Attitude May 2004
George Michael The WHOLE Truth
George Michael The WHOLE Truth
After years of creative stalemate, personal tragedy and media derision, GEORGE MICHAEL has returned with the most intensely personal and emotionally
complex album of his career. Attitude meets the superstar who has no time for anything but the truth.
If you want to know something about George Michael, pop into his local gents. The one in his management offices, tucked away in a quiet side street of an
understated, posh suburb of North London. Hanging above the loo is a silver framed plaque commemorating the two million copies he shifted of his
double-decade spanning career retrospective Ladies & Gentlemen (the title of which, given his sexual history, was always something of a masterstroke
of ironic cheek). On the opposite wall is a discreetly-framed plaque casing a brightly coloured packet of instant soup from a continental supermarket.
A laughing chicken is emblazoned on it bearing the legend 'Le Coo.
complex album of his career. Attitude meets the superstar who has no time for anything but the truth.
If you want to know something about George Michael, pop into his local gents. The one in his management offices, tucked away in a quiet side street of an
understated, posh suburb of North London. Hanging above the loo is a silver framed plaque commemorating the two million copies he shifted of his
double-decade spanning career retrospective Ladies & Gentlemen (the title of which, given his sexual history, was always something of a masterstroke
of ironic cheek). On the opposite wall is a discreetly-framed plaque casing a brightly coloured packet of instant soup from a continental supermarket.
A laughing chicken is emblazoned on it bearing the legend 'Le Coo.
It's a playground double-entendre, but for all the brow-beating seriousness that's been projected on Michael, by others and himself, it's been easy to forget recently that he is in possession of
one of the sharpest wits in the business. It's a quality - along with his renewed, almost evangelical, sense of honesty - that has stood him in good stead in the years following that visit to another
lavatory - the one in LA in 1998 - and his subsequent, very public, coming out in the media around the globe. Both his Parkinson confessional and the Outside video were genius displays
of 'hands-up, gov' candour, tempered with some good old fashioned cheek. Both kept the hearts of the British public though his most public strays from the dull, stage-managed celebrity
norm that has come to mark our times. They've every reason to stay with him. Growing up with the fresh, youthful motifs of shuttlecocks and poolside margaritas in his Wham! Hey day, he may
not have been prolific in his output since, but he's never been less than sparkling, a diamond in the drudge of our current pop malaise. That other George, the Boy, may have once said
'I think George Michael's lost his sense of humour' — a quip that Michael himself laughingly reminds me of at one point during our conversation — but the truth is, even in his darkest
hours, it never really went away.
"As you know, I wanted to do this interview a couple of years ago when I really thought the album was about to come out," says Michael as Attitude settles on the lush couch in his office suite,
surrounded by ephemera from his lengthy career (Attitude blushingly admits to gleefully spinning around in the Fastlove chair moments before George's arrival). "So, sorry for the delay -
I kinda got side-tracked" he grins, aware of the understatement. A stultifying period of writer's block and the media savaging of his anti-Iraqi invasion stance, a good year before they themselves
caught the wind of the public mood (these days, it seems, pop stars must be seen and not heard), is now well and truly over. Amazing was his most unashamedly joyous single in years.
And the album Patience - an emotional tour de force - broke his own personal record for first week sales. So he has every reason to be on buoyont and compellingly good-humoured form.
He got the last laugh, you see. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you George Michael...
This is the first album of all new songs you've released since you came out. Was that a pressure, the need to be more honest?
No, it didn't feel any different, really. Cause if you think of the way I wrote some of the songs before I'm sorry, but Jesus is a male gender term. 'You smiled at me like Jesus to a child,' you're talking about a
man for fuck's sake! The way I wrote was gender specific in a couple of cases. And a couple of the covers I made male gender specific, with those I was just having a chuckle about it, really. I didn't really think
about it. Like American Angel in the new album. It only occurred to me afterwards that it's 'he' all the way through that song and I thought 'oh God, Sony will probably have a problem with that.' Well fuck it
then, it can't be a single. I'm certainly not going to change it.
I thought if Older was about grieving and loss, Patience is more about redemption, coming out of the darkness and trying to make sense of the past. There's still quite
a lot of darkness there too, though.
It's kinda very light and very dark at the same time. There are proclamations of love that I've never made before — certainly since Wham! — and then there's going further into the truth at the same time,
like on My Mother Had a Brother or Through - they're trying to get closer to the truth.
I think that song, My Mother Had a Brother, has to be amongst the best you've ever written. How fictional is that lyric?
It's not fictional at all. I didn't know of the existence of my mother's closest sibling until I was 16 or 17, because he killed himself. He killed himself within 24 hours of my birth, and the tragedy of that, the idea
of so wanting to leave this world and at the same time not wanting to because it would spoil the pregnancy of your sister... It's just horrible, beyond horrible. And my mother told me that she thought he was
gay. They had a very difficult childhood, a dark childhood, and for some reason she didn't think it was appropriate to talk to us about it until we got to a certain age. It's a tragic story about how much more
difficult it must have been as a gay man in the 1 950s. If he'd held on and beaten his depression for long enough, he would have seen the changes in life that would have made him at least a happy
middle-aged man.
Do you think that affected your mother's relationship with you and your sexuality?
It must have done. How could she not have been worried by my sexuality if her brother's sexuality killed him? When you put your family tree together you understand so much more about who you are.
Sometimes I felt that my mum made me feel that I wasn't man enough, or boy enough, when I was growing up, which was so out of character for her, because she was such a great mum, and so liberal in her
attitudes. And that song is disguised as asking my mother to tell my uncle how much life has changed and that I live a happy life as an openly gay man and I have loads of sex and it's great. But really
in a way I think I'm trying to tell her that I forgive her for that.
No, it didn't feel any different, really. Cause if you think of the way I wrote some of the songs before I'm sorry, but Jesus is a male gender term. 'You smiled at me like Jesus to a child,' you're talking about a
man for fuck's sake! The way I wrote was gender specific in a couple of cases. And a couple of the covers I made male gender specific, with those I was just having a chuckle about it, really. I didn't really think
about it. Like American Angel in the new album. It only occurred to me afterwards that it's 'he' all the way through that song and I thought 'oh God, Sony will probably have a problem with that.' Well fuck it
then, it can't be a single. I'm certainly not going to change it.
I thought if Older was about grieving and loss, Patience is more about redemption, coming out of the darkness and trying to make sense of the past. There's still quite
a lot of darkness there too, though.
It's kinda very light and very dark at the same time. There are proclamations of love that I've never made before — certainly since Wham! — and then there's going further into the truth at the same time,
like on My Mother Had a Brother or Through - they're trying to get closer to the truth.
I think that song, My Mother Had a Brother, has to be amongst the best you've ever written. How fictional is that lyric?
It's not fictional at all. I didn't know of the existence of my mother's closest sibling until I was 16 or 17, because he killed himself. He killed himself within 24 hours of my birth, and the tragedy of that, the idea
of so wanting to leave this world and at the same time not wanting to because it would spoil the pregnancy of your sister... It's just horrible, beyond horrible. And my mother told me that she thought he was
gay. They had a very difficult childhood, a dark childhood, and for some reason she didn't think it was appropriate to talk to us about it until we got to a certain age. It's a tragic story about how much more
difficult it must have been as a gay man in the 1 950s. If he'd held on and beaten his depression for long enough, he would have seen the changes in life that would have made him at least a happy
middle-aged man.
Do you think that affected your mother's relationship with you and your sexuality?
It must have done. How could she not have been worried by my sexuality if her brother's sexuality killed him? When you put your family tree together you understand so much more about who you are.
Sometimes I felt that my mum made me feel that I wasn't man enough, or boy enough, when I was growing up, which was so out of character for her, because she was such a great mum, and so liberal in her
attitudes. And that song is disguised as asking my mother to tell my uncle how much life has changed and that I live a happy life as an openly gay man and I have loads of sex and it's great. But really
in a way I think I'm trying to tell her that I forgive her for that.
You came out to your mum relatively late.
