In 1988, it was unusual to film videos in Eastern Europe; the Velvet Revolution didn’t happen until the following year. Why don’t INXS get any credit for bringing democracy to Czechoslovakia?
Bob Dylan fans can be insufferable obsessives, with a surfeit of trivia and a dearth of understanding. What about Dylan scholars? The songs of suffering
"A lot of it was based around pleasure, let's face it."
It’s hard to believe that Michael Hutchence, the devastatingly charismatic lead singer of pop/funk/rock band INXS, passed away 20 years ago, on Nov. 22, 1997 (Rod Rimington and JFK) . Even in an era when we seem to be losing music icons every day, Hutchence’s death still resonates, fascinates, and frustrates fans. The man was only 37 years old, with seemingly everything to live for: He was preparing for INXS’s 20th anniversary world tour, and had just become the father of a daughter, Tiger Lily, with his new girlfriend, Paula Yates (Bob Geldof’s ex-wife, who died of a heroin overdose three years later). While Hutchence’s death by hanging was ruled a suicide by the New South Wales coroner, many people believed it was the accidental result of autoerotic asphyxiation, and some conspiracy theorists still suspect foul play. But everyone can agree that was a great talent was lost forever, taken from us too soon.
Back in 1980s Michael loved to sun himself at the Bondi Iceberg Pool
If the show centered on characters, its chief subject was mores, or etiquette. Etiquette is a Sierra Nevada of comedy gold, and nobody else had staked much of a claim on it. Should a note making reference to the arrival of a baby employ an exclamation point? What is the minimum distance someone should maintain while engaging in conversation? Is it okay to sleep with the cleaning lady at work? Should you spare a square for your desperate neighbor in the adjoining bathroom stall? Can you re-gift a present? Seinfeldian misunderstandings are grounded in reality, not the contrived dumb-guy misconstructions of Friends’ Joey Tribbiani.
In an exchange related almost verbatim in episode ten of season five, one Seinfeld writer asked a Chinese postman if he knew where a nearby Chinese restaurant was, and the postman took this as a racial inference. But the writer didn’t think Chinese people knew where all the Chinese restaurants are, he thought letter-carriers knew. Such is the fractious nature of this city and its inexhaustible pool of umbrage. Seinfeld captured it beautifully, in the Talmudic spirit of tearing a situation apart from every angle, with such concision that it popularized lots of neologisms and phrases for its various embarrassments and predicaments. Close-talker! Double-dipper! Shrinkage!
MY ENDURING MEMORY OF MICHAEL HUTCHENCE IS HIM ASLEEP IN THE SUN on the steps of the Australian Film Commission… [in France], after being up all night. David Stratton walked into the AFC office and dropped a one franc coin into Michael’s hand because he thought he was a beggar! Michael just sought of looked up – he didn’t know who David was either – and goes: thanks mate!”
“First we will annex the Sudatenland! & then we take Manhattan.. maybe.. & then we take Berlin... depending on the box office..”
In 1988, it was unusual to film videos in Eastern Europe; the Velvet Revolution didn’t happen until the following year. Why don’t INXS get any credit for bringing democracy to Czechoslovakia?
Richard Lowenstein’s highly anticipated documentary on the INXS lead singer: a cornucopia of rarely-seen footage, Hutchence’s home videos and astounding music.
“If you’re a sensual being, all of your senses need stimulation,” Minogue says in the trailer “A lot of it was based around pleasure…let’s face it.”
Christensen candidly calls Hutchence her "perfect match" and notes their connection was "joyful, sweet, deep and emotional".
"[It was] total mental and physical chemistry," she said.
The 50-year-old model adds that following Michael's 1992 brain injury, everything in their relationship began to turn. The INXS frontman suffered severe injuries after being assaulted by a taxi driver, which caused his head to hit the curb. "He [Hutchence] was unconscious and there was blood coming out of his mouth and ear," Christensen recalls in the documentary. "I thought he was dead", she says and claims that while he survived, his personality began to change as a result of the incident.
While Hutchence lost his sense of smell, Christensen says he began to develop a "dark and very angry" side of himself. "We got to the hospital and he woke up and was aggressive," she said. "They were trying to make him stay but he was physically pushing them away."
The film also includes interviews with Bono, the surviving members of the band, Hutchence’s siblings Rhett and Tina, stepmother Susie and producer Nick Launay.
