Freddie Mercury
and over 900,000 other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| |||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £2.25
Trade in Freddie Mercury: The Definitive Biography for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £2.25, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
Product Description
Review
'Lesley-Ann Jones asserts that Freddie Mercury's was a "big, extravagant, multifaceted life", and the rock journalist has certainly done a sterling job of documenting it here.' (Daily Telegraph, Australia )
'A timely update coinciding with the 40th anniversary of Queen and the 20 years since their frontman's death'. (The Sun )
'Exactly the sort of tribute Mercury himself would have wanted ... full of perceptive and moving insights.' (Spectator )
'Rock journalist Lesley-Ann Jones is lucky enough to have known the man. She toured widely with Queen and formed lasting friendships with the band. It took a while for everyone to open up, but she eventually gained access to Freddie's colleagues and friends, and so we have this thoroughly researched portrait of the man behind the rock legend.' (Brisbane Times )
'A timely update coinciding with the 40th anniversary of Queen and the 20 years since their frontman's death'. (The Sun )
'Exactly the sort of tribute Mercury himself would have wanted ... full of perceptive and moving insights.' (Spectator )
'Rock journalist Lesley-Ann Jones is lucky enough to have known the man. She toured widely with Queen and formed lasting friendships with the band. It took a while for everyone to open up, but she eventually gained access to Freddie's colleagues and friends, and so we have this thoroughly researched portrait of the man behind the rock legend.' (Brisbane Times )
Product Description
This is the definitive biography of Freddie Mercury. Written by an award-winning rock journalist, Lesley-Ann Jones toured widely with Queen forming lasting friendships with the band. Now, having secured access to the remaining band members and those who were closest to Freddie, from childhood to death, Lesley-Ann has written the most in depth account of one of music's best loved and most complex figures.
Meticulously researched, sympathetic, unsensational, the book - like the forthcoming film - will focus on the period in the 1980s when Queen began to fragment, before their Live Aid performance put them back in the frame.
In her journey to understand the man behind the legend, Lesley-Ann Jones has travelled from London to Zanzibar to India. Packed with exclusive interviews and told with the invaluable perspective that the twenty years since Mercury's death presents, Freddie Mercury is the most up to date portrait of a legendary man.
Fully revised and updated edition.
Meticulously researched, sympathetic, unsensational, the book - like the forthcoming film - will focus on the period in the 1980s when Queen began to fragment, before their Live Aid performance put them back in the frame.
In her journey to understand the man behind the legend, Lesley-Ann Jones has travelled from London to Zanzibar to India. Packed with exclusive interviews and told with the invaluable perspective that the twenty years since Mercury's death presents, Freddie Mercury is the most up to date portrait of a legendary man.
Fully revised and updated edition.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Evokes the music biz in the 70s and 80s perfectly,
By
This review is from: Freddie Mercury: The Definitive Biography (Hardcover)
The whole story and legacy of Queen and Freddie Mercury have moved on so far since Lesley-Ann Jones's original book in the mid-90s that there is plenty of scope for an update, but this book goes way beyond a mere update and is very timely what with the movie coming out next year.The research is very impressive - how many rock writers would actually travel to somewhere like Zanzibar to ensure they nail the detail and give the full flavour of their subject's birthplace? And she makes a point of correcting many of the of the inaccuracies that have occurred and probably been repeated in other accounts There is no doubt that certain people in the story - the band members for instance - remain tight lipped to this day but Jones seeks out many of the key players in Mercury's private and professional life, so comes as close as anyone is going to in terms of telling the proclaimed 'definitive' story. What is best about the book, however, is not so much the truly scary stuff about about AIDS setting in, nor even intriguing snippets such as Freddie's friendship with Michael Jackson - it's the atmosphere it evokes of the music industry in the 70s and 80s. For music fans, whether they are into Queen in a big way or not, the chapters about the band's seemingly eternal struggles to gain a record deal, the characters around the band and the lives they all led, are priceless. Lesley-Ann Jones combines her journalistic skills and experience with her love of the music and comes up with a terrific read.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A KIND OF MAGIC !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!,
By Mick Lynch "Mick" (Ireland) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Freddie Mercury: The Definitive Biography (Hardcover)
