Freddie Mercury "Lover Of Life, Singer Of Songs" DVD

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Released 4 September 2006 as a double DVD set.
Length 112 minutes (disc 1) and 108 minutes (disc 2).

Compiled and produced by Simon Lupton

'The Untold Story' (disc 1):
Directed by Rudi Dolezal and Hannes Rossacher
Produced by Jim Beach and Rudi Dolezal
Author and associate producer: Simon Witter

'The Solo Videos' (disc 2):
Audio produced by Kris Fredriksson
Director's commentary compiled by Greg Brooks

This DVD set contains very similar footage to that previously released as part of the 10CD/2DVD set 'Freddie Mercury: Solo', and as 'The Freddie Mercury Video Collection'. However, this set has some differences, which are detailed below.

Both discs feature stereo, surround sound and director's commentaries, as well as subtitles. The main menus contain a short excerpt of 'Overture Piccante', but the rest of the menus are silent.

Disc 1 contains 'The Untold Story', a 112 minute documentary about the life of Freddie Mercury, covering his roots in Zanzibar and India, his life in England before Queen, his solo career and personal life. The documentary was previously available as part of the 'Freddie Mercury: Solo' boxed set, but this is a slightly different version, featuring some different scenes, interviews and different narration (by actor Sean Pertwee), but it basically has the same structure. It also adds an 18 minute 'Making Of' featurette.

Disc 2 features all of Freddie's solo videos, available in stereo, surround sound, or with director's commentary. It also features subtitles in English, French, German, Italian, Castellano, Dutch and Portuguese. It contains the following titles:

1. The Solo Videos - contains the first 9 tracks listed above (38 minutes)
2. Bonus Videos - contains tracks 10-12, which are essentially alternate versions of other tracks (16 minutes)
3. A View Forever - a featurette about the making of the Freddie Mercury statue in Montreux, with interviews with sculptor Irena Sedlecka and Brian May, footage of the press conference and unveiling (12 minutes)
4. The Three Producers - interviews with Freddie's three producers, Mike Moran, Mack and David Richards, arranged into nine chapters (35 minutes)
5. The Last Interview - Freddie's last filmed interview, recorded in Munich 1985 (7 minutes)

The DVD also includes a DVD-Rom feature of the 'Interactive Photo Gallery', previously available within the 'Freddie Mercury: Solo' boxed set.

The surround sound mixes are identical to those on 'The Freddie Mercury Video Collection', except 'In My Defence' which is a slightly different mix, and the 1993 remix of 'Living On My Own', which is exclusive to this set. Full details of all mixes are found on the Surround Sound Mixes page.

A CD titled 'Lover Of Life, Singer Of Songs' was also released, but this features completely different content to the DVD.

