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TIL Brian May's dad helped him build his famous guitar, but was upset when Brian abandoned his PhD program to join Queen. Brian went on to write "We Will Rock You", "Fat Bottomed Girls"—and eventually "A Survey of Radial Velocities in the Zodiacal Dust Cloud", the thesis he finished 36 years later.
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"A Survey of Radial Velocities in the Zodiacal Dust Cloud" never made the charts.
Sounds like a progressive rock song for sure. 50 minutes long. Divided into 5 movements.
An epic spread across three albums
The new release from Flaming Lips
I don't know how to feel about Flaming Lips. I love Yoshimi and War with the Mystics and most of Embryonic but everything else I hear by them seemingly unbearable
Except the one song about vaseline on toast
The Flaming Lips lately are one of the cases of the front man literally ruining everything... especially when he's not even the songwriter. Soft Bulletin and Yoshimi were so great too :,( shame
Rick Wakeman on bibliography.
"I only listen to real music."
You might be interested in Assembly Bias Rap- it's on clyp and you can find it under #interpretivenudes
Is there a copy of his PhD thesis?
https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=af1X6iX0iCEC&oi=fnd&pg=PR2&dq=a+survey+of+radial+velocities+in+the+zodiacal&ots=WfdC_w4XfM&sig=SJcDCdFq-DqxrvPbgtT0cGl_Xf8#v=onepage&q=a%20survey%20of%20radial%20velocities%20in%20the%20zodiacal&f=false There is also a PDF link.
I got to meet Brian after a gig in Glasgow not long after he published this. I was studying Physics at Edinburgh at the time and decided i wouldn't fan boy...So decided to talk to him about this. I think he was kinda grateful that i wasn't just asking the same old questions he always gets
It was brief but I'll always remember that day :)
Fuck me. I could barely make sense of the abstract.
Cheers m8.
sounds like a Pink Floyd song.
the long awaited follow up to "Astronomy Domine"
And the sister song to "Several Species of Small Furry Animals Gathered Together in a Cave and Grooving with a Pict"
A prequel for 'Set The Controls for the Heart of the Sun'
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Or ORB
It was for a different time, a more intellectual time
Yeah. "Survey" was just too 'Boy Band' for the times.
Before the dark times. Before the Empire.
Dibs on the band name Zodiacal Dust Cloud.
Also, to make the story even more bittersweet, when they played Madison Square in '77 he flew his father and mother out to see the show. At the time, his father and him weren't on the most amicable terms due to May's decision to pursue a music career. After the show, his father came up to him, shook his hand, and said "Okay, Son. I get it now."
Edit: Some people find it hard to believe Howard May held a grudge against Brian for so long. I highly suggest reading this article. It goes into a bit more why May's father was upset.
He flew them out on the Concorde and put them up at the Ritz hotel. His dad worked on the landing system of the Concorde as an engineer but couldn't afford to fly on it.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/event/article-2768463/Brian-May-How-I-built-guitar-rocked-The-Queen.html
Thank you for that. I was wondering that, after reading the original article where it said that his father wasn't happy about him ditching his studies for music......and then later on in the article it mentioned that his dad had passed away.
Picture of Brian and his parents backstage at MSG '77
His dad was pretty special to him. They had grown up fairly poor, he probably thought Brian was risking his future at that point (well before 1977 obviously)
Yeah it was a nice read.
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Yea, not like he was playing in MSG or anything.
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You would just want more Queen 30min later though.
It's all that MSG.
mono sodium glutamate madison square garden
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Lol at "early in Queen's career", they'd released 6 albums by that point
He was still pissed in 1977? They were massive by 1977, probably raking in unimaginable sums of money for Bohemian Rhapsody alone, and his dad was still upset with him? I call bollocks.
Could be the dad didn't see music as a proper career despite the money. But seeing the passion etc at the concert changed his mind.
My guess is the dad wanted to bury the hatchet, regardless and saw that as the best opportunity. He just wanted the best for his son, really.
Well maybe if scientists had groupies, millions of adoring fans and a multi million pound contract there would be more scientists in the world.
Why must dreams be dreams. Follow Elon Musk on Twitter.
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Disrespect goes deep.
But also consider how easy it is for his dad to not see how big Queen was. When they were only locally famous, he already heard about them all the time. Going global won't change how much he hears about his son.
Not until you see them filling Madison Square Garden do you realize he really did make it.
I saw an interview with someone from Queen about this a few years ago. Apparently the Dad kept intricate tables listing the chart positions of all Queen's songs right from the start. He was discouraging Brian May from dropping out of school for it, but was still following the band.
I feel like that's just what a lot of dads do though. Like my dad and I haven't seen eye to eye on everything and have fought now and then about certain choices I've made, but ultimately he still hopes things will turn out okay for me and calls regularly to make sure I'm okay.
