Brian May
Brian May
Brian Harold May, CBEis an English musician, singer, songwriter and astrophysicist, best known as the lead guitarist of the rock band Queen. He uses a home-built electric guitar, called the Red Special. His compositions for the band include "We Will Rock You", "Tie Your Mother Down", "I Want It All", "Fat Bottomed Girls", "The Prophet's Song", "Flash", "Hammer to Fall", "Save Me", "Who Wants to Live Forever" and "The Show Must Go On"...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionGuitarist
Date of Birth19 July 1947
CityLondon, England
If I go to places where other people are playing, I often get up and play myself. I just enjoy the sound and feel of playing.
The potential audience seems to be dwindling in the states. I was kind of embarrassed for the band because of the size of the audience.
There's nothing I'm embarrassed about
I like a big neck – thick, flat and wide. I lacquered the fingerboard with Rustin's Plastic Coating. The tremolo is interesting in that the arm's made from an old bicycle saddle bag carrier, the knob at the end's off a knitting needle and the springs are valve springs from an old motorbike.
I had this big thing about guitar harmonies. I wanted to be the first to put proper three-part harmonies onto a record. That was an achievement.
I despise the Lottery. There's less chance of you becoming a millionaire than there is of getting hit on the head by a passing asteroid.
The Wedding March has a bit of a death march in it.
George Harrison was a fabulous, fabulous, fabulous guitarist, and a wonderful example of what a rock star should be. I totally revered him as an innovator. He was always fresh, daring, magnificently melodic, full of spiritual quality, and totally conscious of the chord structure beneath the solo. And he had the courage to play simple. He never took refuge in effects, or tried to impress with speed. I hope he knew how much we all loved and respected him.
Sanctions always hurt the poor, the weak, the children.
We've done an arrangement with an orchestra, but I think the best stuff tends to come when it's just the four of us.
I go through major crises every few months, but then I have great peaks of belief and creativity. I'm a weird kind of animal
I'm into paradoxes. I wanted to make an album about them, but the group told me I was a pretentious fart. They were right.
It's wonderful for me to see what 'We Will Rock You' has done. 'We Will Rock You' and 'We Are the Champions' have kind of transcended the normal framework of where music is listened to and appreciated - they've become part of public life, which I feel wonderful about.
I have to build my own boat this time. It's a big sea out there, and I have a pretty small boat. I have a lot of belief in it.