I accidentally chanced upon this gem while I was decluttering our living room (thanks to Marie Kondo's book for the inspiration). As I was stacking up my dad's collection of DVDs and CDs (and cassette tapes too!), I found this concert DVD of the legendary band Queen. I am familiar with some of their songs (who doesn't know Bohemian Rhapsody duh) but I have never seen any clips of their performances. As an avid concert goer, I knew I need to see this one.

Now I understand why Queen is a legend.

I am humbly blessed to have the opportunity to watch this concert. Even though Freddie Mercury is already dead now, because of this footage, it felt like I was able to experience their music live.




The four members were really musically talented. They could all sing and play instruments. I noticed the members of the band didn't have earpieces, which I found really impressive. Given with all the noises from the crowd, their vocals were still on point. #mindblown 💥

My favorite songs from this set were Save Me and Love of My Life (on acoustic guitar). All these years I thought Crazy Little Thing Called Love was an Elvis Presley song. 😅 Watching them perform Bohemian Rhapsody brought chills, especially during that fireworks part. 

Camera caught this lady looking admiringly at Mercury after Love of My Life performance. I would have worn that exact same expression too if I were there.

How Concerts Were Done Before
With just the opening clips of the concert, I already noticed that this is a whole different era. The people were holding up lighters! I found it really surreal, because what the crowd does today is that they turn on their phone lights and wave them in the air. In this crowd, all I can see are hands waving up energetically in the air. No single phone is in sight. Well technically there were no phones with camera in this era yet 😅(this is circa 1981).


You can actually see the crowd's faces smiling brightly and cheering as Queen graced the stage. There were a few people at the front holding cameras. But that's it. Everyone was in the moment. Some members of the crowd were actually very chill while listening to Queen's rock songs. I found this amusing. If I were there, I might be jumping and dancing all over the place. There were no big screens on stage, so everyone was fully focused on the band themselves.


There were parts later in the show wherein Mercury stood near to the audience. And the people were just there leaning on the stage. 😮 How??? There was no stage barrier or even bouncers! I was really amazed by this footage. You won't be seeing this kind of setup on big-scale concerts today for security reasons obviously.


Weird Observations & Discoveries
Since this was shot in 1981, the difference in fashion is very noticeable. Just looking at the crowd, you'd know. In terms of the band members themselves -  Freddie Mercury with his white pants (which was very distracting... and then he came out later barefoot wearing white shorts!!! 😱) and John Deacon with his terno blue shirt and pants - were indications of the queer fashion of that era... save for guitarist Brian May, whose fashion was beyond his time. Also, I found it bizarre for a rock band front man to have no single tattoo.


While watching their concert, I began to notice that face on the drumset. Apparently it's drummer Roger Taylor's face. They placed it there because most people can't see him behind the drumset during performances. 😆

The only mystery I haven't figured out is that timer caught on some shots of the concert. Was that for the band? It was counting up so I think it's not to tell the remaining time for the show.


Watching Queen in concert is now included in my dream concert list (alongside Linkin Park).
I am so happy I stumbled upon this DVD. This definitely sparks some joy. I'll have to keep it on my shelf. 😀

~o~
Queen Rock Montreal | DVD
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