What the hell went wrong with George Michael?

He was clearly molested as a child. Haven't you listened to "Father Figure"?

He hated being a homosexual

Greeks are not the most accepting people of homosexuality.

Also, it really freaked him out apparently when the 80s were over and he was no longer top of the charts.

He was Cypriot, R3. But your point stands.

Poppers and shit

Michael was of Greek Cypriot, English and Jewish descent.

R3 he brought a lot of it on himself with the Listen to Prejudice album. He had just won a Grammy , and was bitching about his the image he helped to create. The album was fairly successful despite his not being in the music videos for it. Then he blames Sony for not promoting it when he did the exact same thing! Don't blame him for suing Sony to get out of his contract though. But all these things after the Faith album damaged his career in the states.

According to he ex-partner, Kenny, he suffered from addictions to sex, alcohol and weed.

He also had health problems due to all of the above.

R7 here oops Listen Without Prejudice

Don't know if it actually applied to George, but

[quote]Is depression so powerful that even though you have meaningful work, zero money worries, family and friends who love you, it's not enough to calm your soul?

[bold]YES.[/bold] A scurrilous, merciless demon, that depression.

My grandparents were too busy killing themselves working 3 jobs to simply keep a roof over their heads and feed the family to feel depressed. It's absurd the excuses people make today for their precious "feels".

Well, he died for one thing.

His kind of life was destructive, that's what went wrong.

You can't have the same lifestyle you had in your youth.

Nobody gives a shit about your grandparents, R11. And if they had depression they wouldn't have been able to work those jobs and would have been out on the street, apparently with your blessing, since you think depression is another word for "lazy."

Yeah, I have to say I watched an older documentary about him from 2005 last night and thought the same thing. He participated a lot in it, as did Andrew and many of George's other friends, his dad, and several celebrities. He seemed so happy and put together in it, and surrounded by love, and it appeared that he had gone through the hard parts of life and come out on the other side.

And I KNOW depression is a horrid dog, and you can't judge a book and all those things, but jeez, he seemed to have pulled it all together at that point. And the fact that he was suicidal after being so thankful to all of the doctors and nurses who pulled him through the pneumonia several years later also makes his suicide attempts hard to understand.

Bet again, depression doesn't make sense or play by the rules.

(The doc is "George Michael - A Different Story" and it's on youtube if anyone is interested.)

The tragic is that both R13 and R14 have a point.

It's a complicated topic.

Trumps win made many of us want to commit suicide.

Substance abuse and millions of dollars are the exact opposite ingredients to cure depression. It is a combination often ending in death.

r17 wins. Thread closed.

I think there's a huge disconnect between what people understand intellectually about depression and how people feel about it in their gut. Of course, I'm talking primarily about those who've never experienced depression - clinical, diagnosable depression - firsthand.

I've long since realized it's best not to share the fact of my depression with most other people, even those really close to me, because the moronic (though well-meaning) comments people make in response are neither comforting nor helpful.

I mean, can you imagine telling someone with cancer or leukemia, "Maybe tomorrow you'll wake up and it'll be gone"?

Addiction and depression are a vicious circle. Someone might try to self medicate to stave off the depression, and end up feeling worse and wrecking their physical health too. It's a neverending cycle. I don't really know if anything, or anyone, could have helped George. Kind of like Amy Winehouse, you could see the sad end coming a mile away. He would have had to drop all his enabler "friends" like Fadi, sworn off everything and devoted himself to healthy living. But maybe he didn't want that, or maybe it was too late since he had done so much damage to his body already.

Having as much money as GM, and almost no responsibilities, is lethal to recovery from mental illness and addictions. Who was there to set boundaries, to say no? GM was not married, he had no kids, no dependants. He didn't even have a work routine to adher to.

Virginia Woolf once wrote 'It is the skeleton of habit alone that upholds the human frame', by which she , who knew a lot about depression of course, meant that you need work, and structure, to stop you flopping onto the couch with the vapors, if you are a depressive type. GM's 'structure' was getting up when he felt like it, having his PA bring him his Starbucks, rolling a joint, maybe fucking around in his studio for a couple of hours if he felt like it, then cottaging or booking a rent boy, then a restaurant, then more drugs back home, and that turned into all-night parties often enough.

