Bohemian Rhapsody Lyrics by Queen: A Joke That Became a Timeless Rock Masterpiece

Is this the real life?

Is this just fantasy?

Caught in a landslide

No escape from reality

Open your eyes

Look up to the skies and see

I'm just a poor boy

I need no sympathy

Because I'm easy come, easy go

Little high, little low

Any way the wind blows doesn't really matter to me, to me

Mama, just killed a man

Put a gun against his head

Pulled my trigger, now he's dead

Mama, life had just begun

But now I've gone and thrown it all away

Mama, ooh

Didn't mean to make you cry

If I'm not back again this time tomorrow

Carry on, carry on

As if nothing really matters

Too late, my time has come

Sends shivers down my spine

Body's aching all the time

Goodbye everybody, I've got to go

Gotta leave you all behind and face the truth

Mama, ooh (any way the wind blows)

I don't wanna die

I sometimes wish I'd never been born at all

I see a little silhouetto of a man

Scaramouche, Scaramouche, will you do the Fandango?

Thunderbolt and lightning very very frightening me

Gallileo, Gallileo

Gallileo, Gallileo

Gallileo Figaro, magnifico

I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me

He's just a poor boy from a poor family

Spare him his life from this monstrosity

Easy come easy go, will you let me go?

Bismillah! No, we will not let you go (let him go)

Bismillah! We will not let you go (let him go)

Bismillah! We will not let you go (let me go)

Will not let you go (let me go)

Never, never, never, never let me go

No, no, no, no, no, no, no

Oh, mama mia, mama mia

Mama mia, let me go

Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me

For me

For me

So you think you can stone me and spit in my eye?

So you think you can love me and leave me to die?

Oh, baby

Can't do this to me, baby

Just gotta get out, just gotta get right outta here

Ooooh, ooh yeah, ooh yeah

Nothing really matters

Anyone can see

Nothing really matters

Nothing really matters to me

Any way the wind blows

According to uDiscoverMusic, Freddie Mercury started writing Bohemian Rhapsody in the late 1960s, when he was still a student at Ealing Art College. Queen’s guitarist, Brian May, remembers how Freddie brought many small pieces of paper and played different parts of the song on the piano. They called one part “The Cowboy Song” because it had the line “Mama ... just killed a man,” which later became one of the most famous lines in the final song.

Interestingly, Bohemian Rhapsody came from ideas for three different songs. Mercury told his bandmates that he wanted to join them together into one long masterpiece.

Producer Roy Thomas Baker said the song was a “successful joke.” In a 1999 interview with Mix Online, he said, “Bohemian Rhapsody” was totally insane, but we enjoyed every minute of it. It was basically a joke, but a successful joke. [Laughs]. We had to record it in three separate units. We did the whole beginning bit, then the whole middle bit and then the whole end. It was complete madness. The middle part started off being just a couple of seconds, but Freddie kept coming in with more “Galileos” and we kept on adding to the opera section, and it just got bigger and bigger. We never stopped laughing.”

Today, people still argue about the meaning of the Bohemian Rhapsody lyrics. Some think the song is about Freddie Mercury’s struggle with his sexuality and self-acceptance. But Queen has never explained the real meaning. Mercury once said, “I think people should just listen to it, think about it, and then make up their own minds as to what it says to them.”