December 1, 2024 • 65 mins
He’s the superstar DJ who’s hedonistic past led to A-List connections, however, all that glitters is not gold.
After struggling with addiction, losing friends to the AIDS crisis in the 80’s and 90’s and surviving childhood trauma, he’s endured life’s darkest moments and come out on top.
Now, after firmly establishing himself as a pioneer of the UK club scene, a world class DJ and undisputed ‘Meme Queen’ (Sorry Gemma Collins), DJ Fat Tony joins the Mile Fly Club to discuss the highs and lows of life in the fast lane.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
He's the world-class DJ whose hedonistic past led to A-list connections.
(00:05):
It suddenly became a tagline, Freddie Mercury gave me my first line of cocaine.
It wasn't actually Freddie, it was like there were six other people there.
There was a tray going round, the world was a different place in the 80s.
It was a really exciting time because you know, there were tribes, we had tribes then.
It was kind of like you could belong to something.
And now he's at the forefront of the global club scene.
(00:26):
Just don't ask him to take requests.
When anyone ever says well what's your favourite party or what's your favourite club, I always say it's not happened yet.
Because things always get better.
From living life in the fast lane.
Last week I was with Kanye West in Tokyo and his wife's standing there naked.
The first thing I said was oh I wish I could come and wear my bikini now.
(00:49):
I kind of sense you don't like to follow the rules.
I don't follow the rules, no, why would I? Rules are made to be broken.
Are you a member of the Mile High Club?
Of course I am.
Yay!
It goes without saying. I mean come on.
To conquering addiction.
I was helpless. I'd got to that point where what was I going to do if I ever stopped taking drugs?
Because drugs were my life.
(01:10):
DJ Fat Tony joins the Mile Fly Club for an inspiring conversation about overcoming adversity.
It takes such power to say those words, I need help.
And the minute that you say that is the minute that the ball starts to roll.
Welcome to the Mile Fly Club.
Your VIP lane to first class travel tips, tell all talk and turbulent life tales.
(01:36):
Think the Mile High Club only with more clothes but no less revealing.
Each week I'll be inviting high flying globetrotting guests to bear all in my club.
So if you're searching for some tantalising travel did pitch and a good old gossip,
you've arrived at the right destination.
Now sit back, relax and get ready to join me in the Mile Fly Club.
(01:59):
Ladies and gentlemen, we've now reached our cruising altitude.
I'll go ahead and turn off the seatbelt sign so sit back, relax and enjoy the flight.
My next guest's life has been a roller coaster of extreme highs and debilitating lows.
From rubbing shoulders with pop, rock and fashion royalty in the 80s, 90s and 00s,
(02:21):
his lifestyle was like no other and with his stratospheric rise to fame,
he fast established himself as one of the founding fathers of the UK club scene.
However, after years of struggling with addiction, he's made huge changes in his life
and is here today to share both his story and advice.
Welcome to the Mile Fly Club, Fat Tony.
(02:44):
What a life you have lived.
It's not over yet.
Of course it's not.
I like to think it's like in its second phase.
Yeah, chapters. It's all about the chapters of our lives.
Look, as a world famous DJ and musician, you've really paved the way for the current UK music scene.
I like to think I've had my finger in it, yeah.
(03:08):
I want to go back to the start though, where it all began for you in the world of music and nightlife.
Where did it all begin?
You know, I kind of worked in Kings Road when I was like 15, 14, 15 and I left school at 14.
So I got a job working in Kings Road and at that point in time, that whole,
(03:30):
that was the kind of the Kings Road was the epicentre of fashion within London.
And everyone who worked on that market started going out.
So everyone would go to clubs after work or go to start off at the pub and then they'd go to clubs.
So I kind of got into clubbing really at an early age.
So when you left school at 14 and then you said you went to work on the Kings Road, what were you doing on the King Road?
(03:55):
I was working in a place called the Great Gear Market,
an indoor market that had a record store in it run by a guy called Rusty Egan who ran the Blitz Club.
It was his music store. I worked behind that.
So I got into knowing Rusty, I got into knowing all of those people in that market that really were the scene in London.
So you had, it was the talent and the romantics.
(04:19):
Everyone who wanted to be seen went to the Kings Road on a Saturday and they walked up and down Kings Road.
Kings Road was social media at that point in time.
So to be seen, you would go to the Kings Road.
You know, you had Westwood, you had the World's End, you had everything that was going on on that scene was on that road.
You were there.
So yeah, so that's where I worked.
(04:40):
So, you know, going clubbing kind of just was the natural thing for me.
And the name DJ Fat Tony, where did that come from?
You know, I was a fat kid because, you know, certain things happen to you when you're young and, you know,
I got fat as a defence so it became like almost like a castle wall around me.
(05:05):
So that it was like a barrier to stop people from getting close.
And then, of course, what happens is when you put on loads of weight as a kid,
everyone starts to call you your name changes behind your back to which Tony Fat Tony.
So that's how I and I just accepted it. I took the name.
I thought, well, you know, I'll own that.
I mean, that's something.
(05:26):
Do you not think like as a young kid kind of going, do you know what, I'm going to own it and I'm going to accept?
Well, I kind of I was only fat for like about a year and a half anyway.
And then I kind of like lost it all and then kept the name.
You were like, I like this.
Yeah, of course.
You know, it was, you know, back then we didn't have social media, so we couldn't make up false names and hide behind them.
(05:48):
You know, it was a platform.
You had to create your own platform and the name that I was given, you know, behind my back.
I just I just completely accepted for right alone.
Brilliant. I love that.
So someone who has been in your life from before you were both famous is Boy George.
Yeah, you called Gina. Gina. Yeah.
OK. But before you became friends, you were like frenemies, weren't you?
(06:12):
Oh, you know, he I would see him every Saturday and he was coming to the great gear market.
And I'd always say something really vile to him.
And he'd always say something really vile to me. And that would be it.
That was the leverage.
But my best friend, who's going to be my best man at my wedding, which lived with lived with George.
They shared a flat. Did they live on Shooters Hill?
No, just George's where George's family live.
(06:34):
George lived in a place called Alma Square, which is in St.
John's Wood. That's where they shared the flat.
But George grew up in Shooters Hill. Yeah, because my my dad lived on Shooters Hill.
My mom worked in a school on Shooters Hill.
And I'm pretty sure they were like, oh, we regularly see Boy George around here.
The Odals were very known and well known in Shooters Hill.
You know, that's what it was. That's you know, that was his manner as such.
(06:57):
Do you get what I mean? Growing up.
So why Gina? It's just his nickname.
Do you know what I mean?
But you got your nickname Fat Tony because of what you said.
Yeah, because it's Gina. George is short. Gina is just short for George.
That's what we call him.
So you started working on the London Club Circuit in the 80s.
Tell me about that.
Well, literally it was a different place, wasn't it?
The world was a different place in the 80s.
(07:18):
You know, in the 80s, you kind of had to.
We didn't have social media. We didn't have the world that we have living today.
So you had to kind of create your own platform.
And it was a really exciting time because, you know, there were tribes.
We had tribes then. So you had punk. You had new romantics.
You had mods.
You had all of these different people that identified as a group that looked a certain way.
(07:41):
And within the gay scene, we had clones.
We had the older gays within the scene who wore check shirts and jeans.
And you know, that's how you are handled by moustaches.
You know, hence the village people.
They were all that whole look was a clone.
So you had all of these tribes going on.
And what was good about it was it was kind of like you could belong to something.
(08:07):
It was almost like a club within a look.
Do you know what I mean? So you either...
Growing up on my estate, some of my mates were punks.
Some of them were mods. You know, it kind of just how it worked.
Do you look back at that time now?
Because you've mentioned social media a couple of times now.
Obviously, the social media didn't exist.
Do you look back at that time and kind of think, wow, like,
(08:30):
they're not lucky enough now, the kids these days, because they don't have any of that.
They've got social media.
Of course.
You know, I sometimes think I'm so glad I grew up when I grew up because it taught me values.
It taught me a lot about...
It made me streetwise.
It made me realise that I had to do something with my life.
(08:51):
I couldn't just sit at home pretending to do something with my life like a lot of people do today.
You know, it's not about...
Do you feel like that about social media then?
I'm pro and against social media.
I live on social media.
But at the same time, I think that...
It makes me laugh.
I follow some accounts and I literally I laugh all day because just watching what they think they're doing,
(09:18):
you know, it's like, get ready with me.
Go away.
Who do you get ready with?
You know what I mean? It's like, go away, no one cares.
Come on my night out with me.
I was watching one in the car on the way here.
You know, it's just like this world where people buy followers.
And you know they've bought followers because they're getting six likes on a post when they got 32,000 followers.
(09:42):
They're getting six likes, four comments.
Just need to do it for Eaglet.
It's all cats and dogs following you.
You know, it's so...
That's what makes me laugh about social media.
It is really sad.
But you know, that's the world that we live in that people think that that gives them a purpose.
Which is, you know, what's the outcome of that?
(10:03):
What is the end product of that?
Because, you know, at some point you're going to stop paying for those 32,000 followers
and you're going to go back down to 1600.
And then you'll be devastated because, you know, that's the world we live in.
It's quite disastrous in a lot of ways.
But in the 80s we didn't have that.
(10:24):
We had to get up and do something.
You were flying on Concorde.
Yeah, I was when I was 18, of course.
Tell me about that experience.
What? Concorde?
