LETTER NUMBER THIRTEEN

DEAR FREDDIE,

The fashion police called and they are going to investigate your fashion choices throughout your life. Let’s see what their investigation turns up and if you’ll be found guilty of being a fashion icon and having killer style?

So I was thinking about your clothes recently because I changed the month on my Queen calendar, and it was an outfit that wasn’t my favorite, but better than the June one which was very seventies and as we’ve discussed not my favorite decade of fashion. Doesn’t mean that you aren’t a damn style icon just as much as for music.

It’s not a concert you are watching, it’s a fashion show!

Freddie Mercury

Here we go….

Freddie through the years. The 70’s were an interesting fashion time for you. You weren’t making the big bucks that you would make later and your fashion was a little bit odd, but if anyone can do it it’s you. The fashion police first investigation is on the jacket worn in the below picture. This though having status as memorable and truly one-of-a-kind isn’t really your best. I don’t know if this was real fur though it doesn’t look like it, but it made an impression when you sang Killer Queen on top of the pops. It’s one of the rare outfits that they copied perfectly in the movie. This was the long hair phase which though most attach to you in the 70’s it kind of came and went.

The seventies is not my favorite decade and the androgynous look isn’t my fave either but it’s a part of Freddie and his evolution through the years, though for me it’s hard to reconcile early 70’s Freddie with 1986 Magic Tour. The fact they are the same person is hard to fathom considering the difference in appearance is night and day.

Perhaps your most famous shirt from the 70’s is next. It’s made by a designer named Zandra Rhodes and for the life of me I have no clue what else she ever designed. If not for you and Brian I don’t think anyone would know who the hell she was. In the begginings of Queen white was the color. If not white then black. White would continue to grace the stages of Queen concerts for years because it was easiest to see or at least you thought. But as the sets grew and the lights changed and became more elaborate it wasn’t as important. Though in this shirt when you lifted your arms you did look much like a fair from Rhye. The police investigate and though they don’t like it very much they say it’s such an iconic and unique look that it gets their approval.

He loved to preen around the stage in his flappy shirt and then hold his arms out like he was about to take off. Then of course, the black nail polish on the left hand only.

We know the story of the one hand…. we found out later it was only one hand because Freddie was right handed and that was the only hand he could paint. Classic Freddie making an inconvenience look like a purposeful style choice.

Later in the 70’s came the short haired Freddie the one that shows he’s discovering who he was and not wearing what was fashionable. He wore some seriously sparkly outfits as time went on. One making him look like a human disco ball. Your hair went from long and straight to curly and sort of long. But the most famous of these disco ball Freddie outfits are the red shorts jumpsuit and the actual disco ball inspired silver.

Freddie never cared what people thought of him and his tights and ballet slippers. He would bow and preen and show that he was the center of attention and he loved it. He was always posing for the audience and for the press or so he would say on stage. Freddie never once apologized for his look he went out there and did his show and never cared what people might think about his ballet shoes and his jumpsuits lowcut and showing off his um….assets and his skinny long legs.

This is really not my favorite Freddie look, but it’s so classic and so identifiable that without this look they wouldn’t be Queen in the 70’s. Freddie’s hair was as unpredictable as his outfits. From the curly and long, the straight and long, the short and curly like the above picture, or the shorter hair around the Night at the Opera days. The police say that though a very 70’s look this one can be counted into the category of “fashionable,” because it’s so unique and only you could pull it off.

This outfit would resurface in the 80’s in the video Living on My Own from his solo album and also wear it under his jacket to his 39th birthday in Munich, the party he first brought Jim Hutton to.

Last of the 70’s famous outfits that screams Queen in this time between Queen and Night at the Opera. The boys sometimes shared outfits and the picture of the coat below later has Roger Taylor in it as well, which makes sense, it might have come from the booth he and Freddie ran before Queen was successful.

Now comes my favorite Freddie looks, his leather phase, his YMCA, gay club in New York fashion. Even seeming as if he robbed the leather outfit from the one band member. Though we all knew he stole that look, Freddie is more famous for it than the man he stole it from. This is what I call his “leather days.” The leather days were almost completely skipped in the movie inspired by your life. Not a biopic, but inspired by is more appropriate. Out of this era came some of the most iconic looks. The fashion police are now going to investigate these.

