Telegraph Magazine
Big Mouth Strikes Again
by Craig McLean
March 6, 2004
Big Mouth Strikes Again
by Craig McLean
March 6, 2004
Four Hours alter arriving, lightly stoned. George Michael prepares to leave. It's quarter to one in the morning. His bright blue BMW Z4 convertible is parked in the alley directly outside this family-run
Italian in Hampstead. He's a regular here. He chats enthusiastically with the teenage waitress who has stood by patiently, long after all the other patrons and most other staff have left.
He shares her pain at having to work in the family restaurant; he was rubbish at being a waiter in his dad's steakhouse, he confides, and couldn't wait to get out. In the leaving-school summer of
1981, Jack Panos gave his only son six months to find himself a record deal; 18-year-old Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou landed one right on deadline. It was a close shave (one of the last this
famously stubbly pop star would have. boom boom).
He asks her if she saw the picture in the paper the other week, of him getting a parking ticket outside - again. He's sure someone across the road is flogging pictures or tip-offs to the tabloids.
She sympathises. 'Oh.' the waitress calls after him. Next lime he comes in, could he bring a copy of his new album please? He'll do his best.
George Michael... A new album... With his reputation... Since splitting up Wham! in 1986, he has only managed to release three of them. It wasn't just that he took two years out of his music-making
career in the early 1990s to fight an ultimately fruitless legal battle against the record label to which he had signed as a hungry-for-fame teenager. As he had joked earlier that evening, 'prolific is
a word I can barely spell.' adding, as is his chatty, camp. almost giggly way, 'DoyouknowwhatImean'. Then when he did mount a comeback of sorts in 2002. With the 'event" singles Freeek' and
Shoot the Dog. He was accused of using controversy - respectively. sexual and political - to prop up a flagging talent.
He also seemed guilty of staggering hubris: the label that released the singles. Polydor, would be allowed to release his (far more lucrative) album only if Michael deemed its performance with
the singles satisfactory. The singles flopped. Polydor failed its audition.
For a while it looked as if one of the giants of British mainstream music's 1980s heyday had become the Norma Desmond of pop. A legendary star holed up in a mansion on a hill, reclusive and
losing it.'/ am big. It's the music that got smaller.'
Ask him what the worst thing is about being George Michael, and he replies, "that my fame is absolutely irreversible': that he made decisions as a child - to pursue stardom - that now bedevil him
as an adult. Don't get him wrong: he loved his time in Wham!, whooping it up round the world with childhood pal Andrew Ridgeley, the cool, confident, cocky kid he'd met on his first day at Bushey
Meads school in Hertfordshire in 1975. But the adulation, pressure and scrutiny go to Michael. The posing and preening and the shuttlecocks-down-the-shorts for which the Wham! boys became
infamous was down to massive insecurity, not vanity. For Michael anyway.
'It's ridiculous that people used the same word for the way Andrew was and the way I was,' he says, a kernel of frustration still evident. 'I was always f*****g checking my hair because I didn't think
I was gorgeous.' In this light, I notice that he has a small wart on the base of his right nostril. which perhaps accounts for his long-standing insistence on being photographed only from the left.
'Andrew had no neuroses whatsoever,' he
continues. 'Even as a teenager. Andy didn't spend his time looking in mirrors because he was absolutely convinced he was gorgeous." He had a nose job though. 'Yeah - he thought he was
gorgeous, except for the side [profile]! Ha ha ha! I swear to God, I'm telling you. That was his only fault as far as he was concerned, bless him.'
George Michael realised he wanted to be a serious singer/songwriter. Not a teen idol. Thus, as well as demonstrating the maturing of his talent, each of his three solo albums chart his steady
retreat from the light. Or at least, from the limelight. 1987's Faith - global superstar Michael enjoys six number-one singles in America, but doesn't enjoy accompanying 10-month tour; 1990's
Listen Without Prejudice Vol I -panicked Michael refuses to have face on album cover, and when he tours, refuses to play much of the album: 1996's Older - grieving Michael, reeling from the
death of his lover and recovering from legal case. makes an album of marijuana-powered ballads, all but abandons any promotion and effectively disappears from public view. Apart, that is,
from that unfortunate incident in the gents toilets in Los Angeles in 1998. His ongoing and successful reclusiveness - parking violations aside, you don't see many paparazzi shots of George
Michael, not even in the park, far less striding into a premiere or a party - is no mean feat given his humongous fame. Factor in the success of Wham!, throw in the hefty sales of his greatest
hits double CD, 1998's Ladies and Gentlemen, and dust with the modest splash of his contract-fulfilling covers album, 1999's Songs from the Last Century, and George Michael has sold a
whopping 80 million albums.
But yes. Eight years after the last album of his own songs. George Michael does have a new one. with the humorous title Patience, and a new single, Amazing. I was only allowed to hear it once -
fears about the internet and bootlegging being more of a priority for record companies than letting their artists' music be fairly judged - but it does sound like the return of up tempo, exciting George.
Funnily enough, it is being released on Sony, the label he spent all those years and all that money (the court case cost about £6 million: Sony received an estimated £63 million from his post-trial
buy-out deal with DreamWorks) fighting to free himself from. The irony isn't lost on Michael, but any sense of embitterment or embarrassment is. There are three reasons he kissed and made up
with Sony. The business practices he fought against - complicated stuff about money earned per record sold, the length of contractual obligations, and artists being treated as software - are now
common across an increasingly merged industry; there has been a change in personnel at the top of Sony in America; and finally, he says with a satisfied leer, 'They gave me the best deal I ever
seen in my f****** life, which made it a much easier pill to swallow.'
