I was lucky enough to attend two George Michael concerts. I consider George to be one of the best singers to have ever lived, and that really came through in these live performances. I was already asleep when my wife came to tell me that George Michael had passed away. His last Christmas, unfortunately.
George Michael
George Michael, born Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou (Greek: Γεώργιος Κυριάκος Παναγιώτου) (East Finchley, London, 25 June 1963 – Goring-on-Thames, 25 December 2016), was a British pop singer, songwriter and music producer. Michael was one of the most successful singers of the 1980s and 1990s. He won two Grammys and sold over 100 million records worldwide. From 1984 to 2004, he was the most played artist on British radio.
In 1981, when he founded Wham! with Andrew Ridgeley, Michael's success began. The first album, Fantastic, reached number one in his home country in 1983. In the Netherlands, it reached eighth place in the Album Top 100. Several singles from this album reached the top ten in the United Kingdom, including Young Guns, Wham Rap! and Club Tropicana. The second album Make It Big topped the charts in the United States and the Netherlands. The single Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go from this album reached number 1 in both the UK and the US. The single Careless Whisper (1984) reached number one in the charts of nearly twenty-five countries. This single was also the first he released as a solo artist. The album The Final was number one for two weeks in the Dutch Album Top 100. Michael also sang on the Band Aid hit Do They Know It's Christmas? On Elton John's song Nikita, Michael provided backing vocals, as well as on the first solo album of his regular bassist, Deon Estus.
After the farewell single Edge of Heaven, Wham! disbanded in 1986, with a farewell concert at a sold-out Wembley Stadium.
Sunday Morning Classic
On 4 August 2019, Faith was spinning on our turntable as the Sunday Morning Classic.
It is no surprise that Faith marks the step into adulthood, signalled by the conscientiously sexy ‘I Want Your Sex’.
Certainly, songs about drug abuse, battered women and the choice between monogamy and freelance lust are nothing new, but how many other current singer-songwriters can evoke a personal stake in their subject?
One of Michael’s secret weapons is his knowledge that the power and eloquence of soul music comes from simply singing what you feel. And as Faith proves, he has the tools to convey relatively complex emotions.
Faith is not a cynical hit pack; it is a kind of concept album.
After the rockabilly shock of the title track gets things going, each song neatly flows into the next. The disco groove varies from urban throb to slow tropical heatwave, but it doesn’t stop until the end.
Keywords like faith, trust and understanding appear track after track, and the issue of communication between lovers, and the lack thereof, is explored from various angles.
In ‘Look at Your Hands’, a younger man vents his anger over the battered state of his married ex-girlfriend. She has ‘two fat kids and a drunken husband’, and the singer’s outrage stems from both jealousy and a sense of injustice: ‘You should have been my wife when you had the chance.’ “I bet you don’t like your life now.”
An anti-drug song, ‘Monkey’, is not a lecture but rather the question of an irritated lover: ‘Do you love the monkey or do you love me?’
Faith is truly a showcase for George Michael: he co-produced, wrote all the songs, plays many instruments and provides the lion’s share of the vocals, including a wide, strange range of backing voices. Yet his all-encompassing respect for melody, as well as his singing, is truly remarkable.
by Jan Liebregts
source: Wikipedia photo: Faith Tour and Evan Amos
