Today marks the 25th year that Freddie Mercury, unfortunately, passed away, we thought it was fitting to celebrate his cat love.
The true love of the rock star’s life was Romeo, Delilah, Tiffany and the rest of his litter. For many this day connotes sad times for the rock and roll industry and his video for These are the Days of Our Lives also screams tragedy – featuring a frail and ill looking Freddie singing about the days in the past. Just six months after filming the video, Freddie had died, resulting from AIDS.
The video is a beautiful and brave message, and one which hints at Mercury’s love for cats. Did you notice the snazzy waistcoat he was wearing? It is covered in adorable cartoon cats, but not just any cats – his own. The piece of clothing was created by his friend Donald McKenzie who, after looking at photos of Freddie’s cats, painted them onto a beautiful waistcoat.
In fact, Freddie Mercury absolutely adored cats, at one point in his life he lived with at least ten cats in Garden Lodge – his glamorous mansion in Kensington. Even when he travelled on tour with the band, his cats would stay in London all comfortable, for this reason, Garden Lodge became his favourite home.
My Bad Guy – his debut solo album was dedicated to Jerry, one of his cats which he bought during the seventies and the rest of the album was dedicated to all the cat lovers all over the universe. So that’s a song dedicated to us, how beautiful.
Mercury had many cats and loved them all, at least two of them were rescue cats from the Blue Cross shelter. Miko a tabby cat, Romeo who was picked up by Freddie’s boyfriend Jim Hutton, a
Just a few of his cats were Tom and Jerry, Oscar a ginger cat, Miko a tabby cat, Romeo who was picked up by Freddie’s boyfriend Jim Hutton, a grey cat called Dorothy, Goliath and ironically tiny black cat, Delilah Freddie’s favourite cat and Lily a gorgeous white cat.
The song ‘Delilah’ was named after his kitties and even had lyrics which reflected back to the cat; “you’re all claws and you bite.”
The cats continued to have the freedom of wandering around Freddie Mercury’s house even after the singer sadly passed away. There were also reports that Delilah continued to walk along the walls of Garden Lodge – a very fitting and sad ending to Freddie’s love affair with cats. Marking the anniversary of the amazing rockstar with a relatable story about one man’s love for cats is a very beautiful way of looking at Freddie. On one hand, he was an eccentric musical genius who would wow the crowd and on the other side he was a down to earth man who loved cats.
RIP Freddie.