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“Mama, just killed a man” is one of the most recognizable lines in rock music history. But Freddie Mercury originally envisioned the story very differently: in an early version of the lyrics, the song’s protagonist was supposed to go off to war. And for a time, the song even had a completely different working title — Mongolian Rhapsody.

Today, it is almost impossible to imagine Bohemian Rhapsody in any other form. But surviving drafts written by Freddie Mercury reveal just how dramatically the song could have changed during the creative process.

The new details are revealed in the book A Life in Lyrics: The Official Creative Legacy of Freddie Mercury, compiled with Mercury’s former fiancée and lifelong confidante, Mary Austin.

The book was published ahead of what would have been Mercury’s 80th birthday on September 5. It draws on material from the singer’s creative archive, including notebooks, handwritten lyrics and musical sketches discovered at his London home following his death in 1991.

Today, Bohemian Rhapsody begins with the famous line: “Mama, just killed a man.” But in one early version, Mercury wrote:

“Mama, there’s a war began / I’ve got to leave tonight.”

The original version of the story, therefore, centered not on murder but on war and the protagonist being forced to leave. Mercury later took the song in a completely different direction, with the line about killing a man becoming its iconic opening.

Work on what would eventually become Bohemian Rhapsody appears to have begun long before the song was released. Mercury is believed to have written the opening line — “Mama, just killed a man” — as early as 1968, while studying graphic design at Ealing Art College.

The phrase led him to imagine a story with a Western-style plot, which is why he informally referred to the unfinished piece as The Cowboy Song.

The composition would eventually take on a completely different character.

Why the song could have been called Mongolian Rhapsody

One of the most unexpected discoveries comes from drafts bearing the title Mongolian Rhapsody.

On one handwritten page, the title has been crossed out and replaced with the familiar Bohemian Rhapsody.

Other early drafts contain lines that never made it into the final version of the song.

Even Queen could have had a different name

There is also a surprising story behind the name of the band itself.

Mary Austin recalls an early meeting between the musicians during which they discussed what to call the group.

Mercury suggested Queen, while Brian May proposed Build Your Own Boat.

When Freddie asked Austin for her opinion, she sided with May.

“Freddie smiled but said nothing,” Austin writes.

She later wondered whether it had been some kind of test.

“If it was, I suspect I didn’t pass it very well!” she admits.

Ultimately, the band became Queen.

Freddie worked on the song even in his sleep

The creation of Bohemian Rhapsody consumed Mercury so completely that he continued working on it even while he slept.

According to Austin, Freddie would sometimes wake up with fragments of lyrics that had come to him in dreams but could not fully remember them. He therefore began deliberately waking in the middle of the night to write down his ideas.

“He was so consumed by ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ that even his sleep seemed to be part of the process,” Austin writes.

His intense concentration was equally obvious during the day.

Normally, Austin could interrupt Mercury while he was working at the piano, and he would happily take a break for tea and conversation. But while creating Bohemian Rhapsody, things were different.

“He didn’t even move when I came in,” she recalls. “He was so focused that it seemed as though even his posture had changed.”

Nearly 200 vocal overdubs

A Yamaha piano Mercury purchased around this period played an important role in shaping the song’s sound. Austin speculates that the atmosphere of the music shop and the sound of the instruments may have influenced the grand, operatic elements of the future composition.

At the time, Mercury was also listening extensively to Chopin, Mozart and Joni Mitchell.

Mitchell’s music made a particularly strong impression on him. Austin even admitted that she felt a certain sense of jealousy toward the singer.

“Joni Mitchell was the only woman I ever felt jealous of Freddie over!” she writes.

Once the song reached the recording studio, the scale of the production became extraordinary.

Queen spent around three weeks recording the track, which was already one of the most expensive recordings of its time.

The operatic section alone required nearly 200 vocal overdubs by Mercury, Brian May and Roger Taylor.

By the end of the sessions, some sections had been recorded on eighth-generation tape. The tape had become so worn that, according to the account, light could be seen through it.

EMI wanted to cut Bohemian Rhapsody

But once the recording was finished, a new problem emerged.

The song was almost six minutes long — far too long for a conventional single. EMI executives demanded that the track be drastically shortened.

Mercury refused and walked out of the meeting.

Later, back at home, he began to worry that his decision might jeopardize the band’s career and his own future.

But Queen received an unexpected boost from London Capital Radio DJ Kenny Everett.

He was given an advance copy of Bohemian Rhapsody, apparently on the understanding that he would play it once or twice.

Instead, Everett played the full version several times on air over the weekend.

Listeners began calling the station asking where they could buy the single — even though it had not yet been released.

In 1975, Bohemian Rhapsody was released in its full, unedited version. The song spent nine weeks at No. 1 on the UK chart and became Queen’s first hit to reach the U.S. Top 10.

And yet Bohemian Rhapsody became a legend

In 1992, the song experienced another surge in popularity after appearing in the film Wayne’s World. As a result, Bohemian Rhapsody climbed to No. 2 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100.

Another wave of interest came in 2018 following the release of the biographical film Bohemian Rhapsody, which told the story of Freddie Mercury and Queen.

Today, it is impossible to imagine the song under any other title — and even harder to picture it with its original wartime storyline.

But Mercury’s surviving notes are a reminder that even the greatest musical works rarely emerge in the form in which the world ultimately comes to know them.

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