An audience with the Queen

9:28am Saturday 5th August 2006

It's not every day you can say you've been granted an audience with the Queen. Fair enough, it wasn't HM herself (although they did play the National Anthem at the end of their set). I'm talking Killer Queen, the tribute band, who rocked the race crowd to the Ebor Stand's rafters at the York Music Showcase last Saturday.

I had hoped to hang out backstage with an Access All Areas' badge, but in the end I had to settle for a media pass, which at least got me into the County Stand bar. Freddie Mercury, who is Patrick Myers' alter ego, wasn't, it seemed, too keen on having a wannabe rock journo following him around.

"It's a knackering show," Patrick explained on the phone when I told him I wanted to soak up the Mercury kind of magic. "We try to do as little as possible beforehand. We're shy little wallflowers, honest."

Actually, I think it was because he didn't want me to see him put his teeth in. This, I concede, is not a very glamorous rock-star accoutrement, but vital to being buck-toothed Freddie. Patrick had them specially made by a Harley Street dentist who worked on Mercury's waxwork for Madame Tussaud's.

"It takes a while to get used to them," he admitted. "I have to do teeth warm-ups." This may have been tongue-in-cheek; then again, having such a mouthful probably would make you talk funny.

Had he ever accidentally spat them out in the middle of a number? I inquired.

"I use industrial-strength concrete."

I asked Patrick whether he habitually did anything to help him get into character - vacuuming in a frock and high heels perhaps, in I Want To Break Free mode? - but he denies having any shamanistic rituals to invoke the spirit of Freddie.

Neither is he a gay icon: "Although I would be, if I was asked nicely."

Since no one recognises him without his wig, teeth and moustache, this doesn't seem terribly likely; on the other hand it does allow Myers to do bit parts in shows such as EastEnders and Family Affairs, as well as numerous' TV adverts, without compromising his essential Freddie-ness.

Myers, a former drama student, originally formed Killer Queen with some mates for a party in 1993 and got asked to do a show on the strength of it. The next thing they knew they were on tour and haven't stopped since. That's 13 years of scaramouches and fandangoes. Doesn't he ever get bored?

"I suppose I should be, but I never am because I adore doing it. All those songs are designed for a band to do to an audience. I love the crowd and the energy you get from the songs. The love for Queen, all over the world, never goes. Even children know the lyrics."

I can testify to this. Our daughter, who has been raised on a limited musical diet of Bob Dylan, Eminem and Pop Party, was clapping and singing along to Radio Ga Ga like she'd been going to Queen concerts all her life.

Her father, on the other hand, lay on the grass with his eyes closed, groaning. "I had to sit through the real Freddie Mercury doing all that call-and-response stuff with the audience in Wembley in 1978. I went to the bar."

He seemed to be the only one there who didn't appreciate Myers's charismatic and uncannily accurate renditions of the Queen back catalogue. Drunken dads in front of the stage were roaring enthusiastically, suited and booted lads in shades were punching the air on the terraces and the hen parties had kicked off their heels and were boogieing barefoot in a flurry of fascinators to Fat Bottom Girls.

Watching the massive Knavesmire crowd bouncing - "Come on my babies, scream!" demanded Freddie/Patrick, strutting for all the world is if it were Live Aid - it was hard to believe this was the toned-down act.

For their theatre shows, Killer Queen go to town with ramps and risers and fancy lighting, not to mention numerous costume changes. At the racecourse it's a bit different. "You have to set up quickly with a view to not worrying the horses."

I was glad to see that, on the night, Patrick did change from his tight white trousers and yellow jacket into an equally tight pair of leather trousers and a clinging T-shirt, so we did get value for money.

(Not quite as much as we got from the streaker who raced past the finishing post at the end of the 5pm race though, who gave a whole new meaning to the Sky Bet Dash. He got a bigger cheer than the winner.) As the evening came to a good-natured finale, we met up with some friends who had been picnicking and all swayed together singing Bohemian Rhapsody. Even the husband, who was still prone on the grass with his eyes shut, was not entirely unmoved.

I swear I saw him mouth, "Any way the wind blows". It could, of course, have been, "What time does the car park close?" but I prefer to think that Killer Queen had successfully spread the love.