One Night of Queen @ Newcastle City Hall

Friday 10^th June, and to balance up the girls’ trips to an event this week I took Jess to see Gary Mullen & The Works’ “One Night With Queen” at Newcastle City Hall.  Benjamin Franklin famously stated, “In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes’ – well, Mr Franklin, I must interject and add a 3^rd idiom – “...nothing is certain except death, taxes and a fabulous night out if Gary Mullen is on the bill !”

One of my biggest regrets in life is not to have seen Queen live; I missed the opportunity to see them at the hallowed St James Park for being too young (honest!), and by the time Live Aid had thrust them back into the public’s consciousness I was busy playing football, chasing girls and couldn’t really afford the trip down to Wembley.  Nevertheless, Queen and Freddie Mercury played a huge part in the soundtrack to my adolescence; my brother and I played their Greatest Hits cassette until it literally wore out and we had to buy another.  Likewise I will always remember where I was when I heard that Freddie had passed away.

So, when I had the chance to go and see Gary Mullen and The Works 2 years ago at Darlington Civic, I was a little nervous that the show would be a parody, pastiche or just plain wrong – I needn’t have worried, they were awesome then and they are still awesome now.

Friday night was my 3^rd time of seeing the show and the first at City Hall.  The turnout was what the entertainment press would call ‘intimate’ – probably no more than 120, all (initially) seated in the first half of the stalls, but what we lacked in numbers we made up for in energy, noise and good old fashioned fun.  From the 1^st song it was plain that we were not going to be allowed to sit on our behinds and clap to the rhythm, Gary saw to that by ‘politely’ pointing out any ‘boring farts’,  so we spent pretty much the next 2 ½ hours on our feet.

For anyone who has yet to go and see Gary & the band they are totally amazing; He is Freddie incarnate, complete with the mannerisms, cheeky winks, sexy pout and a truly astonishing voice.  The band are note perfect to all the classic queen songs, but they can also hit the ‘jam’ button and drop some funk, soul and disco into the live performance.

Having seen the show twice before I was expecting to know the playlist but there were a number of notable changes; Who Wants to Live Forever brought an almost eerie, spiritual feeling; The Show Must Go On became a majestic anthem and then the coup de grace; a duet with stunningly beautiful and highly talented soprano Ruth Kerr to recreate the 1992 Olympic theme Barcelona.  Never has a song stopped an audience in full flow so absolutely as every single one of us stood, jaws agape, eyes wide open in amazement.  I bet I was not the only one whose arm hairs stood up.

The 2^nd half continued with trademark Queen hits, along with Gary encouraging the audience to join him in some vocal acrobatics – I jest you not, if you closed your eyes then just for a moment you could really believe Freddie was back.  Constantly looking for ways to interact with the audience, whether he was flirting with the front row, challenging the wings to shake their booties or strutting his stuff across the stage, Gary Mullen is in my opinion the world’s best FM. God save this Queen !