On Monday 25th February 1985 at 3pm, Brian presented a two hour show on
London's "Capital Radio" as a guest DJ.
BM: Hello, nice to see you
Roger Scott: This is a new role for you, have you ever done this sort of
thing before?
BM: Not for a very long time. I've played around with it a little bit in
America. In the old days you used to be able to go into a radio station and
they'd say "Alright! You can do anything you want!" kind of thing. These
days they're very tight so they wouldn't let you do it.
RS: You're still going to squeeze in a few knucklebusters here I would
think?
BM: Yes, well it's not going to be that soft, I'll give you that. I can't
say you're that soft these days, my god I couldn't get in the door! He
does rock, does our Roger!
RS: There were so many stories to hit the press about that Rock In Rio show..
BM: Yes, all of them complete fabrication
RS: What's your outstanding memory? I remember reading something about you
chucking people in swimming pools
BM: No, I jumped in myself actually. It was the only thing left to do that
night really. It was a bit warm and everyone was getting very silly and
there was this lovely inviting pool there so in I went. That's all.
RS: Outstanding memory?
BM: Just looking at the crowd really. We never quite believed that it was
going to happen and we were going to get quarter of a million people a
night or whatever, and it just actually happened, they all rolled up
and one night it was pouring with rain and they were still there until
two in the morning from four in the afternoon and it was very well
organised and very well lit which is unusual so you could actually see
the audience very well, all in pools of different coloured lights and
I think there is going to be a video of that some time and perhaps people
will be able to see, but it was quite something I must say. And there
was the feeling of it being the first time, which it was, because there
never was that much rock'n'roll in Rio. Now there is mate, I tell you!
RS: Are Queen taking a rest for the rest of the year?
BM: No, we're starting, er, the beginning of April we'll be in New Zealand
and Australia and then a couple of weeks after in Japan and then we go in the
studios again and make the thirty ninth album!
RS: First of all you have to get through the next couple of hours
BM: That's right, which is going to be quite hard!
RS: Good luck
- ["Hammer To Fall" - Queen]
- BM: This is Brian May and we're going to get straight into this - I can't
believe they let me do this. This is my favourite group....
- ["Photograph" - Def Leppard]
- Yes, Def Leppard from the Pyromania album. I think this country has yet to
see the full might of these guys. I didn't believe it either - I didn't
think they were that good until I saw them. Oh boy oh boy oh boy they
are amazing. This group isn't too bad either. This is some guy called
Edward Van Halen and his brother Alex and there's a couple of other guys
in the group, but you should hear the rapport between the bass.. er guitar
and the drums on this, it's absolutely unbelieveable I think. It's
called "Hot For Teacher" and it's Van Halen...
- ["Hot For Teacher" - Van Halen]
- (in the middle of the track, Brian shouted "Loud!" over the music)
- Yes, Van Halen. It's going to be dry this afternoon - they've got me even
doing this stuff can you believe it! - it's going to be dry this afternoon,
eleven degrees C, clear overnight with a maximum of five degrees centigrade
but misty tomorrow morning. How about that. And here is the best singer in
the world in my opinion.
- ["Better Be Good To Me" - Tina Turner]
- That of course is Tina Turner and absolutely tears me up and I hope
she does you too. This is Brian May standing in for John Sachs on Capital
and I've got something else for you now. A little later we have my favourite
Foreigner track pretty soon after this.
- [commercial break]
- Hello, this is Brian May playing a few tracks for you. This is the kind of
record that I think heals you if you're feeling a little torn up sometimes.
It's Foreigner.
- ["I Want To Know What Love Is" - Foreigner]
- That's Foreigner and I'm very impressed how they can do that after being a
long time on the road. It seems to be something which is very personal which
sometimes is hard to do. And they resist the temptation to tart it up, you
know what I mean? The chorus just keeps on the same although there's loads of
other things that would rhyme. Anyway, this is Brian May standing in for
John Sachs and seeing as he's not here I'm going to do this appeal for him.
