I was wondering if anyone had a good recommendation for biography books or even dvds on Freddie Mercury and or Queen. I'd really appreciate your help. Oh, and in another note, can anyone tell me what FLAC is and how to play them? cause I recently downloaded couple of Queen concerts in Japan and etc. and they were all in FLAC format. I didn't know how to used them and so I had to delete them... Well thank you all!
I think there was already something like this but I definately reconmend Freddie Mercury by Peter Freestone. It's from his point of view but it is chuck full of facts from early in Freddie's career to his death.
"Freddie Mercury" by Peter Freestone, Freddie's personal assistant, is quite good. It is poorly written in parts, jumps from year to year in others, but you get a good idea of what an extravagant and excessive life Freddie lived. There is also a bit of insight into what life was like for Queen, always with emphasis on Freddie's share. I have yet to find a good biography on Queen - I'd like to find one without member preference or bias, but most of the biographies out there are the same rehashed shit. I enjoyed Jim Hutton's "Mercury & Me", despite critism from a lot of Queen fans in regards to the personal information Jim shared.
THE DEFINITIVE BIOGRAPHY
FREDDIE MERCURY- AN INTIMATE MEMOIR
and the last but not least
QUEEN: THE EARLY YEARS- I'm surprised no-one mentioned it yet...
Have to say that I don't like Jim Huttons book too much, although I blame that on the very poor german translation - the same with "As it began", in german it all sounds pretty naive, almost childish, have to get english paperbacks. I do recommend Freestones Book, some passages are really funny, others are very interesting and he also dispels some common rumours.
Does anybody know anything about the Gerry Stickells Live-Book ? Is it really out there ? I would love to read something from Mick Rock (more than just commentaries to photos) Crystal's anecdotes or perhaps a Bandbio by David Wigg - should be better than anything before because he's a professional journalist.