I came out to my mum and dad when Anseimo died. Although my mum always knew.
Because she'd met him, right?
Er, did she ever meet him? No, she never met him. I was thinking, getting confused with someone else she met that I was in love with. I remember him telling me 'the way your mum looked at me she
absolutely knows'. Cause it was a 'don't hurt him' kind of look. And as it happened that bloke did really hurt me. But I knew she knew, because the two years that I was living In LA with Anseimo she never
picked up the phone and called me once. And that for her that meant 'well, if he wants to tell me he will, but I don't want to have someone else pick up the phone on the other end and then pretend that I
don't think it's odd'.
This is something else that's very important to my particular story, and that's that my coming out was not... I won't go further into it than to say that within my family, it was not coming out that I was afraid of,
or thought would be dangerous, because I knew my mum would absolutely be fine with it. And my dad, I'll be honest with you, even though I cared it wouldn't have been a deciding factor. Maybe I didn't care
enough. My relationship with my dad is not that way. The honest thing is that actually it was about being the first member of the family to be openly truthful. We're just one of those families. I was afraid that
it would be explosive in my family. And it was explosive, but that had nothing to do with my sexuality. It was just everybody having to grow up and deal with what really happened in our childhoods. I'll never
regret it, even though it wasted years of my life in certain ways, I wasn't wrong. I was very scared of it for certain reasons and I turned out to be right. But it goes some way as to explaining why I should be
keen to imply in every other way that I could to the public that I was gay without actually saying it.
And your desire to be famous was all tied up with what happened in your childhood?
My childhood was oppressive which is why I wanted to do this, sure. It's an old cliché but children who don't feel heard always want to sing or perform or do something that makes them look as if they have
a right to exist. I suppose having felt oppressed by my family life, then by my own response to my sexuality and then by the media's response to my sexuality, I'm just so sick of all that 'keep your mouth
shut' stuff. Having a big mouth might make things hard, but it doesn't make things any harder than being closeted.
When did you first realise you were gay?
You know, I hear people say they knew when they were as young as 3 or 4. I didn't identify as gay at all when I was a kid. But I swear to god, all of my early memories of masturbation are clinched straight
fantasies like nuns with their tits out and shit like that! I remember them clearly. And I don't remember twigging anything about male sexuality until puberty. When I was 13 a man made a pass at me. I don't
think he was a paedophile - I looked a lot older, probably about 1 6, and it only occurred to me at that point. That's when I started to fantasise about men.
Do you think other people suspected?
There's no question that before I had it figured out I used to have men follow me because they thought they had spotted a gay teenager. But I know exactly the first time it ever occurred to me to have a wank
about a man. I think that's one of the reasons I was confused later. I know people are going to jump all over me for saying this, but I'm being honest so... most of my adult life my knowledge of the gay scene
was so limited, I was so ignorant about gay sex, that I find myself puzzled as to how commonplace mild to harder S&M is in gay circles now. The things that I thought were more peripheral are much more
common than I ever thought. At first I presumed the reason I didn't want to go down any of those roads was because I thought I was too inexperienced. I thought it was something that goes on with time and
boredom- and you have to understand I'm not judging what I'm seeing in any way-but I don't understand why someone as fucked up as me, can I can say that with all honesty, don't want to go there.
I came out to my mum and dad when Anseimo died. Although my mum always knew.
Because she'd met him, right?
Er, did she ever meet him? No, she never met him. I was thinking, getting confused with someone else she met that I was in love with. I remember him telling me 'the way your mum looked at me she
absolutely knows'. Cause it was a 'don't hurt him' kind of look. And as it happened that bloke did really hurt me. But I knew she knew, because the two years that I was living In LA with Anseimo she never
picked up the phone and called me once. And that for her that meant 'well, if he wants to tell me he will, but I don't want to have someone else pick up the phone on the other end and then pretend that I
don't think it's odd'.
This is something else that's very important to my particular story, and that's that my coming out was not... I won't go further into it than to say that within my family, it was not coming out that I was afraid of,
or thought would be dangerous, because I knew my mum would absolutely be fine with it. And my dad, I'll be honest with you, even though I cared it wouldn't have been a deciding factor. Maybe I didn't care
enough. My relationship with my dad is not that way. The honest thing is that actually it was about being the first member of the family to be openly truthful. We're just one of those families. I was afraid that
it would be explosive in my family. And it was explosive, but that had nothing to do with my sexuality. It was just everybody having to grow up and deal with what really happened in our childhoods. I'll never
regret it, even though it wasted years of my life in certain ways, I wasn't wrong. I was very scared of it for certain reasons and I turned out to be right. But it goes some way as to explaining why I should be
keen to imply in every other way that I could to the public that I was gay without actually saying it.
And your desire to be famous was all tied up with what happened in your childhood?
My childhood was oppressive which is why I wanted to do this, sure. It's an old cliché but children who don't feel heard always want to sing or perform or do something that makes them look as if they have
a right to exist. I suppose having felt oppressed by my family life, then by my own response to my sexuality and then by the media's response to my sexuality, I'm just so sick of all that 'keep your mouth
shut' stuff. Having a big mouth might make things hard, but it doesn't make things any harder than being closeted.
When did you first realise you were gay?
You know, I hear people say they knew when they were as young as 3 or 4. I didn't identify as gay at all when I was a kid. But I swear to god, all of my early memories of masturbation are clinched straight
fantasies like nuns with their tits out and shit like that! I remember them clearly. And I don't remember twigging anything about male sexuality until puberty. When I was 13 a man made a pass at me. I don't
think he was a paedophile - I looked a lot older, probably about 1 6, and it only occurred to me at that point. That's when I started to fantasise about men.
Do you think other people suspected?
There's no question that before I had it figured out I used to have men follow me because they thought they had spotted a gay teenager. But I know exactly the first time it ever occurred to me to have a wank
about a man. I think that's one of the reasons I was confused later. I know people are going to jump all over me for saying this, but I'm being honest so... most of my adult life my knowledge of the gay scene
was so limited, I was so ignorant about gay sex, that I find myself puzzled as to how commonplace mild to harder S&M is in gay circles now. The things that I thought were more peripheral are much more
common than I ever thought. At first I presumed the reason I didn't want to go down any of those roads was because I thought I was too inexperienced. I thought it was something that goes on with time and
boredom- and you have to understand I'm not judging what I'm seeing in any way-but I don't understand why someone as fucked up as me, can I can say that with all honesty, don't want to go there.
You think you're fucked up?
I don't feel really fucked up as a 40 year old man, but I have been a fucked up person. With a fantastic career, cause for some reason I could always
hang onto that and do that well, but everything else has been a mess. I come from a mess. I was a mess. And I'm trying not to be a mess. But I
can't help thinking that when the role play of power gets beyond a certain degree in gay sex, it always becomes about someone being punished and
someone doing the punishing. And we all know that people want to be punished out of childish desire. But it's always the same: someone being
punished for being a nasty little queer and punishing someone for being a nasty little queer. I understand the turn-on of that a little, but I can't go
to any degree till I end up either wanting to start laughing or to bow out of it. I feel it's degrading. Believe me, these people can't all be as fucked
up as me. They can't be!
But maybe the reason my sexuality doesn't go there is because I didn't self-identify as gay when I was young, when you're at your most vulnerable and
most impressionable to people telling you your sexuality is wrong. When I heard clergymen arguing on the telly or my dad calling someone a poof at work,
it didn't hit me, it didn't make me feel 'god, that's the way I feel, he's talking about me' which must be horrific. This is what drives me mental about gay
stereotyping on TV and when the fucking clergy come out of their confession boxes and all start having a go at us, it makes me extra sensitive to that idea
of what it potentially does to children. It's difficult enough knowing that your parents don't want you to be gay, that they won't great grand-kids and you'll
let them down in that respect, that's always going to be hard enough. But to have all this other shit going on.
