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I agree it's an amazing song. Pure genius. But We Will Rock You, We Are the Champions and Another One Bites the Dust were the Queen songs everybody knew back in the day.
They were like household names.
I think Wayne's World (1992) kind of gave Bohemian Rhapsody a resurgence, and then there was the movie Bohemian Rhapsody (2018) that probably introduced the song to a younger audience.
And then there's the muppet version...which is awesome.
Agreed. Bohemian Rhapsody wasn't even on the most popular Queen's Greatest Hits CD, this one! (I'm sure other compilations exist but this was most popular
I have a distinct memory of building sets for my high school musical, and our art teacher blasted this CD through the theater. It was fun, got us pumped, and was my first time hearing "Bicycle Race," "Fat Bottomed Girls," and others
By 98-99, I taped my classic rock radio station's "Top 100 of ALL TIME" and B.R. was #6, maybe? So it was known. But it has become exponentially even more ubiquitous since.
Toto's "Africa" is another one -- you very occasionally heard it, but it's only in the last 5 years that you hear it *all the time.* On the flip side, apparently a Peter Frampton live album was an astronomical success in the 70's, but is never played on the radio today, except maybe "i want you to show me the way."
I agree about Toto's Africa. I don't recall hearing that song at all until about 5 years ago. Talk about a song being resurrected from the dead.
Pink Floyd's signature song used to be Another Brick in the Wall. But now, Comfortably Numb seems to be considered their most iconic song.
It is fascinating how the popularity of a song changes and takes on a life of its own over time.
"Bohemian Rhapsody" was huge when it was released. Everyone I knew had a copy of A Night At The Opera. There's nothing meteoric here; it's always been a freakishly popular song. Two or three generations have joined this planet since the album was released; there simply are more people around now to enjoy it.
Correct, it was 1975 and "Bohemian Rhapsody" was played regularly on AM and FM radio, it was an instant hit. I remember thinking I'd never heard anything like it with the operatic vocals and long length. Their song "Killer Queen" put them on the map in the charts the year earlier.
When the 80s came, and synthy new wave music was on the zeitgeist, I turned away from Queen thinking most of their singles were awful ("Another One Bites the Dust" "Crazy Little Thing About Love" "Radio Ga Ga" "I Want to Break Free"), but history would favor Queen and they would go on to be seen as an all-time massive classic act (to this day).
"Under Pressure" ('81/'82) with David Bowie was terrific of course. Saw them in Hartford around this time and though the show was good, I realized that live, Queen were a hard rock/heavy metal band. The heavy guitars overshadowed their vocals and more musical aspects.
I have heard Bohemian Rhapsody more than enough. If it comes on the radio, I'll usually get up and change to something else. But that is also true with quite a number of famous but heard too many times songs.
(U2 or Bruce Springsteen come on radio, more often than not they get turned off. Overplayed for my tastes for too long. Pink Floyd, mostly turned off. Pearl Jam never lasts 10 seconds for me. Lots of other cases where hearing them 100-500 times was more than enough / too much. The most popular Who, mostly off. Metallica, usually off. Red Hot Chilli Peppers, off. Green Day, always off. Bon Jovi, Def Leopard, REM, The Police. Fortunately I don't have to fight off Cold Play, Oasis, Blink 182, Maroon 5, Fallout Boy or Dave Matthews much anymore. Surprisingly kinda tired of Jimi Hendrix. Don't disliked it, just pretty tired of it, of at least the 5 most popular plays.)
I don't remember it being played frequently on the radio. I was a kid and that was my source of music back then. The first time I noticed the song was many years after it was released. It was not a big deal among all the music that was going on in the 70s and 80s.
But now, it is considered one of the best songs of all time of any genre. It has more than 1 billion views on YouTube. Pretty impressive for a song written in 1975.
Anybody else shocked by the meteoric rise of Bohemian Rhapsody long after it was released?
Meteoric? Hardly.
Also, it certainly was a big deal from the beginning. It was 1975's Christmas #1 and parked itself atop the British charts for 9 weeks (then a record) and topped the charts in many other countries.
But back to its status as one of the all-time great rock and roll songs, no one should be surprised. And I say that without any particular reference to the song itself. The vagaries of the public embrace of art are a mystery. Moby-Dick is the great American novel, but it languished all but forgotten for more than seven decades until it came to be embraced as a great book. Once Upon a Time in the West is often considered the greatest western ever filmed, but it took a long time before it was seen as anything special at all. Need I mention Van Gogh?
My point is that no one knows where an artistic creation will go, or how it will be perceived in the future. It's a mystery. So, no, it doesn't surprise me.
And I say this as someone who finds the song interesting in concept but who is also totally bored with it and never needs to hear it again.
I don't remember it being played frequently on the radio. I was a kid and that was my source of music back then. The first time I noticed the song was many years after it was released. It was not a big deal among all the music that was going on in the 70s and 80s.
But now, it is considered one of the best songs of all time of any genre. It has more than 1 billion views on YouTube. Pretty impressive for a song written in 1975.
Anybody else shocked by the meteoric rise of Bohemian Rhapsody long after it was released?
It was sort-of a big hit when it came out. Not huge, but it got a fair amount of attention.
But yes I agree, since then its stature has definitely risen. Happens a lot in music, sometimes time makes people appreciate things more.
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