When they signed their original record deal in 1973 with Trident records, they got a shit deal. They didn't end up making any money when Bohemian Rhapsody came out in 1975, and they had so much debt, and paid an assload to ditch their contract / switch record companies / managers, they weren't wealthy or rich until the end of the 70's / beginning of the 80's.
Their record contract was so bad (listen to death on two legs, dedicated to their then manager) that in 1975 they got a "raise" in their allowance to 60£ per week per member....which was barely better than the average wage of a working stiff in Britain at the time.... but nothing for successful musician. At one point in '75, John Deacon asked for 4000£ to buy a house for his pregnant wife and him.... not only did the record company refuse, but the band found out that not only did they not have 4,000£ but that they owed 200,000£ before they could receive anymore income payments or advances from the record company.
I believe Bri stated at one point it took the sales and tours for ADATR in '76, NOTW In '77, and Jazz in '78 to get them out of the red and "wealthy".
This was one of the problems that his father had with Brian choosing the music business, he saw his son wasn't making hardly anything for years, all the while abandoning a financially lucrative PHD...
If I'm not mistaken, which I have been often (especially lately), wasn't that the straw that broke the camel's back?
Yes this was the straw that broke the camel's back.
It was this, and Freddie meeting John Reid, Elton John's manager at the time....who agreed to become their new manager and expressed sympathy for their situation. He navigated them through buying out their contract, buying the rights to their back-catalog, and got them their new contract at EMI
(Interesting side note: John Reid was the man who helped Freddie come out of the closet, which led to the end of his relationship with longtime girlfriend Mary, basically his first male relationship at age 29)
So you're saying that Fat Bottomed Girls' observations about the contribution of fat bottomed girls to the rotation of the Earth was written by an astrophysicist?
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I'll never see the Earth the same way again.
I'll never look at a girl's fat bottom the same way again.
I'll never look at blue-eyed floozies the same way again.
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Don't know about that, but '39 is about the implications of travelling at near light speed.
Fun fact, the song don't stop me now is the tale of a man called mister Fahrenheit who actually does travel at the speed of light.
In the year of '39 assembled here the Volunteers,
My favorite Queen song by far
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Calling "The Prophet's Song" and "The March Of The Black Queen" a bit odd is an understatement.
I think it's kind of funny you left out Bohemian Rhapsody on the commonly heard list
my favorite Queen is probably Don't Stop Me Now
Mine as well, maybe besides Seven Seas of Rhye. I love Brian's subdued vocals on the studio version, but Freddie singing it live is also quite amazing
Seven Seas of Rhye is definitely in my top 5 Queen songs.
Get Down, Make Love holds a special place in my young heart. I think it was the rudest thing I'd ever heard at that point!
In the days when lands were few
Here the ship sailed out into the blue and sunny morn
The sweetest sight ever seen
Not sure it is common knowledge, but "'39" was about space travelers according to May. I always thought it was an homage to songs from the second world war.
Wow. I can't believe I've never heard that.
Probably the best song ever written about the oddity of near light speed travel.
Fat, indeed, creates gravity.
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I'm cultivating ass.
Well, start harvesting!
ASStrophysicist
Young callipygian females enhance planetary rotational inertia!
Actually, it was an observation on how the mass of the ass is proportional to the angle of the dangle. To put it more simply, as the bootie of cutie increases, the heat of the meat rises as well.
To be specific, the rotation of the Rockin' World!
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You can download it free here
edit: updated to use official link from his college, thanks to u/EnApelsin
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But all those poor broke universities...
don't forget the unprivileged impoverished textbook makers
Here is his thesis from Imperial College's thesis archive: https://spiral.imperial.ac.uk:8443/handle/10044/1/1333
Isn't science supposed to be shared freely? I never understood why they can't use CC licenses on scientific papers.
This has become a big issue in science and academia. Before the internet, journals performed a valuable service by organizing peer review and publishing articles. Now they aren't needed at all, they're just parasites collecting money for doing practically nothing. They charge money to the authors of the papers and then also charge to read the papers. But everyone still needs journal publications to advance their careers so it's hard to break the cycle.
Arxiv is great but it's only used in certain fields. Last year a site called Sci-Hub made big news by illegally sharing millions of journal articles. It's still up so that's pretty cool. There are a couple papers of mine on there and I fully support it.
No, journals are extremely important as gatekeepers and for the peer review process. If everyone just wrote their papers and put them up for everybody by themselves, then wed have a whole lotta really shitty science not being checked. Of course Im not defending their business practices, but they need to exist.
They don't do "nothing" they provide a limited amount of space so that if you get your article in Nature or Science etc. you get to wave your dick around more than if you got your article in a lesser journal.
So...nothing, got it
Don't underestimate the appeal of dick-waving.
