Bohemian Rhapsody was written by Freddie Mercury of Queen and said himself it took three years to write. Initially it was not put to paper, carried solely in his head. It is from the 1975 album A Night At the Opera. The song is in the style of a stream of consciousness nightmare, and has a very unusual musical structure for a piece of popular music. It has no chorus, instead consisting of various seemingly disjunct sections including operatic segments and in a cappella and heavy metal part.

Despite this, it was released as a single and became a huge commercial success. The single was accompanied by what is generally cited as a groundbreaking musical video which helped establish the visual language of the modern music video.

The song was recorded after a three rehearsal period. During the making of the song, a further four studios were used.

Brian May, Freddie Mercury, and Roger Taylor sang their vocal parts continually for ten to twelve hours a day, resulting in 200 separate overdubs. Since the studios of the time only offered 24- track analogue tape, it was necessary for them to overdub themselves many times and "bounce" these down to successive sub mixes. In the end, eighth generation tapes were being used. The tapes had passed over the recording heads so many times the normally opaque tapes could be seen through, as the oxide layer was being worn off.

A backing track of the grand piano (Mercury), bass guitar (Deacon) and drums (Taylor) was recorded first. The band used many instruments to produce the song, including a Fender Precision Electric bass, May's Red Special guitar, Ludwig drums, timpani, and a Paiste Gong. When it was finished it was the most expensive single ever made and remains one of the most elaborate recordings in music history.

Mercury was famously evasive when asked about the song's meaning. Mercury disliked analyzing his own material and preferred listeners to construct their own interpretations. When the song was released in Iran a leaflet in Persian included a translation. There it states the song is about a a young man who had accidentally killed someone and, like Faust, sold his soul to the devil. On the night before his execution he calls to God in Arabic, "Bismillah", and with the help of angels regains his soul.

The  song is composed of six distinct sections: introduction, ballad, guitar solo, opera, rock , and an outro. This format, replete with abrupt changes in style, tone, and tempo was unusual to rock at the time.  A rapid series of rhythmic and harmonic changes (E-flat major to A minor, among others) introduces a pseudo-operatic midsection which contains the bulk of the elaborate vocal multi-tracking.

In 1077, two years after it's release, Bohemian Rhapsody" was named the best single of the last twenty-five years by BPI.  It's fourteen weeks at the UK #1 spot  make it the fourth longest  serving #1 on UK singles chart. It is the only single to sell a million copies on two occasions and is third of best selling singles in the UK.

It consistently ranks high in media reader polls of best singles of all time. It ranked tenth in the BBC's World Service poll to find the world's favorite song. In the annual "Top 2000" it has , until 2005, been ranked #1 every year.

I was watching a documentary about three years ago and it showed a story by a London music producer riding a taxi to work and heard the song for the first time. After it was over, he said the only thing he could think was "how in God's name could they do that?"

     Lyrics- Bohemian Rhaprody

Is this the real life-
Is this just fantasy-
Caught in a landslide-
No escape from reality-
Open your eyes
Look up to the skies and see-
I'm just a poor boy, I need no sympathy-
Because I'm easy come, easy go,
A little high, a little low,
Anyway the wind blows, doesn't really matter to me,
To me

Mama, just killed a man, Put a gun against his head,
Pulled the trigger, now he's dead,
Mama, life had just begun,
But now I've gone and thrown it all away-
Mama,  oooo,
Didn't mean to make you cry-
If I'm not back again this time tomorrow-
Carry on, carry on, as if nothing really matters-

Too late, my time has ciome,
Sends shivers down my spine-
Body's aching all the time,
Goodbye everybody- I've got to go-
Gotta leave you all behind and face the truth-
Mama, oooo, (anyway the wind blows)
I don't want to die,
I sometimes wish I'd never been born at all-

I see a little silhouetto of a man,
Scaramouche, scaramouche will you do the fandango-
Thunderbolt and lightening- very very frightening me-
Galileo, galileo
Galileo, galielo
Galileo figaro- magnifico-
But I'm just a poor boy and nobody loves me-
He's just a poor boy from a poor family-
Spare him his life from this montstronsity-

Easy come, easy go- will you let me go-
Bismillah! no- we will not let you go- let him go
Bismillah! we will not let you go- let him go
Bismillah! we will not let you go- let me g0
 No, no, no, no, no, no, no-
Mama mia, mama mia, mama mia let me go-
Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me, for me, for me

So you think you can stone me and spit in my eye-
So you think you can love me and leave me to die-
Oh baby, can't do this to me baby-
Just got to get out- just gotta get right outta here-

Nothing really matters,
Anyone can see, Nothing really matters- nothing really matters to me,

Any way the wind blows