I don't feel really fucked up as a 40 year old man, but I have been a fucked up person. With a fantastic career, cause for some reason I could always
hang onto that and do that well, but everything else has been a mess. I come from a mess. I was a mess. And I'm trying not to be a mess. But I
can't help thinking that when the role play of power gets beyond a certain degree in gay sex, it always becomes about someone being punished and
someone doing the punishing. And we all know that people want to be punished out of childish desire. But it's always the same: someone being
punished for being a nasty little queer and punishing someone for being a nasty little queer. I understand the turn-on of that a little, but I can't go
to any degree till I end up either wanting to start laughing or to bow out of it. I feel it's degrading. Believe me, these people can't all be as fucked
up as me. They can't be!
But maybe the reason my sexuality doesn't go there is because I didn't self-identify as gay when I was young, when you're at your most vulnerable and
most impressionable to people telling you your sexuality is wrong. When I heard clergymen arguing on the telly or my dad calling someone a poof at work,
it didn't hit me, it didn't make me feel 'god, that's the way I feel, he's talking about me' which must be horrific. This is what drives me mental about gay
stereotyping on TV and when the fucking clergy come out of their confession boxes and all start having a go at us, it makes me extra sensitive to that idea
of what it potentially does to children. It's difficult enough knowing that your parents don't want you to be gay, that they won't great grand-kids and you'll
let them down in that respect, that's always going to be hard enough. But to have all this other shit going on.
There's enough people out there ready to throw shit at you without beating yourself up
Exactly. And I'm definitely not above internal homophobia. I think every gay man is a recovering gay child or teenager or whatever. I just feel there should be a generation that is allowed to develop without that
extra shit.
Is that part of why you want to be so honest about everything now?
I suppose I'm a little more open about my sexuality than people expect me to be. I don't want to fit into the groove that David and Elton fit. Or Graham Norton fits. I want to be me. I know some people would
consider me camp and some wouldn't. I know I'm not butch. I also know that I don't find myself represented on TV. I see myself like many of the people I've met who don't relate to people on TV. Not that
those people shouldn't be there, because they are a representation of some of gay culture. It's great that it's almost fashionable now, but I don't think it should necessarily be on straight people's terms.
The harmless 'funny uncle' stereotype?
The idea of the gay man being the most entertaining in a group of people is easy for straight society to take under its wing. I've been watching the TV since I was a child, and there isn't a huge difference
in the representation from the Larry Graysons and the John Inmans to what's on TV now. They're very entertaining, but they're such big nellies that you can't imagine them having sex. The whole thing is
very comfortable, but we should be beyond that now. Young kids should see their sexuality as acceptable, not laughable. I suppose my speaking openly about my sexuality is not comfortable to people
in that way, but it's who I am.
No celebrity, point blank, has talked as honestly about open relationships, yet it is a reality for lots of gay men. Why shouldn't you talk about it?
I quite like the fact that I'm the last person that anyone expected to do it. Being humiliated so badly in the press was a good starting point for me being honest. It gave me the guts to do it. But now I see
it as a mission. To say, 'look, I know you like me, and I know you like my music. But at the end of the day I'm gay. And I'm a slut; [laughs] Some of us are and we should be fine with that.
Exactly. And I'm definitely not above internal homophobia. I think every gay man is a recovering gay child or teenager or whatever. I just feel there should be a generation that is allowed to develop without that
extra shit.
Is that part of why you want to be so honest about everything now?
I suppose I'm a little more open about my sexuality than people expect me to be. I don't want to fit into the groove that David and Elton fit. Or Graham Norton fits. I want to be me. I know some people would
consider me camp and some wouldn't. I know I'm not butch. I also know that I don't find myself represented on TV. I see myself like many of the people I've met who don't relate to people on TV. Not that
those people shouldn't be there, because they are a representation of some of gay culture. It's great that it's almost fashionable now, but I don't think it should necessarily be on straight people's terms.
The harmless 'funny uncle' stereotype?
The idea of the gay man being the most entertaining in a group of people is easy for straight society to take under its wing. I've been watching the TV since I was a child, and there isn't a huge difference
in the representation from the Larry Graysons and the John Inmans to what's on TV now. They're very entertaining, but they're such big nellies that you can't imagine them having sex. The whole thing is
very comfortable, but we should be beyond that now. Young kids should see their sexuality as acceptable, not laughable. I suppose my speaking openly about my sexuality is not comfortable to people
in that way, but it's who I am.
No celebrity, point blank, has talked as honestly about open relationships, yet it is a reality for lots of gay men. Why shouldn't you talk about it?
I quite like the fact that I'm the last person that anyone expected to do it. Being humiliated so badly in the press was a good starting point for me being honest. It gave me the guts to do it. But now I see
it as a mission. To say, 'look, I know you like me, and I know you like my music. But at the end of the day I'm gay. And I'm a slut; [laughs] Some of us are and we should be fine with that.
You've talked about open relationships for a long time. The lyrics to Spinning the Wheel - 'you've got a thing about strangers... were pretty clear. Do you not think that open
relationships breed insecurity, though? In that song you seem unhappy with the idea, as if you were on the other end of it.
That Iyric was actually about how I can't believe how many people have unsafe sex. I went to a benefit for Patrick Cowley, who was Sylvester'; producer, in '82 and people were talking about this
new gay cancer and pretty much straight aft that I started using condoms. I never stopped. Actually, I stopped when I first met with Kenny because at that time we wanted to be monogamous and
we had both been tested and were fine. I'd tested after Anselrno told me he was positive but I hadn't been tested since then, which was three four years. The period between that and when I knew
my eye was wandering again was when I had unprotected sex. We were at the beginning of the relationship and we both made that decision. I don't think I would do that again because in th situation
you rely on your partner having the gut to tell you the moment things stop being monogamous. Actually, I don't know if I would try to be monogamous again. The minute that I knew my eye was
wandering again, I talked to Kenny about it and we started using protection again. I've always been very aware of it. Whether I've been pissed or taken an e or whatever, I've always used protection.
Going through the whole thing with Angeleno, it just struck me that I would write a song about having a partner who just w practise safe sex, basically. It wasn't written from a personal point of
view, where I was complaining about someone sleeping around. I suppose it sounded like though, didn't it?
relationships breed insecurity, though? In that song you seem unhappy with the idea, as if you were on the other end of it.
That Iyric was actually about how I can't believe how many people have unsafe sex. I went to a benefit for Patrick Cowley, who was Sylvester'; producer, in '82 and people were talking about this
new gay cancer and pretty much straight aft that I started using condoms. I never stopped. Actually, I stopped when I first met with Kenny because at that time we wanted to be monogamous and
we had both been tested and were fine. I'd tested after Anselrno told me he was positive but I hadn't been tested since then, which was three four years. The period between that and when I knew
my eye was wandering again was when I had unprotected sex. We were at the beginning of the relationship and we both made that decision. I don't think I would do that again because in th situation
you rely on your partner having the gut to tell you the moment things stop being monogamous. Actually, I don't know if I would try to be monogamous again. The minute that I knew my eye was
wandering again, I talked to Kenny about it and we started using protection again. I've always been very aware of it. Whether I've been pissed or taken an e or whatever, I've always used protection.
Going through the whole thing with Angeleno, it just struck me that I would write a song about having a partner who just w practise safe sex, basically. It wasn't written from a personal point of
view, where I was complaining about someone sleeping around. I suppose it sounded like though, didn't it?
You don't think monogamy can work in gay relationships?
With Kenny, well, as a gay man, you keep hold of monogamy for as long as you can - cos, sure, it's a great way to be, but then you either turn into liars and cheats or you deal with it full on and work
though it and come to whatever arrangement you come to. With a man, if you fight hard enough, you'll both get to the same page and I think that's one of the real up sides of my gay relationships.
That I've been able to be so direct and honest. There is so much security in knowing it doesn't matter how many times your boyfriend has slept with other people or that you have slept with other
people, no-one's going anywhere. If you can be around a succession of great looking one night stands over a certain number of years - cause I don't exactly have to sleep with dogs and neither
does he - you rather get the impression that nothing is going to take someone away. Lust can't do it. Once you take the sexual jealousy out of it you're left with 'do I want to spend every day of
my life with this person?' And you're free to say yes or no without sex being the issue.