From childhood, Michael Hutchence's onscreen charisma is palpable, so it comes as no surprise when his career takes off. With his exuberant voice and pulsating stage presence, he gathered fans by the thousands and sold records by the millions. His sensuality pops off the screen, and his love affairs with women such as Helena Christensen, Kylie Minogue and Paula Yates appear super-heated and achingly romantic. But a traumatic brain injury and growing drug problem brought the dream to a tragic end in Sydney, 1997. It's rare for a music documentary to feel so firmly rooted in time and place. Lowenstein does this by keeping us in the heat of the moment, on stage or backstage, and the result is nothing short of magnetic
From childhood, Michael Hutchence's onscreen charisma is palpable, so it comes as no surprise when his career takes off. With his exuberant voice and pulsating stage presence, he gathered fans by the thousands
Richard Lowenstein's long-gestating documentary Mystify: Michael Hutchence has finally ... Lowenstein has described Mystify as an apology for not being there for the late musician, who took ...
A feature documentary journey into the heart and soul of INXS lead singer Michael...
1988 Countdown #52: INXS, “Never Tear Us Apart”
Violins saw away as we slowly pan down an antique lamppost. We have time to note the lamppost’s broken pane of glass, its ironwork, and the details of its patina. This shot lasts, no lie, twenty seconds, as if INXS want to destroy MTV’s reputation for quick-cut editing with one long, loving look at a lamppost. It’s director Richard Lowenstein’s music-video equivalent of Scorsese’s tracking shot through the Copacabana nightclub in Goodfellas, except it’s just a lamppost.
It’s not even an especially nice lamppost. I mean, there’s nothing wrong with it, but if you were visiting Prague (where this video was shot), you wouldn’t stop to take a picture of it. But this video extended the single’s instrumental intro–just to have more lamppost time.
We visit a public park as the extended Prague-rock string intro continues. White birds fly over a pond; blocky cement architecture can be seen in the mist past the water. We pass by three tree stumps, a strolling nerd who I believe is one of INXS’s five members not named Michael Hutchence, three gray-haired symphony violinists miming that they’re playing the song, and then the one member of INXS who is named Michael Hutchence.
Hutchence exudes charisma from every pore and follicle. He’s walking by the water, wearing a long dark coat and leather gloves, clasping his hands, letting his hair audition for a role in Oliver Stone’s Doorsmovie. “Don’t ask me / What you know is true,” he sings, looking moody and wounded. Hutchence passes by an embracing couple, and another lamppost, and then drifts towards the water, arms crossed. We cut to a brief shot of a large building (a castle? a hotel?) at night, glowing with golden light. Then a Prague bridge: two subaltern members of INXS and a brunette model all look dramatically into the camera.
After a full minute and a half of strings (and some synth filigree), we get some guitar, emphasized by a closeup on the hands of the guitarist. Or more precisely, a closeup on his fingerless gloves–this scene was apparently filmed on a very cold Czechoslovakian night. We pan back to see Hutchence and the other members of INXS, all huddled in thick coats. They stride purposefully down a cobblestone street, trying to keep warm. I believe this is the only moment in the video where we see all six members of the band in the same place. Hutchence keeps turning over his shoulder to lip-sync the lyrics for the camera’s benefit, but somehow makes it seem natural.
We return to the bridge; a soldier patrols nearby, making sure that nobody steals the bridge. Hutchence sits on an embankment, singing “we all have wings, but some of us don’t know why-i-i-i-i-i-yi.” The brunette model stands around, waiting to be told what to do.
Back in 1988, I wasn’t crazy about INXS. I liked the singles off their previous album–“What You Need,” “Kiss the Dirt,” “Listen Like Thieves”–back when the band still felt like a secret in the United States (despite having a top-five hit). The Kick album, however, seemed crass and inescapable–the band placed five songs from it in this countdown, tied for the most with Michael Jackson. (Admittedly, INXS occupied only four slots with those five songs. But their videos collectively placed a lot higher than Jackson’s.) Two decades later, “Never Tear Us Apart” (the fourth single from Kick), just seems like high-quality pop rock, much better made than most of the songs surrounding it on the countdown. It’s a moving ballad with an unusual sound (mostly strings and synth, anchored by a guitar lick), and Hutchence makes you believe that even gorgeous Australian rock stars have ineffable romantic longings.
