Freddie Mercury forged an unmistakable identity as lead singer of Queen. But on one of his biggest hits, he did a little bit of an homage to a much earlier era, and to vocalists who helped clear the rock and roll path for artists like him to eventually trod.
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The song was “Crazy Little Thing Called Love,” which despite being a departure for the band, was chosen as the first single from Queen’s 1980 album The Game. Good choice, indeed, as the song gave the band their first ever U.S. No. 1 single.
Getting “Crazy”
How would Queen make the transition into the ’80s? Would their particular brand of go-for-it bombast have a place in the new decade? Surely, those questions were playing in the heads of the band’s four members as they headed to Germany in 1979 to record their new album.
As it turned out, the band delivered arguably the finest batch of material in their career, top to bottom, for that album. They created several songs that sounded right at home in the era, including the tough funk of “Another One Bites the Dust” and the soaring space-rock of “The Game.”
But they had another ace up their sleeve in a song Freddie Mercury wrote while taking a bath one night. It was clearly inspired by some of the sounds of his youth, rockabilly such as you might expect from folks like Gene Vincent or Elvis Presley. Another unique aspect of it: He wrote in on guitar, which as he explained in a 1981 interview with Melody Maker (as quoted by Songfacts), helped contribute to the finished product:
“‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’ took me five or 10 minutes. I did that on the guitar, which I can’t play for nuts, and in one way it was quite a good thing because I was restricted, knowing only a few chords. It’s a good discipline because I simply had to write within a small framework. I couldn’t work through too many chords and because of that restriction I wrote a good song, I think.”
Mercury brought the song to a session at a time when only drummer Roger Taylor and bassist John Deacon were present. Worried that guitarist Brian May might want to complicate it too much, Mercury and the two others quickly laid down the basic track.
May couldn’t object once he discovered how catchy the finished product was. He made sure to add an ideal finishing touch by playing a solo that sounds like something that James Burton might have rocked on an Elvis track.
Examining the Lyrics of “Crazy Little Thing Called Love”
This thing called love / I just can’t handle it. So begins Freddie Mercury on “Crazy Little Thing Called Love.” It sets you up to think this guy is overwhelmed by it all. But as the song progresses, we find out that’s part of what excites him: I kind of like it.
Love is clearly an elusive thing: It cries in a cradle all night / It swings, it jives / It shakes all over like a jellyfish. Mercury also touches on the passionate aspects of the attraction enveloping him: She gives me hot and cold fever / She leaves me in a cool, cool sweat.
In the final verse, the narrator does all he can to prepare himself for the oncoming storm: Take a backseat, hitchhike / Take a long ride on a motorbike / Until I’m ready. At which point, the backing vocals respond, Ready, Freddie. It’s the right hint of whimsy to add the icing on this cake, as “Crazy Little Thing Called Love” ascends into the retro-rock pantheon.
Photo by Werner Baum/picture alliance via Getty Images
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