I've been wondering, and I apologize if this has been brought up before, if you think Freddie never got involved with Smile that Smile would've gone places as a band themself. I was listening to Ghost of a Smile recently and I was just thinking to myself "Wow, these guys probably could've had decent success." What do you think?
No dear man because they weren't devoted enough. Espacially Brian was working for his Ph.d. that's the reason Tim Staffel went away, before Freddie came along. SO SMile stopped before Freddie so there was no future
I wonder how long it takes before someone says: "Smile couldn't be successful because they didn't have Freddie"
Thats bullcrap ofcourse. I think Smile could've been very succesfull. as a matter of fact, they were pretty succesful as a band in England. Especially in the college scene
They were a semi-pro band, who didn't exactly stand out and couldn't get a decent record label. They split up due to a general lack of interest from the public and within the band. It isn't far fetched to say that without Freddie Mercury they wouldn't have got signed, in fact its highly likely as Brian probably wouldn't have continued with music professionally and they wouldn't have had Freddies songwriting skills.
If Smile had been doing well, he wouldn't have left. They were nothing unique and they didn't have the songs - they were fairly mediocre, on record atleast. Maybe they were a great live band, but the recordings speak for themselves.