The mustache look hadn’t caught on as much yet, but here was Freddie as usual his long double jointed legs in his leather, or maybe vinyl, pants. I just wonder how he got them off at the end of show considering the sweat made it like glue.

Leather remained a Freddie favorite throughout his life and career. Leather jackets which seemed made to fit him as much as they did the cow they came from, were worn both on stage and off throughout his life leather was a fashion love, along with his Adidas boxer tennis shoes that I don’t think they even make anymore. I need to correct something, Freddie though the look would be inspired and desired to be leather it was often vinyl pants he would wear on stage. As like I said, how the hell would you ever get out of leather pants after sweating? I don’t know but it would be painful and since it was a show a night just about, that’s too much pain for anyone so I guess the vinyl was less painful? If you messed up the vinyl pants or wore them once they weren’t as expensive. Fashion police are still investigating this look closely.

In real life Freddie was a jeans and t-shirt man, though many of his t-shirts were hilarious. Always the showman even when just walking around in public his outfits are noteworthy. In most things in his life Freddie compartmentalized and put parts of his life in boxes that really never overlapped, except for one place, his clothes. If he liked an outfit you could maybe see parts of it in his more casual looks.

I don’t know where or when Freddie tried on his first pair of jeans, but he found that Wranglers, a brand impossible to find in the UK at the time were his favorite.

I’ve always jokingly called them his “magic jeans.” The things he can do on stage in a skin tight pair of jeans is unbelievable unless it was his idea to put spandex into jeans back then, but since it wasn’t really invented yet as such, I don’t think so. All I know is how he managed to do his acrobatic and gymnastics like moves in his Wrangler’s is seriously hard to understand. Jeans just don’t give like that, but for Freddie Mercury they did. Maybe he had as much control over jeans as he did over concert crowds, if so that explains it. Peter Freestone said many times that whenever Queen toured the US or when Freddie visited New York as he frequently did starting in the early 80’s and late 70’s Peter after finally being hired as Freddie’s personal assistant would always make sure to find a store with Wranglers and buy all the pairs of the kind Freddie liked because he wore them constantly, and he looked damn good in them.

Freddie’s choices with stage outfits always did confuse me and add to his mystery. What was with the knee pads? Was it for stage antics or was that a Freddie thing or because I wasn’t really born yet, was it a 80’s fashion to wear pants with knee pads over them? The knee pads are the only thing about Freddie’s clothes I never really understood. Were they for fashion or useful? I guess we won’t ever know. Freddie was obsessed with belts. There are very few times you can find him not wearing one. There is something about the Zoastrian religion that Phoebe mentions on his blog about them liking ties or something and he wonders if Freddie picked that up subconsciously. Seeing Freddie without a belt or tie around his waist except when maybe wearing some of the jumpsuits in the 70’s was really rare.

In the early days, the 70’s and throughout his career, the top button of his pants would be unbuttoned. Freddie cared about style but he also cared about comfort, and even for skinny Freddie some of those outfits were too tight and that top button just had to go. It’s more evident in studio pics and casual pictures than on stage. After The Game album came out, after that it was very, very, rare to see Freddie without a mustache. At the beginning, that mustache was the greatest gift to the press Freddie could have given, they wrote story after story about it and mostly criticized it and the other members were asked about it in interviews. They all knew that Freddie did what he wanted and there was no changing it. Of course, a lot of fans were against it for the reason it first appeared. The uniform for gay clubs in the USA and later in Europe as well was mustache, vest (or as we Americans call it, tank top) or t-shirt, and jeans.

It wasn’t often back then that you saw any man who was frequented the many gay clubs in the early 80’s without a mustache. Because many fans knew it was what was worn in those clubs the razors would fly on stage when Freddie’s mustache made it’s first appearance, the attention that one piece of facial hair received was unbelievable and another reason that Freddie hated the press. There was a mutual contempt between them back then and Freddie was the winner of that war because his seldom interviews and clever answers always left the press salivating for more. They didn’t care he was shy or private they wanted to know everything and honestly didn’t we all. However, Freddie’s fame was highly more infamous back then than famous, the press hated every outfit or look he had and the attention from this one mustache was insane at the time.

I sometimes wonder if you wore it after that as kind of a “fuck you all, I do what I want,” statement to the press and fans that criticized it. It was well known if you told Freddie Mercury not to do something, he was more than likely going to do exactly what you asked him not to. It was his way of showing that no matter what the press said they didn’t control him. It drove them nuts too and you knew it!

