Mark Blake, former assistant editor of Q and author of Pigs Might Fly: The Inside Story of Pink Floyd which was widely regarded as the most in-depth Pink Floyd biography, is now set to release Is This The Real Life? The Untold Story of Queen.
This new book tracks Queen’s entire career from their earliest performances at Imperial College to their show-stopping appearance at Live Aid to their 21st Century collaboration with Paul Rodgers. Blake, having already interviewed the band members while working as a music journalist, conducted almost 100 new interviews with producers, musicians, ex-managers, Queen’s first bass players and Freddie’s earliest school friends.
I read 'Pigs Might Fly' within the last couple of years and was happy with it. I'll probably check this one out for sure. It will likely be a lot of old news for me, but the Paul Rogers stuff might make it new and interesting enough to make it worthwhile.
I had a look at this in Waterstones this morning and, other than a couple of very interesting pre-Queen photographs, there's prescious little of any real interest that can't be found elsewhere.
Well I tried to order it from Amazon yesterday only to discover that it's not going to be released here until February. Grrr. The same thing happened when I tried to order Brian's 'Village Lost and Found' last year so I just wandered off and never ended up buying it 4 months later. There must be some logic for the publishing houses but it escapes me, and I'm left to conclude someone is getting them over by paddleboat.
GratefulFan, you can order it now through Amazon.co.uk. That's what I did. It costs a bit more, but I think it's worth it - as opposed to having to wait until February.
I usually have to get drunk to order things in pounds. I don't know how the hell much I'm spending, but woooo hoooo anyway! Credit card roulette! Yeah!
I've ordered one.
if he has indeed talked to that amount of key characters in the Queen story, there are bound to be some stories or quotes which we haven't heard before.
on a related note; many of the unofficial queen dvds have snippets of great interview segments - simply cause there are some "unusal" people featured.
for instance; there's one which features that ballet dancer who was a friend of freddies (wayne something) - he has some great stories to tell - well worthy of any official release (especially the untold story)
anyways - these are the things I'm hoping for whenever I pick up a new Queen book. and who know - he might shed some light on the end of QPR? :)