Do you have rules?
There's never any question of taking anyone for a drink or for dinner. There have to be some boundaries somewhere. And those are ours. There's never any question of spending the evening with
someone. It's just sex. I get puzzled by gay men who do lie and cheat on one another. Okay, with Kenny and I it was harder at the beginning. But I think that was more the fact we didn't have any
experience. I think it's a wasted opportunity not to be directly honest with one person in your life. Kenny is the one person in my life who I can be absolutely honest about absolutely everything with.
And you have an opportunity to do that as a gay man that I'm not sure you do as a straight man. Men understand each other better than men and women do.
When you were going out with women.
Which is always the big 'if isn't it?
With Kenny, well, as a gay man, you keep hold of monogamy for as long as you can - cos, sure, it's a great way to be, but then you either turn into liars and cheats or you deal with it full on and work
though it and come to whatever arrangement you come to. With a man, if you fight hard enough, you'll both get to the same page and I think that's one of the real up sides of my gay relationships.
That I've been able to be so direct and honest. There is so much security in knowing it doesn't matter how many times your boyfriend has slept with other people or that you have slept with other
people, no-one's going anywhere. If you can be around a succession of great looking one night stands over a certain number of years - cause I don't exactly have to sleep with dogs and neither
does he - you rather get the impression that nothing is going to take someone away. Lust can't do it. Once you take the sexual jealousy out of it you're left with 'do I want to spend every day of
my life with this person?' And you're free to say yes or no without sex being the issue.
Do you have rules?
There's never any question of taking anyone for a drink or for dinner. There have to be some boundaries somewhere. And those are ours. There's never any question of spending the evening with
someone. It's just sex. I get puzzled by gay men who do lie and cheat on one another. Okay, with Kenny and I it was harder at the beginning. But I think that was more the fact we didn't have any
experience. I think it's a wasted opportunity not to be directly honest with one person in your life. Kenny is the one person in my life who I can be absolutely honest about absolutely everything with.
And you have an opportunity to do that as a gay man that I'm not sure you do as a straight man. Men understand each other better than men and women do.
When you were going out with women.
Which is always the big 'if isn't it?
I'm thinking of the time around the Faith album when your image was propelled at its most-
Macho? Look, I tried really hard. [laughing] I put the pearls on the leather jacket. Didn't you notice? I had my earring and I had my pearls! Basically, people look at my relationship with Kathy
[Yeung, the Japanese-American girl George dated in the late 80s] and say 'Oh, she must have just been your professional beard'. I've never had a professional beard in my life.
Really early on there was a girl that went to the papers and said she had slept with me, an old friend of Boy George's. She was a really sweet girl called Pat. I remember we went to a party, the Camden
Palace or something, early 80s, and I was absolutely rat arsed - I'd gone from drinking nothing, I never drank beer, I went from coca cola to Scotch and used to get totally rat arsed. Anyway, Pat must
have known almost immediately because I announced to this whole fucking party, pissed out of my head, that I wanted to have sex and invited the whole room basically! I ended up going downstairs
with this American guy and this English girl. So she knew really early on about that. She fell in love with me, and I told her there was no way, and what happened was, she got so hurt by me that she
sold her story to the papers and then left the country because she was so ashamed.
Later, the whole thing with Kathy was... Okay, it love with a guy at that point in time. I was still saying I was bisexual. It was a relationship that was basically fucked up. She was fully aware of my
sexuality and when the drugs run out and I had to work, well, then the relationship ran out with them. And she was the only female that I ever brought into my professional life. I put her in a video
[/ Want Your Sex]. But I was e-d off my tits half the time. Of course she looked like a beard. I thought she looked like that myself at the time! I don't even remember how I felt at that time. It was all
such a mess, really. My own confusion and then on top of that what I was prepared to let the public think.
And then there were all the super models...
But that was just marketing, wasn't it? Because I didn't want to be in the videos anymore and it was a genius idea, you've gotta admit. It meant that video [Freedom 90] was on forever and I didn't have
to be in it. They were the hottest thing at the time and at the end of the day, I love looking at women.
So when you burnt the Faith jacket in that video, was it just as much about getting rid of that whole idea of being a packaged commodity as it was 'I don't wanna play
this role anymore, this big straight heart-throb'?
Oh, absolutely. By the end of the Faith tour I was so miserable because I absolutely knew that I was gay. I was so attracted to this one guy. So then I had to start de constructing it. I didn't suddenly want
to come out. I wanted to do it with some kind of dignity. So I thought 'okay, you have to start de constructing this whole image.' And that's when I disappeared for a bit of time and waited a few years and
really got my life together. And sure enough, in that time I met somebody and started my first proper relationship. That was the point where I realised I was totally playing a role. And I thought there has to
be some way of backing out of this slowly. And I knew there were all kinds of things that were wrong with my life that were stopping me from having a relationship and definitely one of them was that I
wasn't openly gay. It's incredibly difficult to talk about that period of my life because I've spent six years now being completely out and it's really hard to remember how I felt. It's hard to remember not
being certain, because I feel so certain about everything now.
Are you jealous of someone like Will Young who can come out at the very beginning of his career and be accepted by the public as gay?
No, I actually think that 1 2 or 13 year old girls would always accept Will Young or me if it was presented right. And mums and grandmas would always accept it — I mean, they love a nice fairy, don't they? But
it's the late-teen girls that would have more of a problem with it. I actually believe that if your music touches peoples hearts, especially as so few musicians are aiming for people's hearts, that people will take it
where they can get it these days. That was a pretty song that he had out just before Christmas. His intent is good and he's trying to make good music. Though actually I should apologise to him. I said
something about his lisp on Radio 2 and I don't know why it came out.
Macho? Look, I tried really hard. [laughing] I put the pearls on the leather jacket. Didn't you notice? I had my earring and I had my pearls! Basically, people look at my relationship with Kathy
[Yeung, the Japanese-American girl George dated in the late 80s] and say 'Oh, she must have just been your professional beard'. I've never had a professional beard in my life.
Really early on there was a girl that went to the papers and said she had slept with me, an old friend of Boy George's. She was a really sweet girl called Pat. I remember we went to a party, the Camden
Palace or something, early 80s, and I was absolutely rat arsed - I'd gone from drinking nothing, I never drank beer, I went from coca cola to Scotch and used to get totally rat arsed. Anyway, Pat must
have known almost immediately because I announced to this whole fucking party, pissed out of my head, that I wanted to have sex and invited the whole room basically! I ended up going downstairs
with this American guy and this English girl. So she knew really early on about that. She fell in love with me, and I told her there was no way, and what happened was, she got so hurt by me that she
sold her story to the papers and then left the country because she was so ashamed.
Later, the whole thing with Kathy was... Okay, it love with a guy at that point in time. I was still saying I was bisexual. It was a relationship that was basically fucked up. She was fully aware of my
sexuality and when the drugs run out and I had to work, well, then the relationship ran out with them. And she was the only female that I ever brought into my professional life. I put her in a video
[/ Want Your Sex]. But I was e-d off my tits half the time. Of course she looked like a beard. I thought she looked like that myself at the time! I don't even remember how I felt at that time. It was all
such a mess, really. My own confusion and then on top of that what I was prepared to let the public think.
And then there were all the super models...
But that was just marketing, wasn't it? Because I didn't want to be in the videos anymore and it was a genius idea, you've gotta admit. It meant that video [Freedom 90] was on forever and I didn't have
to be in it. They were the hottest thing at the time and at the end of the day, I love looking at women.
So when you burnt the Faith jacket in that video, was it just as much about getting rid of that whole idea of being a packaged commodity as it was 'I don't wanna play
this role anymore, this big straight heart-throb'?
