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At face value, Freddie Mercury and Jimi Hendrix might seem far removed from each other, but there is much that connects them. Both were total iconoclasts, a breath of fresh air who augmented their timeless records with an onstage dynamism that remains unmatched.
Added to this is the fact that both’s flames extinguished long before their time, imbuing the heights that they hit in their life with real tragedy, making fans think, ‘What if they had lived longer?’, as it is certain that their game-changing efforts would have continued to make the world a better place. Despite their untimely passings, by the time Mercury and Hendrix departed this mortal coil, they left the world in a much better place than they found it.
Queen’s dedicated fans will be aware that the connection between Mercury and Hendrix runs much deeper than their artistic similarities. In the 1989 Queen track ‘The Miracle’ from the album of the same name, when mentioning the wonders of the world, Mercury namechecks Hendrix: “Jimi Hendrix to the Tower of Babel”.
It transpires that Mercury was one of Jimi Hendrix’s biggest fans. When he was still Farrokh Bulsara, an art student dreaming of making it as a musician at Ealing Art College in the late 1960s, he was captivated by the ‘Purple Haze’ musician’s style and stage presence. Hendrix so inspired him that he even kept a photograph of him on his bedroom mirror for daily inspiration.
Mercury once said: “Jimi Hendrix was just a beautiful man, a master showman and a dedicated musician. I would scour the country to see him, whenever he played, because he really had everything any rock’n’roll star should have; all the style and presence.”
Interestingly, for a time, the future Queen frontman even wanted to be a guitarist like Hendrix, but eventually came to the conclusion that he would never be as good as the once-in-a-generational talent, so he concentrated on the piano. This tool would have a defining impact on the creation of the icon that we all know as Freddie Mercury.
Freddie added: “He (Hendrix) didn’t have to force anything. He’d just make an entrance and the whole place would be on fire. He was living out everything I wanted to be.”
“Hendrix is very important. He’s my idol. He sort of epitomises, with his presentation on stage, the whole works of a rock star”, he said elsewhere. “There’s no way you can compare him to anyone and there’s nobody who can take his place.”
Mercury also revealed that he was “inconsolable” when he heard that his hero had died in 1970. At the time, he was already playing with future Queen legends Brian May and Roger Taylor, and so they paid tribute to him the night he died. In his honour, they performed a medley of Hendrix staples such as ‘Voodoo Chile’, ‘Purple Haze’ and ‘Foxy Lady’.