Does he feel defeated? As If. 'I swear to God, the business isn't worth feeling that way about. I have principles but I don't believe in empty gestures." Can he put a figure on the deal? 'No! What
do you think my name is?' He smirks. 'And I'm not gonna say what comes after that. It's obvious.' As if by magic, the spectre of Robbie Williams enters the conversation. Williams is the second most
-famous music-biz contractual ball breaker, having signed a deal worth £80 million. Ground breakingly, EMI wasn't just buying his music, it was securing a share of his revenue streams. 'I have to say
that I did not fight those battles just for myself. I thought I was fighting for a generation of artists beyond me. But that Robbie Williams deal f**** every artist. Because it says, "OK guys, you're not
making enough money on the records you're screwing me on? Come and take some of my merchandise. Come and take my book publishing. Take this, take that." It's like, you f****r.
"The point is, he has - and he told me ...No, I'm not even gonna say what he told me.' Go On! No, I can't say. At the end of the day I think it's a huge betrayal of any sense of community [of musicians
/artists]. But then there isn't a community any more so I suppose it's understandable. But I wouldn't want to know that I had introduced these ideas to the people that are gonna sign the next
generation of artists."
Not only is George Michae back, but he is talking about being back. too. It's fascinating and hilarious. He's just brainier than most pop stars. And more honest. Helpfully, after years
when he was seen as a po-faced goatee-wearer, one whose huge talent came unleavened by humour or humility, he's also a good laugh these days. He still has an ego the size of a small planet,
but then so might you if you'd written Careless Whisper on the bus when you were 17. But at least now he can take the mickey out of himself. After all, everyone else has.
'In terms of public humiliation, most things are small stuff [compared with] getting your knob out in a public toilet,' he chuckles, taking the same' 'ti's a fair cop' line that won him the nation's hearts and
minds on his post-arrest, coming-out interview with Michael Parkinson in December 1998 ('the most important interview of my career' - and not just because it helped double sales of Ladies and
Gentlemen). 'You can't really top that. I don't have any fears. I'm still afraid of physical pain, but that's about it really."
Meet George Michael: chilled-out entertainer and model of full-frontal candour. Being caught with your pants down by the LAPD. and then he world, can do that to a man. Combine that with a raging
self-belief and extreme grief and the result is something like invincibility, which in turn means a refusal to admit that you are ever wrong.
'Why am I here?' he had pondered as he sat down with a normal level of entourage and fuss (ie none) at a normal table in this normal restaurant in normal clothes - dark-blue jumper (nothing
under neath) and black trousers. His brow had furrowed beneath his Eddie Munster-esque widow's peak. He may have turned 40 last summer, but Michael's Greek -Cypriot genes have ensured the
maintenance of a healthy thatch. His hair is lustrous and gelled in little points; his body is buff and his posture upright.
He looks like he takes care of himself, but says he doesn't. He's not a big drinker. But he doesn't eat well. and there's the daily regime of five or six joints (a drop from the mind-boggling 18 he was
having each day during the making of Older) for a start, although his consumption of class-A drugs is now down to an Ecstasy pill on 'special occasions" - the last one was 18 months ago.
There's a gym in the Hampstead house, but its for boyfriend Kenny Goss's use. 'I keep threating to use the dumbbells,' he says. but he does use the treadmill. When he's 'down by the river' at his
house in Goring. Berkshire, he finds that a three mile walk each day with his dogs keeps him in shape. But no, he's no keep-fit freak. 'Life is too short,' he says. 'I'm lucky: I'm healthy. I'm
presentable, I have all kinds of reasons people might want to get me in the sack. I don't need to pump iron.'
The only signs of ageing are a little grey in his beard. I had initially suspected the strange stareyness of his eyes to be the work of needle or scalpel. But he later insisted, with some feeling,
that he would never have Botox (it's like introducing a virus) And although he would not discount cosmetic surgery, his dislike of pain is a problem. What's more, despite being a bona fide telly
addict (He's had a lot of time to watch it; Six Feet Under is a big fave), squeamishness and embarrassment make watching the viscerally realistic plastic-surgey drama Nip/Tick difficult.
Italian in Hampstead. He's a regular here. He chats enthusiastically with the teenage waitress who has stood by patiently, long after all the other patrons and most other staff have left.
He shares her pain at having to work in the family restaurant; he was rubbish at being a waiter in his dad's steakhouse, he confides, and couldn't wait to get out. In the leaving-school summer of
1981, Jack Panos gave his only son six months to find himself a record deal; 18-year-old Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou landed one right on deadline. It was a close shave (one of the last this
famously stubbly pop star would have. boom boom).
He asks her if she saw the picture in the paper the other week, of him getting a parking ticket outside - again. He's sure someone across the road is flogging pictures or tip-offs to the tabloids.
She sympathises. 'Oh.' the waitress calls after him. Next lime he comes in, could he bring a copy of his new album please? He'll do his best.
George Michael... A new album... With his reputation... Since splitting up Wham! in 1986, he has only managed to release three of them. It wasn't just that he took two years out of his music-making
career in the early 1990s to fight an ultimately fruitless legal battle against the record label to which he had signed as a hungry-for-fame teenager. As he had joked earlier that evening, 'prolific is
a word I can barely spell.' adding, as is his chatty, camp. almost giggly way, 'DoyouknowwhatImean'. Then when he did mount a comeback of sorts in 2002. With the 'event" singles Freeek' and
Shoot the Dog. He was accused of using controversy - respectively. sexual and political - to prop up a flagging talent.
He also seemed guilty of staggering hubris: the label that released the singles. Polydor, would be allowed to release his (far more lucrative) album only if Michael deemed its performance with
the singles satisfactory. The singles flopped. Polydor failed its audition.
For a while it looked as if one of the giants of British mainstream music's 1980s heyday had become the Norma Desmond of pop. A legendary star holed up in a mansion on a hill, reclusive and
losing it.'/ am big. It's the music that got smaller.'
