SPRINGFIELD \u2014 Gary Mullen wants one thing for the audience when he brings his Queen tribute \u201cOne Night of Queen performed by Gary Mullen and The Works<\/a>\u201d to MGM Springfield on Sunday.<\/p>\n He wants them to have fun.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are trying to create a time that you\u2019ll never see again which is, you know, Queen with Freddie Mercury. It\u2019s all about the costumes and the music and the lights and the energy, because Queen live was always an exciting concert experience,\u201d Mullen said in an interview with The Republican.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are trying to give that to the audience and make them part of the show. You can sing, you can dance, just get into the show,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n Queen was formed in 1971 and in 1973, signed a recording contract with EMI to release their first self-titled album. One of the world\u2019s best-selling musical acts, Queen released some 18 albums spawning an equal amount of hit singles, including \u201cWe Are the Champions,\u201d\u201dWe Will Rock You,\u201d \u201cAnother One Bites the Dust,\u201d and many others. The band originally consisted of Freddie Mercury on lead vocals backed by band members Brian May, John Deacon and Roger Taylor.<\/p>\n Considered by critics as one of rock\u2019s most versatile performers, Mercury is often remembered for his flamboyant style as the band\u2019s frontman and for his mock operatic masterpiece, \u201cBohemian Rhapsody.\u201d<\/p>\n On Nov. 23, 1991, Mercury announced to the world in a prepared statement that he had AIDS. He died at home the next day surrounded by family and friends.<\/p>\n Mullen\u2019s journey to becoming his idol began in 2000 when his wife and mother secretly entered him into the Granada TV show \u201cStars in Their Eyes.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe difference between \u2018Stars in Their Eyes\u2019 and other shows like \u2018American Idol\u2019 or \u2018X Factor\u2019 was that you would go on this show to impersonate someone like Elvis or Madonna, or in my case, Freddie Mercury. You would go on and they would dress you up, and there was a band and then people would vote for the singer they thought sounded most like the person that they were impersonating,\u201d Mullen said. <\/p>\n He won the overall Live Grand Final, polling 864,838 votes, more than double the runner up. He also set the record for most votes on the show.<\/p>\n \u201cThe other difference with the show is that for the winner there was no money or recording contract, just the glory of winning and saying \u2018Hey, that was great.\u2019 Then you went back to your sort of life,\u201d Mullen said.<\/p>\n But Mullen didn\u2019t go back to his \u201csort of life.\u201d<\/p>\n Eventually, there would be a \u201cStars in Their Eyes Tour,\u201d but by that time Mullen had formed his own show with The Works in 2001. <\/p>\n In 2002, he hit the road with his band, embracing frontman Freddie Mercury.<\/p>\n \u201cWe never anticipated the response our show would get, but we\u2019ve been touring ever since. It\u2019s just been wonderful, and we never thought it was going to do this well. We thought, well, maybe a couple of year, but it has just been growing,\u201d Mullen said.<\/p>\n While Mullen noted it was \u201calways Queen\u201d for him, growing up he listened to \u201call sorts of music.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThere was always a record playing in the house. It was an important part of life for my family. I heard a lot of things, an eclectic mix, anything from country to Motown to rock and roll. Elvis would be on one minute, then it would be Stevie Wonder up next,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n But none topped Mercury.<\/p>\n \u201cFreddie\u2019s voice, for me, it was incredible. How could someone sing like that? And the music, it was big and clever. They took risks and the music was so differing going from something so operatic to rock and roll,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Showtime for \u201cOne Night of Queen performed by Gary Mullen and The Works\u201d is 7 p.m.<\/p>\n Tickets, ranging in price from $39 to $68, are available online at mgmspringfield.com.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement<\/a> and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and\/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.masslive.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" SPRINGFIELD \u2014 Gary Mullen wants one thing for the audience when he brings his Queen tribute \u201cOne Night of Queen performed by Gary Mullen and The Works\u201d to MGM Springfield on Sunday. He wants them to have fun. \u201cWe are trying to create a time that you\u2019ll never see again which is, you know, Queen […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1968407","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-entertainment"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1968407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1968407"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1968407\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1968407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1968407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1968407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"One](\"https:\/\/www.masslive.com\/resizer\/v2\/A25WMPR7SNCNPK43QYFPOAOTUI.jpg?auth=a83ddec57404f72000c64ed72ab183cc5753b875a0cda917215f6b5e1d82a399&width=1280&quality=90\")
<\/picture>Journey to becoming Freddie Mercury<\/b><\/h2>\n