It's hard to believe that Queen celebrates their 40th Anniversary this year, and even more significant is that it also marks the 20th Anniversary of the death of their lead singer. In `Freddie Mercury - The Definitive Biography', author Lesley-Ann Jones takes us on a fascinating journey through his life from Zanzibar in 1946 to his death in Montreux in 1991.The early chapters in the book cover his childhood in Zanzibar, his resentment at being sent to school in India at the age of eight, and his early tastes for music, and how his life would change once he arrived in the UK in 1964. What makes this book stand-out for other biographies is that Jones has certainly done her research (she was side-stage at Live Aid), and her determination to find a copy of Freddie's original birth certificate. She also travelled back to Africa and India and spoke to family and friends, people that knew Freddie first hand. There is still local resentment toward him, with one claiming "he gave up his family name.....and wasn't proud of Zanzibar", hence the lack of tributes, memorials or statues to him in his homeland. Moving to England would change his life forever, as he dabbled with several bands before convincing Brian and Roger to do more original material. As he cleverly put it "If I was your singer, that's what I'd be doing". This would lead to the formation of Queen, and their first gig in 1971. The fact that he didn't own a TV when they made their first Top of The Pops appearance, forcing him to watch it in a TV shop window in Oxford Street is just one of the many fascinating pieces here. The great thing though out this book is that it's not a Queen book. While it's impossible to ignore their achievements, Jones cleverly throws in the odd statistic and chart achievement but keeps her focus on Mercury throughout. She doesn't shy away from Freddie's life off-stage either. We all know the showman who grabbed Live Aid by the balls, but do we know much about his lovers, his lifestyle, his 3-in-a-bed romps or his many excessive gay parties that included anything from Lesbian strippers to dwarfs, fire eaters, drag queens, mud wrestlers, snakes and hookers? Then of course there's the music, which is what he lived for. His hero Montserrat Caballe, the duets with Michael Jackson and Bowie, what the intro to `One Vision' really is when played in reverse, his drinken on stage antics with Tony Hadley, his favourite composition, and the many meanings to Bohemian Rhapsody, the song he is most proud of. There really is so much to learn here; their disappointment at not being asked to sing on the Band Aid record, Bowie's refusal to originally release `Under Pressure', John Deacon's depression after his death, and a fan's death at Knebworth that finally ended their live performances. With the Sasha Baron Cohen movie of Freddie's life due to hit cinemas in 2012, Freddie Mercury's name is still on everyone's lips, 20 years after his death and I'm sure he's still looking down on everyone, and having one hell of a party in Heaven. I'm sure if he had read this book he'd be very proud of the masterful job Lesley-Ann Jones has delivered in his absence. Ultimate Magic!
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Even Freddie would love this book,
This review is from: Freddie Mercury: The Definitive Biography (Hardcover)
Well, I'm slightly surprised, to say the least, at some of the more critical posts on the worthiness of this book.Personally, I don't think it scratches the surface. More like it slices a forensic scalpel through the life and times of Freddie. It claims to be 'definitive'...always a bold call. But, having read both this book and the first incarnation, I reckon it pretty much gets as close as you can to a sensible definition of a man who probably wouldn't even get to first base defining himself. Maybe he defied definitive definition. Surely Freddie, the mercurial, was the archetype riddle wrapped up in an enigma; and all the more attractive for that. We weren't supposed to understand him. But, let's face it, for us who we there at the time, he was the ultimate showman. He made David Bowie look like a support act. He made being camp cool. But the top line was he gave Queen a global anthemic edge which still plays loud and clear today. So would we be surprised he had a complicated and turbulent private life? Not really. Ms Jones, it would appear from the text, travelled with the band in its early days and chatted to FM on occasions. Her job as a rock correspondent for a top paper with her own TV show, would underline that position and a quick google shows her placement in rock n roll writing. A bit like once upon a time sports reporters travelled with soccer teams, drank and partied with them and what happened on tour, stayed on tour. These days they don't even get on the tour. That's why I like so much the informative intro when journalists actually took a moral stand to hold back on publishing details of a chance, unguarded meeting, because a guy had been honest and open. Especially in current times when newspapers are under criminal investigation for hacking phones, computers and allegedly paying bent coppers for information. (I can't wait for the book on that.) Ms Jones has patently travelled the world sourcing her information and, having read pretty much all the rival books, this does get under the skin of Freddie and Queen and the times back then when gayness and AIDS were both mostly treated with denial or suspicion. She takes us on a fascinating trip around the world speaking to many close associates and friends of the man. I liked it as a pacy and informative read, Freddie seen through his family and contemporaries. The guy 's dead. Which is shame. But let's face it his influence and memory lives on. If you like Freddie and Queen and want to learn more, you probably need tonbuthis book beyond all others in my humble opinion.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
|
Most Recent Customer Reviews |
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
