I recommend this book to anyone who has ever loved George Michael. This book takes a hard look at George’s final days and while an answer is never conclusively given, you get a good sense of the total picture.
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I remember my devastation and the series of weird tweets that preceded the event - both the tweets by George before his death and the ones that followed his death that were made and deleted by his boyfriend at the time. I never really understood how George Michael died. The book also sensitively explores his latter day reckless behavior (there was one incident that particularly saddened me, in which he seemingly intentionally got into a car accident without a seatbelt), his drug use, and the illnesses that finally claimed his life. At times heartbreaking to read, the through line of the book is both George’s immense talent and his darker side - George’s discomfort in his own beautiful skin, his self-destructive tendencies, his internalized homophobia, and his creative struggles. James Gavin does justice to the gifted, tortured, closeted, and magnetic life led by George Michael, with a very specific focus on what Michael’s life - and death - meant to the gay community. If my introduction seems personal, it is - and this book is too. (My father, who had mysteriously “volunteered” to take me to every George Michael concert of my childhood, had a lot more in common with George than I did, but I would not find that out for twenty more years.)
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I had harbored a long-standing and passionate sixth-grade crush on George (whose full Greek name, Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou, I also knew), and I was certain he would somehow see me in my lawn seat beside my father and our fates would intertwine. (My father, who had mysteriously “volunteered” to take me to every George Michael concert of my childhood, had a lot more in common with George than I did, but I would not find George Michael - or more precisely, Wham! - was my first concert as a kid. George Michael - or more precisely, Wham! - was my first concert as a kid. With deep analysis of the creative process behind Michael’s albums, tours, and music videos, as well as interviews with hundreds of his friends and colleagues, George Michael: A Life is a probing, definitive portrait of a pop legend.more
George Michael: A Life explores the compelling story of a superstar whose struggles, as well as his songs, continue to touch fans all over the world.Īcclaimed music biographer James Gavin traces Michael’s metamorphosis from the shy and awkward Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou into the swaggering, dominant half of the leading British pop duo of the 1980s Wham! he then details Michael’s sensational solo career and its subsequent unraveling. As one of the industry’s most privileged yet tortured men began to self-destruct, the press showed little sympathy.
Soon his obsession with fame would start to backfire. It also hid-for a time-the secret he fought against revealing: Michael was gay. His fabricated image-that of a hypermacho sex god-loomed large in the pop culture of his day. He was a songwriter of true craft and substance, and his music swept the world, starting in the mid-1980s. George Michael was an extravagantly gifted, openhearted soul singer whose work was both pained and smolderingly erotic. H The definitive biography of George Michael, offering an expansive look at the troubled life of the legendary singer, songwriter, and pop superstar.
The definitive biography of George Michael, offering an expansive look at the troubled life of the legendary singer, songwriter, and pop superstar.