Ask him what the worst thing is about being George Michael, and he replies, "that my fame is absolutely irreversible': that he made decisions as a child - to pursue stardom - that now bedevil him
as an adult. Don't get him wrong: he loved his time in Wham!, whooping it up round the world with childhood pal Andrew Ridgeley, the cool, confident, cocky kid he'd met on his first day at Bushey
Meads school in Hertfordshire in 1975. But the adulation, pressure and scrutiny go to Michael. The posing and preening and the shuttlecocks-down-the-shorts for which the Wham! boys became
infamous was down to massive insecurity, not vanity. For Michael anyway.
'It's ridiculous that people used the same word for the way Andrew was and the way I was,' he says, a kernel of frustration still evident. 'I was always f*****g checking my hair because I didn't think
I was gorgeous.' In this light, I notice that he has a small wart on the base of his right nostril. which perhaps accounts for his long-standing insistence on being photographed only from the left.
'Andrew had no neuroses whatsoever,' he
continues. 'Even as a teenager. Andy didn't spend his time looking in mirrors because he was absolutely convinced he was gorgeous." He had a nose job though. 'Yeah - he thought he was
gorgeous, except for the side [profile]! Ha ha ha! I swear to God, I'm telling you. That was his only fault as far as he was concerned, bless him.'
George Michael realised he wanted to be a serious singer/songwriter. Not a teen idol. Thus, as well as demonstrating the maturing of his talent, each of his three solo albums chart his steady
retreat from the light. Or at least, from the limelight. 1987's Faith - global superstar Michael enjoys six number-one singles in America, but doesn't enjoy accompanying 10-month tour; 1990's
Listen Without Prejudice Vol I -panicked Michael refuses to have face on album cover, and when he tours, refuses to play much of the album: 1996's Older - grieving Michael, reeling from the
death of his lover and recovering from legal case. makes an album of marijuana-powered ballads, all but abandons any promotion and effectively disappears from public view. Apart, that is,
from that unfortunate incident in the gents toilets in Los Angeles in 1998. His ongoing and successful reclusiveness - parking violations aside, you don't see many paparazzi shots of George
Michael, not even in the park, far less striding into a premiere or a party - is no mean feat given his humongous fame. Factor in the success of Wham!, throw in the hefty sales of his greatest
hits double CD, 1998's Ladies and Gentlemen, and dust with the modest splash of his contract-fulfilling covers album, 1999's Songs from the Last Century, and George Michael has sold a
whopping 80 million albums.
But yes. Eight years after the last album of his own songs. George Michael does have a new one. with the humorous title Patience, and a new single, Amazing. I was only allowed to hear it once -
fears about the internet and bootlegging being more of a priority for record companies than letting their artists' music be fairly judged - but it does sound like the return of up tempo, exciting George.
Funnily enough, it is being released on Sony, the label he spent all those years and all that money (the court case cost about £6 million: Sony received an estimated £63 million from his post-trial
buy-out deal with DreamWorks) fighting to free himself from. The irony isn't lost on Michael, but any sense of embitterment or embarrassment is. There are three reasons he kissed and made up
with Sony. The business practices he fought against - complicated stuff about money earned per record sold, the length of contractual obligations, and artists being treated as software - are now
common across an increasingly merged industry; there has been a change in personnel at the top of Sony in America; and finally, he says with a satisfied leer, 'They gave me the best deal I ever
seen in my f****** life, which made it a much easier pill to swallow.'
Does he feel defeated? As If. 'I swear to God, the business isn't worth feeling that way about. I have principles but I don't believe in empty gestures." Can he put a figure on the deal? 'No! What
do you think my name is?' He smirks. 'And I'm not gonna say what comes after that. It's obvious.' As if by magic, the spectre of Robbie Williams enters the conversation. Williams is the second most
-famous music-biz contractual ball breaker, having signed a deal worth £80 million. Ground breakingly, EMI wasn't just buying his music, it was securing a share of his revenue streams. 'I have to say
that I did not fight those battles just for myself. I thought I was fighting for a generation of artists beyond me. But that Robbie Williams deal f**** every artist. Because it says, "OK guys, you're not
making enough money on the records you're screwing me on? Come and take some of my merchandise. Come and take my book publishing. Take this, take that." It's like, you f****r.
"The point is, he has - and he told me ...No, I'm not even gonna say what he told me.' Go On! No, I can't say. At the end of the day I think it's a huge betrayal of any sense of community [of musicians
/artists]. But then there isn't a community any more so I suppose it's understandable. But I wouldn't want to know that I had introduced these ideas to the people that are gonna sign the next
generation of artists."
Not only is George Michae back, but he is talking about being back. too. It's fascinating and hilarious. He's just brainier than most pop stars. And more honest. Helpfully, after years
when he was seen as a po-faced goatee-wearer, one whose huge talent came unleavened by humour or humility, he's also a good laugh these days. He still has an ego the size of a small planet,
but then so might you if you'd written Careless Whisper on the bus when you were 17. But at least now he can take the mickey out of himself. After all, everyone else has.
'In terms of public humiliation, most things are small stuff [compared with] getting your knob out in a public toilet,' he chuckles, taking the same' 'ti's a fair cop' line that won him the nation's hearts and
minds on his post-arrest, coming-out interview with Michael Parkinson in December 1998 ('the most important interview of my career' - and not just because it helped double sales of Ladies and
Gentlemen). 'You can't really top that. I don't have any fears. I'm still afraid of physical pain, but that's about it really."
Meet George Michael: chilled-out entertainer and model of full-frontal candour. Being caught with your pants down by the LAPD. and then he world, can do that to a man. Combine that with a raging
self-belief and extreme grief and the result is something like invincibility, which in turn means a refusal to admit that you are ever wrong.