Travel experience.
Not many people get to travel on Concorde.
No.
How got to travel on it?
No, Concorde was amazing.
And you did that with Gina?
No, I did quite a lot on my own.
I did the first trip with Gina.
(10:45):
But then after that I kind of would go all the time to play at the Palladium in New York
and I would always fly over on that.
And it was just, Concorde was an incredible, incredible experience.
But after the first time you'd done it, it just felt like a normal plane.
What was incredible about it?
Just the fact that you could get to New York in such a short time.
(11:06):
And also it was like, such, it was like, you know, if you're, if anyone is gold on British Airways
or a gold executive plus, you'll understand that urge to like want to keep it.
So, you know, we're flying on Concorde, going into Concorde Lounge, going through the whole rigmarole.
You know, there were two types of people that went on Concorde, right?
(11:28):
There were people that went on there for business and they wanted to get to New York quick.
And then there were like kind of a pause winners, you know, at the time, people that kind of like...
Pause winners?
You know, it was kind of like, suddenly, you know, it was like, oh, we've got, we've come into money.
So we're going to fly on Concorde. Do you get what I mean?
Yeah. I never got the experience to go on Concorde.
So I don't know, can't imagine what it was like, but yeah, you could get to New York in like four hours, was it?
(11:53):
Three hours, yeah.
You know, it was an experience because it was, you know, everyone, not everyone would do Concorde.
Were you sad when it stopped?
The headphones were great. I used to steal all the headphones all the time.
Why? What was great about the headphones?
Because they were really good headphones. They were really good, mate. They were banging Olsen and you could just like literally, yeah, they were great.
(12:16):
So what was it, because you were flying to New York regularly, what was the club scene in New York like?
Oh, everyone in London wanted to be in New York and everyone in New York wanted to be in London.
It was that whole like, kind of like the grass was always greener.
The clubs at that point were pre-Mare Giuliani, who completely raped and pillaged New York and shut everything down.
You know, it was pre-AIDS crisis. It was at that time when everybody was like living their best lives as such.
(12:44):
You know, the club scene in New York was so incredible.
Where did you prefer to be, London or New York?
Oh, New York, because it was New York and I was from London. It's like anything.
It's like if you live in the country, you want to be in London. Do you know what I mean?
It's like, so for me, it was like that whole, the excitement of going to New York and New York was like, London was, you know, you're talking free streets.
(13:10):
You know, the clubbing scene in London was free streets. It was so ho.
That's all we had. We had Greek Street, Wardour Street, Dean Street.
You know, all the clubs were basically around there on those streets and that was it.
That was the West End. You know, that was our great old and everything shut at 3am.
It wasn't too much later that clubs suddenly got later licenses.
(13:32):
But in New York, you go to clubs until two o'clock in the afternoon.
You know, there was always something on, you know, down on down on an alphabet or any of those areas.
There was so many illegal, amazing venues that you'd go in it.
And, you know, an illegal after hours drinking club in London consisted of it being in a basement underneath a kebab shop.
(13:56):
Right. In Soho, full of the worst low life people you'll ever meet in your life.
But that was the excitement of it. In New York, you went to, say, Save the Robots, which was on Avenue A, which opened at 3am in the morning onwards.
And it was an experience like you've never experienced before because you go in and there was this one bar which was filled with sand and was like,
(14:22):
like a scene from like one of those like Big Trouble in Little China type films.
Like, you know, it was all based on like, like lanterns. It was insane.
And then each floor would be different. Do you know what I mean?
So every the clubbing at that point in New York was amazing.
(14:43):
So it was it was just after Studio 54 and you had Save the Robots, you had Area, you had all these amazing venues that just were just so magical because of what they put into them.
You just mentioned the infamous Studio 54. Did you ever?
No, I never went. I was too young for Studio 54.
I came along to Alander that I did their next club, which was Steve Rubell's next club, which was the Palladium, which was a disused massive cinema down on between 7th and 8th on 12th Street.
(15:19):
And it was like it was just this incredible experience.
It was a massive club and each room was designed by different artists. They had the Kenny Schaaf room. You had all these different artists that come in and they brought them in and made this incredible space.
You've never been anywhere like it in your life because it was so big. But they each there was like 20 clubs within one club.
(15:44):
Do you have a favourite like club that you can think of?
No, because when anyone ever says, well, what's your favourite party or what's your favourite club? I always say it's not happened yet because things always get better.
Everyone's go, oh, you know, a lot of people when you talk about clubbing that don't go out anymore or had their moment at a certain era will say to you, oh, it's not the same.
(16:07):
Well, of course it's not the same. Thank God it's not the same. Could you imagine how boring it would be?
For me, there's been so many magical clubs and so many magical parties in my lifetime that it would be unfair to say one was the best.
It's like when people say to you, where's your favourite destination to travel to in the world?
That changes every week.
You can't answer it, can you?
(16:28):
Last week I was in Tokyo and at that point in time I would say to you, oh my God, I want to move to Tokyo. Every time I go somewhere new I always say I work in Libya.
Working, DJing in Tokyo?
Yeah, I was DJing. I flew over to see John Galliano and Marjela. It was incredible. Yeah, it's an amazing trip. I was there for four days.
(16:50):
Which, you know, an in and out job like that I love. I can go, I do my job, go and see the city to get enough of it to want more.
I really like that. Whenever I go anywhere and I spend too much time somewhere, I think, all right, I'm ready to go home now.
I like to leave just on the cusp of like, I've not had enough. I've not had enough of Tokyo. I will be going back to Tokyo.
(17:17):
I've never been to Tokyo.
It's an incredible experience.
Yeah, I would love to go.
Incredible. You know, when you live in London or you live in a big city, like, with such high crime rates, the UK right now, we know what's going on everywhere.
It's not safe to walk down the street wearing a watch. It's not, you know, you feel that edge all the time because that's what we're pumped full up.
(17:42):
In Tokyo, it was totally different. Everyone was just so nice and polite and clean. They had smoking areas on the street.
You know, you're not, people weren't allowed to smoke in the street. You have to go to a little glass cube to smoke in.
And just like no drinking on the street and stuff like that. It's just, it was kind of like certain areas you're not allowed to drink at all. It's just amazing.
(18:06):
It's definitely on my list. You really have partied with some of the greats in music, art, fashion, Andy Warhol, Diana Ross, Rodgers, Sade. I mean, these are amazing.
You know, there's quite a lot of new people as well.
Okay, okay. Tell us about the new people. I want to hear about the old people as well.
(18:29):
You know, those people from then, you know, I mean, and the thing is, right, when you write a book and you write your life story.
And I want to talk about you.
And in that book, you put all of those, you try not to make it the book about the other people in the books about you.
But within your story, you have to talk slightly about other people. Otherwise, it would be a totally different book.
(18:50):
So, of course, when you do interviews or whenever people, they'll always bring up the same six people.
Okay, so tell me about the others.
No, but it's true though. You know, there's been so many people. I mean, I'm very fortunate. Last week, I was with Kanye West in Tokyo.
Oh my word.
And John Galliano at dinner. John Galliano, Kanye West, and the guy that owns Diesel and owns Margiela at dinner.
(19:16):
It was one of those pinch me moments and Kanye's wife. It was just it was literally one of those like, what's going on here?
You must have constant pinch me moments.
I do. You know what? I'm really blessed within my job. My job takes me to some of the most extraordinary experiences.
I liked Kanye. I thought Kanye was great. You know, the first hour at dinner, I didn't even realize it was Kanye.
(19:37):
It was like there were six of us at dinner and he was talking to talking to us about my love of tattoos and my placement of tattoos.
And then we started talking about the word cunt for like a good hour and a half.
What did you talk about it?
Yeah, just why I'm so obsessed with it because I have it around my neck. I have it tattooed.
(19:58):
You know, I just about the freedom of using it because there's so many other things that going on in this world that people are still offended by the c word.
And it's baffling that they will focus on the c word rather than they will what's going on elsewhere because it's easier to be offended by that than.
(20:21):
What was Kanye's take on it?
Kanye loved the word, but you know, it was funny. It was just because I, as I say, at first I didn't realize.
I mean, I didn't put Kanye West, Marjela and John Galliano and myself all together because no one told me he was coming.
So when someone like Kanye turns up and his wife standing there naked, the first thing I said was, oh, I wish I would come where my bikini now.
(20:46):
She was like start naked with like tape over her breasts and parts and it was just like it was just it just flowed.
I didn't one minute think, oh, my God, I'm sitting at dinner with Kanye.
And it wasn't until later on that I kind of thought, oh, fuck, I've been with Kanye all night.
Do you know what I mean? Because it was just a natural conversation.
So you think you're a little bit starstruck by that?
(21:08):
No, far from it.
Have you ever been starstruck by anyone you've met?
Of course. I mean, Cher, I mean, I've been so starstruck by meeting Cher.
I went away to Brazil for a week on a job with for Amfa and Cher was headlining it.
And we spent that she was in the same hotel as us and spent five, four days with Cher and her son.
(21:30):
And it was amazing. Yeah.
I mean, I was completely starstruck.
So what was it about meeting Cher then that made you starstruck over anyone else that you've met?
Because it's Cher. I mean, it's like, you know, because it's yeah.
But there's legend status and then there's legend status.
And Cher is someone that I grew up watching, grew up loving.
(21:55):
You know, it's kind of just like this.
There's legends and there's legends.
