Inspiration

(From Rolling Stone's Top 100 Singers of All Time:)

Even as he was dying, Mercury threw himself into his majestic, operatic singing. Queen's Brian May recalls that Mercury could hardly walk when the band recorded "The Show Must Go On" in 1990.

"I said, 'Fred, I don't know if this is going to be possible to sing,' " May says. "And he went, 'I'll fucking do it, darling,' — vodka down — and went in and killed it, completely lacerated that vocal."

A healthy dose of respect for Freddie is equivalent to sheer and total awe.