'Why am I here?' he had pondered as he sat down with a normal level of entourage and fuss (ie none) at a normal table in this normal restaurant in normal clothes - dark-blue jumper (nothing
under neath) and black trousers. His brow had furrowed beneath his Eddie Munster-esque widow's peak. He may have turned 40 last summer, but Michael's Greek -Cypriot genes have ensured the
maintenance of a healthy thatch. His hair is lustrous and gelled in little points; his body is buff and his posture upright.
He looks like he takes care of himself, but says he doesn't. He's not a big drinker. But he doesn't eat well. and there's the daily regime of five or six joints (a drop from the mind-boggling 18 he was
having each day during the making of Older) for a start, although his consumption of class-A drugs is now down to an Ecstasy pill on 'special occasions" - the last one was 18 months ago.
There's a gym in the Hampstead house, but its for boyfriend Kenny Goss's use. 'I keep threating to use the dumbbells,' he says. but he does use the treadmill. When he's 'down by the river' at his
house in Goring. Berkshire, he finds that a three mile walk each day with his dogs keeps him in shape. But no, he's no keep-fit freak. 'Life is too short,' he says. 'I'm lucky: I'm healthy. I'm
presentable, I have all kinds of reasons people might want to get me in the sack. I don't need to pump iron.'
The only signs of ageing are a little grey in his beard. I had initially suspected the strange stareyness of his eyes to be the work of needle or scalpel. But he later insisted, with some feeling,
that he would never have Botox (it's like introducing a virus) And although he would not discount cosmetic surgery, his dislike of pain is a problem. What's more, despite being a bona fide telly
addict (He's had a lot of time to watch it; Six Feet Under is a big fave), squeamishness and embarrassment make watching the viscerally realistic plastic-surgey drama Nip/Tick difficult.
I decide his boggly eyes are merely the result of the spliff he had 45 minutes previously. Before he begins
talking (almost non-stop) for four hours, he is desperate for a Diet Coke for his claggy, post-smoke mouth.
'Why am 1 here, broadly? I'm just showing willing really. To record company, management, whatever. I've
worked so hard, five and a half years, [it] was so tempting to just do absolutely nothing. Especially when
you've got a single that is all over the radio. [But] it's been so difficult to make, taken so long, that I really
should go out there and shout about it. At least for a couple of weeks,' he smiles.
Where is your head at in 2004? 'Oh, it's unbelievable actually,' Michael exclaims, like a teenager. 'For the
first time in 10 years I've actually felt generally positive about everything. I had 10 years which were basically
made up of either worrying about terminal illness, losing someone to terminal illness, or getting over someone
that I lost to a terminal illness. And at the very end of that, I was so browbeaten that I did lose my ability to
write songs for a good three years.'
It wasn't that he was writing nothing, or writing 'crap'. He simply had no idea whether the 'thousands' of
half-finished songs he worked on over three and a half years were any good. 'My confidence was gone.
My spirituality was gone. None of my natural desire to make music was there.'
Marijuana, he says, was and is 'the only way I manage to keep myself open enough to the idea that what
I do is good'. Really? 'Yeah. People just do not appreciate how... how difficult it is to have the confidence
that you're gonna better your history. That became terrifying just after Faith. Writing's always been a bit of
a chore, because there's so much anxiety that goes with it. With this album, in the last year, my joy for
writing has come back.'
talking (almost non-stop) for four hours, he is desperate for a Diet Coke for his claggy, post-smoke mouth.
'Why am 1 here, broadly? I'm just showing willing really. To record company, management, whatever. I've
worked so hard, five and a half years, [it] was so tempting to just do absolutely nothing. Especially when
you've got a single that is all over the radio. [But] it's been so difficult to make, taken so long, that I really
should go out there and shout about it. At least for a couple of weeks,' he smiles.
Where is your head at in 2004? 'Oh, it's unbelievable actually,' Michael exclaims, like a teenager. 'For the
first time in 10 years I've actually felt generally positive about everything. I had 10 years which were basically
made up of either worrying about terminal illness, losing someone to terminal illness, or getting over someone
that I lost to a terminal illness. And at the very end of that, I was so browbeaten that I did lose my ability to
write songs for a good three years.'
It wasn't that he was writing nothing, or writing 'crap'. He simply had no idea whether the 'thousands' of
half-finished songs he worked on over three and a half years were any good. 'My confidence was gone.
My spirituality was gone. None of my natural desire to make music was there.'
Marijuana, he says, was and is 'the only way I manage to keep myself open enough to the idea that what
I do is good'. Really? 'Yeah. People just do not appreciate how... how difficult it is to have the confidence
that you're gonna better your history. That became terrifying just after Faith. Writing's always been a bit of
a chore, because there's so much anxiety that goes with it. With this album, in the last year, my joy for
writing has come back.'
In 1993 George Michael's boyfriend, the Brazilian designer Anselmo Felipa, died of an Aids-related brain hemorrhage. Older is dedicated to him, and there is a track on Patience called Please
Send Me Someone (Anselmo's Song). In 1996 Michael phoned his mum to tell her that he'd finally met someone else, Texan businessman Goss. He had come out to his parents the day after
Felipa died (his close friends already knew). 'I felt like Anselmo's parting gift to me was [saying], "Look, you've got all this bullshit going on; you've told everybody else. You need to tell your
mum and dad." My mum told me it was the most beautiful letter she'd ever read - because I took real care over it, and I felt really so natural.'
In keeping with his Greek-Cypriot roots, family is everything to him (he has two elder sisters, Yioda and Melanie). He bought his dad a stud farm in Hertfordshire the venue for Michael's lavish,
1970s-themed 30th birthday party in 1993 - but, noting that he thinks his dad was bored, says that lack Panos has recently re-bought the restaurant in Edgeware London, in which Michael grew up.