And Kanye is not a legend to me.
Do you know what I'm saying to you? Whereas Cher was a legend and is a legend.
You know, it's like the first time I ever met Elton.
It was that same experience. I kind of thought, wow, I'm having dinner at Elton John's house.
Do you know what I mean? Now it's Elton. Do you know what I mean?
(22:18):
They were like, we're having dinner with you.
No, but you know what I mean? It's one of those things.
Because of how my head operates most of the time because of my ADHD.
It takes me sometimes for my wiring to like link things to other things.
So I'll go off on different tangents. And then afterwards, think, oh, my God, I just realised what that was about.
(22:44):
When you say how your head operates with your ADHD, when did you kind of realise?
I've always had it. It's not, you know, ADHD suddenly become the new board book.
Everyone uses it as an excuse for other people's behaviours.
I was thrown out of school at 14 because I was unteachable and ADHD didn't have a name then.
(23:06):
Then you were an unruly child. You know, I was unteachable because my dyslexia was so bad and so severe that I couldn't focus and I couldn't concentrate.
And I couldn't read it. I could read perfectly, but it was writing it backwards.
Every time I wrote it, it would always come up and all over the shop. And it's still the same today.
(23:28):
It's a lot better. But, you know, I understand now. I understand my ADHD.
I understand dyslexia. I understand all of those things because I've spent a lifetime of learning about them.
I don't need to be told by someone, oh, you've got ADHD. I can drink a coffee and go to sleep because that's what I do.
(23:49):
Because coffee has that opposite effect. It's stimulants. Don't stimulate me. They make me go within myself.
You know, I can spend all day running around like doing a million and one things.
The minute I sit down, I'll just pass out.
But any time I want to concentrate on something, I don't have the ability to concentrate on it. My body shuts down and I go to sleep.
(24:13):
So when your head hits that pillow after a crazy day, you're out.
It doesn't even get the chance to hit the pillow because I'll be asleep.
Say I sit down to watch a movie. I'm out like a light within the first three minutes.
My partner is always like, you're going to be asleep in a minute anyway. And I'm like, no, I'm not. I've never watched a whole RuPaul's Drag Race ever.
(24:34):
I always fall asleep around the same time and wake up at the very end. Every time.
And I always have to go, who went home? Every time. Because that's just how my brain is.
It is. You know, I don't. And I can say hand on heart, I've never watched a whole episode.
Trying to concentrate. I can have something going in the background, which won't interfere with me at all. It's like music.
(24:57):
Music soothes me. I can have music on. The minute I start to sing it or start to like partake in it, it's a different.
It's a completely different feeling. So if music is on in the background, it becomes it's kind of like.
You know, it's a calming experience. But when I'm stimulated at work from music, it has a different effect.
(25:20):
So, you know, music will take me to places that nothing else can. Yeah.
Tell me about Ibiza, because obviously you spent so much time there. We had Zoe Harman on as one of our guests. I don't know if you know Zoe. Zoe's a DJ on Heart Radio.
She loves Ibiza. Her mum loves Ibiza. You love Ibiza. Tell us a bit about it. I've been going to Ibiza since 1983.
For me, it's an island that's changed in so many ways, but also still has the magic when you walk there.
(25:47):
You still go now? Yeah, I spent the whole summer there this year. I'm there literally throughout the summer.
I'm probably back and forth from Ibiza most summers about 20 times. From April up until September, October.
I go at least this year, I think it's about 20, 25 times I flew there and back.
And you say it's obviously changed a lot. It has changed a lot, but at the same time, you know, there's parts of that island that are still untouched.
(26:16):
You know, if you want that Hawaii beef, you're a let's go clubbing experience. It's great you can go and do that.
But also there's the north of the island. There's so many parts of the island that you can go to where it's just beautiful.
So you mentioned obviously then earlier about Tokyo and the fact that you go to places and why is it Ibiza then that you've continually gone back to and never because Ibiza is not a massive island.
(26:41):
You continually go back to Ibiza and you don't get bored. Oh, I didn't say don't get bored.
Oh, no, there's a difference. You know, if I like come the end of this season, I would be because I always like I stay in Ibiza town and I would.
I that you know, if I'm there more than three days, four days on the draw, I'll be like, what am I going to do today?
(27:02):
Because I don't drive. So then I end up going to the beach and I know when I get started going to the beach, it's time to go home because I don't.
I'm not one of these people can sit on the beach for like three hours, four hours, just laying on the beach.
You sleep. I get so bored. Yeah, I get so restless.
OK, so you've traveled a lot then through work, but where do you like to travel on holiday, like on your own or with your partner?
(27:28):
I never travel alone on holiday. That's not a holiday. A holiday, you have to be with someone.
I mean, a lot of people go, I like to be on my own on holiday and rest. That's great.
But for me, a holiday is about sharing and and and finding out new things and and with someone else.
So for me, I always travel with Stavi. We always go away with we've been together like three years.
(27:52):
And in that time, we've been so many places, Cambodia, like Vietnam.
So it's a list is endless. I think for me, January, February are the times the best time to go away and just go away.
Do you know what I mean? Without the phone on, without any of that stuff.
(28:14):
Last year, when I was very fortunate enough to go on safari, we went to South Africa, went to Cape Town.
We went to. Yeah, we did. With Stavi. Yeah, we did.
We did nearly three weeks in South Africa. We went to a place called Group Boss, which was like,
but just it was like a safari, but it was an it was a plant safari. It's insane.
(28:38):
It was absolutely insane. It was mental.
You know, just being in the wilderness in the bush and just like being just like drive, looking around, going around, looking at plants.
Now, that sounds so tedious as a part of going on safari.
What do you do? Yeah, normally you go on safari. You look at like we did.
We did both ends. We did that. And then we went off and we and we went on the most incredible safari.
(29:02):
Like it was amazing. I mean, just to spend five days with lions and elephants and giraffes and rhino and hippopotamuses outside your window of the lodge.
It's just it was so magical. Yeah. So, so magical.
I went to South Africa. Oh, when my my daughter, who is now nine, when she was like two and I need to go back to my dad was born in South Africa.
(29:26):
But he's never been back since he was four. His parents both died and he was adopted and he can't go back there.
And I'm like, I'm aware it's just the most amazing place you've got. It really is the most amazing place because I, before I went, everyone was like, oh, it's really it's really it's really unsafe to walk around.
It's really this. It's really that. So I'd kind of set myself up to hate it before even going.
(29:49):
And I remember two days before I said, why are we even going to my stabby's like, because you said you wanted to go.
And I was like, I know, because I was writing a whole thing for the Times Travel because I'm a Times Travel writer.
So I write. So I was doing that for Times Travel. And I was like, why we did this if it's going to be so rough.
So I set myself up for this whole like drama. And there was no drama. It was magical. Every part of it was just so.
(30:17):
So how are you were there writing? So you actually you weren't on a holiday.
It was a holiday. I don't write on holiday. I just go and do the holiday when I come back. Yeah. I talk into a Dictaphone and that's it.
And then we then stabby that films like most of it and we do the videos for it.
So, you know, we we starting our own travel blog, like website called Thank God You're Not Here dot com, which is because I when I was writing for the Times and I was writing, I was columnist for the Evening Standard.
(30:46):
Every week I would get edited and every week they would change. We would write things and they would change it because you can't say this.
You can't. I wrote a whole article about British Airways and I wasn't allowed to publish it because they're one of our sponsors.
And, you know, and I just thought to myself, why am I doing this? Why am I writing stuff that's going to get completely and utterly the bollocks taken out of it?
(31:13):
The real grit because I want to be honest about things. If something's shit, I'm going to say it's shit. Yeah. I don't want to say like, say, oh, it's all right.
You know, I did like, you know, last summer I did a whole I stayed in every hotel on the island in Ibiza to review them.
So I stayed in Nobu. I stayed and every all of them. I had six senses and all of them and did honest reviews of each hotel.
(31:38):
But before writing them, I went to the management and said, listen, your service is atrocious. This needs to change.
I don't want to write a bad review about you, but I'm going to come back here and stay here again in three weeks, four weeks time.
Let's see if you've changed that. And each time it got progressively worse.
So when I come to writing, you know, places like Nobu, for instance, in Ibiza, our destinations, you know, it costs a lot of money to stay in those hotels.
(32:07):
Right. So the service needs to be incredible. It needs to be an experience.
Nobu, when you go and eat in their restaurants is an experience. Right.
Anywhere in the world. And Ibiza, they got it so wrong. And the placement of it is so wrong.
It's on Talamanca Beach, which is where one of the main outlets of sewage is.
(32:28):
So the beach has been written off for years. So when you're lying there, you're getting wafts of sewage.
We call it Pooh Beach. And the thing about it is like, you know, the service was so bad.
So I wrote about it and they kept changing it. And I was like, we're not doing this anymore. I'm not doing this anymore.
I need to do an honest website where people can come.
(32:51):
We're not going to be there slagging everything off because there's been so many magical places. It just has to be honest.
No one is honest anymore when it comes to that stuff because we live in such a PC world where you can't say what you think because of sponsorship.
Yeah, I think it is very hard there, isn't it? Because if like someone is doing like a press day or a gift set, it's like, oh, well, we need to promote it in the best possible.
(33:13):
My son actually said to me, I want to create a little reviewing site from a kid's point of view, because my children have both had one of me since they were like three weeks old.
