The "Post-Mercury Demise Queen" Conundrum

However long this person spends trying to avoid the issue, the truth remains that Queen without Freddie Mercury (or, 'Freddie Mercury' as he appears here, for some reason) isn't really Queen at all. But how many ways can he find to fudge the issue? Or, as a reader has it:

If anything can be said to scream, 'Please give it up, granddad,' then it's this...

“THE COSMOS ROCKS”
QUEEN + PAUL RODGERS FIRST STUDIO ALBUM
EMI/Parlophone Release September 15

“Our teachers were The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, blues & soul…”

The first thing you notice about The Cosmos Rocks, the much anticipated first album from rock legends Queen + Paul Rodgers is “all tracks written by Queen and Paul Rodgers”…”produced and performed by Brian May, Paul Rodgers and Roger Taylor” (indicating that between them they played all instruments, including bass - Paul and Brian swapping duties - in case you were going to ask NO ONE WAS, NOT EVER). This is obviously not a case of Rodgers lightly stepping in to fill a vocal gap, as some might have been drawn to assume would be the case when the three of them got into the studio together.

No, this is a full bodied, group endeavour: May, Rodgers and Taylor in a totally democratic union, even down to equally sharing the credits. The album’s dedication to legendary Queen front man ‘Freddie Mercury,’ (you’ll also see thanks credits to John Deacon and Paul Kossoff) shows the band mates still feel his presence strongly enough to dedicate this entirely new work to him, nearly 13 years on from Queen’s last studio album. You also wonder how Rodgers who takes control as main vocalist on all thirteen tracks here feels about his work being dedicated to the man whose fans still worship at the altar WORSHIP AT THE ALTAR! AMAZING! of the pre-Mercury demise Queen HE MEANS QUEEN.

But then thinking about it, it doesn’t seem quite so strange. Brian May and Roger Taylor have, after all, never shied from acknowledging the mighty presence Mercury provided to the band on stage and the wonders of his extraordinary creativity in the studio. Mostly, they acknowledge how even today, they still miss ‘dear Fred' I CAN'T STAND ANYMORE