George Michael
- Profession: Musician
- Place/Date of Birth: Finchley, 25 June 2020
As the 42-year-old celebrated his album triumph, four schoolgirls landed the fastest-selling debut album by a classical act in the history of the UK charts.
All Angels entered the pop album charts at number nine, with 33,000 sales in just one week.
They eclipsed the debut first week sales of household names like Charlotte Church, Katherine Jenkins, Luciano Pavarotti and Russell Watson.
Their high entry also put them above new albums by big name acts like All Saints, Jarvis Cocker and Keith Urban.
The group signed a record-breaking deal this summer with Universal Music Group, home to artists like Eminem, Scissor Sisters and Snow Patrol.
They said: "To have a major record deal is fantastic, but to do so well in the charts is beyond all our expectations."
All Angels are former choirgirls Melanie Nakhla, 17, Laura Wright, 16, Charlotte Ritchie, 17, and Daisy Chute, 17.
George Michael kicks off Euro-tour - Nov 18 2006
George Michael wowed thousands of fans at the start of his first UK tour for 15 years.
The 42-year-old singer began the UK leg of his 25 Live European tour in front of 16,500 ecstatic fans at the MEN Arena in Manchester.
The multi-million selling artist walked on stage to rapturous applause at the end of a reprised version of Waiting, before opening with hit Flawless (Go To The City).
And fans sang and danced along as he ran through their favourite hits including songs from his chart-topping Wham! days.
Speaking before the concert, Michael, who last year swore that his career was over, said he had decided to tour again "just because I have the courage to do it".
"To be perfectly honest, I’ve enjoyed it so much I wish I started again years ago," he said.
He said he was looking forward to a long-planned free concert for nurses to be held in London, saying it was something he had always wanted to do.
"I had said to my friends and family that if I toured again I would do a special concert for nurses.
"We wanted to do it at Wembley Arena until they kindly pointed out to Mr Showbiz here that 12,000 nurses might be a lot to take out of the system - we had to do it somewhere else. But it’s still a in 3,000-seater venue and it will probably be the best night of the tour," he said.
The star said the tour was an opportunity to put his troubles behind him: "Most of the stuff that happens to me is partially my fault but some of it is definitely not. All that stuff is relevant to people who read ’red tops’ (tabloid newspapers), as we call them. I’m just very, very happy that I have a No 1 album out this week and that, along with coming back and playing to an English crowd for the first time in 15 years, is fantastic".
Cannabis keeps George ’sane and happy’ - Oct 21 2006
Pop star George Michael spoke openly about taking cannabis while smoking the drug during a television interview, it was reported today.
The Daily Mirror said George, 43, lit up a joint backstage before a concert in Madrid while doing an interview for ITV’s The South Bank Show.
In an interview to be screened on October 31, he told Melvyn Bragg: "This is the only drug I’ve ever thought worth taking but you have to wait.
"It never occurred to me to take even this until I was about 22 or 23.
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Michael had hit after hit with Wham! - Club Tropicana, Wham Rap, Wake me Up Before You Go Go all remain classics, featuring on every best of the eighties compilation going. Whilst in Wham! George had solo success with one of his most famous hits, Careless Whisper.
When the mighty Wham! split in 1986 Michael found he had to prove himself to music critics who thought he was just another flash in the pan boy band reject. He did it easily with hit after hit, a duet with Aretha Franklin and a blue eyed soul boy image. In the nineties he kept the good work up, duetting with Elton John on Don’t Let the Sun Go Down On Me and in 1992 was announced to be one of the richest men in the UK thanks to incredible record sales.
But in the mid to late nineties things started to turn sour with George’s record label, Sony and despite producing one of the most successful albums of the decade with Older, he left Sony to create his own label - Aegean Records. A year later George hit the headlines after being arrested for committing ’lewd acts’ in a public toilet (you all know that story), forcing the singer to come out publicly.
Many thought it would be the end of his career, but the master of reinvention hit back with arguably his finest single to date, Outside. The video for his hit single featured the cheeky Greek dressed as a policeman gyrating about a disco-balled toilet, a great two fingers up to the press and police who had outed him. George has since played up his gayness, recently telling the world about his ’open relationship’ with boyfriend Kenny Goss and his ’Vanilla’ tastes in sex. In between revealing all he has become increasingly political, releasing slated single Freeeek!, an anti Iraq war song and using interviews to champion the causes close to his heart.
The ex Wham! star remains a force to be reckoned with even after announcing that he is bowing out of the music business to release his recordings online for free. Good news for skint George Michael fans, not so much for the industry.
By Laura Walton
October 2007