And he said, I want to call it Rocko Reviews and I'm going to talk about it from a kid's point of view.
And he was going into hotel rooms. He was opening up drawers going, well, that's a bit rubbish.
That falls out. But he was like, yeah, I want to do it from a kid's point of view.
(33:34):
I'm sorry. I'd much rather see that than read some like lame review of somewhere because they're being paid.
They've got a free holiday for it. I don't need a free holiday. Do you get what I mean?
So you set up the site. So what's the site called?
The site is called ThankGodYou'reNotHere.com.
Right. And when does it launch?
And it's launching just probably next couple of weeks, like just before Christmas.
(33:59):
And it's all the places you've been to.
It's all the places we've been to. We've done videos of them. We're getting other people to do blogs as well.
So when people are going away, we're asking them to do their honest opinion of what that place was like on their phones and then we'll upload it.
So it's kind of almost like a reader's wife's kind of part of it.
Do you get what I mean? Because I want people to be honest. If someone says I've had the best experience of my life at this place, then we'll promote that.
(34:24):
So it kind of has the opposite effect. So instead of people going, oh, we're going to fly you over for a three day press trip, which is great. Thank you.
We just had a... We went on one and we did the one and onlys in Greece. And then we went to Spain. I cannot fault that place.
Yeah. They're all amazing hotels.
The thing about it was incredible.
(34:47):
Where did you go in Greece?
We went to just outside Athens. We went to the new one and only. And then we got a boat from there across to an island called Keio.
And it was just mind blowing on the side of a cliff. All these little... You know, there was not one thing you could say bad about it at all.
And that's why the site's so important because it's not about wanting a free holiday. It's about being honest.
(35:15):
And I think people deserve an honest review. We're not out to ruin people's hotels.
You know, I stayed... There was a hotel I stayed at in Ibiza for the last four years and the food was atrocious. The hotel was handy.
The food was atrocious and the coffee. You know, you're a five star hotel and you're using a coffee machine.
(35:38):
You know, like literally, go and put your coffee cup in there and get the worst coffee in the world.
But yet you have down the other end an espresso machine that you don't use because it's too much hassle.
You're meant to be a five star hotel. Who's giving you five stars? It's that kind of thing.
Listening to you say, oh, you know, you wanted to make something of your life, you know, it's incredible.
(36:01):
Like what you've done, your music career, you know, you're now a travel writer.
Oh, yeah. We're about to, you know, this year, all of next year, we're releasing music every month.
And we have my own label called You Do You Records, which is kind of just like the next phase for me.
(36:24):
So start producing, go back into studio like I used to do 30 years ago and start producing again.
And I've had the best time doing it. And how do you... I do obviously I want to talk about your book.
And I want to talk a bit more about the clubbing scene and the music because like the clubbing scene,
would you say it's synonymous with drugs?
Well, the clubbing scene. Yeah. Depends what clubs you go to.
(36:48):
Do you know? Listen, if you go out looking for something, you're going to find it regardless of wherever rules are put in place or, you know, stringent security.
Whatever you want, wherever you go, you will find if you want it that badly.
And I kind of sense you don't like to follow the rules. I don't follow the rules. No, why would I?
You know, rules are made to be broken. And at the end of the day, you know, the clubbing scene, clubs change as drugs change.
(37:17):
All right. So I was very fortunate to come from an era in the middle of the 80s when Ecstasy came in to play and we had Acid House
and we had a whole change of key as such within dance music because it suddenly became from a place of love.
Everyone started loving each other again and loving the music and the drugs went with the music.
(37:40):
If you go to a club that's full of people taking cocaine, they're not there for the music.
They're there for the cocaine. Cocaine and music do not go together.
You are not going to have your socks off high on cocaine because all you're going to want to do is chat bullshit to somebody that doesn't want to listen to it.
So, you know, it has a different effect on different clubs.
(38:03):
So, you know, for me now, when you go to festivals or you go to these places, the majority of people who are there are having a good time because they're there because it's music led.
It's not drug led. If you're going out clubbing and you it's always the first experiences about the music.
You don't go because you know the barman sells good tequila or, you know, you're going out clubbing because for that experience and we forget about that sometimes.
(38:29):
You know, suddenly we discover alcohol and then we discover drugs and then we forget about the main purpose of why we went, which was the music.
I think nowadays it's changed a lot again. DJs and clubbing has become so much more about the music again.
I mean, DJing, don't get me wrong, it's always been about that. But what I'm saying is why people go.
They go because there's a headline DJ. They go because they know that that DJ is going to be playing what they want to hear.
(38:54):
And that's it. And then I think to a lot of the extent that everything else comes second to that.
I think it's really important.
You've had your fair share of issues with addiction.
Yeah, of course.
I've picked up your autobiography here. I don't take requests.
And the opening line is actually quite shocking of how it exposes where you were at one point.
(39:18):
I'm going to read the first paragraph, is that right?
I'm pretty sure I'd already shat myself that night.
I say shat myself, but by that stage of a bender, it would just be something like water.
And I say night, but by day five of rollercoasting, freebasing eight balls of coke and then taking three or four a hypno and diazepam
(39:40):
at a time to take the edge off the paranoia and psychosis, day and night had lost all context.
A day could be 72 hours. And the only way I vaguely kept track was by which club night we were at.
Everything had got out of control, the drugs, the sex, the money, everything.
Wow.
When you say it like that, it sounds like it's out of context. It sounds like it's a boast.
(40:05):
It sounds like they're badges of honor, but they weren't badges of honor.
That was my darkest point.
That was like literally, that was, you know, it was survival.
It wasn't, there was no enjoyment within that.
When I wrote that, you know, it took two and a half years to write that book because it brought up so much.
(40:27):
I had to go into intense trauma therapy throughout it.
There were so many parts to that book and so many parts of my life that I was ashamed of.
I carried so much shame with me throughout my life from one relationship to the next relationship.
And that's not just a loving relationship like a boyfriend or a partner.
(40:50):
That's a friendship, any kind of relationship with my parents, everything.
I had so much shame because of the stuff that happened in my life that I'd never dealt with.
When we don't deal with problems, they become so big and we become so ashamed of them
that we try to block them out and we move on to the next drama.
(41:11):
And that's kind of what happened.
So when we wrote that, it kind of is just like it's the most honest it could be because I kept going back and changing it.
Because, well, no, that's not right.
The more I kind of worked on myself, the more honest I got.
So that book started off as a totally different book.
And by the end of it, I handed it in and that night, the next night, I woke up crying in the middle of the night
(41:39):
and I rang Hannah, who was my publisher, and I said, I need to get the book back.
I need to get it back.
And she was like, why?
And I said, because I don't want people to hate me.
I don't want people to hate me.
I said, I'm all right where I am in life.
Why would they hate you?
And she was like, because of the shame that was attached to it.
Because there were so many stories in there that I thought people were going to judge me on.
They were going to turn their back on me.
(42:03):
Because that's the reason why I did what I've done most of my life.
Back then, use drugs or alcohol or use people or use other things was because I was never comfortable within my own skin.
So when you come to write that stuff and people are going to read that stuff about you,
(42:24):
I've not written, you know, I always say this to people, it's not the Gruffalo.
I've not written like this, like, happy little let's skip through the woods and take grandma some sandwiches book.
It's a book of my life.
So people know everything about you.
And, you know, it's so that was so daunting in within itself.
And then, of course, when the book came out, I remember going to get the first copy.
(42:46):
I was in Ibiza and I was there for my partner's birthday and everyone was at the villa.
And I said, I'm flying back to London tomorrow because I had to go and do a job.
And I published a FaceTime, you know, just before your book comes out there, you have a publishing call.
And they're all like sitting there and they had the copy.
And I was like, oh, my God, that's my book.
My head stood on end.
I said, can I get a copy?
(43:07):
And they went, we've only got one here, but you can you can have this.
So I got off the plane at City and I went straight to on the embankment to come out house and got the book.
And I remember sitting in the cabin.
I opened it on FaceTime to stab it and I was like, I just burst out crying because it was that relief of suddenly.
Oh, my God, this is it. It's here.
And then two weeks later, after it had been released, you know, I was at the airport and this woman came up to me.
(43:35):
She said, can I talk to you?
And I thought, oh, here we go.
And she went, I just want to give you a big hug.
And she was with her husband and her kids.
And I was like, what?
And it was just when I read your book and I just think I want to give you a big hug.
And I was just like, she said, your honesty blew me away.
And that was the first realization that I've done something good because I've still got that point of me where I had to destroy destroy it within internally.
(44:02):
My head had to destroy it because I thought that I still wasn't worthy.
I still wasn't good enough.
So how how did addiction affect your life?
Majorly, you know, it became it.
I didn't have a life in the end.
It wasn't a life.
It was a survival.
You know, towards the end, all I ever thought about was dying every day.
(44:25):
You know, it it completely and utterly I lost everything.
I lost every bit of self worth, every bit of self esteem.
I had no respect for myself.
So therefore I didn't respect anyone else.
All I knew was how to survive.
And the book, you know, in the book, I talk about that journey, but addiction took me to the very, very, very, very bottom of the food chain.
(44:56):
I was the lowest of the low.
And when you get that low, there's only one place you can go.
You either die or you go up.
And I went up.
You know, there was this moment in within which I describe in the book where the pilot like came back on and it was a flickering pilot like that one bit of hope that made me think I can I can change.
(45:18):
I can change.
