First he was irritable and then he was irascible. Boy George arrived in Taipei after he was delayed in Seoul for seven hours at the airport and was forced to hand over US$1,000 in "taxes" for performing in South Korea. The prickly star had two hours of rest and was fetched from his hotel for this interview, at Ministry of Sound (MoS).
A man who introduced himself as the tour manager said the South Koreans had "basically taken a big back-hander." He said there had been a problem with George's visa as a visiting DJ. "So, they said no problem, you can go into the country, but then they got us on the way out." He said it was extortion and George piped up, "I'm never going back again. It was bullshit."
I had met George once before at a club in England and he was pleasant to talk to, though more interested in my male friend. Dressed in a tweed jacket he came off as a smart businessman.
This time he was in a red "Neverland" jacket with thin, dark stripes. The biggest change was a large "Celtic" kind of tattoo that could be seen trailing down from his shaved head, below the black fedora-style hat, which had a feather poking out of the band. He wore eyeliner, mascara, white foundation with pink blush and red lipstick. He had put on weight and people's eyes were popping at his evil Teletubby look.
The music had not been turned off in the booth overlooking the MoS dance floor, where the interview was held, so everyone was waiting for the noise to die down. One journalist shouted that Elton John had recently visited Taiwan.
"What the fuck has he got to do with me," George responded, causing everyone to shift uncomfortably. Mercifully, the tour manager pulled out the booth's loudspeaker plug and it was a little quieter.
I mentioned our meeting and George said it must have been seven or eight years ago. I said he had proved himself as a DJ at that point, after having previously made it as a musician with Culture Club.
"I did a lot of stuff for Ministry [of Sound]. I've always worked and if you stick around long enough then fame comes back. But it's not me that changes, it's them, whoever decides these things. The thing to do is just carry on working, doing what I love and I just keep at it," George said.
"So, you'd be quite happy doing this for another 20 to 30 years?" I asked.
"Oooh, I haven't thought that far ahead, though if there was a scene and I was still enjoying myself, then I don't see why I would stop. But in 15 years? I would be quite old then."
"So what would you do? Retire?"
"I've got a lot of other things to do. I don't just DJ, though I have always loved music and will always have something to do with it. I have other interests. I would do anything that stimulated my imagination."
An Internet journalist broke in and said there were a lot of Web sites out there covering Boy George. He asked if they were official.
"Not really, though there is a good one out there called 100% Boy George [no longer being updated].... A lot of the kids who do these things, they know more about me than I do. Some of them are really good, others aren't."
Another journalist said that she had read on a Web site that he kept in touch with Cyndi Lauper.
"Yeah, we keep in touch but we don't call each other. People in the business aren't necessarily friends," George said.
What about the members of Culture Club? he was asked by the same journalist.
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