Oh, absolutely. By the end of the Faith tour I was so miserable because I absolutely knew that I was gay. I was so attracted to this one guy. So then I had to start de constructing it. I didn't suddenly want
to come out. I wanted to do it with some kind of dignity. So I thought 'okay, you have to start de constructing this whole image.' And that's when I disappeared for a bit of time and waited a few years and
really got my life together. And sure enough, in that time I met somebody and started my first proper relationship. That was the point where I realised I was totally playing a role. And I thought there has to
be some way of backing out of this slowly. And I knew there were all kinds of things that were wrong with my life that were stopping me from having a relationship and definitely one of them was that I
wasn't openly gay. It's incredibly difficult to talk about that period of my life because I've spent six years now being completely out and it's really hard to remember how I felt. It's hard to remember not
being certain, because I feel so certain about everything now.
Are you jealous of someone like Will Young who can come out at the very beginning of his career and be accepted by the public as gay?
No, I actually think that 1 2 or 13 year old girls would always accept Will Young or me if it was presented right. And mums and grandmas would always accept it — I mean, they love a nice fairy, don't they? But
it's the late-teen girls that would have more of a problem with it. I actually believe that if your music touches peoples hearts, especially as so few musicians are aiming for people's hearts, that people will take it
where they can get it these days. That was a pretty song that he had out just before Christmas. His intent is good and he's trying to make good music. Though actually I should apologise to him. I said
something about his lisp on Radio 2 and I don't know why it came out.
It just did! And I'm never nasty about people like that. But no, it's not hurting him at all. Things have changed. Absolutely. For young pop stars it makes sense
that it'll be alright. It's perfect for young girls because they don't have to think about any comeback. You know? The man might as well not have a knob. At a certain
age that's what girls want. God knows I tried hard enough to look like I didn't have one for a couple of years, [laughing] You can't get much worse than wearing a
couple of curtain rings in your ears with Lady Di hair!
Even songs in the early 90s like Cowboys and Angels were codedly gay...
The funny thing about Cowboys and Angels is one verse is addressed towards a man and one verse is addressed to a woman. It's that triangle I was telling you about.
She was in love with me because she couldn't get me, and I was in love with him because I couldn't get him. I mean, who the fuck was going to know that? It's a very
personal lyric, but it's about the ridiculousness of wanting what you can't have.
that it'll be alright. It's perfect for young girls because they don't have to think about any comeback. You know? The man might as well not have a knob. At a certain
age that's what girls want. God knows I tried hard enough to look like I didn't have one for a couple of years, [laughing] You can't get much worse than wearing a
couple of curtain rings in your ears with Lady Di hair!
Even songs in the early 90s like Cowboys and Angels were codedly gay...
The funny thing about Cowboys and Angels is one verse is addressed towards a man and one verse is addressed to a woman. It's that triangle I was telling you about.
She was in love with me because she couldn't get me, and I was in love with him because I couldn't get him. I mean, who the fuck was going to know that? It's a very
personal lyric, but it's about the ridiculousness of wanting what you can't have.
A lot of the lyrics now make more sense in retrospect, particularly the Older album. And of course you dedicated it to Anselmo.
Exactly. I don't understand this idea that my sexuality was shrouded in any sort of mystery. I mean, there were three page articles about Anselmo in the papers! There was one by Tony Parsons,
who I thought was a good friend. If Tony Parsons writes an article that I had taken part in about my dead lover, where is the mystery? He outed me. Basically, I told him all this stuff as a mate, because
my life had changed so much and I wanted to tell him what I'd gone through. And he put it all into print. But I didn't deny it, so all those statements stood. So where the fuck was I not out? Until you s
it down in front of the press and say 'I am gay' you're not considered to be out. And I wasn't going to do that. And I absolutely believe that in some ways I went through all of that nightmare in LA rather
than sit down with a hack and go, 'Yes. I am gay'. That's the problem with having too much pride. You can really fuck yourself over.
Did your relationship with the press reach a nadir there?
I was really angry with the press. Anselmo wouldn't accept medical help in LA. He always wanted to go back to Brazil, and I really think one of the reasons he insisted on that was that he was afraid
for himself and his catholic family if, being my boyfriend, the press got hold of the fact he was HIV+. And I think it killed him. He went to Brazil and wasn't getting the best treatment that he could have.
He died the year before combination therapy really kicked in, and with the right help I think he could have stayed alive. And so I was not a big fan of the press at that point in time. I hated them. I
felt that to some degree that they had been responsible for his death. And when I look back I think that's why I found it unbearable to even be civil or expose anything about myself. It makes more
sense to me now, but all these things didn't necessarily occur to me at the time. Looking back its clearer.
Why do you think that the public stuck with you through all this?
Exactly. I don't understand this idea that my sexuality was shrouded in any sort of mystery. I mean, there were three page articles about Anselmo in the papers! There was one by Tony Parsons,
who I thought was a good friend. If Tony Parsons writes an article that I had taken part in about my dead lover, where is the mystery? He outed me. Basically, I told him all this stuff as a mate, because
my life had changed so much and I wanted to tell him what I'd gone through. And he put it all into print. But I didn't deny it, so all those statements stood. So where the fuck was I not out? Until you s
it down in front of the press and say 'I am gay' you're not considered to be out. And I wasn't going to do that. And I absolutely believe that in some ways I went through all of that nightmare in LA rather
than sit down with a hack and go, 'Yes. I am gay'. That's the problem with having too much pride. You can really fuck yourself over.
Did your relationship with the press reach a nadir there?
I was really angry with the press. Anselmo wouldn't accept medical help in LA. He always wanted to go back to Brazil, and I really think one of the reasons he insisted on that was that he was afraid
for himself and his catholic family if, being my boyfriend, the press got hold of the fact he was HIV+. And I think it killed him. He went to Brazil and wasn't getting the best treatment that he could have.
He died the year before combination therapy really kicked in, and with the right help I think he could have stayed alive. And so I was not a big fan of the press at that point in time. I hated them. I
felt that to some degree that they had been responsible for his death. And when I look back I think that's why I found it unbearable to even be civil or expose anything about myself. It makes more
sense to me now, but all these things didn't necessarily occur to me at the time. Looking back its clearer.
Why do you think that the public stuck with you through all this?
I do genuinely think that people have an affection for me in this country. Even though the press have always been baying for my blood, I have consistently given people pop music for 22 years.
A lot of people may not be big fans, but they've got one or two moments that are part of their memories and they have affection for my career. It was also a moment for people to say 1) if you're
honest, we like it and 2) we're much easier with the whole idea of gay people than we used to be. It was almost like the public chooses the way it responds to certain things to say something
collectively. It was a way of them saying 'we don't give fairies a hard time in this country anymore'.
Of course America's very different
Oh my God, yes. I mean all Bush had to do to distract people away from the fact no weapons of mass destruction are going to be found and that a major weapons inspector had resigned
saying 'there's nothing there' is to pull gay marriage out of the hat because he knows it's such a hot potato. If he says 'I'm gonna change the constitution not to allow same sex marriage' he knows
it's a three week story and, sure enough, it's all anyone's talking about. Did you see the letter Bette Midler sent him? It's good. It's not a ranting one, it's smart. And Bette, what a perfect
spokesperson. Other than getting Judy Garland back from the dead there's no one better.
Where do you stand on gay marriage?
I think it's pretty obvious where I stand. I do think those things, but I have said I wish that Labour understood that they are in a position to go on, with or without him. There have been achievements.
I have a charitable trust for disabled people and I know that they've made lots of moves in those areas, too. But unfortunately we're on the cusp of something so long lasting and damaging that the
people at the centre of it need to be got rid of. The people that think it's too late to do anything else but pretend that we can beat terrorism. And I'm just one voice, but the more that no one says
anything the more I'll keep saying it.
If you were saying what you were saying 20 years ago, in that golden age of pop and politics, no one would have noticed.
I remember when Kylie and the whole PWL thing first arrived. It drove me mad that everything they said was so perfect, so designed not to upset anyone or say anything. And that was the
beginning of that new family entertainment thing that we're now swamped by, that's lost the industry all its money. All I know is there used to be a lot of people with opinions and integrity in this
business, and now I look like somebody who's been let out of an asylum! It's true. Everyone around me thinks I'm my own worst enemy.
Do you think 'so what if they don't play my records anymore?'
