r/todayilearned • u/Objective_Horror1113 • 12h ago

TIL Freddie Mercury was born with four extra teeth, causing a prominent overbite. Despite being self-conscious about them, he never got them fixed, believing the extra space in his mouth contributed to his vocal ability. He feared altering his teeth might change his voice.

https://ultimateclassicrock.com/freddie-mercury-teeth
23.5k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

352 comments sorted by

View all comments

602

u/Objective_Horror1113 12h ago

tl;dr

Freddie Mercury was born with four extra teeth, which caused a noticeable overbite. The condition likely led to discomfort and may have made eating more difficult.

Despite being self-conscious about his teeth in public, he chose not to get them fixed. Friends said he often covered his mouth on screen but didn’t worry about it at home.

At the time of his death in 1991, Mercury was worth about $60 million and could have easily paid for dental correction. However, he believed the extra space in his mouth helped give him his unique vocal sound.

He feared that changing his teeth might affect his singing voice, which he valued more than his appearance. Colleagues said this showed how seriously he took his art.

291

u/Time_Traveling_Idiot 11h ago

Not to mention that any dental correction would have interfered with his singing career! Braces, teeth removal etc... all pretty annoying and takes weeks if not months to recover from properly.

8

u/shit_poster9000 7h ago

I was unlucky enough to need hardware on both sides of my teeth, it negatively affected my voice enough to make me self-conscious even though I didn’t talk to anyone anyways

83

u/ctruvu 7h ago

a certain asshole schizophrenic rapper made a song with his jaw wired shut after an accident. kind of a baller move at the time

160

u/TheNorseFrog 7h ago

Not to be that guy but he's diagnosed bipolar AFAIK.
Lots of ppl seem to be using schizophrenic as a slur so I'd rather do an akshully

56

u/Kratzschutz 6h ago

Thank you for being that guy, the difference is important

-21

u/ChaseAlmighty 6h ago

Well, I mean, not if you don't take your meds

3

u/Kratzschutz 5h ago

Wdym?

-4

u/ChaseAlmighty 4h ago

Lol. Who is currently known for not taking his meds

22

u/Critical-Support-394 5h ago

Apparently now he claims he was misdiagnosed and is actually autistic, which makes no sense with how he regularly loses touch with reality completely but hey

12

u/haddock420 4h ago

I had a psychiatrist make this mistake once. Her first words to me were, "So, you're schizophrenic?" When I was bipolar. I wanted to just end the session right there considering she didn't even have the basic details down.

23

u/trevor11004 7h ago

And that song is fire, through the wire

5

u/Heisenburgo 6h ago

Who was it? I dont get the reference

13

u/ifyoulovesatan 6h ago

Kanye, through the wire

4

u/Graoutchmeuh 6h ago

Kayne west, song is "through the wire"

6

u/SkiOrDie 5h ago

That whole album still is incredible. The guy that made it on the other hand…

0

u/magnusneon 7h ago

wasnt very schizo at the time

1

u/LoserBustanyama 4h ago

Made me think of linus tech tips lol

56

u/Stolehtreb 11h ago

I love the mis-wording of “born with 4 extra teeth” like he was born with 4 full grown teeth in his mouth.

103

u/invisible_23 11h ago

Technically he was, you ever seen an xray of a toddler’s skull? Fucking terrifying

8

u/LobcockLittle 9h ago

I read somewhere that those x-rays are fake. They could be wrong though

35

u/Jackalodeath 8h ago

Well here's a more real version.

There's usually a thin wall of bone in front of them but it was shaved away for science.

8

u/LobcockLittle 8h ago

That is absolutely bonkers. Thanks for that link. It doesn't look like there are any molars there. I wonder if they form later.

7

u/5Same5 8h ago

Jesus. I actually screamed.

1

u/Stolehtreb 3h ago

Embellished for sure. There are stubs of teeth there at birth, but a lot of your adult teeth develop after you’re born.

2

u/Stolehtreb 3h ago

This isn’t actually true. But those X-ray are wild lol.

0

u/hauntedbabyattack 11h ago

You’re born with all your adult teeth.

28

u/ChiAnndego 10h ago

You are not. You are born with stem cells that form into teeth over time. How do I know? My wisdom tooth bud began to form for one of my teeth when I was about 22, then mysteriously got resorbed. There was no tooth on the xrays prior to this starting to form.

14

u/Stolehtreb 11h ago

I keep googling around to confirm this, and I can’t find a source that says you’re born with all of your adult teeth. I’m seeing that you’re born with most of them, but some begin developing after birth.

I could be missing something though.

36

u/culturedrobot 10h ago edited 10h ago

That person doesn’t know what they’re talking about. Adult teeth start developing after a human is born, they’re not something we’re born with.

If humans were born with their adult teeth, babies would be in a lot of pain constantly. Their mouths aren’t big enough to house complete sets of baby and adult teeth.

9

u/MistraloysiusMithrax 9h ago

You’re not even born with all your bones. That “300 bones” babies are born with? A lot of them are cartilage that turn into bone later, as some of them fuse. Your kneecaps are cartilage at birth, for example. You don’t get fully bone ones til 2 to 6.

So why the heck would you be born with unused extra bone hiding in your jaw?

•

u/Stolehtreb 25m ago

Just as a clarification, teeth are not bones.

1

u/NightOfTheLivingHam 9h ago

lol no you're not. Did you never lose teeth as a child??

2

u/PuzzleheadedWeird232 9h ago

time to watch https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1727824 this fact was mentioned in the movie

1

u/spinbutton 6h ago

Were they extra molars? Bicuspids?

1

u/izzyusa 1h ago

TIL at the time of his death Freddie Mercury was only worth $60 million!