They were going to try and make me say mayday but I don't know about that
really, but it's some kind of appeal, OK! So has anyone got an old guitar
to give away, bass and acoustics are needed, give Capital helpline a ring
on 01 388 7575 if you can respond to this urgent [sharp intake of
breath] mayday. Oh my god! Right, try this.
- ["Since You've Been Gone" - Rainbow]
- (record stopped in the middle, and Brian said "spot the deliberate mistake"
and then restarted it)
- That's Rainbow from some time back. A little tasteful Ritchie bit on the
end, I hope you like that. OK, the next one you're going to enjoy even
more, this is "Gimme All Your Loving". Did you spot the deliberate
mistake there? I'm sorry about all that, but we thought you might enjoy the
same record twice, you know how it is. They're all having kittens in here,
you see they made the big mistake of giving me the knobs to play with as
well as talking. It's great, I can go over here or I can go over here or I
can do all this shit... excuse me!
- ["Gimme All Your Loving" - ZZ Top]
- I've been listening to those guys for a very long time, ZZ Top, they're just
so unbelieveably cool. I don't know what it is, it's great. So we're going
to have something totally different after this.
- [commercial break]
- Just in case you were wondering if this was going to be totally headbanging,
this one really gets me. It's very emotional, it's Amii Stewart.
- ["Friends" - Amii Stewart]
- Isn't that pretty? So's this.
- ["Start Me Up" - Rolling Stones]
- The Rolling Stones, in case you needed to be told. I've got two problems
in life, firstly I never grew up and secondly I never got out of flower
power so we're going to have some flower power music after this.
- [commercial break]
- Where were you in the summer of 1967? I was in about a six foot by five
foot bedsit listening to Jimi so I'm going to enjoy him now.
- ["Little Wing" - Jimi Hendrix]
- Guess what? Someone heard my mayday, so special thanks to Tessa Martin who
sent in a guitar, and this is something else from our little flower power
indulgence period here. I hope you like this one. That was Jimi Hendrix
and this is Cream. I think if they re-released this it would be a big
hit in the days on the beach(???) to come this summer.
- ["Sunshine Of My Love" - Cream]
- In total contrast this is something pretty modern which I actually got to
play on. This is Brian May, by the way, I'm standing in for John Sachs
and I don't usually do this kind of stuff, I usually play guitar for a
living but just for once I'm in here playing some records. This is
Jeffrey Osbourne.
- ["Stay With Me Tonight" - Jeffrey Osbourne]
- (straight into)
- ["Ogre Battle" - Queen]
- That's my group, Queen, from some time back - "Ogre Battle". I wasn't going to
play any Queen stuff but they forced me, you know. I'd like to play this
for my long suffering lady, Chrissie, the next couple of tracks.
- ["Time After Time" - Cyndi Lauper]
- I think Cyndi Lauper is great and very much underrated. She's going to be round
for a very long time. This is especially for a friend of ours - this is for
John [Deacon], some of you may know that John's had a little problem with his
car recently but he's going to be alright.
- ["Don't Drive Drunk" - Stevie Wonder]
- [commercial break]
- This is Brian May on your Capital Radio, playing some Genesis for you.
- ["Turn In On Again" - Genesis]
- Normally I don't like this stuff that's just drum machines and various
kinds of machines, but this is very strange. I don't think this has ever
been heard in this country, I doubt. It's by a group called Animotion
and it's called "Obsession" and after a while if you hear it a few times
it just gets in your brain.
- ["Obsession" - Animotion]
- I was just getting all emotional, but they're going to make me read some
traffic news here, I'm sure you're going to enjoy this a lot. There are
townbound delays on the A4 because of roadworks in the nearside lane
appraching Hammersmith Broadway, watch out on the A4 coming into London.
There are faulty fraffic lights at the junctions of Baker Street and George
Street, and Clapham Road and Bedford Street, and a broken down tanker is
causing long delays in both directions on Gunnersbury Lane between Chiswick
roundabout and Hangar Lane. We're going to play some more music and it's
real music. I think this is my favourite record ever.
