CORY REYNOLDS | DATE 9/5/2021

Remembering Freddie Mercury, born OTD 1946

Featured photograph, of inimitable Queen frontman Freddie Mercury, who would have turned 75 years old today, on the North American Jazz Tour of 1978, is reproduced from Queen: The Neal Preston Photographs—the official book on the band. “Freddie was the obvious visual focus of the band for me,” photographer and author Neal Preston writes. “He was always happy to have me around and I came to realize that his favorite thing in life was to be Freddie Mercury. Even when he was ‘off’ he was ‘on.’ He never told me to put a camera down, on the contrary he seemed to revel in the fact that I was always around to document everything that went on. As a badge of honor and acceptance I was immediately given a very Queen-esque nickname by Freddie, dubbed ‘Linda Lens.’”