- Title: UNITED KINGDOM: Boy George returns to the stage
- Date: 22nd March 2010
- Summary: LONDON, ENGLAND, UK (MARCH 20, 2010) (REUTERS) (SOUNDBITE) (English) BOY GEORGE SAYING: "The biggest change that happened to me over the last couple of years was getting sober. That happened before getting into prison. So I went to prison with a clear head and a strong mind so really the turning point for me was when I stopped drinking and taking drugs so that's when it started. Prison was just an annoyance of two wonderful years of my life."
- Embargoed: 6th April 2010 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: United Kingdom
- Country: United Kingdom
- Topics: Arts / Culture / Entertainment / Showbiz,People
- Reuters ID: LVA9DBZQHLSDGPW2G7VTO7I06NLO
- Story Text: During his first official gig after being released from jail, Boy George talks exclusively to Reuters TV about growing up, taking responsibility and focussing on music.
Boy George on Saturday (March 20) made his first public gig in central London nightclub 'Merah' after being released from prison last year. The ex-Culture Club frontman is to release his new single 'Amazing Grace' on Monday, March 22. This will be his first singe with a record label for some time. Boy George said his focus is now on his future as a musician and entertainer:
"What I want to do at the moment is put records out regularly, release albums every year, tour, basically get back into a routine, to remind people of what I actually do which is make records and to entertain. I haven't really been away but perhaps the attention I've had over the last few years has been for other things and not actually for what I do and so I'm here to remind people that I'm an entertainer and a musician and that's sort of the main thing," he said.
Towards the end of 2008, Boy George was sentenced to 15 months jail after being found guilty last month of falsely imprisoning a Norwegian male escort, Audun Carlsen, to a radiator and causing him bodily harm. His jail sentence lasted a few months and the singer has come out of it with a positive and optimistic view of his future:
"I think I've grown up a little lot. yeah I think I have and it's funny you know, in the past I would never have been able to say I have grown up without feeling nauseous but yeah I can say, say that it's nice to say that, I have." Amazing Grace is a spiritual song that reminds the singer of the strength he devolved during his prison sentence.
"The idea of the song is to celebrate to live in the moment hence the lyrics, forget about tomorrow don't be a slave to time, life is in the moment it's divine and also because of my troubles over the last couple of years I've learned a couple of things about myself, I've learned that I'm resilient , I've learned that when I need to I can find Amazing Grace from the strangest of places," he said.
Boy George admitted that getting sober and stop using drugs was the biggest success for him over the past two years:
"The biggest change that happened to me over the last couple of years was getting sober. That happened before getting into prison. So I went to prison with a clear head and a strong mind so really the turning point for me was when I stopped drinking and taking drugs so that's when it started. Prison was just an annoyance of two wonderful years of my life," he said.
The star who has had his fair share of bad tabloid publicity speaks philosophically about his relationship with the media:
"You can't control what people write about you but certainly if you constantly give people bad things to write about you by getting arrested and things like that you can't really complain so I'm not gonna complain. People say to me do I have a difficult time with the media, I don't because I don't have a blanket attitude towards the press, I take every person as I find them, I never tell people they can't ask me anything, I don't give lists of questions , I'm actually quite relaxed about it so it's really my job to try as best I can to make sure that what you are writing about is actually musical and creative and not criminal."
After the release of 'Amazing Grace', Boy George is planning on putting a new album out thorough Decode Records. He has also worked with super producer Mark Ronson on a new single. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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