That behavior is about someone who has deep-seated issues, and who is begging someone - usually an absent father or mother - to pay attention, and to make them stop. A plea for love, basically. People need rules, and prohibitions, to keep them from giving in to their worst proclivities.

R20, i can understand your resentment, you have a point and i partially agree with you, but it is also true that in some cases, sick people take advantage of their condition and they take things for granted. Of course, they do that without being able to grasp it, because it sucks when you are running out of excuses and when you are in a vulnerable position. Other people have issues and feelings too, though.

We all need some control.

He got old. And even older because of his many unhealthy addictions.

I doubt he was a loner. He was probably stubborn and people were afraid to speak to him directly. They weren't courageous enough to burst his bubble and if they ever did that they were not consistent enough with their help.

People like GM are surrounded by syncophants. They never hear the word no.As such they don't live in the real world. Privilege, sex and drugs are theirs for the asking. Too much money fuels all this . It's really no surprise that many celebs end up nuts.

He was as addicted to depression as he was to drugs, alcohol and sex.

Plenty of very wealthy musicians get sober. It's about wanting to be sober, and finding something of value to occupy your time.

That said, most addicts and alcoholics do not get sober, and die an early death. George's time was up. Plain and simple.

[quote]My grandparents were too busy killing themselves working 3 jobs to simply keep a roof over their heads and feed the family to feel depressed. It's absurd the excuses people make today for their precious "feels".

R11, you sound just like my brother. You know, just before he got the mother of all burnouts. And millions of dollars on his bank accounts still couldn't save him. At least, his own struggles taught him sympathy. I wish you struggles. And a better outcome.

George really didn't want to get sober, though. And sobriety doesn't work if the person doesn't want it.

Was he HIV+? Might have been an element of his depression if he was.

An extremely sensitive person who's struggle with emotional well-being was not solved by success, fame, world-wide adulation or money.

I happen to think that aside from his unhealthy addictions, George also had a very difficult time with aging. Many beautiful people do.

It's not easy looking in the mirror, and seeing the face that turned a million heads, becoming wrinkled and saggy.

He was a very good looking man. He was also sexy as all get out, which is a rare trait in men, or women.

I think it pained him greatly to watch himself age.

Yes, although he was a sexy older guy too. The one pic from Sept that shows him seriously overweight is a clue R34

Who would have thought Boy George would outlive George Michael?

George would have aged into a hot older man but he indulged too much in drugs and food which affected his appearance. He simply didn't take care of himself. It sounds like he lived a reckless life and was addicted to it.

It's a shame because watching the Oprah interview from 2004, he looked healthy and happy. He seemed happy with Kenny and got his mojo back with Patience. It seems like it went wrong after that.

Guys who cruise bathrooms, parks and other public places are depressed and have low self-esteem. George was hooking up in the bushes with fat, old and ugly men. It's no different than white-collar people cruising the slums looking for drugs.

Thank you for that brilliant analysis R37

🙄

Maybe a lack of self-love.

I knew his uncle committed suicide, but didn't know his grandfather did as well, just a few days after his uncle.

That adds a lot more to his background and struggle.

I used to play the song Father Figure over and over. it was kind of like my anthem.

I was sexually abused by both my father and brother as a small child.

SIA meetings and materials were really helpful to a friend of mine, R41, best to you.

Father Figure is a disturbing song.

Guilty feet have got no rhythm.

In his autobiography, Tommy Mottola (ex head of Sony) said that George, along with Lauryn Hill, was someone who simply could not handle fame in the end, and he sabotaged himself.

Mottola was actually pretty kind about George in that book. But he said that George would simply not help them at all when it came to Listen Without Prejudice, and refused to accept his own role in the fact that it was not as successful as earlier work. I love the album, but I think what Mottola had to say about both it and George was pretty reasonable.

R22, such an insightful and tenderly written post.

Your insight made a huge impact on my own current struggles.

Michael Jackson, Whitney, Prince and now George Michael: Speculate all you want, but none of you will ever understand what it's like to walk in their shoes; to be under the burning spotlight of the kind of fame they had (which really doesn't exist anymore). From that class of superstars, only Springsteen, Madonna and Janet are still standing.

I do not know whether it's true or not but like so many gay men he appeared to be insufferably vain, possibly a true narcissist. That type doesn't take aging and the loss of one's looks very well.