- ["Tracks Of My Tears" - Smokey Robinson]
- That's definitely the best record ever made, I'm going to die with that
playing. So we've got some Steve Perry after this
- [commercial break and trailers]
- So that's what you're getting tomorrow. Meantime, here we go with Steve Perry.
- ["Oh Sherrie" - Steve Perry]
- In case I don't get a chance again, I'd just like to say a big thank you to
Mike the producer, without whom I never would have got through all this.
So we're going to try and get this cue right. Get a load of this.
- ["Can't Get Enough" - Bad Company]
- (start splutters and Brian says "close, wasn't it!")
- It's terrible this disc jockey business. They don't have toilets in here,
you have to rush out along the corridor. I just bumped into Roger Scott
who said it's terrible and they used to put on Bohemian Rhapsody in
the old days so they could go for a long leak. Anyway, this is Ozzy.
- ["Crazy Train" - Ozzy Osbourne]
- Now the problem with this kind of program is that it's not hard to find the
tracks to play, it's very hard to know what not to play. It's really terrible.
We've gone back to Def Leppard now. These people are very underrated, you
should listen to this.
- ["Foolin'" - Def Leppard]
- This is Brian May and after this it is going to be the Hitline so I have to
do what I'm told after this, OK.
- [commercial break]
- OK,we're now back to the Capital Hitline and at number 10, these are the
records that you voted for by the way on 388 7671, number 10 is The Commodores
"Night Shift", at number 9 Paul Young "Every Time You Go Away", and at
number 8, this.
- ["You're The Inspiration" - Chicago]
- I'm personally very glad that the Capital Hitline people force that kind
of stuff to get played in this country which is well made and at the
same time means something. This is the Capital Hitline and I'm standing in
for John Sachs, I'm called Brian May. At number 7 there's Maxi Priest
which is called "Should I?". At number 6, Phil Collins.
- ["One More Night" - Phil Collins]
- Phil Collins at number 6 on the Capital Hitline. London Road in Forest
Hill is slow moving in both directions because of the weight of traffic.
There are faulty fraffic lights at the junctions of Baker Street and George
Street, and Clapham Road and Bedford Street, and a broken down tanker is
causing long delays in both directions on Gunnersbury Lane between the Chiswick
roundabout and Hangar Lane. Watch out on the roads OK. Be careful. It
ain't worth it.
- ["Love And Pride" - King]
- Number 4 is next.
- [commercial break]
- If you're wondering whast's going on, John Sachs is not here today. This is
Brian May from the Queen group standing in and doing some stuff. We're on
the Capital Hitline and we're up to number four which is the excellent good
bloke Howard Jones, number 4.
- ["Things Can Only Get Better" - Howard Jones]
- Hitline number three is Prince.
- ["Let's Go Crazy" - Prince]
- If you want to vote for tomorrow's Capital Hitline, the telephone number is
388 7671 so vote for tomorrow's hitline on that number.
- [a bit more of Prince]
- I couldn't fade out his histrionics at the end. That's Prince at number 3.
Number 2 sound is Dead or Alive so here we go.
- ["You Spin Me Right Round" - Dead or Alive]
- It's been a lot of fun being here on Capital Radio this time. Three o c'clock
tomorrow you can hear Heaven 17 having a go at disc jockeying like me,
best of luck to them, and a five o'clock today you can hear Nicky Horne.
This is Brian May signing off. I've had a good time, thank you for listening.
I don't know what to say about Bruce except that I hope he's not as good as I
think he is on this tour, it's going to be too much to bear. And very best
of luck, thank you for listening to me.
He's number 1 on the hitline, I should have told you that. Bruce is number 1.
Bye.
- ["Dancing In The Dark" - Bruce Springsteen]
- It's not bad this, really. It's a shame Roger Scott doesn't like this guy.
He's pretty good, Bruce Springsteen.
- [a bit more of Bruce]
- Right, this is definitely the last time. Drive home real carefully, OK.
Look after your mate.
- [commercials and cut to next programme]