Smile

Smile was an English rock band based in London, best known as the predecessor to renowned rock band Queen. In 1968, Brian May, a student at London's Imperial College, and Tim Staffell formed a group when May placed an advertisement on the college notice board for a "Ginger Baker type" drummer, and a young medical student named Roger Taylor auditioned and got the job. Smile were signed to Mercury Records in 1969, and had their first experience of a recording studio in Trident Studios that year. Staffell was attending Ealing Art College with Freddie Mercury, and introduced him to the band. Mercury (then still Farrokh Bulsara) soon became a keen fan. The group's biggest public performance was on 27 February 1969 at the National Council for the Unmarried Mother and Her Child held at the Royal Albert Hall. May, Taylor and Staffell performed as a trio on guitar, drums and bass respectively with keyboardist Chris Smith. Smile gigged quite a bit on the London scene. In June 1969 they were given a one-off recording deal by Mercury Records to record three tracks, "Earth" (Staffell), "Step on Me" (May), and "Doin' All Right" (May/Staffell). In September of the same year, Mercury Records commissioned them to record three more songs: "April Lady" (Stanley Lucas), "Blag", a May instrumental, and "Polar Bear". When Staffell left in 1970 to join another band, Humpy Bong, Smile disbanded. Bulsara persuaded May and Taylor to continue, and at about the same time he changed his surname to Mercury and joined the band as lead vocalist, from which emerged Queen.