Absolutely. I'm not attached to my celebrity anymore. I'm really not. You've got to be in a position like me where you're not worried about your future or your bank balance to be able to do it. Or
maybe it's a shame that so much time can be wasted over the word. We should absolutely have the same legal protections as straight people but I absolutely believe that the nature of marriage is
designed for children and that it doesn't appeal to me. If I were to have a ceremony with Kenny I wouldn't want it to look anything like straight peoples'. I don't see the point. I think people should
have the exact same right to make their vows under God, but why can't we have all those legal protections and call what we do something different? Why do we need their words to feel that we're
equal? We need the same rights, absolutely. It doesn't seem as strong to me because my family would never presume to be more important than Kenny in the event of my death, but under law
I should be able to get it sorted.
You've been harsh in your criticism of Tony Blair, but what about Labour's record on gay rights? Immigration, adoption, repealing clause 28 - he's done a lot.
Let's be honest, though, they've reneged on a lot of the promises they made the gay community too. My point is that, like most Labour supporters, I don't think they've gone far enough in the
promises that they made. I do think they've done a lot of things that they're not getting credit for, absolutely true, but unfortunately I think the urgency of getting Tony Blair off the world stage and
therefore changing Britain's position in all this mess is so much greater than our own domestic issues. You're right, though. I never give him credit for everyone's too fucking cowardly.
Can we talk about cruising?
Sure
Why do it?
When I was being furtive and was worried about being found out... God! It was such a turn on. I can never be that turned on again. Guilt is a massive turn on.
You're very honest.
I think it's important that I can be out there and say that I'm a big tart and still have a big smash album. When I was tempted to give up in the middle of making this album, one of the things that made
that difficult for me is that I would have felt I'd have let down a whole generation of young gay kids. That they'd think 'he's massive, then he comes out and then he's gone'. When I made the Outside
video I knew I was helping a whole generation of 15 year olds who are cruising right and dying of shame about it. I felt that lightening the stigma around cruising was the most immediately beneficial
thing I could do. I know for a fact that when I was 16, 17, when I started cruising, that watching the Outside video would have taken some of the weight off my shoulders.
Weren't you worried all the time about someone going 'oh my god, I've just picked up George Michael' and then hopping off to the papers and selling the story? Well, that's the wonderful thing
about cruising. The vast majority of men were either married or in the closet. So you have a mutual secret and that's pretty water tight. Especially if you're cruising outside London. If you're a suburban
cruiser like my good self and you like guys that are really straight-acting, then most of the people you pick up, whether you take them home or do it there and then, are not going to tell your secret
because they've got one themselves. I mean, fuck, it worked for years.
Was there a moment when people would double-take and realise it was you? I think probably most of them did. Sometimes we'd talk about it afterwards and have a laugh. Actually only in
later years. I was so ashamed but I was turned on by the fact that I was putting myself in such a stupid situation. Even with my therapist, who I'd started seeing when I found out Anselmo was positive
in 1991 and I still see today, I talked about everything with him but I couldn't talk about the cruising because it was so stupid. He's an amazing man and he's helped to change my life. But one of the
best things about LA happening is that I talked to him about that and it stopped it being so covert and compulsive. And fun, if I'm being honest. The compulsion to do something stupid was what
kept me doing it. I would tend to do it when I was feeling bad about something. I would tend to do it as a form of self-punishment. I don't do that anymore. I wish to God I could get that excited
about it! [laughing] Don't knock a bit of guilt. Catholics have the best sex on earth, I'm told.
Was cruising your secret place?
One of the things about cruising and having a secret sex life for so long is that I think it helped me keep my feet on the ground. Because I was constantly in contact with people that I
had a shared secret with, well, that was totally levelling. And it meant that I was constantly meeting ordinary people. How else would I have done that, in a weird way? And be on their level?
Because at the end of the day you both want the same thing out of it. Sex is very levelling. And I still believe that with the people I meet for sex. It's nowhere near as regular as it was but I
constantly meet new people via people that I know are cool and I can trust. When you meet somebody, see them a few times, and basically say, 'who do you know that's cool and tasty
with a big knob?' [laughing] and I meet people all the time that way. They're not in the industry, and if they are impressed, well, no-one looks like a superstar in bed. I could put that
a lot more crudely but [laughs]. Now that it's not furtive, I've met some really cool people that way. Much cooler than the people that I'm going to meet at some fucking celebrity party.
When was the last time you went to a gay dub? In America I said to Kenny, 'oh come on, we've got to go to some fucking gay clubs. I'm sick of hanging out with all our straight friends
all the time and only having a sexual gay life and never a social gay life'. And I tried it a couple of times, and my god! I don't even fucking sell records in America, but we were in
Houston and for ages no-one said a thing because they didn't think it was me, they couldn't fathom that it was me. Then when I asked for a glass of wine they realised that it was
me, because in America nobody fucking drinks wine in a bar! I swear to god, the number of people that grabbed my arse or did something as they walked past, or just stopped and
stared. And the entire place got my autograph because I'm too polite to tell them to fuck off, and it was just impossible.
You never get to talk about this stuff properly in interviews.
I've never talked to a gay magazine before, and Attitude's so much more intelligent than the others. Plus, I've never been in position to talk about this stuff and that's the reason I genuinely
wanted to. I don't think I've gotten enough of it out the way for this stuff not to be problematic yet but I don't care, really. I feel like the best defence I have at the moment is just to be completely
honest, because if I'm honest I make a headline every five fucking paragraphs or whatever, and they've got to get bored with me eventually [laughs].
Why did you rework Flawless for the album ?
Don't you think that's like my first proper queen's record? They're going to go mental to that one. I'll have to go to DTPM just one night to see it. It's supposed to be about that Pop Idol mentality
applied to a young gay man. That idea of getting out of the dull as dishwater town you're in and go to London or whatever. But I wanted to camp it up a bit more and so many people I know loved that record.
When I was trying to decide whether to use that track or not, one night I arranged to meet this guy. I told him who I was but I don't think he really believed me. Anyway we arranged for me to
pick him up outside a station and he nearly had a heart attack cause it was me! The truth of the matter is nothing happened, because this guy was so freaked out cause he was a massive fan and just
within two minutes of chatting to him about this and that, I asked him about music. He was talking about late '70s funk and all the stuff I like, and then he said 'but I love that Flawless track that came
out last year'. And I thought 'fuck, someone is trying to tell me something here.'
Of artists today, who do you think will still be around in 10 years time?
Musically? Possibly Chris Martin. Some-: "sometimes those people's careers can be cut shorter because band loyalty means you're tied to the restrictions of the band, but as an individual I think
he's a very talented guy. Jamelia is hot. For British R&B that is a serious track. I meant to email her and tell her, I think it shows a lot of potential. We could absolutely sell her to America, which is
something you couldn't say about most of our R&B artists. Amy Winehouse, maybe. It's not easy to make a whole career out of something so esoteric, but maybe.
Christina?
I wasn't really thinking of American artists. Well she could be, she's got a very good voice. But it's so heartless. Don't you think? She's still a bit Mickey Mouse Club. Of course there's Justin. He
could survive it. He's very talented and very young. I think he's genius technically, but at the moment it still feels very learnt to me, just the way he's got the fake accent. That winds the fuck out of me. I can't
bear white kids putting on black voices. I'll be really interested to see how he goes on though. He's easily the most talented white kid that's been out there for a long time
You said in The Big Issue recently 'I always believed I would outlast everyone else, with the possible exception of Madonna'. What do you make of her current position?
Well, I think people aren't used to seeing her fuck up three or four times in a row. They're used to seeing her fuck up once, possibly twice and then doing something really good. And she's made
a couple of mistakes in a row so everyone's jumping all over her. But all she has to do is make another great record. She is perfectly capable of coming back and doing something wicked. I must
admit, I do think she's probably moved so successfully into being a mother and wife that I don't think she has the clarity of vision about what's going to work that maybe she had before. In which
case, good luck to her. Her family's much more important than keeping MTV happy.
