Michael Hutchence was born on January 22, 1960 in Sydney, Australia. Hutchence was raised in Hong Kong, China, and got an early taste at performing while starring in a local toy store commercial. Hutchence moved back to Sydney with his family in his late teens, and befriended Andrew Farriss in high school. Hutchence and Farriss’s brothers, Tim and Jon, formed the band The Farriss Brothers. Before long, Garry Beers and Kirk Pengilly had joined the band, which then became known as INXS.
In 1979, the Farriss family moved to Perth, Western Australia, and the rest of the band followed suit. Soon after, they moved back to Sydney, where the released their self-titled debut album in 1980. Hutchence came alive on stage as the band’s front man and sex-symbol. Off-stage, however, he remained much more introverted. Hutchence and Andrew Farriss co-wrote nearly all of INXS's songs, creating an infectious pop sound that would gain momentum throughout the 80s with the release of several successful albums.
By 1987, Hutchence had also branched into acting, appearing in the Australian movie Dogs in Space. Two years later, he played Percy Shelley in Roger Corman's Frankenstein Unbound.
In 1989, Hutchence started a highly-profile relationship with an up-and-coming Aussie singer/actor Kylie Minogue, whom he mentored during her transition from soap opera actress to pop singing sensation.
In 1992, Hutchence suffered a blow to the head during a scuffle with a taxi driver in Denmark, causing him to lose his sense of smell and partial sense of taste. Hutchence became depressed and agitated during this time, even pulling a knife on one of his own band mates. Also around this time, Hutchence parted ways with Minogue, and began dating Danish supermodel Helena Christensen, prior to dating television personality Paula Yates, whom he had met when Yates interviewed him. At this time, Yates was married to British media mogul, Bob Geldof, with whom she had three daughters: Fifi Trixibelle, Peaches Honeyblossom, and Pixie. In 1996, Yates and Hutchence welcomed the birth of Hutchence’s only child, daughter Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily Hutchence.
The mid-90s saw a period of inactivity for INXS, which was not-so-subtly highlighted by Oasis singer Liam Gallagher during the 1996 Brit Awards when he commented to Hutchence, "Has-beens shouldn't be presenting awards for gonna-bes." However, one year later, INXS made a come-back with th release of a new album, Elegantly Wasted and subsequent world tour. The tour was cut short on the morning of November 22, 1997, when Hutchence was found dead by an apparent self-strangulation in his room at the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Double Bay, Sydney.
Although Hutchence’s death was initially ruled a suicide, the lack of a suicide note led some to believe he had died of autoerotic asphyxiation. At the time, Hutchence’s body was found to contain traces of Prozac, alcohol and cocaine.
In July 2005, the CBS reality show, Rock Star: INXS debuted featuring the remaining INXS band members in search of a new lead for the band. The winner of the show was Nova Scotian singer J.D. Fortune.
YUDDY
