At some point not so long ago, the Aspiring Pirate started his Queen phase. And his Queen phase isn't like the Queen phases that other people have. Other people obsess on, say, A Night At The Opera or A Kind Of Magic. Not the Pirate. Instead, he developed a tremendous fondness for the album Jazz. I don't get it either. I mean, I love Jazz (of course) but it really is an inconsistent effort. It's not as solid as, say, your Sheer Heart Attack or your Queen II. But it has many good points. Recently we drove around with a notebook and some Vanilla Cokes, listening to Jazz and making a list of our fav-o-rite things.
We were shooting for a list of twenty-five. We imagined the first draft being one hundred eighty items, then we would each have to take a copy, narrow it down to twenty-five each, and then fight over the final list. I thought we should narrow it down to twenty-five, then rank them. The Pirate had a flash of wisdom and realized that project could take us years, and we might hurt each other over the technicalities of Bicycle Race. So he declared the list would be in order of appearance on the album. And, since we overestimated the highlights from Jazz, the list did not come out to be one hundred eighty. The first list came out at thirty-three items. Obviously, thirty-three is good, but thirty-three and one third is even better. Here are our favorite parts of Jazz.
1. Mustapha.
2. The fact that he was just a skinny lad. (Fat Bottomed Girls)
3. "She was such a naughty nanny." (Fat Bottomed Girls) We love naughty nannies!
4. Right before the line, "I've been singin' with my band," is the greatest bass slide ever. (Fat Bottomed Girls) We sat in the parking lot of the gas station just to hear it before we could go buy our Vanilla Cokes.
5. The phrase blue-eyed floozy. (Fat Bottomed Girls) The first day we were discussing the Pirate's Jazz phase, he said, "I want to be known as a blue-eyed floozy. I've got blue eyes!" "If you really want me to, I will call you a blue-eyed floozy." And that is how I wound up friends with a blue-eyed floozy.
6. He's got mortgages and homes, plus he has stiffness in the bones. (Fat Bottomed Girls)
7. The enormous rock star drum fill. (Fat Bottomed Girls)
8. Freddie Mercury being polite, yet sexual at the same time. (Fat Bottomed Girls)
9. "Get on your bikes and ride!" (Fat Bottomed Girls)
10. The Jealousy riff, which sounds very much like the White Queen riff. (Jealousy) But we decided it's okay for Brian May to borrow from himself.
11. Suspicion on my trail. (Jealousy)
12. Freddie Mercury turning the word pain into a multi-syllable pain event. (Jealousy)
13. It matters not. (Jealousy)
14. All he wants to do is bicycle. (Bicycle Race) We sincerely believe Freddie when he claims that all he wants to do is bicycle.
15. Forget all your duties. (Bicycle Race)
16. The orchestra of little bicycle bells. (Bicycle Race)
17. Brian May trading licks with himself in multiple speaker channels. (Bicycle Race) The Pirate envisioned this conversation, "We need someone to trade licks with Brian. But no one's really as good as Brian. He can just do it himself."
18. Verse three, second half. (Bicycle Race)
19. The first bass slide. (Let Me Entertain You)
20. The second bass slide. (Let Me Entertain You)
21. "It's a sellout!" (Let Me Entertain You)
22. The concept of, "I'll Cruella DeVille you." (Let Me Entertain You)
23. "Of course!" (Let Me Entertain You)
24. A lot of pretty lights. (Let Me Entertain You)
25. Rock á la carte. (Let Me Entertain You) We love taking a look at the menu and seeing that Queen gives us rock á la carte.
26. "We'll breakfast at Tiffany's." (Let Me Entertain You)
27. "We'll sing to you in Japanese." (Let Me Entertain You)
28. The concept of having a "son of a bitch of a time." (Let Me Entertain You)
29. The ending that is both abrupt and drawn out at the same time. (Dead On Time)
30. Dreamer's Ball.
31. Mr. Fahrenheit. (Don't Stop Me Now) "Two hundred degrees, that's why they call me Mr. Fahrenheit." Freddie, no one calls you Mr. Fahrenheit. I think you are making it up. It's been bothering me for years. According to the Pirate, no one in the history of the world has ever been called Mr. Fahrenheit unless they bestowed it upon themselves. Keep in mind, though, that the day the Pirate decided that he wanted to be known as a blue-eyed floozy, he also decided he wanted to be called Mr. Fahrenheit. That's two nicknames off one record.
32. The fact that there is a rock album with a reference to Lady Godiva. (Don't Stop Me Now)
33. Roger Taylor.
1/3. The other six songs that did not get picked apart individually. They're okay, but they mostly get in our way of Let Me Entertain You and Don't Stop Me Now, so we skip them. In Only Seven Days isn't a bad tune, but if we are going to have Queen take us through a week in the life, we'll take Lazing On A Sunday Afternoon any day.
A few days after we made this list, I happened to look at the song credits. It's pretty cool that they stole the White Queen riff for Jealousy, but what's even cooler is the fact that Brian May wrote White Queen and Freddie Mercury wrote Jealousy. So, Freddie Mercury lifted a riff from Brian May. Beautiful. And then the Pirate pointed out, not only did Freddie steal a riff from Brian, it was for a song called Jealousy. Doubly beautiful. We giggled for ten minutes over that. It makes a good album even better.