I Heart the Music: Your Online Source for Live Music Reviews and Interviews in Toronto!

When we heard that the worldwide phenomenon that is Queen was coming to town we had our doubts. For one thing, Freddy Mercury has been dead for quite some time now and we hadn’t heard that an Elvis-like situation had taken place whereby fans and the media were convinced that his death was a fake. So when we actually looked into this some more, we soon came to find out that it was an actual stage reproduction of Queen’s last world tour with Freddy entitled Queen: It’s a Kind of Magic. Headed by Australian musician and bona-fide Queen historian Craig Pesco, this reproduction literally goes as afar as to create EXACTLY what would have been seen and heard during Queen’s heyday. When we say EXACTLY, Pesco actually explained to us that he sports fake teeth that look just like Freddy’s in order to make it as authentic as can be. Once we heard this, we had to see it for ourselves.

Seated in the second row (yes, we were amazed that we were able to grab these seats too) and amongst some of the biggest Queen fans in Toronto, we set out to discover the magic that is a Queen live show. The stage was decked out with all the trimmings that apparently one would find during their reign; the white baby grand piano, the blinding lights and the huge sound. Pesco (Freddy Mercury) came out in full force in costume (and teeth) and as soon as he hit the stage the crowd went crazy. Their first song “A Kind of Magic” started and we felt like we were literally thrown back into the early nineties.

Throughout the course of this production Pesco changed approximately five times, including one number in full drag (with the boobs to match), and it became more and more apparent that Pesco was the man leading (and stealing) the show. His enthusiasm and passion were evident and became even more so against the not-so-enthusiastic rest of the band. This lack of enthusiasm was extremely evident and continued throughout the rest of the production. Another rather distracting feature of this show was the wigs that they were wearing. I understand that they were there to “look like” the original Queen members, however, the wigs were not only extremely obvious to the point of funny, but also took away from the fact that this was a serious show. Their skills, however, blew me away as each member of the band spent a good two minutes each showcasing their talent on their respective instruments. I have never seen a bass solo, so that was a pleasure to view so close!

They played all of the well known tunes (and a few that I had to ask around for) including “Crazy Little Thing Called Love”, “Another One Bites the Dust” and came on for their encore to perform cult classic “Bohemian Rhapsody” which was clearly met with chants by everyone in attendance. The crowd consisted of the young and old and most people left fairly satisfied. I did, however, meet one fan (Randy Pater) who found the whole performance a little too obvious and was not convinced. I understand where he was coming from but then you have to bring it into context: it is a tribute band in all its forms and with that, they did well.