedy
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Post by speedy on Nov 16, 2024 16:55:55 GMT
Its one thing to look full of beans on a video where you are surrounded by good people than to give your all live and poor Freddie could not win if he sung live and there where dodgy parts they (press) would be on his back and if he mimed to a track they would have done the same. Perhaps a TOTP recording could have been done and a few tricks. I look on it the energy promoting The Miracle would have taken away the time and Freddies energy into what we got for Innuendo and Made in Heaven so I think what they did with their time worked for the best under a strange world for them at the time. I would love to see a live version but what we got on the bonus disc on the last box set is closest to that we will sadly ever get. Could Freddie have done it - possibly depending on the set up but a full charged 86 tour is the best way to end it.
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