FloridaMan doesn't.
Well, to be fair, it's also just a quick estimate for whether or not an article is full of shit for person who is only partially an expert in the field. It's silly though, of course. Most physicists stick their shit on arXiv anyways.
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The Reddit Journal of Science: where people review papers based on the title and the first sentence of the abstract, and then level uninformed criticism based on personal anecdotes.
Also, mathematicians, physicists, and computer scientists already freely share their papers on arXiv, and we keep them updated even after publication. For example, here's a paper by Brian May.
I get most of the papers I need directly from arXiv, and rarely have to use my university's journal subscriptions unless it's an older pre-arXiv paper.
You've just described my masters dissertation
nb I didn't read beyond the first paragraph of your comment
Okay, hold up. I get the frustration of setting up academic papers behind paywalls, but peer review and citation is ABSOLUTELY the best route to be on in that particular area.
You had me until that last half a sentence.
Pretty review, while not 100% accurate is certainly better than the Reddit system. Also arxiv exists for these reasons
In Dad's defense. No way he could've known how successful a music career would be. To throw away a "sure bet" (PHD) for a gamble with really bad odds makes us dads nervous.
Yeah but it got so tense between them his mom had a nervous break down and had to go to hospital.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/event/article-2768463/Brian-May-How-I-built-guitar-rocked-The-Queen.html
Ha, that's a great headline OP. Before I saw it was his thesis, I thought "wow that song about radial velocities sounds trippy as hell I'd love to hear that."
Title 🔥🔥🔥. 💯👌
It could be an actual song in prog rock
He's terrific on Top Gear as well.
You may be thinking of the wrong may
Sure, next you'll be telling me he wasn't terrific paired with Mike Nichols.
And he sure is handling this whole Brexit thing pretty good
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Personally, I was thrilled when he changed his name to Doris and married himself.
Edit: This joke is way too obscure isn't it: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/doris-day-petition-hits-the-mark-1.209426
They are both Captain Slow in their own way.
He was a really great saleman too, always had more to offer with the original deal. May he rest in peace.
a the ol' reddit switcharoo
Strong title game, OP.
I love titles that are really great in that more subtle sense. No big flashy pun or anything; just a particularly clever way to phrase the info.
That's Dr. Brian May to you.
He didn't spend five years in Brian May musical school just to be called Mister, thank you very much.
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Plus, Interstellar just left me saying "Hmm, interesting.." while "'39" makes me feel such feelings that I won't sing it in public lest my voice break at "Your mother's eyes, from your eyes, cry to me."
It's honestly such a heartbreaking and incredibly well written song
I don't believe it. He has a PhD in physics? Yeah, right. What are you gonna tell me next-Steve Buscemi was a firefighter during 9/11?
The front man of Bad religion also has a PhD...
You've got to be kidding me. What's next, Mark Walhburg assaulted an immigrant during the 80s?
Wait till you learn about the time Mr Rogers convinced Congress to fund his show!
Oh my effing God. No way. This is hardly as believable as when someone told me the lead singer from foo fighters was in Nirvana.
Dude, he'd have been more likely to be in Tenacious D than Nirvana.
What the fuck? Honestly I'd rather believe that Kanye west sang in a hoobastank music video than that bro
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It is a little strange that their lives were basically worth $87.50 each.
What a bargain
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John Lennon beat up everyone he met.
He stabbed George Harrison over 20 times and framed someone else
Milo of Decedent's also
He went to college?
So does Peter Weller (Buckaroo Banzai, Robocop)... in Italian Renaissance Art History.
The singer from the offspring has a PhD in molecular biology
Wow, you made me wiki him cause it blew my mind. And I see that he's a licensed airline transport pilot, a certified flight instructor, wrote a paper on how HIV evades immune response, does charity work to help use DNA testing prove innocents of previously convicted men, all while being the front man of my favorite band back in the day - the dude is pretty awesome.
Surprised Bruce Dickinson doesn't have a PhD yet
He was probably too busy with the Olympic fencing to pursue one.
But he has a fever that can only be cured by more cow bell
According to Wikipedia he has a Master's but no PhD, although he was working on one as of 2013.
Just here to say that website is excellent. I'm tired of being linked to outrageously bloated sites that take 10s of seconds to load on mobile, and freeze up when you try to scroll past the innumerable ads.
It's mostly plain text.. it's the opposite end of the spectrum.
There is a middle ground. With animations and images and colors that work cohesively with the content and don't feel bloated or "in the way". Reddit does this well. There is such a thing as a non-intrusive advertisement that doesn't get in the way of or take attention away from the content, but is still visible and provides an income source for the website. Google does this well.
You're so used to seeing sites like facebook or buzzfeed where everything is "in your face" that you've forgotten how those animations can actually work in tandem with the content to provide a good experience. The solution isn't to remove them all and make a plaintext website, the solution is to make actually good web design.