[quote]From that class of superstars, only Springsteen, Madonna and Janet are still standing.

So we are dead?

r47, I recently read about how George was very generous to people in need and he did it without publicity. Narcissists don't give a shit about other people and they crave the attention. I wasn't a fan of George but I don't think he was a narcissist. He sounds like he was a kind person.

This was mentioned in another thread, but it's sad and odd that Fadi slept in his car the night George died. Wish George could've gotten the help he really needed a long time ago.

he was a bad boy

Rooting for you, R45

R20: speaking as someone who has had both, depression is way more manageable. In fact, I sta cure for depression is cancer because you can't "afford" it any more. You must marshal your resources or you most likely won't make it through.

So I've gone back to thinking of depressed people as indulged - even though I was one. And yeah, it's true that in the bad old days pre-medication, you'd just end up a bum on the streets if it was resistant enough, but the other is also true, that if you have to scramble every day to even survive you don't have the time to even conceptualize your mental state much less luxuriate in it.

My personal take is that he had to be on meds (steroids maybe?) that made him fat and unattractive. Add age and compared to what he was used to - depression. If he'd been straight, it would have hit him less hard because straight men are far more forgiving of their own ugliness. But a gay poo star? Of course he's going to be depressed. The dreamworld sex thing isn't sustainable.

*poo=poo shoes Actually, *poo=pop

What is a "gay poo star"? Do I want to know?

[quote]Is depression so powerful that even though you have meaningful work, zero money worries, family and friends who love you, it's not enough to calm your soul?

Yes, OP. Yes, it is. Like R20, I don't tell people about depression either. Not because I'm ashamed of it, because I'm not at all, but because I don't have the energy to deal with how much continuous stupidity people will fling at you about it.

The comments about depression have been very interesting. I too suffer, especially at this time of year. Yesterday I met with a friend of mine, an immigrant from Peru. I help her with her English, and she helps me with my Spanish. We talk about our lives, and yesterday we talked about depression. Her take is similar to that of [R53]. She has to work so hard just to survive that she doesn't have time for depression. She pointed out how much more I have, which is true. I hope this doesn't come off sounding awful but: How do you create that need to fight if it just doesn't exist?

I have to say, reading "gay poo star" might just be as good as my meds and sunlight today.

Aren't all the porn stars poo stars

Twinkle, twinkle gay poo star

How I wonder what you are

Sorry, but "I just don't have the time and energy to be depressed!" is bullshit. One can fulfill a schedule that is packed full from morning until night and still be depressed. That person may be just easier able to deny it or ignore it but it's still there.

I relate to the people on this thread who are reluctant to discuss their depression for fear of hearing idiot responses like, "You're just not busy enough!" Ugh, the ignorance is aggravating.

Or buy yourself flowers, R60. Or take a bubble bath!

R60 is right. You can distract yourself tirelessly but it's going to be there in the back of your mind.

I have new one for you: you aren't really depressed, you still laugh (@dry humor sarcastic jokes) so stop abusing special provisions for really trully depreses people. Witch clearly you aren't

r44 George's suit against Sony made NO sense. I mean, I get he wanted to put the focus back on the music instead of his image but he wouldn't do interviews, wouldn't appear in videos. What more could Sony do? And to be fair to Sony, both Praying for Time and Freedom '90 were huge hits in North America, more successful than they were in the U.K. I remember the Freedom '90 video being played incessantly here in Canada.

It was no surprise he lost his legal battle. His judgment was clouded. Perhaps it was depression or resentment at too much fame and not being able to handle it but I don't think Sony was at fault here. George had creative freedom. And his suit was different from Prince's.

The Sony contract was an extension of the original, shitty contract that he signed with CBS at age 18. That original contract locked him in for way too many albums and his pay was a pittance. George wanted that original contract canceled so that he could sign a new one with Sony. They refused, making him a virtual slave. So, very reluctantly since he knew it would bruise his reputation and keep him out of the game for a long time, sued.

He did many TV interviews explaining the suit. You can find them on YouTube. I recommend the interview he did with David Frost but there are others.