Okay, I have a few quick questions to round off, things like...
How big is your cock? [laughs].
Yeah, top or bottom?
[more laughter]
No, actually, the first one's did you write Bag It Up for Geri? Everyone thought you did.
No! Did people think that? Of course I didn't! [laughing] If I was going to write a song for a friend, then it would be better than that! I've never written anything for her. Bless her. Kenny played me
something down the phone the other day that she's worked on and she's done a really nice little bossa nova, like an Astrud Gilberto summery track. It's lovely. I was quite shocked, actually. It'd
be lovely to see her have a hit single this year.
I thought she was doing a cover of Cherish.
What? By Kool & The Gang?
No. Madonna.
Madonna! Oh, bless her heart. I wouldn't put it past her. I hope not.
OK. Is Aretha still on your Christmas card list?
No, I've never had a Christmas card list. I'm not that polite. Kenny likes to get little notes to people after a dinner party, but it's just not me. I'm not really one for etiquette. I'm very polite but I'm not
into that.
What song in your career has learned you the most money?
That's a hard one. Oh I know, though actually I didn't make the money. Because it gets re-released every year and the money still goes to charity. It's Last Christmas. It's one of the biggest selling
records never to have been number one. We did three million in the UK alone the year it came out and they've been releasing it ever since — occasionally it's number one in Japan at Christmas
and weird things like that. That's the biggest earner. If something starts out as a charity record, it's always a charity record. 4 or 5 of the tracks on the Greatest Hits were originally charity records.
So hopefully if the album takes off in America, and then the Greatest Hits starts selling again, some of these charities can get like 100 grand a year just from being on there.
Who's the most famous person on your mobile?
No-one on my mobile, because I hardly ever use it. In my phone book, maybe... The most famous person is... do you have to have called them regularly? Oh, I don't know. Ask me some names.
Elton?
Obviously.
Jody Watley?
Jody Watley! [George did a duet with Jody in the late 80s] I haven't spoken to her for years and years, bless her. We had the same manager in the late 80s, that's how that single [Learn To Say No] came
about. But I heard it recently on the internet. I haven't heard it for like 20 bloody years, but it sounded pretty good, actually! I'm gonna put it on the Duets album when it comes out.
There's going to be a Duets album? With some new ones?
Yeah. Which is going to be really exciting, but I can't say who yet.
Whitney.
I've done Whitney!
No, is Whitney in your phone book?
Do you think anyone would pick up? I shouldn't say that. No, I don't have Whitney's home number. I don't think many people have Whitney's home number. Bless her heart.
Mary J Blige?
Yeah.
Tony Blair?
No. If I did I think he would have changed it by now, don't you? He probably has my number, that's the scary thing. Do you know what I mean? I'm probably under fucking surveillance for all I know!
Madonna. No phone number. We had a bit of a falling out many years ago. I won't go any further than that.
I've think we've exhausted it, George.
Good. You've got plenty of material there. You know more than my fucking therapist knew in the first ten years of knowing me. Patience is out now on Sony, the single Flawless is due for release next month.
A lot of people may not be big fans, but they've got one or two moments that are part of their memories and they have affection for my career. It was also a moment for people to say 1) if you're
honest, we like it and 2) we're much easier with the whole idea of gay people than we used to be. It was almost like the public chooses the way it responds to certain things to say something
collectively. It was a way of them saying 'we don't give fairies a hard time in this country anymore'.
Of course America's very different
Oh my God, yes. I mean all Bush had to do to distract people away from the fact no weapons of mass destruction are going to be found and that a major weapons inspector had resigned
saying 'there's nothing there' is to pull gay marriage out of the hat because he knows it's such a hot potato. If he says 'I'm gonna change the constitution not to allow same sex marriage' he knows
it's a three week story and, sure enough, it's all anyone's talking about. Did you see the letter Bette Midler sent him? It's good. It's not a ranting one, it's smart. And Bette, what a perfect
spokesperson. Other than getting Judy Garland back from the dead there's no one better.
Where do you stand on gay marriage?
I think it's pretty obvious where I stand. I do think those things, but I have said I wish that Labour understood that they are in a position to go on, with or without him. There have been achievements.
I have a charitable trust for disabled people and I know that they've made lots of moves in those areas, too. But unfortunately we're on the cusp of something so long lasting and damaging that the
people at the centre of it need to be got rid of. The people that think it's too late to do anything else but pretend that we can beat terrorism. And I'm just one voice, but the more that no one says
anything the more I'll keep saying it.
If you were saying what you were saying 20 years ago, in that golden age of pop and politics, no one would have noticed.
I remember when Kylie and the whole PWL thing first arrived. It drove me mad that everything they said was so perfect, so designed not to upset anyone or say anything. And that was the
beginning of that new family entertainment thing that we're now swamped by, that's lost the industry all its money. All I know is there used to be a lot of people with opinions and integrity in this
business, and now I look like somebody who's been let out of an asylum! It's true. Everyone around me thinks I'm my own worst enemy.
Do you think 'so what if they don't play my records anymore?'
Absolutely. I'm not attached to my celebrity anymore. I'm really not. You've got to be in a position like me where you're not worried about your future or your bank balance to be able to do it. Or
maybe it's a shame that so much time can be wasted over the word. We should absolutely have the same legal protections as straight people but I absolutely believe that the nature of marriage is
designed for children and that it doesn't appeal to me. If I were to have a ceremony with Kenny I wouldn't want it to look anything like straight peoples'. I don't see the point. I think people should
have the exact same right to make their vows under God, but why can't we have all those legal protections and call what we do something different? Why do we need their words to feel that we're
equal? We need the same rights, absolutely. It doesn't seem as strong to me because my family would never presume to be more important than Kenny in the event of my death, but under law
I should be able to get it sorted.
You've been harsh in your criticism of Tony Blair, but what about Labour's record on gay rights? Immigration, adoption, repealing clause 28 - he's done a lot.
Let's be honest, though, they've reneged on a lot of the promises they made the gay community too. My point is that, like most Labour supporters, I don't think they've gone far enough in the
promises that they made. I do think they've done a lot of things that they're not getting credit for, absolutely true, but unfortunately I think the urgency of getting Tony Blair off the world stage and
therefore changing Britain's position in all this mess is so much greater than our own domestic issues. You're right, though. I never give him credit for everyone's too fucking cowardly.
Can we talk about cruising?
Sure
Why do it?
When I was being furtive and was worried about being found out... God! It was such a turn on. I can never be that turned on again. Guilt is a massive turn on.
You're very honest.
I think it's important that I can be out there and say that I'm a big tart and still have a big smash album. When I was tempted to give up in the middle of making this album, one of the things that made
that difficult for me is that I would have felt I'd have let down a whole generation of young gay kids. That they'd think 'he's massive, then he comes out and then he's gone'. When I made the Outside
video I knew I was helping a whole generation of 15 year olds who are cruising right and dying of shame about it. I felt that lightening the stigma around cruising was the most immediately beneficial
thing I could do. I know for a fact that when I was 16, 17, when I started cruising, that watching the Outside video would have taken some of the weight off my shoulders.
Weren't you worried all the time about someone going 'oh my god, I've just picked up George Michael' and then hopping off to the papers and selling the story? Well, that's the wonderful thing
about cruising. The vast majority of men were either married or in the closet. So you have a mutual secret and that's pretty water tight. Especially if you're cruising outside London. If you're a suburban
cruiser like my good self and you like guys that are really straight-acting, then most of the people you pick up, whether you take them home or do it there and then, are not going to tell your secret
because they've got one themselves. I mean, fuck, it worked for years.
Was there a moment when people would double-take and realise it was you? I think probably most of them did. Sometimes we'd talk about it afterwards and have a laugh. Actually only in
later years. I was so ashamed but I was turned on by the fact that I was putting myself in such a stupid situation. Even with my therapist, who I'd started seeing when I found out Anselmo was positive
in 1991 and I still see today, I talked about everything with him but I couldn't talk about the cruising because it was so stupid. He's an amazing man and he's helped to change my life. But one of the
best things about LA happening is that I talked to him about that and it stopped it being so covert and compulsive. And fun, if I'm being honest. The compulsion to do something stupid was what
kept me doing it. I would tend to do it when I was feeling bad about something. I would tend to do it as a form of self-punishment. I don't do that anymore. I wish to God I could get that excited
about it! [laughing] Don't knock a bit of guilt. Catholics have the best sex on earth, I'm told.
