(Credit: Far Out / Denis Pellerin)
Sat 10 January 2026 4:00, UK
Nothing about Brian May was ever about being subtle whenever he stepped behind the fretboard.
Whereas most guitar players have found a way to make the guitar sound beautifully subdued, there’s something about the way that May laid his fingers across the frets that made everything sound so regal whenever he played, whether that was making something sound like a royal announcement or trying to get his instrument to cry half the time that he was playing. But for all the life that May had in his playing, no one was going to be able to survive the body blow of losing someone like Freddie Mercury.
Let’s make one thing crystal clear: there’s no soul on this Earth who could possibly do what Mercury did back in the day. He was the archetype for what a rock and roll frontman was supposed to be, and while not everything that he sang may have been to everyone’s tast,e whenever he sang, no one could argue the conviction that was in his voice whenever he tore through one of their classics.
So when he passed away from AIDs in the 1990s, it was only natural for Queen to call it a day. There’s no sense in someone trying to replace Mercury, and while the band have done various tours with Adam Lambert and Paul Rodgers, it’s understood that the night is always meant to be a celebration of what Mercury did rather than trying to leech off of his songs whenever they take to the stage.
And it’s not like the band were exactly the most fashionable thing in the world by the time they closed up shop. Made in Heaven was a fine way to pay tribute to their fallen bandmate, but if the 1980s were a prime time for them to become the biggest stars in the world, there was always going to be a caveat for them trying to make a name for themselves in the world of grunge music.
Fans of Nirvana and Pearl Jam probably weren’t going to be listening to Innuendo in their spare time, but that didn’t matter to May. He was off to see what he could do on his solo records, and while Back to the Light helped bring him back down to Earth,, he knew that he couldn’t have done it without the help of Cozy Powell.
There were plenty of friends coming to his aid after losing one of the greatest frontmen in the world, but May said that Powell was the one that truly helped him restructure himself, saying, “Cozy was the core. Without Cozy, I don’t think I could have done it. He had such a fountain of positivity and humor. He became the greatest friend. Of course, we lost Freddie and I kind of clung to Cozy as a mate and as a musical person to bounce off of. All of those sessions, Cozy would come in full of positivity. Sometimes I’d say, ‘Cozy, I don’t know if I feel up to it today.’ He said, ‘But you do, you can feel up to it.’ He just kicked me into action every time. It was the greatest thing.”
Besides, having one of the greatest living drummers in your band wasn’t going to hurt, either. Having come from working with May’s best friend, Tony Iommi, it was a lot easier for Powell to make things a lot heavier, usually coming from the John Bonham school of drumming and pounding the life out of every single drum in sight whenever he worked on the record.
Getting everything back on track wasn’t going to be easy, but listening to tracks like ‘Too Much Love Will Kill You’, May wasn’t simply trying to forget about his legacy. He wanted to make something that could stand alongside his output in Queen, and while nothing was going to bring Mercury back, the least that he could do was remember him with the help of a few friends by his side.
Related Topics