I think at one point, after coming out, wanting to live on his own terms openly, he made some bad choices. He embraced his hedonistic and promiscuous lifestyle as both a protest and affirmation. Lots of men of his age did that, passed through some years of that life, emerged and made changes once they worked through what they needed to. He was unable or unwilling to do that. Who really knows what drives another? He had his demons.

R27 - too much money is not a good thing for anyone. I'm looking at you Trump, Koch Brothers, Tom Cruise, etc.

That was well put and realistic, R66. I'll love his beautiful voice and be grateful for his humanitarianism and his many terrific contributions to pop music forever, human as he was to the end.

Many things went wrong with George. His story isn't too different from the stories of other artists.

The music industry is brutal, and it will chew you the fuck up, and spit you out, if you do not have the gravitas to endure.

The people who have staying power in this business, learn early on to get their shit together. No heavy partying, no blowing through wads of cash on hideous decor (a la Michael Jackson).

You have to have your wits about you to make it in this industry, and you have to develop a head for business. Those things are the bottom line.

George was a very bright, and exceptionally talented man, who let his demons get the best of him. We could have had 10 to 20 more years of George, had he gotten over the drugs and alcohol.

The depression was something that was never going away. It could have been managed quite effectively, but once your brain chemistry is fucked with, via drug use, or because of hereditary factors, you are fucked. Never going away, but manageable. Unfortunately, drinking and drugging, usually make depression worse. He was never getting over that hump, unless he had gotten sober.

R63, I have severe clinical depression, which I manage with antidepressants, and regular exercise, AND, I laugh quite often. Depression and laughter aren't mutually exclusive. Try becoming educated about a topic, before spewing out incorrect judgements.

r46, I totally agree with you. A lot of people have wealth envy thinking if you are wealthy that life is a piece of cake. I think the only thing worse than being rich and famous would be being poor and famous. Life in the spot life has got to be pretty tough.

I wonder how Freddie Mercury would have fared had he avoided AIDS? He was a pretty heavy partier, but I think he always wanted to be famous or recognized for his talent.

So then what George was experiencing with his contract was the same thing that Prince fought back against when he turned himself into a symbol?

Well I always thought his fight with Sony was about them not promoting Listen Without Prejudice. I'll have to look into the interviews that r65 mentioned.

R71, yes, Prince and GM had similiar Issues with their respective record labels at the same time.

According to George, Prince reached out to him but GM didn't take the calls. He was annoyed that P changed his name to a symbol and wrote "slave" on his face. GM thought these "stunts" distracted from the serious labor issues that each artist faced.

I know right, R69? You can have severe depression, suicidal ideation and still put on a happy face. That's how you get the "it can not possibly be suicide: we dined yesterday and he was laughing and looked quite happy." Actually you have to put on a happy face, otherwise people won't like to have you around for much longer. Of course true friends will keep supporting and seeing you, but they'll prefer to do it on a one on one basis.

I have BD type II and, anecdotally, I noticed that when I have to take an SSRI (when I get on the depressive side of things and even though conventional wisdom tells you that you have to give them at least three weeks to kick in), I start having fits of giggles about two hours after taking the very first pill. The kind of fits that got me thrown out of more classrooms in high school than I can remember until I had cooled down (and immediately relapsing on coming back into the room because someone there was triggering me).

Back to topic: to me the fact that GM would be addicted to cannabis and smoke up to 25 spliffs on daily basis was a big red flapping flag. If you cannot treat cannabis with respect (with its low addiction profile), because of your inordinate addictive nature, then you should definitely not indulge in alcohol, opiates or crack cocaine.

Maybe he had unresolved issues with his mother, which complicated his grief over her death. I believe molestation as a child might have been part of the picture too. Poor guy.

Popbitch Seems to think that Fadi Fawaz was part of the problem

* We're sure you're all seasoned media-watchers and don't need help reading the subtext, so we won't join in the chorus piling in on poor, buffoonish Fadi Fawez.

But a quick look at the stories does tell us one thing. The job title "celebrity stylist" is obviously the 21st century version of the 1980s job of "ambience technician" in a music star's entourage.

Elton John invalidates everything R69 said.

25 spliffs of weed a day? And he still felt the need to do hard drugs?

From all I've read on him and from the more personal interviews I saw him give it was obvious he was a very lonely man but one who hated his fame and celebrity. He hated having to do the media bit every time he did a new album. He closed himself away much of the time in his home and wanted to just be left alone by anyone other than his most trusted friends.

