Falco

When George IV died in 1830 The Times wrote:

“There never was an individual less regretted by his fellow-creatures than this deceased king. What eye has wept for him? What heart has heaved one throb of unmercenary sorrow? ... If he ever had a friend — a devoted friend in any rank of life — we protest that the name of him or her never reached us”

Somehow it is peculiarly unkind to be cruel to the dead; no matter how ridiculous they were in life.

*

Rock Me Amadeus was the number one hit in New Zealand in March and April of 1986. I was in the third form at Kapiti College. I remember walking across the field at the back of school with a guy called David (it must have been in early March) telling him that while I thought the song was awesome it was far too strange for most people and would NEVER be a number one in New Zealand. Shows how much I knew at the age of thirteen.

The song was mostly in German. It was fun to sing without knowing what it meant. Here’s what it meant:

He was a punker and he lived in the biggest city
It was in Vienna where he did everything
He had debts because he drank, but all the women loved him,
And all of them shouted "come and rock me Amadeus"
He was a superstar, he was popular,
He was so exalted, because he had flair,
He was a virtuoso, was a rock idol,
And everyone shouted "come and rock me Amadeus"

It was in 1780 and it was in Vienna
No plastic money anymore,
The banks were against him,
Where his debts came from was well-known by everyone
He was a ladies' man, ladies loved his punk,
He was a superstar, he was so popular
He was so exalted, that was exactly his flair
He was a virtuoso, was a rock idol
And everyone still shouts today "come and rock me Amadeus"

I’m so glad I found out. The composer of this song had a peculiar knack for writing novelty songs. Imagine if you had an idea of yourself as a serious musician and your real gift was writing novelty songs. Who says God doesn’t have a sense of humour?

*

This photo is why I like Falco. He could walk the line between being a totally overblown, pompous idiot and taking the piss. Of course there were times when I'm sure that Falco actually took himself seriously. Mostly this would have been when he got paid squillions of dollars. At that point it would have been hard not to believe that you were actually a "genius”. Luckily pop celebrity is so brief and the post fame ignominy so complete that this feeling is temporary.
Life is absurd, unfair and ends unpleasantly. This photo sums that up. It is absurd, and unfair that someone dressed like this was rich, and his life certainly ended unpleasantly. In fact you almost can see the precipice Falco is about to fall off in this picture.

Maybe he is dressed like this in hell.

*

I was quite upset when I heard that Falco had died. He was 40. He was avoiding tax on a Caribbean island. Unfortunately, while he was avoiding tax he drove into a bus.

Falco is buried in the Zentralfriedhof in Vienna along with Beethoven, Schubert, a bevy of Strauss', Brahms, Gluck, Salieri, and Schoenburg. Actually there are a few more people buried there as well. I see that the family went for something restrained and dignified when they commissioned the headstone.
While I was finding out about how Falco died I learnt a lot about the man after his moment in the sun in 1986. Here are highlights:

• He received a Golden Bambi award


• For his 1990 comeback album: "Falco developed an artificial language corresponding to the computer age: I mine, I-me-you-I-mine. You yours so alone, to be alone. And so on. But the success Falco and especially Hans Hölzel were hoping for did not eventuate. "It was a very introverted album and I did get a bit carried away with clever word games," Falco said in retrospect."


• "In the summer of 1997 Claudia Wohlfromm, wife of the producer Torsten Börger, became Falco's manager. She wanted to develop a whole new Falco style, one she thought would fit the new millennium. And Falco didn't stop her. One day he appeared in public with dyed blonde hair and a diamond in the upper right incisor."

The last song on Falco's album Emotional is called The Kiss of Kathleen Turner. It is a very odd song indeed. The lyrical highlight must be:

Austerlitz, Waterloo, Verdun, Stalingrad, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Harrisburg, Brokdorf, Zwentendorf, Cattenom, Wackersdorf, Tschernobyl, Kathleen, can you hear me babe Kathleen, do you know what I'm talking about I'm just talking about Not the first kiss of my life I'm talking about ... our planet ... Kathleen!

What the hell! How is Chernobyl connected with Waterloo? Why is he talking about our planet? How is Kathleen Turner connected with any of this?

*

People are unkind: to themselves and to others.

After a career in the 1980s as one of the sexiest women in movies Kathleen Turner got fat in the 1990s and people mocked her. In the papers there was speculation about drugs, food and booze. Actually she had rheumatoid arthritis.

George IV is famous now as Hugh Laurie's Prince Regent in Blackadder III. When I was in England with my good friend Matt we went to see George's beach residence at Brighton. It was ridiculous and opulent. I quite liked it.

What are you supposed to do with what you are handed? If you are handed wealthy irrelevance how or why should you remain austere and serious-minded? If you are the beauty of the world and given a painful disease what should you do? Or if you studied music in Vienna but were seduced by the glamour of pop novelty hits… what then?

It’s hard to die happy if you are unhappy with what life has handed you.

Falco, I love you.