Music > Never Boring
Released in 2019, the “Never Boring” box set brought together for the first time a specially curated selection of Freddie Mercury’s music, visuals and written and spoken words — a collection to jog the memory of fans, old and new, as to why Freddie remains such a beloved figure, nearly thirty years after his death.
Taken from the very best original source material available, the full “Never Boring” collection contained three CDs with 32 tracks; a Blu-ray and DVD featuring 13 promo videos and an interview; a 120-page 10”x10” hardback book of photographs — many of them rare and unpublished — as well as thoughts and quotes from Freddie himself, and an introduction from Rami Malek, who won an Oscar for his portrayal of Freddie in Twentieth Century Fox’s “Bohemian Rhapsody”. Specially created insert packaging includes a double-sided poster containing an image of Freddie alongside an original work by artist Jack Coulter, inspired by the song “Mr Bad Guy”.
The three CDs included a new 12-track compilation of many of Freddie’s greatest solo performances; a newly mixed 11-track special edition of ‘Mr Bad Guy’; and the nine-track 2012 special edition of ‘Barcelona’ featuring full orchestra. The Blu-ray and DVD of Freddie’s promos and his stage performances with Montserrat Caballé include eight painstakingly reassembled from the original 35mm film rushes, offering the best-ever visual and sound quality. The albums were also made available on CD, vinyl and digital and streaming services.
The set included the recently discovered track Time Waits For No One, produced by Dave Clark, and a haunting track Love Me Like There’s No Tomorrow, immortalised in a new animated video by the award winning duo Beth David and Esteban Bravo.
For all the 2019 ‘special edition’ tracks on ‘Never Boring’ and the ‘Mr Bad Guy’ album, sound team Justin Shirley-Smith, Joshua J Macrae and Kris Fredriksson took the very best original source material available. Rather than going back to previously remastered and mixed tapes, they returned to the original source multi-track tapes, building a new mix true to Freddie’s original versions, taking advantage of the time, resources and technology that were unavailable to Freddie in the 1980s. the result is ultimate quality, first generation vocals that showcase Freddie’s extraordinary vocal range.
The special edition of the ‘Barcelona’ album had been reworked in 2012 using similar methods, in addition to replacing the synthesisers and drum machines used on the original album with new, live symphonic orchestration and percussion.
The same painstaking care brought to rebuilding the audio tracks was brought to restoring all of Freddie’s original video promos.
The entire “Never Boring” package reflects Freddie’s eclectic tastes and love for life. As he himself said: “Some people can take second best, but I can’t. I look upon it as defeat. If you’ve got the taste of being number one, then number two isn’t good enough.”