Rewind: Freddie Mercury - "The Great Pretender"

Had he lived, Freddie Mercury would have turned 65-years-old this week. It's hard to imagine the mercurial Queen frontman -- immortalized as a Google doodle -- at retirement age, but  The Guardian's Paul Lester has some ideas:

It would be lovely to imagine him living up to his reputation, ascribed to him by former bandmate Brian May in a blogpost, as the fearless, flamboyant dandy, causing havoc in the mainstream, and doing some of those colourful, creatively daring things that pop stars never tend to do when they reach a certain age, getting up to the sort of artistic mischief we probably wish we could tease out of Bowie or Jagger: work with Gaga, collaborate with Aphex Twin, do a concept album with someone boundary-pushing and young – Tyler, the Creator, say – about the perils of fame in this media-saturated era. You could certainly see him making an appearance on the next Muse album, or joining them for some neo-operatic warbling during one of their live extravaganzas, showing them how to really wow Wembley. Even a brief cameo on the last Scissor Sisters album would have been marvellous. Most likely, though, Freddie would probably be doing now what he did then: twirling that 'tache, showing us his hirsute torso, and surveying all with a wry look that suggested he was about to go and do something a lot more fun and interesting than anything we had planned. Still, it's nice to dream.

I chose to focus on a single song rather than an album because, well, Freddie Mercury solo work is a bit spotty. He died too soon from AIDS to leave much post-Queen work behind, but I've always found this song unusually moving. His private life, his sexuality, even his battle with AIDS kept behind closed doors, the lyrics "I seem to be what I'm not you see," become even more poignant.