Don't Stop Me Now

Back in 2002/03 time I rediscovered a collection of old cassette tapes hidden away in my house. In amongst the old "Now that's what I call music" double sets and few singles (including the great "Swamp Thing" by The Grid), was Queen's Greatest Hits.

It's an absolutely biblically epic album with such belters as Bohemian Rhapsody, Another One Bites the Dust, Killer Queen, Fat Bottomed Girls, Bicycle Race, You're My Best Friend and of course Don't Stop Me Now. If anything it is perhaps the greatest of greatest hits.

"Oooh" says I, but not in a Mercury esque manner. It might have been. Ok it was.

"I think I might have to give this a bit of a hammering."

It got a quick listen that very night. I was quickly hooked and then, by chance, I was in my mate Keith's Mam's car (A silver J reg escort - it's vivid my memory you know) and we made it all the way through Bicycle Race and You're My Best Friend and then, in a pivotal moment, the Queen track, Don't Stop Me Now blasted out of the Escort's speakers.

I don't know what it was that happened that night. Perhaps the speed we were travelling, the turned up stereo system of Keith's Mam's Ford Escort or simply the elated mood we were in. We'd both just gained our first proper jobs around this time, both of us had gotten seriously into nights out and life was on the up. Don't Stop Me Now obviously rang true with us at the time. For the next few months it became "the" song (amongst a few others I might add).

Now, around this time, Keith and I were regular, almost weekly, visitors to Redcar where we would tour the few bars, get absolutely smashed on Vodka and Red Bull which had just been introduced to the scene and then request songs from who I swear was the absolute double of Ned Flanders. Ned used to DJ in the now closed The Royal pub. The finest, funnest, most ridiculous pub Redcar has ever seen. During this time, I started asking for Queen's Don't Stop Me Now, because we loved it and it always tore the house down. Turns out other people loved it. It was a beautiful happy period of my life.

And then it spread like some disease from bar to bar. It became an essential part of the cheesy DJ's set. I asked for it in Walkabout. I asked for it in Chicago Rock. I asked for it in Aruba. It was played. How we danced. How the others danced. How we threw our hands across an imaginary sky during the line, "like a rocket ship racing through the sky"...

But.

You see.

The thing is, I cannot stand the song now.

Every week, in several of the bars we now go in it's almost guaranteed to be played.

Guaranteed.

"Tonight, I am gonna have myself a real good time..."

Well I am sorry Freddie, Bri and the other two, whatever your names are, but maybe I am not this week. Maybe I am a bit miffed that you get played all the time now during my hazy period on a night out. "Tonig...

No Frederick. Just. No.

And do you know what? It's my fault he gets played every week.

I asked for it every week.

Without fail.

Yes, me.

It was fresh and new and retro back in the early 2000's! It hadn't been played for 25 years! But oh no, I just took it too far. It's now become an essential part of your modern night out now. It's a Walkabout classic. A Chicago Rock floor filler. A downstairs in Aruba nightmare.

I am almost certain, 99% certain infact that I never heard Queen's Don't Stop Me Now in a pub or club before until I asked for it that fateful night in Redcar. A good 3 or 4 years worth of going out from 1999 or so.

So, for this, I apologise.

The next time you hear this Queen "classic" belt out of the speakers in your local cheesy disco please, spare a little thought for me.