What do you think it was?
Love.
It was love.
It was love from someone that I was with at the time who had been with for like nearly 10 years and he'd been through everything with me and we'd gone through this whole three years, four years, five years of drama.
(45:41):
And then that one night he came and I was in a place of despair.
And I was, he shouldn't have been there because it was in the back room of a club that he'd been barred from because he used to come to work and drag me out the DJ box and say to the promoters, you're going to find him dead on the floor, your toilet, you're going to have his blood on your hands.
And I'd be like bar him.
He's mental.
(46:02):
He's just getting in the way of my of me having a good time.
That's, you know, the insanity.
But you know, the thing was all he was doing was trying to save my life.
And that one night he came and that dad robbed his house.
And broke in his house and robbed his house where I was living, but he threw me out.
And I robbed his house and stole his brand new jeans and I'd stolen his credit card.
(46:23):
Oh, you know, the usual.
And I was off and he came to the cross that night and I was in the back room.
And I just, he walked in and someone was like, he's here.
And I was like, I can't deal with this.
And I used to sit rocking backwards and forwards.
I had no teeth at this point.
I'd pulled them all out.
I was dying.
I was literally one step away from dying.
(46:47):
I weighed about seven stone.
In fact, I know exactly how much I weighed.
Just over seven stone.
I was emaciated.
And he came and literally was like, and I thought, oh, please don't start fighting me tonight.
Because I just robbed your house.
You know, I just sit there thinking I can't deal with this.
You know, the selfishness that comes with addiction.
(47:08):
I can't deal with it.
I just robbed his house.
But I couldn't deal with it.
But he came and he just put his hand on my shoulder and looked at me and said, what happened to you?
And that was it.
That was that bit of life where the life suddenly got switched on because I looked at him and I just burst out crying.
I said, I don't know.
And we left.
And then two days later, because it was a Friday, on the Monday, I went to my GP.
(47:32):
And I said to the doctor.
So you hadn't done anything up until that point going to seek any help or anything?
Because I was helpless.
I'd got to that point where.
What was I going to do if I ever stopped taking drugs?
What was what would I do?
Because drugs were my life.
That's all I did.
At what point did you actually start drinking and taking drugs?
(47:53):
When I was 16.
16.
Started in the King's Road after work.
I would go to the Chelsea Pub on the King's Road.
And I would sit there with my friends drinking snake bite.
And then they would all go home and come 11 o'clock.
I'd still be the last one there.
And kind of that's where it started.
(48:14):
It started with alcohol.
And then I would drink into blackout.
And then slowly but surely someone once said to me, oh, if you take this, you'll be able to stay awake longer and drink longer.
And that's kind of how it started.
And it just slowly but surely crept in and it become.
I was having a good time.
It wasn't suddenly the first day I had a drink it all went to doom and gloom.
(48:38):
I had a good time for a very long time.
But I didn't know how long that time was going to go on for.
So I tried to cram as much in as possible.
And of course lost my way.
Like most people do when they're in that situation.
You say that somebody said to you about if you take this, then you'll be able to drink a bit more.
You've actually told this story many times.
But did you experience the first time you experienced cocaine was with a global rock star?
(49:03):
Yeah, it was. It was at Freddie Mercury's house.
And I told that story.
I said about that story at the end of an interview once.
And it suddenly became a tagline. Freddie Mercury gave me my first line of cocaine.
It wasn't actually Freddie.
It was like there were six other people there.
There was a tray going around.
So it was at Freddie's house.
(49:24):
Freddie didn't come up and go, you want this.
But it was within that situation.
And yet again, it's another one of those lines that sounds like it's a boast.
Or the other one was, oh, I spent over a million pounds on drugs.
That's not a boast.
That's heartbreaking.
Do you know what I mean?
(49:45):
Because it wasn't even about the money.
It was about what it did to me.
It literally left me worthless.
But look, you did incredibly turn your life around.
It's amazing.
And you got help.
So what advice would you give to anyone that was dealing with addiction right now?
(50:06):
Open your mouth.
Because if you don't open your mouth, you don't get fed.
The minute that you say to someone, I've got a problem.
The minute it takes such power to say those words, I need help.
And the minute that you say that is the minute that the ball starts to roll.
I think the thing is that where we live in such a judgmental society of anyone that has a drug problem,
(50:31):
I deal with it all the time.
I get so many people messaging me on Instagram or on Spire social media, which is a great platform to do that.
But I reach out to me about their children or their partner or their wife or their husband and say, listen.
And I always say, they go, oh, we're thinking about doing an intervention.
I'm like, why don't?
(50:52):
So the worst thing you could do speaks to the person and show them that you you're there to support them, not to judge them.
Because the first step normally with people is, oh, my God, I can't deal with this.
Oh, my God, why are you doing this to us?
It's not about you. It's not about anyone.
You know, you know, someone's in a relationship like when their husband's a drug addict, you know, take it.
(51:15):
They find out that they think they personalize it straight away and they're like, oh, my God, how's he doing this to me and the kids?
He's not your second. You're not even in the equation.
He's doing it to himself to destroy himself. And that's addiction.
So what I will say to people is always support that person, show them however painful it is to watch.
Just say, look, I'm here for you. I'll do this with you.
(51:38):
Let's talk about this. Just keep talking about it.
But in a way that shows them that you care, because being judgmental is not going to get anyone anywhere.
You know, it's like walking past that person on the begging outside Tesco's.
You know, it's quite easy to walk past them because they're drinking a can of lager, you know, and look down your nose at them, because that's what most people do.
(52:00):
They ignore them. You know, it's that one day that person might be the one that saves your son's life.
And I say that because I was that person.
You know, I was that person sitting there picking up dog ends off the street or lying unconscious on the floor.
That was me. I got walked over and walked past many times.
And, you know, today I'm in a position where I can help to change people's lives by making sure that my life is changed.
(52:27):
Well, I'm sure like people listen to this will be like, thank you. Thank you.
And, you know, take something from that advice.
Addiction is it takes no prisoners. It's the worst thing because it happens to so many people on so many different levels.
You know, it's not about sitting on a park bench drinking cider.
It's not about ending up with no teeth in a nightclub and being on crystal meth.
(52:52):
It's about so many other things, you know, work addiction, sex addiction, food addiction.
The list goes on. You know, if you see someone and you think you're working so many hours.
Why? You know, at the end of the day, all of those things I just mentioned,
all have one primary purpose and that's to have you dead at the end of it.
(53:15):
Because that's what addiction does. It wants you in a room on your own, isolated, wanting to kill yourself.
Whether it be food, work, sex, all of those things.
And don't underestimate any of those things because they're all when it becomes an addiction, it becomes a problem.
The other thing that I think is incredible, you grew up in a time where homosexuality wasn't openly talked about.
(53:39):
And pop stars like you and George Michael, you felt you couldn't be public about it.
I could. I was always public about it. I was always having sex in public.
But you know, I was always public about it. But you know, whereas George and even the other George, Regina,
even he would say that he preferred a cup of tea over sex so that he didn't have to answer that question.
(54:03):
Because we lived in such judgmental times. We just come through the AIDS crisis.
People wanting to burn down your house if they thought you were gay because you had AIDS.
That's the world we lived in. It's really hard to explain it to a lot of people
because they don't understand the actual savage times that we went through.
(54:27):
What was that? I mean, you lost a few friends.
Well, I lost my entire peer group at one point. All of my friends, circle of friends one by one.
My partner, I lost loads of people. You know, the thing about it was we lost more than people.
We lost so much more because it put us back and people just didn't want...
(54:48):
If you were gay, suddenly you could give someone a disease because the media painted us with such an awful, awful, awful brush.
It was unreal because we all deserved it. We deserved to have AIDS. We brought AIDS on ourselves.
It was a bizarre time. And you know, the sad thing is it feels like it's 2025 around the corner.
(55:12):
It feels like we're going backwards in so many ways.
The things that we thought in 1985 that we wouldn't have a problem about in 2025, we have a bigger problem about.
You know, still with the stigma that's attached to HIV AIDS, there's so much stigma still attached to it all around the world.
(55:35):
But yet, you know, it's no longer a problem. If you do something about it, you know, literally you can have an injection now that stops you transmitting.
You know, people become undetectable. They can't transmit. There's so many levels to it.
But yet there's still so much shame attached to it. Still people won't talk about it because of that past trauma.
(55:58):
That trauma is still not dealt with. It's never been brought to the table.
You know, it's kind of like, you know, recently there was that program on TV about the postman.
You know, like the postmasters all being like put sent to prison.
And that brought it all to the surface and suddenly everyone felt sorry for them.
(56:22):
So say one day we might get to a place where what went on to those people that died at that point in time or those families of people that had HIV and AIDS.
One day we might get that and we might get the apology that we all, my community, deserve.
Is that not something you think actually, you know, why don't you make the way?
(56:44):
We're doing it in other ways. You know, there's lots of film opportunity for our book, for my book.
And one of the writers wants to focus on 85 to 95 and that's Irving Welsh.
He's one of the scriptwriters on it. And for him, that's a really big era that he wants to write about.
(57:06):
I think that, you know, it's a sin touched on it, which is really great because it kind of brought it to the surface.
But it didn't go into it because it wasn't about that.
I just think that there's an awful lot of love that needs to be given back to that community.
And it really does. And I just think, you know, when it comes to LGBT plus, we're moving backwards in so many ways, you know, in the most.