It's a motherfucking website.
Better motherfucking website.
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I want this chain to continue, so that in the end the site becomes everything the original guy didn't want it to be.
About as edgy as the stick figure telling me how to make chili at 2 am
This is better.
And highly amusing with it.
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wtf is that
http://motherfuckingwebsite.com
http://bettermotherfuckingwebsite.com
https://bestmotherfucking.website/
https://thebestmotherfucking.website/
Brian May was one of the first musicians to have a website. He was blogging before blogging was a thing.
Or they scroll on you last minute so you click on an ad.
Really? All that in the headline and no mention of '39? The best rock tune ever written about the special theory of relativity?
I don't think it's popular enough, should've been released as a single.
I adore the song, but it never would have charted. Its a nice tune, and nice vocals, but the real hook to the song is the vocals, which most people don't pay real close attention to, and a lot of people would not have understood, especially back when that album came out
Brian May is definitely one of the people I'd put down on my "if you could have a conversation with anyone" list.
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No, that's a genie. Genial means he's a penis and/or vagina.
No, that's genitalia. Genial is a very high rank in the military.
No, that's a general. Genial is the Judeo-Christian story of creation.
What did you talk about?
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For non-UK people: pissed means drunk, not annoyed.
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Dad: Brian, you really should rethink this move. You need to do something constructive with your life
Brian: Don't stop me now, I'm having such a good time
Brian: I Want it All!
We can only dream to make it so far in life using big bottomed girls.
Well he could always go into astronomy if his career as a rock star doesn't take off
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Don't forget he wrote '39. It's a wonderful marriage of Queen and and a PhD in astrophysics.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kE8kGMfXaFU
Brian May is fantastic. He's so low key and humble.
He mentioned that this song was part of a concept he had for an entire album of paradoxes. He was making plans for the other tracks until the rest of the band told him he was being (in his words) "a pretentious fart". He agreed with them and instead made A Night At The Opera.
Damn, '39 is one of my two favorite songs ever. I wish he would've went ahead and made more like it.
"Long Away" is kind of it's analogue on Day At The Races.
Knowing very little about guitars, the story of the Red Special and its construction kind of blows my mind. I love how time turns objects like this into revered artifacts.
A very good friend of mine (Jeff) who has a Doctorate in quantum physicist runs into doctor Mays at conferences occasionally. Around a year and a half ago they got into a conversation about that guitar (The Red Special, Fireplace, Old Lady). Brian and his dad made it (the neck) from the mantle piece from a 100+ year-old house they had move into.
He also let my friend know that he was involved with a small release of replicas, and asked my friend if he wanted one. They settled on a price, each giving half of the proceeds to charity.
There were delays due to the Brexit thing as the wood was being blanked/worked in the Czeck Republic, which then had to be sent to the UK for the hardware. Jeff finally received the guitar about a month ago. Jeff loves it, says it's hard to play because the neck is so thick, but wouldn't trade it for the world.
As consolation for the late shipment, Dr. May also had a Rickenbacker sent to Jeff for free.
EDIT: Removed images at request of my friend.
Is there an opposite of r/titlegore? Because this was beautifully crafted. Kudos, OP.
Jeff Baxter of Steely Dan is now a counterterrorism expert.
They built the guitar out of a fireplace, and the same guitar is still holding up to this day.
And he uses an old sixpence piece for a guitar pick!
Also, the song '39.
If anyone has the time/money, May helps hosts an annual astronomy/music event, Starmus
It gets big name science people with some musicians and other artists. I'd love to go.
Can confirm
I think "A Survey of Radial Velocities in the Zodiacal Dust Cloud" was the B Side to "Flash".
I thought A Survey of Radial Velocities in the Zodiacal Dust Cloud was a Queen song that I hadn't heard, and was about to search for it...
Glad he finally made something of himself.
And another one bites the zodiacal dust ♫
Just sang a song about Fried Pickles to the tune of Bicycle and then this thread pops up.
Reddit, why do you do this to me?
My first question was if his father was alive to see him defend his dissertation or not. Talk about coming full circle.
I've worked with Brian, and have seen the red special guitar up close :) great guy, great guitar!
Brian May once got up on stage, in the middle of my friends set and went on a rant protesting a badger cull. This was around 2013-maybe 14. One of the most bizarre things things I have ever seen.
Both Brian May and his son went to my school. At parent's evening, he sat in the front row and you could see his hair from the back of the hall.
After this I checked who the writer of "I Want it All" was... If you didn't know, you guessed it: Bryan May! Now everything makes even more sense :)
Fat Bottom Girls and We Will Rock You probably had more of an impact on more people's lives than "A Survey of Radial Velocities in the Zodiacal Dust Cloud" ever will.