The Last Interview

Recorded in 1987, as a promotion for 'The Great Pretender', interviewed by Rudi Dolezal. Length 6:45.
This is the last filmed interview with Freddie. Towards the end, Freddie records some soundbites the promote the track.
Dialogue:
Rudi: Ah, Freddie, the last couple of weeks and months you were working on solo stuff, can you tell us a little bit about what kind of things you
Freddie: Erm, this last couple of weeks I have been working with this amazing woman, erm, she's an oper-, a big operatic star, her name is Montserrat Caballe, she comes from Barcelona, and she just called up, um, a few weeks ago, and said she'd like to, um, sing with me, so of course I fell flat on the floor, you know, I felt my God, but I've loved her, you know, for years, and I think it worked when I went to um, Barcelona, um, recently, so, I did a TV show, and they, they asked me, you know, and I said, well you know, she's the best singer in the world, and I'd, you know I'd love to be able to sing with her, so she, she must have read, well she must have seen it, and so she called up the office and said she'd like to do things. So, um, well last night, I mean, she sang one of my songs at, at the Royal Opera House, so it's amazing, I mean now I'm going into opera, you know, forget rock 'n' roll
Rudi: Is this a new experience, an exciting experience?
Freddie: Absolutely, it's such a challenge actually. It's, um, it's gonna be great, because, um, I've never, sort of, thought of writing songs in that way, now she said she wants to do duets with me, I have to sort of think in a totally different way, and actually, um, I'm sure the opera critics will, you know, slam it and everything but I mean this is something that, it's, it's a good challenge at this time in life, you know
Rudi: Is it, is it true that you are planning to do a whole album with her?
Freddie: Yes, well you see, I, I, I went and saw her, um, a week ago, and I just thought maybe one song, or a duet and that's it, and she said, um, she said things like, um, 'only one song, are you sure? Um, you only want to do one song?' and I said 'well let's see how we get on, you know, if you like more of my music' and she said 'how many songs does a normal rock 'n' roll album have?' and I said 'something like ten', 'oh, we'll do ten songs then'. So, um, you know, so she just said 'yes, write ten songs' like tomorrow
Rudi: So you have to write songs in Spanish and other languages?
Freddie: Yes, yeah things like that. Because I mean, I said, you know I said 'yes, we have to sort of', um, I said 'I'll write the songs and then you come in, in, in the studio and sort of try out things' so she said, she looked up her schedule and she said 'well I have three days to spare in May' and that's all, and she thinks she can just come in and do it, but that's the way they, they work you see. So, she thinks in three days she'll probably just come in and sing the whole, so I have got to have it all prepared, but I think three days is pushing it
Rudi: Er, you had a great success with your solo single 'The Great Pretender', (Freddie: yes) in England, can you tell us when you had an idea to pick the song
Freddie: Well, um, yes, I've always, I've wanted to do a cover version, you know, a long time ago, and er, you can't do that with Queen, you know, because I mean we just write our own sort of original material, and I've always had that in the back of my head, and this song was the one I always wanted to do, so last Christmas, it was, well before Christmas, I went in, into the studio and sort of tried out a few trials, and I liked it, it sort of suited my voice, it's a great sort of song to sing, so I sort of went ahead, and I just said 'well I'll release it as a fun single' and then what happens, I mean, when it came out there was this huge um, resurge of, of old things, so I mean it, it looked like I jumped on the bandwagon or something, but luckily it came out on, on the front end as it were, because now there's about fifteen or twenty, and if, if it came like even two weeks later it would have looked like I ran into the studios to try and do that, but I'm glad it just happened, I think it happened at the right time. Most of the stuff I do is pretending, it's like acting, you know, so you go on stage and I pretend to be a macho-man and all that, and then in, in my videos you know, you go through all the different characters, and you're pretending anyway, so I think it's a great title for, for what I do, and it's sort of suited to what I was doing, I mean although the meaning, the meaning in the song of how it is, is all to do with love, that he's pretending about love, but I mean I, I sort of take it a stage further I think, you know, the way I see it is that I'm pretending, you know, all this is a pretense, you know, and it's, it's just fun
Rudi: Maybe do you see the, the whole rock 'n' roll thing as a game that you play, instead of being your life, or is it...
Freddie: It's, well I think it is because I mean, um, when say, I can only go by my own, own experiences, when I go on stage I'm acting out a certain role, I mean I'm, when I come off it, I mean, I don't um, carry on that way, otherwise I'd be dead, you know, so it's like a pretense you know, um, when you go on stage you sort go through different moods and something, and then you're putting on, you know you change your costume and you become some, somebody else, and then after that, you, you, you know, you're own person, so it's
Rudi: In your video for that song you went to different roles and you also re-did scenes of very bang-on videos, can you tell us about the idea, how it came?
Freddie: Well, yes in fact, that's what we were talking about now, is that I wanted to show people that, that all these different roles that I was doing in video was a kind of pretence, that I was pretending, and to bring them back I had to sort of um, choose um, key roles that I did in the past, and then to try and marry them with, with the word 'pretender', and things like that. So basically we just had um, different mini-sets built all the way round the studios, and I just sort of re-created some of the things in my costumes and we just sort of bridged the two together, with lighting sort of technique and things

Producer: Camera
Freddie: Hello, my name is Freddie Mercury, and this is my latest recording, 'The Great Pretender'
Producer: Camera
Freddie: Hello, my name is Freddie Mercury, and this is my latest recording, 'The Great Pretender'
Producer: Cut
Freddie: I think it's too long, isn't it?
Unknown dialogue: Twitter?
Producer: Camera. Action
Freddie: Hello, I'm Freddie Mercury, and this is my new recording, 'The Great Pretender'
Producer: Cut it. Cut it, OK