(57:37):
Just across the pond, what's going on to our community, just to, you know, around the world, we're living in such troubled times.
It's kind of sad. It is really sad. You get what I mean?
Can you explain that a bit further when you say it's really, really sad?
Well, you know, there's so much war going on in the world right now. There's so much.
(57:58):
There's so many unfreedoms. People aren't allowed to be who they want to be anymore because of fear of this.
You're damned if you say something, you're damned if you don't. You get attacked for saying stuff.
You get attacked for this. You get attacked for your sexuality. You get attacked for your religion.
You get attacked for so many things. And that's the worst side to social media because as soon as you say anything or you raise your head on social media in any way on that,
(58:24):
then there's a million and one people that want to shoot you down.
But you're honest on social media?
I'm honest on social media. I'm honest because I have to be. Do you get what I mean?
You can't please everyone. The minute you try pleasing everyone, it's game over, isn't it?
So we mentioned your autobiography, I Don't Take Requests. Where did that come from, the title book?
(58:48):
Because I've never, you know, it's of course it's to do with being a DJ and not taking requests, but it's a lot deeper than that.
You know, when I was a kid and my mum would go, you're not leaving the table until you've eaten your greens.
And I'd be like, I'm not eating fucking greens. And I'd sit there all day long and I would chew it in my mouth and give it to the dog under the table.
Because the minute you tell me to do something, as that problem child with ADHD, it was not going to happen.
(59:15):
Don't follow the rules.
Shall we just be quiet? I ain't going to be quiet. You know, and I've never ever taken requests in that respect.
Never?
Well, no, no. When you read the book, you'll understand why it's kind of like, maybe if I had, my life would have been a different life entirely.
But you know, when people go, oh, when you, I've read your book, is there anything you would change?
(59:37):
I started the book by saying there was nothing I would change and there's so much I'd change.
But you know what, my life is who I am today. The reason I'm not stacking shelves today is because of what went on in my life.
You know, I've gone to rock bottom and I've climbed back up. I've done so many things.
You know, I'm in a position now since that book came out where I no longer have that shame.
(01:00:01):
I no longer carry that shame. I no longer hate myself for the past Tony. I'm really much about the present.
I love who I am today. I love what I have in my life. I don't take it for granted. There are moments I take things for granted.
Of course, we all do, you know, but then it literally snaps back in. I just think, oh my God, I'm so blessed to be here.
(01:00:26):
You know, I can get to the airport and moan about children, families getting on before me because I should be on the plane first.
You know, I will do that. And then I think, hang on, how blessed are you to be up the front on the plane?
You know what I'm saying to you? Wait, who cares? Do you know what I mean? I still do it, but you know, I do it in a way that's funny.
(01:00:49):
And my partner's like, Stabby rolls his eyes. But you know, I'm in a position where I can be loved now because I love myself.
I've never ever had that before. I could never be with one person and now I'm so content with being one person.
OK, we've got to talk about Stabby. So you never expect to settle that?
No, no, no, no. In a million years, marriage is, you know, with something everyone else did.
(01:01:13):
I couldn't think of being, I used to think, oh my God, being with one person is the most boring thing in the world
because I was so scared of intimacy that I was on the other end of the spectrum.
I talk about it in the book about sex addiction. Sex addiction is probably one of the most loneliest places on the planet.
It really is because you are just giving your soul away. You're giving so much away to strangers because you can't cope with intimacy.
(01:01:41):
And now I'm so, you know, I used to be scared of it so much of intimacy. I used to like make jokes about it all the time.
Now, because I'm lovable, it means I can love. And I've just, you know, if you told me, oh, you're going to get married in 2025,
you know, at the age of 60 almost, do you get what I mean? I would be like piss off.
(01:02:05):
But yeah, you know, I've waited a lifetime for that person because I met him 12 years ago.
It's not a lifetime because you've got a lot of life to still live.
But we met him, I met him 12 years ago. He came into my life and for one night and we went different paths.
And then 10 years later, because it was like when I met him, 10 years later, he came back into my life.
(01:02:28):
And it was at the end of a relationship that I'd been in for eight years, one of the most toxic times of my life.
And your world changed. My world has changed. My world's completely changed. I have real happiness.
I love it. I love it when you literally, your face just like that. I have real happiness. I laugh like I've never laughed before.
(01:02:52):
You know, I look at him sometimes and I just think, you know, it's a remarkable thing.
And I'm just so blessed to be getting married. I'm getting married in a club called The Limelight that is in the book
where in 85 to like 95, that was the place to go. And we're getting married in that building because it's really significant
(01:03:14):
that all the people that are no longer with us that used to be in that building can be with us.
It's just got its full circle. There's so many levels to it. Yeah, I've never.
Where are you going on your honeymoon? Have you got that planned?
You know what? I don't know that one. That's the one thing I don't know. Where are we going to go on honeymoon?
We haven't got that far. Do you know how hard it is to plan a wedding? Jesus Christ.
(01:03:39):
You know, it's like, it's crazy, isn't it? But you know what? I'm really happy about it.
Some mornings I think, oh my God, what are you doing? You know, why?
Only for like a fleeting moment of like, because of fear. I still get feared around around the most simplest things.
Wedding invites. Oh my God. Tablecloths. Stupid things.
(01:04:03):
What date's the wedding?
I don't know. May 31st. Last day of May. Yeah.
Well, it's been absolutely amazing, Chetie. Thank you so much. Thank you so, so much.
But I can't let you go without asking you one final question.
Well, you do a lot of travel. You talked about sex addiction.
(01:04:24):
Are you a member of the Mile High Club? Of course I am.
Yay! I want to know. I mean, come on. Seriously. More than once?
If you're doing long haul anywhere in the world and you're with someone, of course you're going to have sex.
Not many people say they have. A lot of people would like to be a part of it.
(01:04:45):
You know, yeah, a long time ago I joined the Mile High Club and I, you know, yeah.
Wow. Thank you so much. You are officially a member of the Mile Fly Club too.
Thank you so much. Thank you so much and good luck with the wedding. Have an amazing day.
Thank you.
And thanks to all the listeners out there. We love having you all as members of the Mile Fly Club.
(01:05:06):
So stay tuned for more fantastic episodes coming soon.
He's the world-class DJ whose hedonistic past led to A-list connections.
(00:05):
It suddenly became a tagline, Freddie Mercury gave me my first line of cocaine.
It wasn't actually Freddie, it was like there were six other people there.
There was a tray going round, the world was a different place in the 80s.
It was a really exciting time because you know, there were tribes, we had tribes then.
It was kind of like you could belong to something.
And now he's at the forefront of the global club scene.
(00:26):
Just don't ask him to take requests.
When anyone ever says well what's your favourite party or what's your favourite club, I always say it's not happened yet.
Because things always get better.
From living life in the fast lane.
Last week I was with Kanye West in Tokyo and his wife's standing there naked.
The first thing I said was oh I wish I could come and wear my bikini now.
(00:49):
I kind of sense you don't like to follow the rules.
I don't follow the rules, no, why would I? Rules are made to be broken.
Are you a member of the Mile High Club?
Of course I am.
Yay!
It goes without saying. I mean come on.
To conquering addiction.
I was helpless. I'd got to that point where what was I going to do if I ever stopped taking drugs?
Because drugs were my life.
(01:10):
DJ Fat Tony joins the Mile Fly Club for an inspiring conversation about overcoming adversity.
It takes such power to say those words, I need help.
And the minute that you say that is the minute that the ball starts to roll.
Welcome to the Mile Fly Club.
Your VIP lane to first class travel tips, tell all talk and turbulent life tales.
(01:36):
Think the Mile High Club only with more clothes but no less revealing.
Each week I'll be inviting high flying globetrotting guests to bear all in my club.
So if you're searching for some tantalising travel did pitch and a good old gossip,
you've arrived at the right destination.
Now sit back, relax and get ready to join me in the Mile Fly Club.
(01:59):
Ladies and gentlemen, we've now reached our cruising altitude.
I'll go ahead and turn off the seatbelt sign so sit back, relax and enjoy the flight.
My next guest's life has been a roller coaster of extreme highs and debilitating lows.
From rubbing shoulders with pop, rock and fashion royalty in the 80s, 90s and 00s,
(02:21):
his lifestyle was like no other and with his stratospheric rise to fame,
he fast established himself as one of the founding fathers of the UK club scene.
However, after years of struggling with addiction, he's made huge changes in his life
and is here today to share both his story and advice.
Welcome to the Mile Fly Club, Fat Tony.
(02:44):
What a life you have lived.
It's not over yet.
Of course it's not.
I like to think it's like in its second phase.
Yeah, chapters. It's all about the chapters of our lives.
Look, as a world famous DJ and musician, you've really paved the way for the current UK music scene.
I like to think I've had my finger in it, yeah.
(03:08):
I want to go back to the start though, where it all began for you in the world of music and nightlife.
Where did it all begin?
You know, I kind of worked in Kings Road when I was like 15, 14, 15 and I left school at 14.
So I got a job working in Kings Road and at that point in time, that whole,
(03:30):
that was the kind of the Kings Road was the epicentre of fashion within London.
And everyone who worked on that market started going out.
So everyone would go to clubs after work or go to start off at the pub and then they'd go to clubs.
So I kind of got into clubbing really at an early age.
So when you left school at 14 and then you said you went to work on the Kings Road, what were you doing on the King Road?
