Bohemian Rhapsody: You are my nemesis

Regular readers will know that I like to sing; I mean, I talk about it all the time. I go to Karaoke and, as often as possible, we play Rock Band. We've been at it for about 2 years now, and on version 3 of the game, and we have about 600 songs. I was SO excited when Rock Band 3 came out, because it had Bohemian Rhapsody on it. I don't need to go on and on about how much of an awesome song it is, we'll all just stipulate to that fact, shall we? Here, let's start with all the evidence we need; I picked a version with lyrics built in:




So, the thing with Rock Band is that if I want to score well in the game (and not fail out and therefore die a horrible, embarrassing Rock Band death) I have to sing it exactly the way the game wants me to. Most of the time this is fine, except when it's a song that I usually sing the harmonies to. The game wants me to sing the melody but I always get really fucked up by that, because I'm so used to doing it one way... but that way is wrong, according to the game. So, even when it's a song I adore and know really well, it's really hard for me to get through. Case in point:





OMG! Uncle John's Band in Rock Band! How exciting and wonderful! But... NO. I only know the harmonies to this song, and the harmonies are WRONG. That sucks! I had no idea what I was in for with Bohemian Rhapsody. Of course there's that Rock Opera part in the middle, but that shit is 4 part harmonies. I have no idea WHAT the fuck I'm doing trying to get through that. I've learned any one of the 3 harmonies, I don't even know which, and not the melody, so I'm constantly jumping around trying to figure out where I'm supposed to be and I'm always FAILING. And this is a song I've been listening to practically my entire life, it was released in 1975! It's really hard to sing it a different way than I've been singing it for 30+ years.

What the hell were these Rock Band assholes thinking with this?? I mean, according to the B.R. Wikipedia page, "May, Mercury, and Taylor sang their vocal parts continually for ten to twelve hours a day. The entire piece took three weeks to record, and in places featured 180 separate overdubs." AND, if you look at videos of them performing the song live, whenever they got to that Rock Opera part, they would switch to the studio version because there's no way they could recreate it. So, the band that wrote and performed the song couldn't do it, but I'm supposed to be doing it in my living room? NO WAY! It's fucking impossible! Seriously, check out the difficulty level on this song:

That doesn't stop me from trying, of course. We did it tonight and I failed the first time but then got 91% the second time. Actually, earlier tonight Child 2 says out of nowhere "what's that song that goes 'oh mama mia mama mia mama mia let me go'..... Can you do that on Rocking later?" What can I say? The kid has good taste and he's only 5.

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