He really was a sweet gentle soul who did so many good things for people who never even knew it was him that did it. He had his demons, as we all do. But those demons can not negate all the good things he did. We lost a good one when he died.

He didn't totally avoid the limelight, even when he didn't have anything to promote.

During the 00's he got quite friendly with Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan who had an early evening talk show and would regularly phone in and appear (they seemingly became friends off-screen as well). He was always interesting and articulate, he was obviously in a pretty good place at the time?

R76 Do you have the Popbitch newsletter with the stories about GM after his death? Can you copy/paste it here?

R81 - Here you go

WHAM RIP! A GEORGE MICHAEL SPECIAL ************************************

>> Bye, bi baby [html removed]> Careless printer [html removed]> Plot points [html removed]> Geri slandering [html removed]> Blue Christmas << Ambience is back in style

Has any death since Princess Di brought out as much fevered tabloid speculation as George Michael's? We're sure you're all seasoned media-watchers and don't need help reading the subtext, so we won't join in the chorus piling in on poor, buffoonish Fadi Fawez.

But a quick look at the stories does tell us one thing. The job title "celebrity stylist" is obviously the 21st century version of the 1980s job of "ambience technician" in a music star's entourage.

>> Geri slandering << George ribbing Ginger

George Michael was a huge fan of Little Britain. He first got into Matt Lucas and David Walliams through their earlier Rock Profile series. He used to ring up and laugh at Geri Halliwell whenever she got the piss taken out of her on the show.

Apparently Geri was quite upset about it all at first, but was re-assured when George told her "You really are like that, dear."

Damn all the links to the stories were removed. Those bitches. Thanks anyway.

Keeping good company

George Michael is expected to be buried next to his mother in Highgate Cemetery. Her neighbour on the other side is Alexander Litvinenko (the Russian who died of polonium posioning).

Few people worked out who she was as she's there under her Greek surname. The guides never gave the game away either as they told people that "this lady's son asks that you don't take pictures of her grave".

SH writes: "In November 1996, I was working at the Big Issue when we got our first major celebrity scoop - George Michael spoke openly about his sexuality for the first time. It was a huge boost to us (and the homeless people who sold it) that he chose The Big Issue for this interview.

"We were all sworn to secrecy and the valuable exclusive was kept under tight security until it hit the streets on Monday's publication. Until – over the weekend – a copy got smuggled to the Sun (via one of the printer's wives) who nicked our exclusive and splashed with it on Saturday, ruining our exclusive.

"But customers were disgusted with the Sun's underhand tactics and, as a result, sales on the Monday rocketed. We smashed all former sales records – and thousands were earned by homeless vendors as a result."

Some very fond memories

Back in the early days of Popbitch, one of our editors struck up a conversation on gay.com with a user by the name of "Regents Park Bi".

Having exchanged the usual pleasantries, the two arranged to meet for sex – and our ed was most surprised to find none other than George Michael turning up on his doorstep.

(George then took to going to assignations in a balaclava so that he wouldn't be recognised.)

Another way George used to preserve his anonymity was by checking in to hotels under the name Hugh Jarss.

Thanks! You rock!

Stories of George staying in hotels under various funny/silly pseudonyms date back to the 80s. He seemed to have had a really good sense of humor.

AIDS

R77 - Elton John is made of steel and can be ruthless - look at all the famous friends he buried, and then immediately exploited for profit and self-adulation once they died. George Michael by all accounts was far more sensitive.

Elton John treated Billy Joel like shit when Billy drank too much during their brief tour together - and my guess is Elton had little patience for George either after a certain point.

From whuch friends' deaths did Elton profit? You aren't referring to the Candle single that sent all proceeds to charity, are you?

Billy Joel had said that Elton tried tirelessly to get Billy into rehab. Is that what you're referring to when you say Elton treated Billy Joel like shit?

What a monster, R92.

Also, Billy and Elton have mounted at least five of the Face to Face concert tours. Hardly "a brief tour" as you say.

What's your weird beef with Elton John about?

Faintly weird that GM will rest eternally with Litvinenko as a near neighbour. The latter of course fell foul of ever-topical Vladimir Putin, and paid a high price.