In the same telephone conversation in which she first heard about Goss, Lesley Panayiotou had to tell her son that she had cancer. She died in 1997. 'So I didn't even get a day off,' Michael
laughs drily. 'I didn't get my 18 months, two years of pure
joy with Kenny. I didn't even get the first day of it. Which is probably why Kenny and I are happier now than we ever were. This is the first time he's known me to have everything in life as 1 want it.'
Michael and Goss first met at the hip LA department store Fred Segal. After bumping into each other again at a party, they went on a date to the upscale restaurant Paladino. Their second date was
at the equally upscale Maple Drive, 'and I fell down the stairs and tore a ligament'. Ah, the romance. Did he take you to casualty? 'No,' Michael says through a mouthful of scampi. 'I was so up for
shagging him that I ignored the ankle. He held out on the first night. But the second night, I was so not gonna let it go.' Michael says he doesn't remember much pain, or 'it impairing me much. But
anyway, I told him 1 loved him within three or four days. I was so sure. It took him about three seconds longer.'
The demands of his business (his company sells sports gear to American schools and colleges - 'cheerleader stuff, it's a real apple-pie company') means Goss is still primarily based in America. 'But
now we've got an apartment in Dallas. Which is nice, because we had to stay at his brother's when we went before. I'm terrible with hotels, I'm terrible staying with friends. I just need my privacy. That's
why I tend to buy houses in places that I like.' (As well as Dallas, he has homes in Hampstead, Highgate, Regent's Park, Berkshire and St Tropez. His personal wealth was last year valued at £60 million.
While not known for Elton- or Sting-levels of profligacy, in 2000 he paid £1.4 million for the piano on which John Lennon wrote Imagine.}
Goss and Michael are 'emotionally monogamous' but not sexually. 'I'm sure it's fascinating to straight people but it's completely run of the mill in gay society.' Michael says gay men experience the
same initial 'chemical buzz' as heterosexuals concerning the need to procreate. This binds straight couples together, and blinds them, ensuring that when the 'mist clears' they stick together to
rear children.
'But the truth about two gay men is, is once they deal with reality again, there's no fooling one another.
You look into each other's eyes and you know exactly what the other one wants. Because you're both men, and you're both programmed just like every other man: after three years, you're really
desperate to get it somewhere else.'
If gay men decide - as Goss and Michael have - that they don't want to have children, they are accepting that 'one of the great joys in life' is not going to be theirs, 'and you're not going to have
anyone to look after you when you get old. That is the sacrifice that a gay man makes.'
Michael is on a roll now. He's clearly thought long and hard about the biological determinism of his sexuality. He's also considered the philosophical implications, vis-a-vis getting his oats.
'To me, there are two experiences that bring close to God. One is procreation. The other is simply through orgasm.' Le petit mort, as the French call it. 'Yeah, the little death. And if you're not gonna
have one, make f*****g sure you're gonna get plenty of the other.' Michael gives a giddy squeal:'Doyouknowhutlmean! It's true!'
He might not have had many sexual partners before he was outed, but 'it's been a huge number since!' he guffaws. 'You can have a lot more fun when people know you're a tart!' Albiet a prudent
one: he says that, since he first heard about AIDS in 1982, he has not once had unsafe sex.
Amazing, the first single from Patience, a giddy, celebratory dance number about meeting Kenny, and about moving on. Another album track, American Angel, also concerns the beginning of their
relationship. It rhapsodises about a 'horny cowboy' with a 'Texan smile'. Did it take gumption to write lines as, well, corny as that? 'I didn't have any problem with it. Although I'll be honest, I don't put
as much lyrical energy in talking about positive aspects of love as I do in loneliness. I do actually look at some of the stuff that's personal about Kenny's life, about my life in there and think, "Are you
doing this to create a problem for yourself?" Then I think, "No, you're doing it because it's about your life."'
Part of the inspiration for his feeling so up about being 'out' is My Mother Had a Brother a moving, piano-led ballad. 'It's possible that one of my close extended family killed himself because he was
gay in the 1950s, right?' Michael contrasts the difficulties the relative would have faced them with the opportunities offered gay men now. 'I'm a free man in a world where, if you're smart and have
respect for people, it's a. fantastic time to be gay man. That was what that song was about. |
'It's really interesting: I started to dream about my uncle - his name was Colin but not much rhymes with Colin - in the middle of last year. And the idea for the song came to me.' Did he, as the song
says, kill himself on the day you were born? 'Within 24 hours.' Presumably Colin wouldn't had been out then [homosexuality being illegal in Britain until 1967]? 'Mmm... And the sad thing is that life
changed so drastically in the 10 years after he died. He could have been a very happy middle aged aged man.' Michael pauses for some wine. 'But obviously, I think I wasted time in not coming
forward about my sexuality earlier. Simply because trying to keep that secret wasted my energy. The end of the song is basically saying, whatever they can throw at me, it's only words and the
opinions of straight people who are homophobic. I'm not really
Send Me Someone (Anselmo's Song). In 1996 Michael phoned his mum to tell her that he'd finally met someone else, Texan businessman Goss. He had come out to his parents the day after
Felipa died (his close friends already knew). 'I felt like Anselmo's parting gift to me was [saying], "Look, you've got all this bullshit going on; you've told everybody else. You need to tell your
mum and dad." My mum told me it was the most beautiful letter she'd ever read - because I took real care over it, and I felt really so natural.'
In keeping with his Greek-Cypriot roots, family is everything to him (he has two elder sisters, Yioda and Melanie). He bought his dad a stud farm in Hertfordshire the venue for Michael's lavish,
1970s-themed 30th birthday party in 1993 - but, noting that he thinks his dad was bored, says that lack Panos has recently re-bought the restaurant in Edgeware London, in which Michael grew up.