(03:55):
I was working in a place called the Great Gear Market,
an indoor market that had a record store in it run by a guy called Rusty Egan who ran the Blitz Club.
It was his music store. I worked behind that.
So I got into knowing Rusty, I got into knowing all of those people in that market that really were the scene in London.
So you had, it was the talent and the romantics.
(04:19):
Everyone who wanted to be seen went to the Kings Road on a Saturday and they walked up and down Kings Road.
Kings Road was social media at that point in time.
So to be seen, you would go to the Kings Road.
You know, you had Westwood, you had the World's End, you had everything that was going on on that scene was on that road.
You were there.
So yeah, so that's where I worked.
(04:40):
So, you know, going clubbing kind of just was the natural thing for me.
And the name DJ Fat Tony, where did that come from?
You know, I was a fat kid because, you know, certain things happen to you when you're young and, you know,
I got fat as a defence so it became like almost like a castle wall around me.
(05:05):
So that it was like a barrier to stop people from getting close.
And then, of course, what happens is when you put on loads of weight as a kid,
everyone starts to call you your name changes behind your back to which Tony Fat Tony.
So that's how I and I just accepted it. I took the name.
I thought, well, you know, I'll own that.
I mean, that's something.
(05:26):
Do you not think like as a young kid kind of going, do you know what, I'm going to own it and I'm going to accept?
Well, I kind of I was only fat for like about a year and a half anyway.
And then I kind of like lost it all and then kept the name.
You were like, I like this.
Yeah, of course.
You know, it was, you know, back then we didn't have social media, so we couldn't make up false names and hide behind them.
(05:48):
You know, it was a platform.
You had to create your own platform and the name that I was given, you know, behind my back.
I just I just completely accepted for right alone.
Brilliant. I love that.
So someone who has been in your life from before you were both famous is Boy George.
Yeah, you called Gina. Gina. Yeah.
OK. But before you became friends, you were like frenemies, weren't you?
(06:12):
Oh, you know, he I would see him every Saturday and he was coming to the great gear market.
And I'd always say something really vile to him.
And he'd always say something really vile to me. And that would be it.
That was the leverage.
But my best friend, who's going to be my best man at my wedding, which lived with lived with George.
They shared a flat. Did they live on Shooters Hill?
No, just George's where George's family live.
(06:34):
George lived in a place called Alma Square, which is in St.
John's Wood. That's where they shared the flat.
But George grew up in Shooters Hill. Yeah, because my my dad lived on Shooters Hill.
My mom worked in a school on Shooters Hill.
And I'm pretty sure they were like, oh, we regularly see Boy George around here.
The Odals were very known and well known in Shooters Hill.
You know, that's what it was. That's you know, that was his manner as such.
(06:57):
Do you get what I mean? Growing up.
So why Gina? It's just his nickname.
Do you know what I mean?
But you got your nickname Fat Tony because of what you said.
Yeah, because it's Gina. George is short. Gina is just short for George.
That's what we call him.
So you started working on the London Club Circuit in the 80s.
Tell me about that.
Well, literally it was a different place, wasn't it?
The world was a different place in the 80s.
(07:18):
You know, in the 80s, you kind of had to.
We didn't have social media. We didn't have the world that we have living today.
So you had to kind of create your own platform.
And it was a really exciting time because, you know, there were tribes.
We had tribes then. So you had punk. You had new romantics.
You had mods.
You had all of these different people that identified as a group that looked a certain way.
(07:41):
And within the gay scene, we had clones.
We had the older gays within the scene who wore check shirts and jeans.
And you know, that's how you are handled by moustaches.
You know, hence the village people.
They were all that whole look was a clone.
So you had all of these tribes going on.
And what was good about it was it was kind of like you could belong to something.
(08:07):
It was almost like a club within a look.
Do you know what I mean? So you either...
Growing up on my estate, some of my mates were punks.
Some of them were mods. You know, it kind of just how it worked.
Do you look back at that time now?
Because you've mentioned social media a couple of times now.
Obviously, the social media didn't exist.
Do you look back at that time and kind of think, wow, like,
(08:30):
they're not lucky enough now, the kids these days, because they don't have any of that.
They've got social media.
Of course.
You know, I sometimes think I'm so glad I grew up when I grew up because it taught me values.
It taught me a lot about...
It made me streetwise.
It made me realise that I had to do something with my life.
(08:51):
I couldn't just sit at home pretending to do something with my life like a lot of people do today.
You know, it's not about...
Do you feel like that about social media then?
I'm pro and against social media.
I live on social media.
But at the same time, I think that...
It makes me laugh.
I follow some accounts and I literally I laugh all day because just watching what they think they're doing,
(09:18):
you know, it's like, get ready with me.
Go away.
Who do you get ready with?
You know what I mean? It's like, go away, no one cares.
Come on my night out with me.
I was watching one in the car on the way here.
You know, it's just like this world where people buy followers.
And you know they've bought followers because they're getting six likes on a post when they got 32,000 followers.
(09:42):
They're getting six likes, four comments.
Just need to do it for Eaglet.
It's all cats and dogs following you.
You know, it's so...
That's what makes me laugh about social media.
It is really sad.
But you know, that's the world that we live in that people think that that gives them a purpose.
Which is, you know, what's the outcome of that?
(10:03):
What is the end product of that?
Because, you know, at some point you're going to stop paying for those 32,000 followers
and you're going to go back down to 1600.
And then you'll be devastated because, you know, that's the world we live in.
It's quite disastrous in a lot of ways.
But in the 80s we didn't have that.
(10:24):
We had to get up and do something.
You were flying on Concorde.
Yeah, I was when I was 18, of course.
Tell me about that experience.
What? Concorde?
Travel experience.
Not many people get to travel on Concorde.
No.
How got to travel on it?
No, Concorde was amazing.
And you did that with Gina?
No, I did quite a lot on my own.
I did the first trip with Gina.
(10:45):
But then after that I kind of would go all the time to play at the Palladium in New York
and I would always fly over on that.
And it was just, Concorde was an incredible, incredible experience.
But after the first time you'd done it, it just felt like a normal plane.
What was incredible about it?
Just the fact that you could get to New York in such a short time.
(11:06):
And also it was like, such, it was like, you know, if you're, if anyone is gold on British Airways
or a gold executive plus, you'll understand that urge to like want to keep it.
So, you know, we're flying on Concorde, going into Concorde Lounge, going through the whole rigmarole.
You know, there were two types of people that went on Concorde, right?
(11:28):
There were people that went on there for business and they wanted to get to New York quick.
And then there were like kind of a pause winners, you know, at the time, people that kind of like...
Pause winners?
You know, it was kind of like, suddenly, you know, it was like, oh, we've got, we've come into money.
So we're going to fly on Concorde. Do you get what I mean?
Yeah. I never got the experience to go on Concorde.
So I don't know, can't imagine what it was like, but yeah, you could get to New York in like four hours, was it?
(11:53):
Three hours, yeah.
You know, it was an experience because it was, you know, everyone, not everyone would do Concorde.
Were you sad when it stopped?
The headphones were great. I used to steal all the headphones all the time.
Why? What was great about the headphones?
Because they were really good headphones. They were really good, mate. They were banging Olsen and you could just like literally, yeah, they were great.
(12:16):
So what was it, because you were flying to New York regularly, what was the club scene in New York like?
Oh, everyone in London wanted to be in New York and everyone in New York wanted to be in London.
It was that whole like, kind of like the grass was always greener.
The clubs at that point were pre-Mare Giuliani, who completely raped and pillaged New York and shut everything down.
You know, it was pre-AIDS crisis. It was at that time when everybody was like living their best lives as such.
(12:44):
You know, the club scene in New York was so incredible.
Where did you prefer to be, London or New York?
Oh, New York, because it was New York and I was from London. It's like anything.
It's like if you live in the country, you want to be in London. Do you know what I mean?
It's like, so for me, it was like that whole, the excitement of going to New York and New York was like, London was, you know, you're talking free streets.
(13:10):
You know, the clubbing scene in London was free streets. It was so ho.
That's all we had. We had Greek Street, Wardour Street, Dean Street.
You know, all the clubs were basically around there on those streets and that was it.
That was the West End. You know, that was our great old and everything shut at 3am.
It wasn't too much later that clubs suddenly got later licenses.
(13:32):
But in New York, you go to clubs until two o'clock in the afternoon.
You know, there was always something on, you know, down on down on an alphabet or any of those areas.
There was so many illegal, amazing venues that you'd go in it.
And, you know, an illegal after hours drinking club in London consisted of it being in a basement underneath a kebab shop.
(13:56):
Right. In Soho, full of the worst low life people you'll ever meet in your life.
But that was the excitement of it. In New York, you went to, say, Save the Robots, which was on Avenue A, which opened at 3am in the morning onwards.
And it was an experience like you've never experienced before because you go in and there was this one bar which was filled with sand and was like,
(14:22):
like a scene from like one of those like Big Trouble in Little China type films.
Like, you know, it was all based on like, like lanterns. It was insane.
And then each floor would be different. Do you know what I mean?
So every the clubbing at that point in New York was amazing.
(14:43):
So it was it was just after Studio 54 and you had Save the Robots, you had Area, you had all these amazing venues that just were just so magical because of what they put into them.
You just mentioned the infamous Studio 54. Did you ever?
No, I never went. I was too young for Studio 54.
