Freddie Mercury Google Doodle Video Celebrates Queen Singer's Legacy

Freddie Mercury was the lead singer (and one of the driving creative forces) in the band Queen, famous for such hits as "Another One Bites The Dust," "Bohemian Rhapsody," "Killer Queen," and many more. And today is his birthday. Mercury died in 1991, but his music still resonates today, and a great many modern musicians cite Queen and Mercury as a major influence on current popular music. Oh, and Google's apparently a big fan as well.

To celebrate the musical career and influence of Mercury, the search giant has rolled out one of its patented Google Doodles--fake Google logos used to commemorate special events, dates, or individuals. And today it's Freddie's turn.

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Thankfully, and enterprising YouTube user with screencasting software decided to grab the whole thing to share with the world. So even if you're not yet seeing the Freddie Mercury Google Doodle video in your part of the world, you can see it in its entirety here:

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5RtSTrLk6k" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5RtSTrLk6k']);" rel="nofollow, external" target="_blank"><img class="nopin" src="http://i.ytimg.com/vi//0.jpg" alt="Freddie Mercury Google Doodle Video Celebrates Queen Singers Legacy" title="0"/></a>

It's interesting that the Google Doodle is so much more than a doodle these days. Once upon a time, the day-long custom logo-doodles would merely link you to a search results page filled with results pertaining to the person or thing the logo was honoring.

But now we have start buttons, and custom animated music videos with closed captions for the lyrics and even a pause/fast-forward/rewind control interface. My how the Google Doodle has grown... into a video.

Makes perfect sense, if you ask me. Video is more engaging. Would you rather read about how Freddie Mercury was a passionate singer, or hear him sing something with passion?

Let's not forget that Mercury's music still makes a huge impact on our culture today. For instance... the official Queen video for Bohemian Rhapsody has over 20 million views on YouTube. You can see it for yourself:

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJ9rUzIMcZQ" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJ9rUzIMcZQ']);" rel="nofollow, external" target="_blank"><img class="nopin" src="http://i.ytimg.com/vi//0.jpg" alt="Freddie Mercury Google Doodle Video Celebrates Queen Singers Legacy" title="0"/></a>

That's a pretty good view-count for a song several decades old. But a cover version less than two years old has even more views--over 22 million--though the "band" performing the cover might have brought some of their own fans to the table:

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgbNymZ7vqY" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgbNymZ7vqY']);" rel="nofollow, external" target="_blank"><img class="nopin" src="http://i.ytimg.com/vi//0.jpg" alt="Freddie Mercury Google Doodle Video Celebrates Queen Singers Legacy" title="0"/></a>

But probably the most famous cover of the song--of any Queen song, for that matter--still belongs to these guys:

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzUU7SRRsGo" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzUU7SRRsGo']);" rel="nofollow, external" target="_blank"><img class="nopin" src="http://i.ytimg.com/vi//0.jpg" alt="Freddie Mercury Google Doodle Video Celebrates Queen Singers Legacy" title="0"/></a>

If you're still not seeing the Google Doodle video on the Google home page, you can see it on the UK version of the site.

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