Was cruising your secret place?
One of the things about cruising and having a secret sex life for so long is that I think it helped me keep my feet on the ground. Because I was constantly in contact with people that I
had a shared secret with, well, that was totally levelling. And it meant that I was constantly meeting ordinary people. How else would I have done that, in a weird way? And be on their level?
Because at the end of the day you both want the same thing out of it. Sex is very levelling. And I still believe that with the people I meet for sex. It's nowhere near as regular as it was but I
constantly meet new people via people that I know are cool and I can trust. When you meet somebody, see them a few times, and basically say, 'who do you know that's cool and tasty
with a big knob?' [laughing] and I meet people all the time that way. They're not in the industry, and if they are impressed, well, no-one looks like a superstar in bed. I could put that
a lot more crudely but [laughs]. Now that it's not furtive, I've met some really cool people that way. Much cooler than the people that I'm going to meet at some fucking celebrity party.
When was the last time you went to a gay dub? In America I said to Kenny, 'oh come on, we've got to go to some fucking gay clubs. I'm sick of hanging out with all our straight friends
all the time and only having a sexual gay life and never a social gay life'. And I tried it a couple of times, and my god! I don't even fucking sell records in America, but we were in
Houston and for ages no-one said a thing because they didn't think it was me, they couldn't fathom that it was me. Then when I asked for a glass of wine they realised that it was
me, because in America nobody fucking drinks wine in a bar! I swear to god, the number of people that grabbed my arse or did something as they walked past, or just stopped and
stared. And the entire place got my autograph because I'm too polite to tell them to fuck off, and it was just impossible.
You never get to talk about this stuff properly in interviews.
I've never talked to a gay magazine before, and Attitude's so much more intelligent than the others. Plus, I've never been in position to talk about this stuff and that's the reason I genuinely
wanted to. I don't think I've gotten enough of it out the way for this stuff not to be problematic yet but I don't care, really. I feel like the best defence I have at the moment is just to be completely
honest, because if I'm honest I make a headline every five fucking paragraphs or whatever, and they've got to get bored with me eventually [laughs].
Why did you rework Flawless for the album ?
Don't you think that's like my first proper queen's record? They're going to go mental to that one. I'll have to go to DTPM just one night to see it. It's supposed to be about that Pop Idol mentality
applied to a young gay man. That idea of getting out of the dull as dishwater town you're in and go to London or whatever. But I wanted to camp it up a bit more and so many people I know loved that record.
When I was trying to decide whether to use that track or not, one night I arranged to meet this guy. I told him who I was but I don't think he really believed me. Anyway we arranged for me to
pick him up outside a station and he nearly had a heart attack cause it was me! The truth of the matter is nothing happened, because this guy was so freaked out cause he was a massive fan and just
within two minutes of chatting to him about this and that, I asked him about music. He was talking about late '70s funk and all the stuff I like, and then he said 'but I love that Flawless track that came
out last year'. And I thought 'fuck, someone is trying to tell me something here.'
Of artists today, who do you think will still be around in 10 years time?
Musically? Possibly Chris Martin. Some-: "sometimes those people's careers can be cut shorter because band loyalty means you're tied to the restrictions of the band, but as an individual I think
he's a very talented guy. Jamelia is hot. For British R&B that is a serious track. I meant to email her and tell her, I think it shows a lot of potential. We could absolutely sell her to America, which is
something you couldn't say about most of our R&B artists. Amy Winehouse, maybe. It's not easy to make a whole career out of something so esoteric, but maybe.
Christina?
I wasn't really thinking of American artists. Well she could be, she's got a very good voice. But it's so heartless. Don't you think? She's still a bit Mickey Mouse Club. Of course there's Justin. He
could survive it. He's very talented and very young. I think he's genius technically, but at the moment it still feels very learnt to me, just the way he's got the fake accent. That winds the fuck out of me. I can't
bear white kids putting on black voices. I'll be really interested to see how he goes on though. He's easily the most talented white kid that's been out there for a long time
You said in The Big Issue recently 'I always believed I would outlast everyone else, with the possible exception of Madonna'. What do you make of her current position?
Well, I think people aren't used to seeing her fuck up three or four times in a row. They're used to seeing her fuck up once, possibly twice and then doing something really good. And she's made
a couple of mistakes in a row so everyone's jumping all over her. But all she has to do is make another great record. She is perfectly capable of coming back and doing something wicked. I must
admit, I do think she's probably moved so successfully into being a mother and wife that I don't think she has the clarity of vision about what's going to work that maybe she had before. In which
case, good luck to her. Her family's much more important than keeping MTV happy.
Okay, I have a few quick questions to round off, things like...
How big is your cock? [laughs].
Yeah, top or bottom?
[more laughter]
No, actually, the first one's did you write Bag It Up for Geri? Everyone thought you did.
No! Did people think that? Of course I didn't! [laughing] If I was going to write a song for a friend, then it would be better than that! I've never written anything for her. Bless her. Kenny played me
something down the phone the other day that she's worked on and she's done a really nice little bossa nova, like an Astrud Gilberto summery track. It's lovely. I was quite shocked, actually. It'd
be lovely to see her have a hit single this year.
I thought she was doing a cover of Cherish.
What? By Kool & The Gang?
No. Madonna.
Madonna! Oh, bless her heart. I wouldn't put it past her. I hope not.
OK. Is Aretha still on your Christmas card list?
No, I've never had a Christmas card list. I'm not that polite. Kenny likes to get little notes to people after a dinner party, but it's just not me. I'm not really one for etiquette. I'm very polite but I'm not
into that.
What song in your career has learned you the most money?
That's a hard one. Oh I know, though actually I didn't make the money. Because it gets re-released every year and the money still goes to charity. It's Last Christmas. It's one of the biggest selling
records never to have been number one. We did three million in the UK alone the year it came out and they've been releasing it ever since — occasionally it's number one in Japan at Christmas
and weird things like that. That's the biggest earner. If something starts out as a charity record, it's always a charity record. 4 or 5 of the tracks on the Greatest Hits were originally charity records.
So hopefully if the album takes off in America, and then the Greatest Hits starts selling again, some of these charities can get like 100 grand a year just from being on there.
Who's the most famous person on your mobile?
No-one on my mobile, because I hardly ever use it. In my phone book, maybe... The most famous person is... do you have to have called them regularly? Oh, I don't know. Ask me some names.
Elton?
Obviously.
Jody Watley?
Jody Watley! [George did a duet with Jody in the late 80s] I haven't spoken to her for years and years, bless her. We had the same manager in the late 80s, that's how that single [Learn To Say No] came
about. But I heard it recently on the internet. I haven't heard it for like 20 bloody years, but it sounded pretty good, actually! I'm gonna put it on the Duets album when it comes out.
There's going to be a Duets album? With some new ones?
Yeah. Which is going to be really exciting, but I can't say who yet.
Whitney.
I've done Whitney!
No, is Whitney in your phone book?
Do you think anyone would pick up? I shouldn't say that. No, I don't have Whitney's home number. I don't think many people have Whitney's home number. Bless her heart.
Mary J Blige?
Yeah.
Tony Blair?
No. If I did I think he would have changed it by now, don't you? He probably has my number, that's the scary thing. Do you know what I mean? I'm probably under fucking surveillance for all I know!
Madonna. No phone number. We had a bit of a falling out many years ago. I won't go any further than that.
I've think we've exhausted it, George.
Good. You've got plenty of material there. You know more than my fucking therapist knew in the first ten years of knowing me. Patience is out now on Sony, the single Flawless is due for release next month.
Words: Adam Mattera
Pictures James Dimmock
Pictures James Dimmock