BONO’S HIDDEN HEARTBREAK OVER MICHAEL
They once called each other close mates, but this rock friendship ended tragically
For a time, Michael Hutchence and Bono had one of the most enduring friendships in rock music – an industry usually littered with jealousy and competition.
The pair – frontmen of INXS and U2 respectively – were neighbours when Michael lived in the South of France, where their “personality differences” cemented a bond.
“He was a nice guy to be around,” Bono once said. “He was very light, whereas I don’t think I’m the easiest person to be around, so we balanced each other out.”
DIVIDED BY DRUGS
Bono was among the millions left heartbroken by drugaddicted Michael’s death by suicide in 1997 – exactly 25 years ago this month – though it seems it wasn’t a shock to the Irish rock star. “We were flying between shows and someone called and told me about Michael’s death,” he explained at the time. “I don’t know whether I’m angry or guilty... You always think if it’s a mate that there was something you could have done. I still find it hard to figure it all out because I had a conversation with him not that long ago where we talked about something like this, and we both agreed how dumb and selfish it would be – and Hutch was not at all selfish.”
Now, in a bombshell new book, Bono, 62, reveals he begged his mate to quit partying – and even turned down a chance to be his daughter Tiger Lily’s godfather over concerns about Michael’s drug use.
In his new book, Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story, Bono confirms he and wife Ali Hewson used to hang out with Michael and his then partner, the late Paula Yates, in the 1990s.
‘I don’t know whether I’m angry or guilty’
But he felt forced to distance himself from the couple as they “spiralled down the vortex of a recreational drug use that had become hard work for everyone, especially their family – especially the younger ones”.
TRAGEDY STRIKES
Paula and Michael welcomed daughter Tiger, now 26, in 1996, adding to Paula’s brood of three little girls shared with her ex, Sir Bob Geldof.
“As their behaviour changed, our friendship became strained and we grew uncomfortable during their visits,” says Bono, adding that he and Ali ultimately declined Michael’s offer for them to be godparents to his beloved baby daughter because they were “so wigged out” by the drug use.
Paula died three years after Michael from a heroin overdose – a tragedy replicated by her daughter Peaches in 2014.
Bono, meanwhile, maintains he’s always eschewed the rock-star lifestyle of sex, drugs and boozing thanks to his Catholic faith.
“I’ve been surrounded a lot in my personal life by addiction,” he said in 2009. “There’s a part of me that thinks, ‘Wow! I’m just an inch away.’ There’s no doubt I have a wild streak and I’d be very capable of setting fire to myself, so, you know, I don’t go to church for the view.”
Even now, Bono is stunned his former friends are gone, leaving an orphaned Tiger to be raised by Boomtown Rats rocker Bob.
“Neither Ali nor I dreamed they’d both end up dead so soon,” Bono says in his book. “Even now, I can’t believe I’ve just written that.”