The juxtaposition of one of my favorite musicians with one of my favorite sciences comes about in my evening through my new computer and my looking up info on Queen and what they are doing now. I am a rather lousy 'fan' in my having had no idea that they made their 1995 album, Made in Heaven, let alone anything after that. I sort of figured from what I could tell about John Deacon when I was paying more attention, that he was not going to stay in the public eye. It was wearing on him in a way that Brian May and Roger Taylor seemed somehow better insulated against. Sad in a way, because as a fan I liked John by far the best of all four of them. However, I didn't know much about any of them, obviously. Still don't, really.
However, I have been browsing Brian's blog tonight. I felt a bit silly writing him a note at all, and while it is what I wanted to ask, I felt just as silly asking him about his thesis, since maybe he already had talked about that plenty if I had just been patient enough to read further. However, no, I don't know much more now. Having read quite a bit further, I know he was interested in interplanetary dust, but so is Kristine, and her research has her hanging out in caverns in Japan watching for rare blinks of light that might indicate a neutrino has passed through their pool of heavy water. Just being interested in interplanetary dust leaves a huge range of research and ideas to sift through still. I doubt I will hear back from him, but I wanted to congratulate him on his PhD, at least, and acknowledge my gratitude for his music, which has kept me company through so much already. It is always nice for me to know from people that my work, whether helping someone find jeans or a bra that fits, or teaching environmental science or pioneering, has done some real good for someone. I suppose even with being a superstar, Brian May might still really appreciate similar acknowledgment.
He will most likely never be any more personally involved in my life than he is now, but I still like the idea that as a scientist he is in fact much more accessible to me, and that it is in fact less impossible that I might one day actually be acquainted with him. Of course if I never get my own PhD that all is less likely, but as I am interested in English schools, and especially in the Scottish tundra, which is close to 'civilization' compared to the Taiga or the vast expanses of central Canada, I may wind up at a school near him, at least to visit. I at least like him well enough from his blog. He reminds me of my college friends, like Erin M, or Kristine W, and somewhat of Jessica S, in such a way that I think had we been students together we would have been at least casual friends. Yes, there are many other people in the world with whom I might be friends, but it is nice to think that a man whose voice sings me to sleep many nights is among those potential friends. It makes his music a bit more personal too, silly though that may be, and unnecessary as that is. He is almost 30 years older than I am, so well outside the usual range of people I am used to being easy friends with, though not outside the range of my actual friends...
I really just need to get on with my degree somewhere and see what happens. It would be quite lovely to actually know Brian May, if I could know him as a person, and a friend, not as a great famous rock star, but otherwise, I make a lousy fan. I have no desire for autographs, and no real drive to follow the careers of rock stars. I may still google Queen and its members occasionally, but it was almost 15 years between now and the last time I really paid any attention to anything about Queen besides the music. I consider it valid enough for me to know all the lyrics to all their songs, and all the notes in all the right places, and be able to hear every album in my mind, perfectly, from my well rehearsed memory, which needs refreshing badly, btw. It does not matter to that music when the musicians were born, to whom they are married, if they married, or anything else. I dreamt that I was going out with Brian May and a bunch of other people to a pob in Surrey, so as illogical as it is, I was not at all surprised that he lives in or around Surrey, and i probably actually knew that factoid earlier, but it doesn't matter the way the music does. Knowing about Freddie's death adds a huge element to much of the last few albums before his death, and makes aspects of Made in Heaven hauntingly beautiful, but the music has to stand alone too. That vignette about how those lines, "my soul is painted like the wings of butterflies, ..." were added into The Show Must Go On certainly made those lines more poignant, and Freddie's nearing death makes the whole song very heavy and sad, but it is important that that song is a great song no matter who sings it, and that when we tried to adapt it to our 8th grade choir, on my insistance, it meant something to all those who were singing it. Moulin Rouge gives it a great setting too, actually.
All in all, I am glad I did not hear Made in Heaven until a few weeks ago, and that I have so much new music to enjoy along with all the old albums I can now afford to start reacquiring. I only have Queen, News of the World, Greatest Hits I and II, and The Game in any format, besides Made in Heaven. The Game is on cassette, and is not going to last much longer, and News of the World and both Greatest Hits albums are as single MP3's from way back when Napster was legal. I found them on Napster shortly before my tape collection was stolen, and while I do not begrudge Queen the money it would take to buy new copies of those albums, I have been glad of those MP3's in the meantime. Now that I have some spending money again I can get the albums, and I can choose which song to play without having to play the whole album. I dislike the remix of We Will Rock You, from the end of News of the World, and would rather not have it pop up in my playlist, but I absolutely love some of the other songs on that album.
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