In a previous blog, there is a quote by Jer Bulsara, Freddie’s mom about how she hated his long hair and begged him to cut it and when he finally did he was so anxious to show her. Freddie always the mama’s boy loved anything that pleased her, but when performing he did everything he could to shock her and due to Jer’s kind and loving nature, no matter what language or look Freddie used on stage, she was never shocked. Her pride and the pride of his Father was evident. It wasn’t what they imagined for their son, but it was what he wanted and he was pretty damn successful at it, so they just accepted it and were proud of all accomplishments.

There’s often a reason that people have a favorite color. Especially when it comes to clothes. Their favorite colors will be the ones they wear the most often and Freddie’s was yellow and red and a lot of his outfits both on and off stage feature those two in some form. Though off stage he wore a dark blue which was very flattering on him and he also looked like an angel in white. The white shirt at his second appearance at Live Aid being one of my absolute favorite looks ever.

Freddie was the ultimate fashion “borrower.” When Queen did the soundtrack for the Flash Gordon move in 1981 many subsequent stage outfits and casual as well featured his Flash t-shirt, which probably got more attention and recognition than the movie itself. They should have paid Freddie for all the free advertising for a movie that was ultimately a flop and in Queen history as usual the soundtrack was the star. The soundtrack was more popular than the movie and it seemed if Queen did the music that would be the pattern. It was the same with Highlander later in the 80’s though a twenty times better movie than Flash Gordon Queen’s soundtrack and album from it were way more popular than the movie. As usual Freddie Mercury had the Midas touch.

Ever since Bicycle Race came out and Freddie said he didn’t believe in Superman as often as Flash t-shirts Superman tank tops would show up on stage especially noteworthy is when he wears it at Montreal in one of the few Queen taped concerts. It quickly comes off as usual, but it wasn’t the only time he would wear it on stage.

We all know Freddie’s performances were legendary no matter when you witnessed them whether it was 1973 and the first appearances of Queen or 1986 on Queen’s last tour. Both his stage presence and his fashions were as much a part of the show as the lights or even the music. To go to a Queen show without an awesome Freddie outfit was not going to happen. Freddie always looked ultra put together from head to toe. His armbands became such a staple that once he started wearing them he really never went without it. They were as much a part of his outfits and looks as his mustache. He made the arm sweatband cool and it was a look that only he could pull off. Many of Freddie’s looks were perfect, but only for him. If anyone else tried to wear something he did it didn’t look the same. Freddie never made an appearance in public no matter what he was doing from boarding a plane to performing, Freddie was never one to look like he just rolled out of bed. That wasn’t him. He was always put together and always in style, may not have been the style of the time but it was always his style and man did he wear it well. It takes confidence to pull off outrageous clothes and there is nothing that describes Freddie better than confident.

The 80’s style was although seemingly outdated now, Freddie was the one who could pull them off. The shoulder pads in the jackets. That is a horrible look and whoever decided that was fashionable in the 80’s needs to cry at their murdering of suits and coats back then. But one person could wear an outfit with shoulder pads and make it work. FREDDIE FUCKING MERCURY

Freddie Mercury invented “colla-poppin” you can see it before he walks on stage in the Milton-Keynes concert and man did he do it right! Long before it was a fashion statement, Freddie was doing it off pure instinct. The man knew how to dress. Period.

Another of Freddie’s fashion staples was arrows. They were everywhere. He had t-shirts with arrows and once even a jacket made of hundreds of arrows that according to Phoebe were was only worn once, though probably the most time consuming and expensive, classic Freddie, apparently the lining wasn’t right and it was hard to get off and we all know how Freddie loved to strip on stage.

What’s the deal with arrows man? I still don’t get it and I can’t get a definitive answer either. It doesn’t seem to be something that was on your casual clothes much but it was on stage costumes often.

I am so curious about the Wranglers. Were you in a store trying on multiple jeans one day and you tried on Wranglers and looked at your ass in a mirror (men don’t act like you don’t do this) and loved it and the way they looked and that was it? Such a random brand to pick but hey they worked. Often customized for you with stripes and the magic-ness built in so you could lunge and climb and whatever else you did in them. Sometimes when I see you in an impossible position on stage not only do I wonder how you did it but how you did it in jeans. Or did you trick us all and they were pants made to look like jeans Freddie? I’m on to you man! Or were they just magic bendy jeans? It shall forever remain a mystery I guess.

