FRE D MANDEL
DEBUT SOLO ALBUM
Fred Mandel is a multi-instrumentalist rock musician. He is known for his work with Queen, Elton John, Alice Cooper, Supertramp, Pink Floyd, Lady Gaga, Chris Stapleton, Jamey Johnson, and more. His work can be heard on television and film including the Oscar winning “The Eyes of Tammy Faye.”
Fred's debut solo album, "Part-Time Rebel" released on May, 3rd, 2024 and within the first 24 hours, appeared on both the US and Canadian iTunes Top Rock charts.
Listen to select tracks from the album below:
Fred's debut solo album, "Part-Time Rebel" released on May, 3rd, 2024 and within the first 24 hours, appeared on both the US and Canadian iTunes Top Rock charts.
Listen to select tracks from the album below:
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BIO
Photo Credit: Steven Smith
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Fred Mandel is a Canadian-born (Estevan, Saskatchewan / Toronto, Ontario) keyboard player and guitarist. He taught himself to play piano at 4 years old, and later guitar at 8. After moving to Toronto, he would start his early musical career gigging in local bands as a teenager.
Mandel began his professional touring career with Canadian bands Grant Smith & The Power, Lighthouse and Domenic Troiano. He made his first recording appearance with Domenic Troiano’s band, on the album “Burning at the Stake”. He then performed on Dick Wagner’s album, “Richard Wagner”, produced by Bob Ezrin. Dick, Alice Cooper’s musical director, invited Fred to join the Alice Cooper Band. Mandel toured and recorded with Alice Cooper for four years on keyboards, lead guitar, and subsequently as the musical director for the band. He was co-writer for many of the songs on Alice’s album “Flush the Fashion” and the follow-up album, “Special Forces”. Alice still performs Mandel’s composition “Pain”. His next major recording was on the 1979 Pink Floyd album “The Wall” where he played on the songs “In the Flesh” and “The Show”. In 1982 Mandel toured America and Japan with Queen supporting their album “Hot Space”. He also appeared with the band on their Saturday Night Live debut, performing the songs “Crazy Little Thing Called Love” and “Under Pressure”. Over the next several years he would collaborate with the band on various projects, including the album “The Works”, Brian May’s side project “Star Fleet”, and Freddie Mercury's solo album “Mr. Bad Guy”. In 2014 Queen released “Queen Forever” which included Brian’s composition “Let Me In Your Heart Again” with the original band, Freddie Mercury on vocals, and Mandel on piano. In 1983 Mandel played to sold-out stadiums across America and Europe with Supertramp on the “Famous Last Words Tour”, the final gigs with the band’s original line-up. In 1984 Mandel joined the Elton John band where he remained through 1990. With Elton, Fred recorded 5 albums and toured the world from 1984-1990, including performing onstage at “Live Aid” in 1985, the “Night and Day” concert at Wembley Stadium and “Live In Australia” with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. In 2010 Mandel appeared on Jamey Johnson’s album, The Guitar Song, which reached #1 on the country charts and was later named #5 on Rolling Stone’s top albums of that year. Fred worked with legendary metal band Anthrax on their 2013 cover track “Smokin'” (originally by the band Boston). In 2017 he played on their cover of “Carry On Wayward Son”, (originally by the band Kansas), and performed it live with Anthrax on the Loudwire Awards. He continues to add his talents to projects of all types. Mandel was enlisted by Producer, Dave Cobb to accompany Jessica Chastain on the Oscar Winning soundtrack “The Eyes of Tammy Faye”. You can hear his keyboards on the single “Testify Or Say Goodbye” from the album “Heavy Fire” by the band Black Star Riders (aka. Thin Lizzy). You can also hear him on their subsequent albums “Another State Of Grace” and “Wrong Side Of Paradise”. In 2023 Brian May re-released the “Starfleet” album with a collectible box set. Mandel was one of the featured musicians on the original project alongside Edward Van Halen, Phil Chen, and Alan Gratzer. Fred was very happy to re-visit the memories of those past recordings with his friend and guitar player extraordinaire Brian May. Mandel has appeared live and on record with powerhouse vocalist, Pearl Aday. Since 2005 Fred has happily taken part in live performances and albums with the great Canadian Blues/Rock guitarist Philip Sayce including his latest release “The Wolves Are Coming”. Fred regards Philip as one of the greatest players in that genre. Other recent albums and songs Mandel has played on include:
Fred Mandel's debut solo album “Part-Time Rebel” released on May 3, 2024. |
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VIDEOS
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QUEEN - Saturday Night Live "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" 1982
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Testimonials
“He’s a magnificent player, an unusually beautiful piano player, and all sorts of other keyboards as well. But his piano playing was really exceptional. It has a wonderful kind of broad ten-finger style, which you can recognize quite easily. And I liked him, I liked being with him again. He’s a very funny guy. He can tell the worst jokes in the world and make them sound funny just because he’s that kind of guy. And so I called him up. I just thought how nice it would be to interact with him in a kind of freer situation.” “The original idea was for Rob to learn the keyboard part note-for-note on the guitar, but he didn’t get around to doing it. None of us can really play keyboards, so Jay Ruston, who mixed the record, got Fred Mandel to come in and do it. Jay really pushed for it to be a keyboard part, like on the original. And thank God he did, ‘cause Fred just nailed it! I got goosebumps when Jay first sent it to me – it was so awesome.” |
“Fred Mandel, who’s a very brilliant keyboard player.” "I'm not saying we were playing badly but we weren’t playing as well as we should have with someone as talented as Fred Mandel in the band. And we all had a get together one night and I said listen, we aren’t using Freddie Mandel as an integral part of the band. We’re using him as a four piece and Freddie Mandel playing the other parts. This is not the way if we want to improve … After that pep talk we’ve been playing out of our skins, or we’ve played out of our skins in Europe, and because Freddie was eventually accepted as a member, not just an outsider playing the parts…. I think Freddie is the person that can switch this band into one final album that would go back toward Tumbleweed Connection. It’s getting funkier and funkier and funkier with Freddie.” In 1983, he joined Queen at the Record Plant in Los Angeles to help record The Works. Mandel played on "Man on the Prowl." "Hammer to Fall," "Radio Ga Ga," and "I Want to Break Free." He later played on Mercury's 1985 solo album, Mr. Bad Guy, before leaving the Queen mothership to tour with Supertramp and Elton John. "Queen was a formidable force," he said, looking back. "A lot of their stuff sounds deceptively simple, but it's pretty complex.’” |