What would Queen's Freddie Mercury be doing if he was still with us?

Not that anyone could know with absolute certainty, but Queen guitarist Brian May recently surmised that the singer and rock icon would carry on fronting the influential band. The rocker said as much in an interview with the BBC's Simon Mayo this week (July 7).

These days, May and Queen drummer Roger Taylor carry the group's spirit with their Queen + Adam Lambert concerts. But it would undoubtedly be a whole different ball game if Mercury hadn't died in 1991. Would the vocalist still be doing his thing onstage and in the studio with Queen? Perhaps Mercury would have gone entirely solo — or maybe even a combo of the two.

Watch the video down toward the bottom of this post.

"He would still be saying, 'Oh, I need to do my solo stuff,' but he would be coming back to the family to do what we do," May told Mayo before sharing a sweet but wistful thought. "The funny thing is I feel more and more that he is kind of with us in a way. Maybe I'm getting to be an old romantic, but Freddie's in my day every day."

The guitarist continued, "He's always in my thoughts. And I can always kinda feel what he would be saying in a certain situation like, What would Freddie think? Oh, he'd probably like this; he'd laugh at this, or whatever. He's so much part of the legacy we created, that will always be the case."

Mercury died on Nov. 24, 1991, at the age of 45, only a day after he first revealed to the public that he had tested HIV positive and was diagnosed with AIDS. The official cause of death was bronchial pneumonia.

"You never finish grieving if you lose a family member," May added this week, "and Freddie was a family member. But you get to the point where you're at peace, and you think, My God, the guy had a great life. We created wonderful stuff together that is still making people happy."

Queen's Brian May Appears on The Simon Mayo Drivetime Show - July 7, 2021

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