Before that Litvinenko had worked with Christopher Steele, who wrote the dossier on Trump's Russian connections.

Six degrees of separation seems in play here. Given that, it's doubtful the tabloid press will respect prohibitions and deny themselves a piquant image.

I once knew, through the man I worked for, a wealthy, self made businessman. He was very successful, was well loved and respected, not only in our community, (one of the top ten largest cities) but also in the industry he was part of. (An international industry.)

He had a strong happy marriage, two beautiful kids, and his own private plane. It was an 8 seater he used primarily for business travel. His kids were nice, decent kids, he & his wife were accessible and participated in lots of worthwhile civic and charitable causes.

I saw him regularly, & I knew him as an unpretentious, kind, compassionate man who never stood on ceremony was never arrogant or callous. He always had a kind smile and showed genuine interest in people.

We had no idea he battled clinical depression for most of his life. At the age of 53, he killed himself. Hung himself in his garage at his home. His wife found him. It was horrible and shocking and profoundly tragic. His kids were young teenagers at the time.

I felt sorriest for the wife who apparently had been doing everything in her power for many years to keep him sane and functioning and loved and supported. She was devastated and felt somehow she had failed him.

Was George HIV positive?

R44, what Motola left out of the book is that it was homophobia y Motola that led to his not wanting to work with Sony. George overheard him referring to george as a fag in a conference call.

Homophobia is reason enough to not want to make money off of a global superstar?? Wow. Bad business. Very bad business.

A different look in his eyes in latter day photos. Who knows why. Sad.

I told him to buy a small parcel of land, turn it into his own park and built a fab mens room. Then he could do what he was made to do; all day long.

O' How Happy We Would Be, To Drink One Another's Pee, While Down On Our Dirty Knees, Doing What We Please ...........

[quote]People like GM are surrounded by syncophants. They never hear the word no. As such they don't live in the real world. Privilege, sex and drugs are theirs for the asking. Too much money fuels all this. It's really no surprise that many celebs end up nuts.

Yeah, tell me...

I'm still mourning George's death. I see that shady Fadi has finally shut up. When will the toxicology results be made public?

They've said 4-6 weeks, putting us in mid-February.

You will NEVER find a depressed person that was raised in a healthy environment. NEVER. So, he had a fucked up childhood. I guess a lot of ppl do, which is why there is so much depression. PILLS are not needed. See a good therapist, eat right, exercise and change your thinking. BOOM.

Maybe he swallowed too much cum?

Shouldn't you be celebrating your president's inauguration or fucking your mother R106?

I don't know if I always believe in 'sex addiction' as a real concept rather than an excuse. Promiscuous behavior among young attractive singers is of course common. But GM seemed particularly out of control.

This will sound weird but he suffered a few head injuries during his life. He credited one bump with giving him more musical ability and sometimes that can happen after a concussion. But head injuries can also be associated with impulse control disorders and can lead to some compulsive behaviors.

I could be totally wrong! But in the end I began to view him as having some kind of sickness he needed help for as his life became increasingly unmanageable. I know that Wham! is cringeworthy nowadays but I enjoyed some of his solo work. That's how I will try to remember him eventually once everything else has been taken care of.

This was a fun watch. Plus it hints at a nasty childhood, although George seems very forgiving of his father.

R108 Some of the Wham! songs are excellent: Freedom, Everything She Wants, I'm Your Man.

I don't think Rod Stewart has paid tribute to GM. Perhaps here is why.

Piers Morgan quotes George saying "Rod Stewart's the meanest man in the world - I went to his birthday party in Beverley Hills once, and I swear he served us Dairylea cheese quarters for the starter. I told Elton and he was sure it was, too."

In another George quote from same conversation about ten years ago: 'Come on, Piers. I bet you've fancied experimenting with a man...'

Please don't tell me he was actually hitting on Piers! He wouldn't would he? Ewww

R97 well was he?

Was he miserable at the end, or something? I never thought anything "went wrong" with him ... he just rode his popularity through a natural trajectory until the public moved on to someone else.

It's not like he died incoherent on skid row.

George Michael started burning out musically after his greatest work LWP. Older was generally OK, but Paience I find unlistenable. I dont think he has capable of writing great songs as he used to. That I believe was part of his problem.