If you closed your eyes or looked away, you could almost pretend that Freddie Mercury was on the Warner Theater stage in Torrington Saturday night. Joe Archambeault, who also goes by J.J. Midnight, lead singer of Celebrating Queen, a Queen tribute band, sounded like Mercury trying to do an impression of himself. His voice shrilled as he hit the higher notes, he carried around the half microphone, painted his nails and wore leather pants. He didn't look like Mercury, but he did a good impression, and when he wasn't trying too hard to sing, he really pulled it off. Celebrating Queen played all the hits, starting with "Princes of the Universe" and fake-ended with "Bohemian Rhapsody" featuring students from the Warner performing arts center. They came back for an encore with "We Will Rock You/We Are the Champions."
Some highlights: This was the home crowd. Archambeault, his brother who was on keyboards and another guitarist are all from Bristol, which isn't too far away from Torrington. The lead guitarist was from Naugatuck, and he definitely had friends and family there. Also, there was a pair of little kids from St. Louis with a band called "Pickletank." They sang "We Will Rock You" earlier in the show, before the big encore version. The red-headed kid was adorable and really into it. The best highlight of all, though, was that I got to sit next to the biggest Queen/Celebrating Queen fan in the world. He sang every lyric to every song and even harmonized with Archambeault. I was going to tell him that he should form his own Queen cover band, but as soon as the show ended, he left before I could.
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