VARIOUS: MEMBERS OF THE BAND INXS TALK ABOUT THE DEATH OF MICHAEL HUTCHENCE

Record ID: 918795

  • Title: VARIOUS: MEMBERS OF THE BAND INXS TALK ABOUT THE DEATH OF MICHAEL HUTCHENCE
  • Date: 17th December 1996
  • Summary: CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA (FILE - MAY 26, 1997) (RTV) SCU INXS POSING FOR PHOTOGRAPHS
  • Embargoed: 6th July 2005 17:46
  • Keywords:
  • Location: SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA/ CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA/ LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES/ LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM
  • City:
  • Country: Usa South Africa Australia
  • Topics: Arts / Culture / Entertainment
  • Reuters ID: LVA6JA6URXTVEIUKGBQS11XLVBM6
  • Aspect Ratio: 4:3
  • Story Text: - INTRO: Rock star Michael Hutchence was mentally unstable and may have been driven to suicide by a mix of anti-depressants and alcohol, band members said in their first interview since their colleague's death last month.

    INXS guitarist Tim Farriss warned the world of the dangers of anti-depressants in the first interview by the band since the death of its lead singer Michael Hutchence.

    "There's been a lot of recent things like anti-depressants and alcohol mixed together making people suicidal and I think the world's got to take a deeper look at it." Hutchence, 37, was found hanged by his leather belt in his hotel room at the Sydney Ritz Carlton on November 22. A coroner has yet to rule the death was a suicide.

    Police said prescription drugs, believed to include the anti-depressant Prozac, were found in his room.

    Australian actor Kim Wilson confirmed she was drinking with the singer hours before he died but denied there was "some sex and drug-crazed orgy happening".

    The five remaining members of INXS, the band Hutchence fronted for almost 20 years, gave one television interview on December 8.

    Videotapes and transcripts of the interview were given to news outlets on Monday (December 15).

    The also group lashed out at the "mini-industry" that had sprung up out of the death.

    "Nothing makes you more sick to the guts than reading about someone who really hardly knew him at all selling their story about how they knew Michael," Tim Farriss said.

    "It makes me furious and just sick, you know." The members would take "a long break" before deciding on the future of the band.
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