In the same telephone conversation in which she first heard about Goss, Lesley Panayiotou had to tell her son that she had cancer. She died in 1997. 'So I didn't even get a day off,' Michael
laughs drily. 'I didn't get my 18 months, two years of pure
joy with Kenny. I didn't even get the first day of it. Which is probably why Kenny and I are happier now than we ever were. This is the first time he's known me to have everything in life as 1 want it.'
Michael and Goss first met at the hip LA department store Fred Segal. After bumping into each other again at a party, they went on a date to the upscale restaurant Paladino. Their second date was
at the equally upscale Maple Drive, 'and I fell down the stairs and tore a ligament'. Ah, the romance. Did he take you to casualty? 'No,' Michael says through a mouthful of scampi. 'I was so up for
shagging him that I ignored the ankle. He held out on the first night. But the second night, I was so not gonna let it go.' Michael says he doesn't remember much pain, or 'it impairing me much. But
anyway, I told him 1 loved him within three or four days. I was so sure. It took him about three seconds longer.'
The demands of his business (his company sells sports gear to American schools and colleges - 'cheerleader stuff, it's a real apple-pie company') means Goss is still primarily based in America. 'But
now we've got an apartment in Dallas. Which is nice, because we had to stay at his brother's when we went before. I'm terrible with hotels, I'm terrible staying with friends. I just need my privacy. That's
why I tend to buy houses in places that I like.' (As well as Dallas, he has homes in Hampstead, Highgate, Regent's Park, Berkshire and St Tropez. His personal wealth was last year valued at £60 million.
While not known for Elton- or Sting-levels of profligacy, in 2000 he paid £1.4 million for the piano on which John Lennon wrote Imagine.}
Goss and Michael are 'emotionally monogamous' but not sexually. 'I'm sure it's fascinating to straight people but it's completely run of the mill in gay society.' Michael says gay men experience the
same initial 'chemical buzz' as heterosexuals concerning the need to procreate. This binds straight couples together, and blinds them, ensuring that when the 'mist clears' they stick together to
rear children.
'But the truth about two gay men is, is once they deal with reality again, there's no fooling one another.
You look into each other's eyes and you know exactly what the other one wants. Because you're both men, and you're both programmed just like every other man: after three years, you're really
desperate to get it somewhere else.'
If gay men decide - as Goss and Michael have - that they don't want to have children, they are accepting that 'one of the great joys in life' is not going to be theirs, 'and you're not going to have
anyone to look after you when you get old. That is the sacrifice that a gay man makes.'
Michael is on a roll now. He's clearly thought long and hard about the biological determinism of his sexuality. He's also considered the philosophical implications, vis-a-vis getting his oats.
'To me, there are two experiences that bring close to God. One is procreation. The other is simply through orgasm.' Le petit mort, as the French call it. 'Yeah, the little death. And if you're not gonna
have one, make f*****g sure you're gonna get plenty of the other.' Michael gives a giddy squeal:'Doyouknowhutlmean! It's true!'
He might not have had many sexual partners before he was outed, but 'it's been a huge number since!' he guffaws. 'You can have a lot more fun when people know you're a tart!' Albiet a prudent
one: he says that, since he first heard about AIDS in 1982, he has not once had unsafe sex.
Amazing, the first single from Patience, a giddy, celebratory dance number about meeting Kenny, and about moving on. Another album track, American Angel, also concerns the beginning of their
relationship. It rhapsodises about a 'horny cowboy' with a 'Texan smile'. Did it take gumption to write lines as, well, corny as that? 'I didn't have any problem with it. Although I'll be honest, I don't put
as much lyrical energy in talking about positive aspects of love as I do in loneliness. I do actually look at some of the stuff that's personal about Kenny's life, about my life in there and think, "Are you
doing this to create a problem for yourself?" Then I think, "No, you're doing it because it's about your life."'
Part of the inspiration for his feeling so up about being 'out' is My Mother Had a Brother a moving, piano-led ballad. 'It's possible that one of my close extended family killed himself because he was
gay in the 1950s, right?' Michael contrasts the difficulties the relative would have faced them with the opportunities offered gay men now. 'I'm a free man in a world where, if you're smart and have
respect for people, it's a. fantastic time to be gay man. That was what that song was about. |
'It's really interesting: I started to dream about my uncle - his name was Colin but not much rhymes with Colin - in the middle of last year. And the idea for the song came to me.' Did he, as the song
says, kill himself on the day you were born? 'Within 24 hours.' Presumably Colin wouldn't had been out then [homosexuality being illegal in Britain until 1967]? 'Mmm... And the sad thing is that life
changed so drastically in the 10 years after he died. He could have been a very happy middle aged aged man.' Michael pauses for some wine. 'But obviously, I think I wasted time in not coming
forward about my sexuality earlier. Simply because trying to keep that secret wasted my energy. The end of the song is basically saying, whatever they can throw at me, it's only words and the
opinions of straight people who are homophobic. I'm not really
interested in those views.' In fact, he adds, he's not even interested in selling records to those people.
George Michael is unrepentant about Shoot the Dog. A satire on the foreign policy of George W Bush
i and Tony Blair in the run-up to war I in Iraq, its cartoon video lampooned Bush as an
imbecile who took foreign policy briefings from a sock puppet and Blair as Bush's (actual) poodle.
Michael, in leopardskin briefs, attempted to ravage Cherie in the Number 10 bed. Shoot the
Dog got to number 12.
The Rupert Murdoch-owned New York Post savaged Michael's attack on the 'war on terror', calling
Shoot the Dog a 'tawdry tune', and dubbing him a 'washed-up pervert pop star' in an article he
ad lined 'Pop Perv's 9/11 Slur'. Stablemate the Sun weighed in, calling Michael a 'flop star, hypocrite
and coward'. Did that hurt? 'No, not in the slightest! Why should it? Regardless of the fact
that the figures went up and up in terms of disapproval of the war. I felt from the very beginning I
was speaking for the majority.'
