Somebody to Love. Matt Richards
made up his mind in early 1971 to leave the band. Mitchell’s final gig at Ewell could also have been Roger Taylor’s final gig with Queen. Also on the bill was Genesis and afterwards Roger Taylor was approached by Peter Gabriel, wanting to know if Taylor would be interested in leaving Queen and joining Genesis instead. Taylor firmly declined the offer; he had invested a lot in Queen already and was certain the band had a future. It was not an opinion that Mitchell shared: ‘I still didn’t think they would make it because they weren’t truly original or obviously commercial.’24
Determined to leave the band, he was asked to reconsider his decision by band members, but he was adamant: his Queen days were over. But Mitchell’s decision coincided with the growing presence of a woman in the Queen entourage: Mary Austin.
10
Mary Austin was a beautiful blonde blue-eyed teenager from a poor family in Battersea, south London. Given their university educations and their cultural pretensions, she seemed an unlikely Queen cohort. Her father was a hand-trimmer for a wallpaper specialist and her mother worked as a domestic for a small company. Both her parents were deaf and she communicated with them through sign language and lip-reading.
At the age of 19, after her family had moved to a terraced house in Fulham, Mary began working in Kensington as customer public relations officer for the fashionable Biba store. Founded by Polish-born designer Barbara Hulanicki, Biba became the epitome of style and fashion in the late-1960s and early 1970s when everyone from Twiggy to Julie Christie to Sonny & Cher shopped there. Musicians such as Paul McCartney and Mick Jagger also frequented the store, seeking both fashion from the hat-stands and frolics from the beautiful store assistants.
The Biba store on Kensington Church Street was situated conveniently close to Freddie and Roger’s market stall, and the two of them would often make a beeline for it. ‘I was a Biba freak right from the beginning, way before it got turned into a big department store. When I used to go there it was just a small boutique,’ recalled Freddie.1
The girls that worked in the store were also part of the attraction. However, unbeknown to Freddie and Roger, another member of Queen had already got there first. ‘Part of the attraction of Biba was that the girls who worked in there were so beautiful and they were dressed just right, and they were well presented as well, and we used to just go in there to enjoy the scenery,’ remembers Brian May. ‘I know Freddie did as well. And one of those ladies was Mary Austin and I met Mary at a concert at Imperial College, my own college, and just got chatting to her because she was sitting behind me, and I was pretty shy but somehow I plucked up the courage to ask her out and we went out a few times.’2
It was 1970 and Freddie was in a sexual turmoil. His most recent girlfriend, Rosemary Pearson, had ended their relationship over his sexual confusion and his interest in exploring homosexuality. However, it appears he had not had any male lovers in the intervening period after Rosemary, certainly none of his bandmates or friends have ever suggested as much. But as he became an increasingly frequent visitor to Biba, Freddie started to become evermore attracted to the blonde PR girl working there and Mary Austin, in turn, became intrigued by him. ‘Occasionally he was brave enough to come in on his own,’ she remembers, ‘but most of the time he’d come along with Roger or he’d come along with somebody and he would smile and say hello in passing, which became quite often and I think this went on for about five or six months.’3
She was, however, dating Brian May, although it became obvious pretty quickly to him that the relationship wasn’t going anywhere: ‘She was very wary of anyone, and so we’d generally just go out for a drink and say goodnight, and have a quick peck on the cheek, and that was it really. It really never got beyond that, but there came a point when Freddie started to talk to me about her and it became obvious that Freddie wanted to go out with her. So I said, “Look, we’re really not going out as such, we’re just good friends so I’ll introduce you to her.” ’4
Brian kept his word and managed to get the two of them together. Initially, Mary was convinced that Freddie was interested in her friend rather than her, but she was fascinated by this man she found both intimidating and compelling. ‘He was like no one I had met before,’ she says. ‘He was very confident – something I have never been.’5
Freddie finally asked her out on a date on 5th September 1970, his 24th birthday, but Mary declined, trying to play it cool. However he remained undeterred and continued to pester her to go out with him. Finally, after three weeks of Freddie asking her out, Mary could resist no longer and on 30th September 1970, he took her to The Marquee in London to see Mott The Hoople in concert.
At this time Freddie, despite his grand musical ambitions, was still eking out a living playing gigs with Queen at various London colleges and making whatever money he could from his stall on Kensington Market selling old clothes and his artwork, but Mary wasn’t put off. Instead, she found herself slowly falling in love with him.
Five months later Freddie and Mary were sharing a £10-a-week bedsit at 2 Victoria Road, Kensington, together with their two cats, Tom and Jerry. ‘We could only afford one pair of curtains and so we hung them in the bedroom. We had to share the bathroom and kitchen with another couple,’ Mary remembers.6 ‘Freddie didn’t have much money then and so we just did normal things like any other young people. There were no fancy dinners – they came later when he hit the big time. It took about three years for me to really fall in love. But I had never felt that way about anyone.’7
Brian May remembers watching Freddie and Mary grow ever closer: ‘Freddie was happy with Mary and they were very in love. I think it’s fair to say she was the love of his life.’8
Having recently come out of his relationship with Rosemary Pearson and now well ensconced in another relationship with Mary Austin, any inkling that Freddie might be homosexual must have disappeared in the eyes of any onlookers. Barry Mitchell, who though he had left Queen, still bumped into Freddie occasionally on Kensington Market recalls: ‘I’d often head off to the Market to see Freddie and Roger, just to knock about. Freddie was always full of wild gestures, hands flying around, and would be very demonstrative when he greeted you. Don’t get me wrong, he was great fun, and we all got used to him, but all this limp wrist stuff – I was sure it was all part of the act. I already knew what he was up to with the band’s image, and I assumed this caper was just an extension of that. I never wondered seriously about him being gay, because there was no sign of anything other than a heterosexual relationship with Mary.’9
Certainly, at the beginning of their relationship, Mary appears to have had no inkling about Freddie’s homosexuality either and it wasn’t long before she took him to Fulham to introduce him to her father: ‘I hadn’t warned my father how extraordinary-looking Freddie was and so I think my father handled the situation very well. My father opened the door and just stayed very calm and treated Freddie very warmly. There were a few glances and comments from the neighbours. Afterwards I realised bringing home this musician must have been quite a shock for him.’10
Freddie, however, wasn’t quite so eager to introduce Mary to his own parents. Was this because of a fear that they would accept her all too readily as the perfect companion for their son and, consequently, put pressure on him to marry Mary and provide Bomi and Jer with the grandchildren they so desired? In fact, despite referring to her as his common-law wife, marriage was never going to be on Freddie’s mind. ‘I treat Mary as my common-law wife and we’re getting on fine,’ he would say. ‘We’re happy with each other and it doesn’t matter what other people think. We believe in each other and that’s enough for me. We believe in each other, so fuck everybody else. Nobody should tell us what to do. As far as I’m concerned we are married. It’s a God given situation.’11
Freddie and Mary’s love affair seems beyond question; those around them identified the love and passion they had for each other. At the beginning of their relationship, Freddie was all-consumed with Mary and their love for each other appeared to blossom, although Mary admits that the romance between them took time to develop: ‘It took a long while for me to really fall in love with this man but once there I could never turn away from