Sunday Mirror (Northern Ireland)
My wish is for Covid to finally f**k off... and being able to gig normally again
Singer says his spirit and voice are stronger
BRIAN Kennedy plans to celebrate 2022 in style after surviving a year of health scares, as he declared his “spirit and voice are better than ever”.
After coming through a heart attack, Covid and prostate cancer, he said Christmas was more special than ever as he treated himself to a posh hotel stay in Dublin.
The Belfast-born star exclusively revealed to the Mirror in October he almost died in the summer, after suffering cardiac arrest outside St James’s Hospital in Dublin.
And he told how he had battled the three Cs – Covid, cardiac arrest and cancer – and came out the other side.
After six hours of life-saving surgery last June, the Recovery singer is still here to tell the tale and looking forward to a luxurious Christmas and seeing in the new year.
Brian, 55, said: “I’m on a strict medication regime and my scars have healed wonderfully. My spirit and my voice are stronger than ever.
“This year I’m at a lovely hotel in Dublin with some close friends.
“I’ve cooked full Christmas dinner many times over the years but the last few have been spent going to the same hotel now because it’s such a treat and there’s no dishes at the end!”
After contracting coronavirus this year his Christmas wish is for “Covid and all its relatives to finally f**k off ”.
He said: “My hopes are that I continue to improve healthwise after my recent quadruple heart bypass surgery, and that it will be four years since my cancer surgery.
“Not to mention the return of being able to gig normally again after all the lockdown constraints.
“I’ve been booked for the Glastonbury Festival again so here’s hoping that goes ahead.”
Getting his cancer all-clear at Barry’s McGuigan’s daughter Danika’s funeral was bittersweet and he couldn’t believe he was alive while cancer took so many dear to him.
Brian also lost his brother Bap to pancreatic and bowel cancer in 2016, aged 54.
Recovery is a song he penned after he got the all-clear from cancer and it’s even more poignant now since he’s recovered from a heart attack.
He said: “You know how sometimes song lyrics become about something else after you’ve written them.
“My lovely friend Boy George was really into it, so that was nice.
“Your health is your wealth, it’s incredible, the whole song Recovery is me talking about truth, justice and love.
“The truth was I had serious cancer, my brother died, the lovely Danika died, she was living with me when she was studying acting.
“Out of the blue she got a tumour which killed her in five weeks, the whole thing is just unbearable.
“But when she died, I flew over, we had a church service then we had a second service of sending the coffin away to be cremated the next day.
“That weekend had to be the hardest of my life so far – and that includes getting cancer, the operation, learning to walk again, all the things.
“I got diagnosed in 2016, I had the surgery in 2018 and here I am. At that time an old love of mine died, an old school friend, my brother died, about nine people I knew had died of cancer and I’m still here. Not only that, I’m getting better. The truth is, it’s serious getting cancer. The justice is getting the right treatment.
“The love of not only people who were my really good friends, but also strangers telling me it was really good that I was opening up on rectal cancer and the reality of colostomy bags.”
He added: “My [colostomy] bags are permanent for the rest of my life, the reality is they are life savers.”
As a child Brian got Osgood Schlatter disease and had to learn how to walk again – something he had to do for a second time after he got cancer.
He said: “I now have ordinary worries again compared to when I had to go through rounds and rounds of chemo, my hair getting thin, losing nearly four stone in weight and just looking shocking.
“Suddenly and slowly, everything I did with the hospital, I was getting better.
“Now I have normal worries again like my belly is too big for those trousers, my face looks like I’m storing nuts for winter.”
Growing up on the Falls Road in West Belfast as a gay man was gruelling.
He recalled: “I grew up in a town where from the pulpit they denounced homosexual people and say they’d burn in hell.
“You only have to scratch the surface of those organisations and they are the most immoral people
I now have normal worries again like my belly is too big for those trousers ON LIFE AFTER HIS HEALTH BATTLES
I’ve been booked for Glastonbury so here’s hoping that goes ahead ON GETTING BACK TO PERFORMING
you’ve ever met in your life, full of paedophiles, moving [them] around.”
As for his love life, he laughed: “I lost my virginity twice, once to a woman and once to a man, and had to learn how to walk twice.
“I’m keeping my options open, where love is concerned.
“I’m an old school gay, I’m a one man man, I’m only interested in dating one person.
“I know these days we can have anything we want but I’m all for one on one.”
His foray with online dating, he admitted, was short-lived. He said: “Can you imagine seeing a picture of someone’s arse before you see their face?
“They talk about how many inches and all that, someone showed me a picture of their bum.
“They said they couldn’t possibly show me their faces.
“In terms of my own situation many people would know my face, so It can get a bit complicated.” Leaving the swipe left, swipe right brigade behind, Brian admitted: “It’s not my thing, I’d love to meet someone at a dinner party.
“When you least expect it or maybe when I don’t have my hair done, I could just meet them taking out the bins!”
Brian will perform live at Monroe’s Galway on December 28 and 30. For other upcoming gigs see briankennedy. co.uk.