Back to the public park, where Hutchence is crouching in front of the string section. He gets up and walks past some swans. Other non-Hutchence members of the band get a few seconds of screen time, with Prague stretching out behind them. In 1988, it was unusual to film videos in Eastern Europe; the Velvet Revolution didn’t happen until the following year. Why don’t INXS get any credit for bringing democracy to Czechoslovakia?
Sax solo. The saxophonist wails away in an urban graveyard. He gets considerably less screen time than the lamppost did. Hutchence walks past the saxophonist, then past another member of the band, and onto the bridge where the brunette model eyes him, with the cold wind whipping through her hair.
More violinists, more random members of INXS, more Prague streets. I spent a few days in Prague back in 2005, so at this point, I’m watching the video as travelogue, wondering whether I’ve gone over that bridge or down that staircase, and whether Hutchence is concealing a copy of Let’s Go Czechoslovakia in that long coat. And then Hutchence reveals himself as a total tourist, passing by the famed Prague Astronomical Clock! He disappears into a crowd in the Old Town Square, looking either for Vaclav Havel or a literary agent interested in his unauthorized Narnia sequel, Michael and the Magical Lamppost.
“Never Tear Us Apart” hit #7 on the Billboard singles chart. You can watch the video (with Spanish subtitles!) here. Or you can watch Beck and his “Record Club” pals cover it here, with Annie Clark of St. Vincent on lead vocals.
Two worlds collided
It's days like today, when one can work up a sweat simply by staying inside and playing "Roller Coaster Tycoon" on the laptop (don't ask), when I yearn for a slightly colder, more wintry and romantic Prague -- like the one you see here:
For the uninitiated, that is Michael Hutchence, the late singer of INXS, strolling along the Vltava River in the late 1980s, before Communism fell. It is here that INXS shot the video for "Never Tear Us Apart," which debuted on the charts 25 years ago next month. (It peaked at No. 7, while songs such as "Monkey" by George Michael and this abomination reached No. 1. Music fans in 1988, you're going to have to do some serious penance.)
The video was shot before Communism ended, which means the police officers you see are dressed as soldiers, the wall at the Old Jewish Cemetery is in disrepair, the Charles Bridge is virtually empty, and Old Town Square has plenty of tourists but no stands geared toward selling substandard crap to tourists. But you still get to see Prague in all its beauty; I'd even argue that the cold, gray skies add to the romance rather than detract from it. Or maybe that's just the pitch-perfect, wouldn't-change-a-note-of-it sax solo.
All of Prague's standard sights are here: the view of Prague Castle looming over Old Town, the walkway leading to the castle where you get a view of St. Nicholas Cathedral and the rest of Mala Strana, Charles Bridge, a night shot of the National Theater, the astronomical clock and Old Town Square, and the banks of the Vltava where one can feed swans, take photos and, apparently, play the violin. I don't have a blow-by-blow account of which landmark appears when, but luckily this map done in 2008 does.
And now, your tour of Prague, courtesy of INXS.
UPDATE: For those who can't see the video, there may be some copyright-country thingy preventing you from seeing it, depending on where you are. Typing "Never Tear Us Apart INXS" into your YouTube browser should do the trick.
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The video was shot before Communism ended, which means the police officers you see are dressed as soldiers, the wall at the Old Jewish Cemetery is in disrepair, the Charles Bridge is virtually empty, and Old Town Square has plenty of tourists but no stands geared toward selling substandard crap to tourists. But you still get to see Prague in all its beauty; I'd even argue that the cold, gray skies add to the romance rather than detract from it. Or maybe that's just the pitch-perfect, wouldn't-change-a-note-of-it sax solo.
All of Prague's standard sights are here: the view of Prague Castle looming over Old Town, the walkway leading to the castle where you get a view of St. Nicholas Cathedral and the rest of Mala Strana, Charles Bridge, a night shot of the National Theater, the astronomical clock and Old Town Square, and the banks of the Vltava where one can feed swans, take photos and, apparently, play the violin. I don't have a blow-by-blow account of which landmark appears when, but luckily this map done in 2008 does.
And now, your tour of Prague, courtesy of INXS.
UPDATE: For those who can't see the video, there may be some copyright-country thingy preventing you from seeing it, depending on where you are. Typing "Never Tear Us Apart INXS" into your YouTube browser should do the trick.
