http://media.millivres.co.uk/pinkpaper/PP963.pdf

 

 Here & Now Tour 2009 - Press Launch

 

LONDON - OCTOBER 16: Boy George attends the press launch of Here & Now Tour 2009 at Soho Revue Bar on October 16, 2008 in London, England. (Photo by Ferdaus Shamim/WireImage)

   

  

LONDON - OCTOBER 16:Boy George,Howard Jones,Nathan Moore and Kid Creole attends the press launch of Here & Now Tour 2009 at Soho Revue Bar on October 16, 2008 in London, England. (Photo by Ferdaus Shamim/WireImage)

http://www.boyzonlineviewer.co.uk/issue894.html page 22

 

Obama chameleon

Peter Robinson finds Boy George hijacking Obama's message of hope

 

Boy Done Good

4:52pm Monday 13th October 2008

By Sarah Jones » http://www.thisishampshire.net/leisure/music/3753455.Boy_Done_Good/

With a new single and tour to promote, Boy George is back in the spotlight for all the right reasons. The iconic star speaks to SARAH JONES about how he's happier than ever and why he definitely doesn't want to dwell on the past.

BOY GEORGE IS BEHAVING OUT OF CHARACTER.

I had been pre-warned by his PR team that he “talks for England” and that with a full schedule of interviews lined up for the morning I'm due to speak to him, he could easily over-run.

So when he rings me a full 50 minutes before our allotted time, it comes as a bit of a surprise.

Famed for his flamboyant style and even more outrageous opinions, the 80s icon doesn't seem quite on his usual form today.

I get the impression he just wants to get it over and done with as soon as he can.

After more than a decade away from singing, he is touring the UK for the second time this year and the unavoidable rounds of promotion seem to have left him with interview fatigue.

Keen to leave the past behind, it's all about “living in the now” the former Culture Club front man tells me frequently.

And who can blame him? Over the years George O'Dowd (his real name) has repeatedly hit the headlines for all the wrong reasons.

There was his community service stint as a road sweeper in New York in 2006 for falsely reporting a break-in.

Then there is the trial, due to be heard next month, where he will stand accused of falsely imprisoning a 28-year-old man in his London home last year.

The singer - famed for hits such as Karma Chameleon and Do You Really Want to Hurt Me? – denies the charges.

There was the well-documented heroin addiction in the 80s and just a few months ago, he was taking up the column inches again when he was turned down for a US visa (because of the pending trial).

Unfortunately for George, a reputation built on such A-grade scandal for the last 25 years is not going to suddenly disappear just because he has decided to turn things around.

“I said to someone just now, I'm looking forward to the day when I don't have to answer these questions,” he snaps when I ask him about the street cleaning, before adding quickly “I'm not arsey about it.”

While his androgynous look may have changed frequently over the years (when he first found fame some found it hard to tell if he was a boy or a girl), his distinctive voice remains instantly recognisable as he dismisses the roadsweeping as insignificant.

“It's kind of done and I don't ever really think about it, only when people bring it up,” he says huskily before forcing a laugh.

“I don't define myself by that. To me it was just a week of cleaning up. I think everyone could benefit from doing community service.”

Normally shielded from the world with a mask of theatrical make-up and zany outfits galore, the sight of the star turning up for duty as a barefaced road sweeper in a high-vis jacket was a paparazzo's dream come true.

Somewhat unconvincingly, the 47- year-old insists a tad sniffily that “it wasn't humiliating at all”.

“It's really hard for some people to understand that,” he exclaims. “I think the reason is because there are so many people who want to be famous and they always have this ridiculous idea about what they would be like if they were a star.

“So whenever they see you doing something that they don't deem starlike, they assume that it must be really awful and traumatic. Maybe Joan Collins or Madonna would have found that humiliating or it would have broken them.

“I made the most of it, I enjoyed it, I was with people I liked and in any situation you can either make it difficult or say, look this is what's happening and I'm going to get on with it.”

Getting on with it, is something George – who also has his own clothing label and organic grocers – is determined to do.

“I'm very much living in the moment,” he says with conviction.

“My plan is to enjoy myself and I really am enjoying myself at the moment.”

Famed for his acid tongue, George wants to be known for his music again instead of for making bitchy comments about his fellow celebs (calling Madonna “a vile, hideous, horrible human being” springs to mind).

He's happy again, living in London and surrounded by his family and friends, after a miserable few years in America.

Following a successful two-year run in the West End, he took Taboo the musical (based on his early life in the New Romantic scene) to Broadway where it was disastrously received and closed in 2004 after 100 performances.

“When that shut down, I foolishly stayed behind,” admits the singer, whose thickset frame bears little resemblance to his once waif like appearance.

George – who sports a tattoo of the Star of David on his scalp and enjoyed a brief flirtation with the Hare Krishna movement in the early 90s – became isolated there and had “too much time to waste”.

When he was sued for £31,000 last year for pulling out of a concert in 2005, George took to the witness stand at Manchester High Court and spoke openly of how he had been struggling against an addiction to cocaine at the time of the gig.

In an interview with Q magazine in August this year, George admitted he only managed to overcome his drug addictions at the end of 2007.

Today, he won't be drawn on how many years of his life were dominated by drugs.

“Oh I don't know,” he says abruptly.

“Who cares? For me, the only important thing is now.”

Bursting into song he exclaims, “yesterday is gone!” before returning to normal to conclude “and tomorrow who knows what will happen?”

It's a myth, he tells me witheringly, that he was addicted to drugs at the height of his Culture Club fame. In fact, he was barely even drinking then, he says.

It was actually after the band split in 1986, and he had too much time on his hands that “things went horribly wrong” and he fell into the grip of heroin.

A member of Narcotics Anonymous, he will say – albeit pretty curtly – that he has been clean of both drink and drugs for “a long time”.

In fact, the only vice the openly gay star will laughingly admit to these days is “lust”.

With drugs and celebrity so often intertwined, George can see depressing similarities between his young self and some of today's tortured talents.

“When I look at the situation with Amy Winehouse or George Michael, unfortunately the reality is no matter how much the people around them love them and try to help them, until they're ready to stop, nothing can be changed,” he says.

While George is “hoping and praying” that Amy will see the light, he remains a huge fan of her work.

Her talent helped inspire him to return to the music scene after a decade-long retreat to DJing to escape “boy bands and manufactured pop”.

His new single Yes We Can is an uplifting tune, inspired both by Barrack Obama's message of positivity and George's own personal journey.

His new show – which he will perform this month at Basingstoke and Bournemouth - looks set to be a fulfilling experience for his fans, who will see him sing with the passion that escaped him for so long.

Featuring his best-known Culture Club and solo hits, mixed with some new songs, George describes it as “poptastic”.

He is a “man on a mission”, determined to be known for what he does best now that he has got his life back on track.

For now that mission will bring an album, more shows, and a spot on the popular Here and Now 80s nostalgia tour is already pencilled in for 2009.

One place we definitely won't be seeing him next year – he assures me – is a courtroom.

So it looks like George will continue to act out of character for a long time yet.

The only person who would disagree with that – surprise, surprise – is George, who says “I don't know whether I've changed, I think I'm more myself now than I've ever been.”

■ The Boy is Back in Town tour will visit The Anvil, Basingstoke on October 17 (01256 844244) and Bournemouth Pavilion Theatre on October 24 (0844 576 3000).

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