You had double jointed knees and elbows and that was never more obvious than when you wore shorts.

Sorry, tangent

Let’s talk about t-shirts

Here are some pics of your tees. Always hilarious

*note I wish so much that we had access to pinterest at work because the amount of pictures I have is kinda sad honestly but it doesn’t leave out I think even one outfit….lol….

The Mineshaft was a notoriously wild BDSM club in the meat packing district in New York wearing the t-shirt was you saying…yep I don’t give a shit….hahahahahaha. You also wore a Peterbilt, a tractor company, tee which I seriously get confused where the hell would you pick on up?

So on to your most famous looks there are two. Both my favorite, and scream I’m Freddie look at me! One is from Live Aid one of the best Queen performances ever and one of your best, as well as the best live music performance EVER.

A lot of conspiracy theories have cropped up over the famous arm band at Live Aid

*Note* This is the only time in the 80’s when Freddie was performing he didn’t wear a sweatband on his right arm. Just a fun fact for you all

They say the arm band was a subversive way of representing the gay scene. How? I don’t get that. I didn’t see a ton of gay men in the 80’s wearing arm bands to to club… that makes no sense. The real story is much less ominous but equally as fun.

That arm band. According to Phoebe, Freddie was looking through his drawers the night before Live Aid and saw what used to be a studded bracelet in one. He thought it was fun and pulled it out. The next day when he realized it matched his belt he would wear on stage at Live Aid, he put it around his right arm. Peter says that since there were really no costumes that day, Freddie wanted a little bit of flare, but nothing so flashy as to take away from the music. He wondered if anyone would talk about it in the press the next day. Well here were are almost 30 years later and we are STILL talking about it. Again, an example of the reason he was, the ultimate showman. The whole purpose of it was for show and dammit, it showed and it was noticed and everyone loved it.

I’ve looked at many articles whether on blogs or online magazines about Freddie’s clothes and they have about 5 examples. That’s like having 5 pieces to a 100 piece jigsaw puzzle. However I do want to get done with this post eventually, so let me go to my and most of your friend’s favorite stage outfit ever. Yes, your friends were asked their favorite stage outfit at the one below blew them all away. Leave it to you to have all these amazing clothes your whole life and one look blows them out of the water and becomes the look that is so incredibly and remarkably, you.

White might have been what you thought would catch the eye of everyone in the audience and it did for the most part, but when the gargantuan stage and the millions of lights, white just didn’t cut it so the genius that is Diana Moseley made you a jacket.

The famous yellow jacket that is so famous and so associated with you it’s about as recognizable as your teeth or mustache when it comes to describing you.

The last image with your arm in the air that you hold for about a second making us so thankful for all fast cameras back then, in a jacket you only wear on stage for about 15 minutes, this has gone down in history as one of your most famous and recognizable looks and it didn’t even make it into the movie. The jacket soon came off and you continued what would become one of your best concerts ever. At least the best one filmed. Some fan owns the jacket and spent a small fortune buying it, they lend it out for display from time to time. Jim Hutton took it with him when he moved out of Garden Lodge because it was his favorite article of clothing. He then auctioned it off at a Queen convention for about 10,000 to the MPT.

We will have to come back to your clothes another day because there are still so many iconic looks to cover, I wanted to get the best ones in but in doing so I discovered other ones. There are a lot of pictures of you and your outfits through the years and thank god, because we sure as hell miss you and wonder not only about what could have been musically, but how would you have impacted fashion if you were here? I know you wouldn’t be wearing clogs like Brian is, but because you died young and in your prime we never have to experience you growing old and our memories can be of you being vigorous and fun and damn well stylish. Fashion police feel they must do more investigation before arresting you for killer style.

As I said maybe a Part 2 to come next.

Never boring, plenty to write about, always more to explore, I’ll be writing quite a few more letters on this blog I have a feeling, but you know, I’m also a geek who is like obsessed with all things you! I miss you as usual, and I apologize to you for the writing on this blog I seem to be in a very uncreative mode today. My witty remarks are few and far between in this blog I hope that people make it to the end without falling asleep.

Miss you, Love you, Be back later with another letter, *blows kiss*

Love,

Me