He is more distressed that he received little vocal support from his peers. He is convinced, too. That
the media response was driven by homophobia and revenge. That the press, gutter and
otherwise, couldn't forgive him for bouncing back after his 'gay sex shame', especially as he 'spun' the
incident into Outside, the wry and hugely successful dance anthem that was Ladies and
Gentleman's lead single. That everyone colluded in trampling over him. It was more important to 'get'
Michael this time than it was to support his right to free speech.
George Michael is unrepentant about Shoot the Dog. A satire on the foreign policy of George W Bush
i and Tony Blair in the run-up to war I in Iraq, its cartoon video lampooned Bush as an
imbecile who took foreign policy briefings from a sock puppet and Blair as Bush's (actual) poodle.
Michael, in leopardskin briefs, attempted to ravage Cherie in the Number 10 bed. Shoot the
Dog got to number 12.
The Rupert Murdoch-owned New York Post savaged Michael's attack on the 'war on terror', calling
Shoot the Dog a 'tawdry tune', and dubbing him a 'washed-up pervert pop star' in an article he
ad lined 'Pop Perv's 9/11 Slur'. Stablemate the Sun weighed in, calling Michael a 'flop star, hypocrite
and coward'. Did that hurt? 'No, not in the slightest! Why should it? Regardless of the fact
that the figures went up and up in terms of disapproval of the war. I felt from the very beginning I
was speaking for the majority.'
He is more distressed that he received little vocal support from his peers. He is convinced, too. That
the media response was driven by homophobia and revenge. That the press, gutter and
otherwise, couldn't forgive him for bouncing back after his 'gay sex shame', especially as he 'spun' the
incident into Outside, the wry and hugely successful dance anthem that was Ladies and
Gentleman's lead single. That everyone colluded in trampling over him. It was more important to 'get'
Michael this time than it was to support his right to free speech.
Maybe it's the lateness of the hour, or the wine. Perhaps the effects of his last spliff have worn off, or perhaps a decade's worth of spliffs have taken their toll. Whatever: when I voice scepticism
at this perhaps paranoid notion of a vast, overarching revenge conspiracy, Michael starts ranting. '
'Come on!' he says, animatedly, voice at high pitch, upper body weaving. 'I was not supposed to survive that arrest! I was not' - and here he bangs on the table, for emphasis and for punctuation -
'supposed [bang] to survive [bang]. I was the man who had said he would not talk to you guys for 12 years and he got away with it and was still selling records.' (Sadly, there is no room here for
his other rants, and the accompanying manual percussion, about subjects including America, record company executives and the legal world's financial system that contributed to his losing his
court case.)
He is more cogent on his stance on Blair and Iraq. He says he was as shaken up as the next person when he heard about the September dossier and the '45 minutes' claim. "We're all being
hoodwinked. It's incredible that at the end of the Hutton Report, Tony Blair can make such a song and dance about it. Because, really, OK, if you weren't lying, you were fooled.' DOS that make
him unfit to govern? 'YES! Of course it does. In combination with a massive ego that is very drawn to the world stage, absolutely'
If there were an election tomorrow, what would you vote? 'Liberal Democrat. Of course, it's very easy to say you won't raise taxes when you're miles from the possibility of government. I wish
Labour had the guts to get rid of him, because they're in the privileged position that Thatcher was in the last time she got elected - people hated her but they were afraid of the alternative.'
Before the 1997 election. Michael was invited to dinner at Tony and Cherie Blair's Islington home. He wont say who the eight or so other guests were - ' I don't wanna slag people off. But I thought
he was a great guy, a really nice guy. Persuasive and charismatic? No. When I left, there were three things that worried
me. One was that a few religious words had crept into the conversation at moments I didn't expect them to. Second, as I was leaving, Cherie goes, "Oh, show him your guitar, show him your guitar!"
And I was thinking, "Oh, don't show me your guitar, I was just about to vote for you!" So he opens the downstairs toilet and there's this little guitar and a really old. tiny little amp. That worried me
simply because I know that means that our egos have something in common. And I know what a good slap my ego needs on a regular basis.
'But the thing that worried me most was that he did not seem the smartest man at the table. You want the Prime Minister to be the smartest man at the f*****g table, don't you? Which is why my
whole impression all this way through has not been "liar, liar" but "well-intentioned fool". And we cannot afford a well-intentioned fool.'
George Michael is terrific company and a brilliant conversationalist - as long as that conversation is more monologue than dialogue. He is bumptious - ask him who he takes creative advice from,
and he replies, 'If I think the public is going to love something, I'm going to believe that.' He is obstinate, still, refusing to countenance the possibility that his last two singles were relative failures
because they simply weren't good enough. He is contradictory - he sees a vast, celebrity-industrial complex that is out to get him, but acknowledges there is a huge reservoir of public goodwill
towards him, one that has no real appetite for seeing him crucified. He is relaxed (the LA policeman who arrested him is still doggedly pursuing him through the courts for a morsel of' damages' -
a rather desperate '10 grand', he says - but Michael is blithery unconcerned) but uptight (he will sue if you call him a wanker). He is fiercely private, but cant help spilling the beans.
He has the world at his feet, but as the lyrics of his new song Round Here demonstrate, he finds it nigh impossible to stray far from the London streets where he grew up. What does that tell him
about himself? 'That I'm horribly unadventurous,' he cheerfully exclaims. 'Much as I find nature absolutely beautiful, I don't find the world as fascinating as I find people and psyche. There's plenty
to work out even if you stand still.'
And he is confused - be loves his music, and getting it over to people, more than anything, but can't bear the thought of performing regularly again. Playing concerts simply pitches him headlong
into the daily 'bullshit' of the business he was ravenous for as a teenager and now can't stand.
