Go to my homepage 4 the main menu
WRECKAGE The name-change went hand-in-hand with the departure of drummer Mike 'Miffer' Smith, as Freddie wrote to Celin Daley. Also Freddie wrote the date when Ibex became Wreckage: "Our first booking as Wreckage is on Friday, 31st October at Ealing College" where Richard Thompson, the former drummer in Brian May's 1984, would have been Miffer's replacement. Despite the arduous rehearsal, no-one seems to recall Wreckage's debut at Ealing College, but a typewritten setlist for the gig (by Richard Thompson) has been recently auctioned. Richard Thompson wrote out these set-lists in October 1969. All titles on the larger of the two were written by Freddie, while the smaller document refers to their debut Ealing gig. Miracoulusly, one of the tracks has survived: Green. The song was taped at the flat in Barnes, on a little Fidelity two-track recorder. "Green" was a melodic, medium-paced ballad, whose tone would recall "Mad The Swine" and some of the more reflective material he wrote towards the end of his life. "There's a sudden change in me...", sings Freddie. "I believe my time has come. Any moment I'll be drifting to the sun... Green, turning Green. Rapidly changing through the bassline, turning Green." Apart from pre-Queen titles like 'Lover', which Freddie later turned into 'Liar', the newly discovered 'Vagabond Outcast' and the three originals disclosed in Freddie's letter to Celine Daley ('Without You', 'Blag-A-Blues', 'Cancer On My Mind'), there are, at least, other four unknown tracks, whose words and melodies can only be imagined, unless any other tapes miraculously surface. 'Universal Theme', probably a Bulsara-Bersin guitar instrumental, 'Boogle', 'One More Train' and 'FEWA', which was an acronym for "Feelings Ended, Worn Away", as Chris Chesney recalls. It was a far better group than Ibex, but the brief history of Wreckage isn't nearly as well documented. Only a handful of gigs were booked under that name, one of which is said to have seen them support U.S. rockers Iron Butterfly at Imperial College, possibly at the 5th November 1969 gig listed in Freddie's letter to Celine Daley. The last Wreckage appearance probably took place at the 1969 Christmas dance at the Wade Deacon Grammar School For Girls in Widnes, booked with the help of John Taylor's younger sister, who was a pupil at the school. There are lots of legends about that night: fed up with the microphone stand he had been using, Freddie removed part of it from its base and leapt around the stage thus discovering what was to become his trademark. Despite flashes of true potential, the end of the Sixties also marked the end of Wreckage. Gigs were few and far between, and while John Taylor, Richard Thompson and Freddie remained in London, Mike Bersin was sent to his college in Liverpool. Inevitably, the band petered out. So, when Wreckage started to fall to pieces, Freddie moved on to something else