Will he ever tour again? 'I'd really like to. I tell you what it'll be about: how my relationship with the media is... because I'm convinced this album is gonna be extremely successful. But if the media
are bored with kicking me in the teeth and this album sells relatively quietly, I'd be much more tempted to tour. If it sells loudly and with a lot of tabloid interest, the chances of me touring are
probably minimal.'
So it's in the interests of your fans for this album not to be megasuccessful? 'Yes. It's true. No! Don't say that - they'll all think they're being loyal by not buying the record.'
It's George Michael paradox number 43, don't buy his record, then you'll get to see him. 'That's my middle name, isn't it, Paradox?' Is that Greek Cypriot? 'Heh - Paradoxis - actually. I'm sure it
comes from a Greek word. Bet you it does.'
With a cheery farewell to the waitress, Michael threads his way through the empty restaurant; with a wave and a nod he is off into the night, towards Hampstead Heath and home. His next
creative endeavor, he thinks, will be to write his autobiography. He thinks he'll be quite good at that.
at this perhaps paranoid notion of a vast, overarching revenge conspiracy, Michael starts ranting. '
'Come on!' he says, animatedly, voice at high pitch, upper body weaving. 'I was not supposed to survive that arrest! I was not' - and here he bangs on the table, for emphasis and for punctuation -
'supposed [bang] to survive [bang]. I was the man who had said he would not talk to you guys for 12 years and he got away with it and was still selling records.' (Sadly, there is no room here for
his other rants, and the accompanying manual percussion, about subjects including America, record company executives and the legal world's financial system that contributed to his losing his
court case.)
He is more cogent on his stance on Blair and Iraq. He says he was as shaken up as the next person when he heard about the September dossier and the '45 minutes' claim. "We're all being
hoodwinked. It's incredible that at the end of the Hutton Report, Tony Blair can make such a song and dance about it. Because, really, OK, if you weren't lying, you were fooled.' DOS that make
him unfit to govern? 'YES! Of course it does. In combination with a massive ego that is very drawn to the world stage, absolutely'
If there were an election tomorrow, what would you vote? 'Liberal Democrat. Of course, it's very easy to say you won't raise taxes when you're miles from the possibility of government. I wish
Labour had the guts to get rid of him, because they're in the privileged position that Thatcher was in the last time she got elected - people hated her but they were afraid of the alternative.'
Before the 1997 election. Michael was invited to dinner at Tony and Cherie Blair's Islington home. He wont say who the eight or so other guests were - ' I don't wanna slag people off. But I thought
he was a great guy, a really nice guy. Persuasive and charismatic? No. When I left, there were three things that worried
me. One was that a few religious words had crept into the conversation at moments I didn't expect them to. Second, as I was leaving, Cherie goes, "Oh, show him your guitar, show him your guitar!"
And I was thinking, "Oh, don't show me your guitar, I was just about to vote for you!" So he opens the downstairs toilet and there's this little guitar and a really old. tiny little amp. That worried me
simply because I know that means that our egos have something in common. And I know what a good slap my ego needs on a regular basis.
'But the thing that worried me most was that he did not seem the smartest man at the table. You want the Prime Minister to be the smartest man at the f*****g table, don't you? Which is why my
whole impression all this way through has not been "liar, liar" but "well-intentioned fool". And we cannot afford a well-intentioned fool.'
George Michael is terrific company and a brilliant conversationalist - as long as that conversation is more monologue than dialogue. He is bumptious - ask him who he takes creative advice from,
and he replies, 'If I think the public is going to love something, I'm going to believe that.' He is obstinate, still, refusing to countenance the possibility that his last two singles were relative failures
because they simply weren't good enough. He is contradictory - he sees a vast, celebrity-industrial complex that is out to get him, but acknowledges there is a huge reservoir of public goodwill
towards him, one that has no real appetite for seeing him crucified. He is relaxed (the LA policeman who arrested him is still doggedly pursuing him through the courts for a morsel of' damages' -
a rather desperate '10 grand', he says - but Michael is blithery unconcerned) but uptight (he will sue if you call him a wanker). He is fiercely private, but cant help spilling the beans.
He has the world at his feet, but as the lyrics of his new song Round Here demonstrate, he finds it nigh impossible to stray far from the London streets where he grew up. What does that tell him
about himself? 'That I'm horribly unadventurous,' he cheerfully exclaims. 'Much as I find nature absolutely beautiful, I don't find the world as fascinating as I find people and psyche. There's plenty
to work out even if you stand still.'
And he is confused - be loves his music, and getting it over to people, more than anything, but can't bear the thought of performing regularly again. Playing concerts simply pitches him headlong
into the daily 'bullshit' of the business he was ravenous for as a teenager and now can't stand.
Will he ever tour again? 'I'd really like to. I tell you what it'll be about: how my relationship with the media is... because I'm convinced this album is gonna be extremely successful. But if the media
are bored with kicking me in the teeth and this album sells relatively quietly, I'd be much more tempted to tour. If it sells loudly and with a lot of tabloid interest, the chances of me touring are
probably minimal.'
So it's in the interests of your fans for this album not to be megasuccessful? 'Yes. It's true. No! Don't say that - they'll all think they're being loyal by not buying the record.'
It's George Michael paradox number 43, don't buy his record, then you'll get to see him. 'That's my middle name, isn't it, Paradox?' Is that Greek Cypriot? 'Heh - Paradoxis - actually. I'm sure it
comes from a Greek word. Bet you it does.'
With a cheery farewell to the waitress, Michael threads his way through the empty restaurant; with a wave and a nod he is off into the night, towards Hampstead Heath and home. His next
creative endeavor, he thinks, will be to write his autobiography. He thinks he'll be quite good at that.