I came along to Alander that I did their next club, which was Steve Rubell's next club, which was the Palladium, which was a disused massive cinema down on between 7th and 8th on 12th Street.
(15:19):
And it was like it was just this incredible experience.
It was a massive club and each room was designed by different artists. They had the Kenny Schaaf room. You had all these different artists that come in and they brought them in and made this incredible space.
You've never been anywhere like it in your life because it was so big. But they each there was like 20 clubs within one club.
(15:44):
Do you have a favourite like club that you can think of?
No, because when anyone ever says, well, what's your favourite party or what's your favourite club? I always say it's not happened yet because things always get better.
Everyone's go, oh, you know, a lot of people when you talk about clubbing that don't go out anymore or had their moment at a certain era will say to you, oh, it's not the same.
(16:07):
Well, of course it's not the same. Thank God it's not the same. Could you imagine how boring it would be?
For me, there's been so many magical clubs and so many magical parties in my lifetime that it would be unfair to say one was the best.
It's like when people say to you, where's your favourite destination to travel to in the world?
That changes every week.
You can't answer it, can you?
(16:28):
Last week I was in Tokyo and at that point in time I would say to you, oh my God, I want to move to Tokyo. Every time I go somewhere new I always say I work in Libya.
Working, DJing in Tokyo?
Yeah, I was DJing. I flew over to see John Galliano and Marjela. It was incredible. Yeah, it's an amazing trip. I was there for four days.
(16:50):
Which, you know, an in and out job like that I love. I can go, I do my job, go and see the city to get enough of it to want more.
I really like that. Whenever I go anywhere and I spend too much time somewhere, I think, all right, I'm ready to go home now.
I like to leave just on the cusp of like, I've not had enough. I've not had enough of Tokyo. I will be going back to Tokyo.
(17:17):
I've never been to Tokyo.
It's an incredible experience.
Yeah, I would love to go.
Incredible. You know, when you live in London or you live in a big city, like, with such high crime rates, the UK right now, we know what's going on everywhere.
It's not safe to walk down the street wearing a watch. It's not, you know, you feel that edge all the time because that's what we're pumped full up.
(17:42):
In Tokyo, it was totally different. Everyone was just so nice and polite and clean. They had smoking areas on the street.
You know, you're not, people weren't allowed to smoke in the street. You have to go to a little glass cube to smoke in.
And just like no drinking on the street and stuff like that. It's just, it was kind of like certain areas you're not allowed to drink at all. It's just amazing.
(18:06):
It's definitely on my list. You really have partied with some of the greats in music, art, fashion, Andy Warhol, Diana Ross, Rodgers, Sade. I mean, these are amazing.
You know, there's quite a lot of new people as well.
Okay, okay. Tell us about the new people. I want to hear about the old people as well.
(18:29):
You know, those people from then, you know, I mean, and the thing is, right, when you write a book and you write your life story.
And I want to talk about you.
And in that book, you put all of those, you try not to make it the book about the other people in the books about you.
But within your story, you have to talk slightly about other people. Otherwise, it would be a totally different book.
(18:50):
So, of course, when you do interviews or whenever people, they'll always bring up the same six people.
Okay, so tell me about the others.
No, but it's true though. You know, there's been so many people. I mean, I'm very fortunate. Last week, I was with Kanye West in Tokyo.
Oh my word.
And John Galliano at dinner. John Galliano, Kanye West, and the guy that owns Diesel and owns Margiela at dinner.
(19:16):
It was one of those pinch me moments and Kanye's wife. It was just it was literally one of those like, what's going on here?
You must have constant pinch me moments.
I do. You know what? I'm really blessed within my job. My job takes me to some of the most extraordinary experiences.
I liked Kanye. I thought Kanye was great. You know, the first hour at dinner, I didn't even realize it was Kanye.
(19:37):
It was like there were six of us at dinner and he was talking to talking to us about my love of tattoos and my placement of tattoos.
And then we started talking about the word cunt for like a good hour and a half.
What did you talk about it?
Yeah, just why I'm so obsessed with it because I have it around my neck. I have it tattooed.
(19:58):
You know, I just about the freedom of using it because there's so many other things that going on in this world that people are still offended by the c word.
And it's baffling that they will focus on the c word rather than they will what's going on elsewhere because it's easier to be offended by that than.
(20:21):
What was Kanye's take on it?
Kanye loved the word, but you know, it was funny. It was just because I, as I say, at first I didn't realize.
I mean, I didn't put Kanye West, Marjela and John Galliano and myself all together because no one told me he was coming.
So when someone like Kanye turns up and his wife standing there naked, the first thing I said was, oh, I wish I would come where my bikini now.
(20:46):
She was like start naked with like tape over her breasts and parts and it was just like it was just it just flowed.
I didn't one minute think, oh, my God, I'm sitting at dinner with Kanye.
And it wasn't until later on that I kind of thought, oh, fuck, I've been with Kanye all night.
Do you know what I mean? Because it was just a natural conversation.
So you think you're a little bit starstruck by that?
(21:08):
No, far from it.
Have you ever been starstruck by anyone you've met?
Of course. I mean, Cher, I mean, I've been so starstruck by meeting Cher.
I went away to Brazil for a week on a job with for Amfa and Cher was headlining it.
And we spent that she was in the same hotel as us and spent five, four days with Cher and her son.
(21:30):
And it was amazing. Yeah.
I mean, I was completely starstruck.
So what was it about meeting Cher then that made you starstruck over anyone else that you've met?
Because it's Cher. I mean, it's like, you know, because it's yeah.
But there's legend status and then there's legend status.
And Cher is someone that I grew up watching, grew up loving.
(21:55):
You know, it's kind of just like this.
There's legends and there's legends.
And Kanye is not a legend to me.
Do you know what I'm saying to you? Whereas Cher was a legend and is a legend.
You know, it's like the first time I ever met Elton.
It was that same experience. I kind of thought, wow, I'm having dinner at Elton John's house.
Do you know what I mean? Now it's Elton. Do you know what I mean?
(22:18):
They were like, we're having dinner with you.
No, but you know what I mean? It's one of those things.
Because of how my head operates most of the time because of my ADHD.
It takes me sometimes for my wiring to like link things to other things.
So I'll go off on different tangents. And then afterwards, think, oh, my God, I just realised what that was about.
(22:44):
When you say how your head operates with your ADHD, when did you kind of realise?
I've always had it. It's not, you know, ADHD suddenly become the new board book.
Everyone uses it as an excuse for other people's behaviours.
I was thrown out of school at 14 because I was unteachable and ADHD didn't have a name then.
(23:06):
Then you were an unruly child. You know, I was unteachable because my dyslexia was so bad and so severe that I couldn't focus and I couldn't concentrate.
And I couldn't read it. I could read perfectly, but it was writing it backwards.
Every time I wrote it, it would always come up and all over the shop. And it's still the same today.
(23:28):
It's a lot better. But, you know, I understand now. I understand my ADHD.
I understand dyslexia. I understand all of those things because I've spent a lifetime of learning about them.
I don't need to be told by someone, oh, you've got ADHD. I can drink a coffee and go to sleep because that's what I do.
(23:49):
Because coffee has that opposite effect. It's stimulants. Don't stimulate me. They make me go within myself.
You know, I can spend all day running around like doing a million and one things.
The minute I sit down, I'll just pass out.
But any time I want to concentrate on something, I don't have the ability to concentrate on it. My body shuts down and I go to sleep.
(24:13):
So when your head hits that pillow after a crazy day, you're out.
It doesn't even get the chance to hit the pillow because I'll be asleep.
Say I sit down to watch a movie. I'm out like a light within the first three minutes.
My partner is always like, you're going to be asleep in a minute anyway. And I'm like, no, I'm not. I've never watched a whole RuPaul's Drag Race ever.
(24:34):
I always fall asleep around the same time and wake up at the very end. Every time.
And I always have to go, who went home? Every time. Because that's just how my brain is.
It is. You know, I don't. And I can say hand on heart, I've never watched a whole episode.
Trying to concentrate. I can have something going in the background, which won't interfere with me at all. It's like music.
(24:57):
Music soothes me. I can have music on. The minute I start to sing it or start to like partake in it, it's a different.
It's a completely different feeling. So if music is on in the background, it becomes it's kind of like.
You know, it's a calming experience. But when I'm stimulated at work from music, it has a different effect.
(25:20):
So, you know, music will take me to places that nothing else can. Yeah.
Tell me about Ibiza, because obviously you spent so much time there. We had Zoe Harman on as one of our guests. I don't know if you know Zoe. Zoe's a DJ on Heart Radio.
She loves Ibiza. Her mum loves Ibiza. You love Ibiza. Tell us a bit about it. I've been going to Ibiza since 1983.
For me, it's an island that's changed in so many ways, but also still has the magic when you walk there.
(25:47):
You still go now? Yeah, I spent the whole summer there this year. I'm there literally throughout the summer.
I'm probably back and forth from Ibiza most summers about 20 times. From April up until September, October.
I go at least this year, I think it's about 20, 25 times I flew there and back.
And you say it's obviously changed a lot. It has changed a lot, but at the same time, you know, there's parts of that island that are still untouched.
(26:16):
You know, if you want that Hawaii beef, you're a let's go clubbing experience. It's great you can go and do that.
But also there's the north of the island. There's so many parts of the island that you can go to where it's just beautiful.
So you mentioned obviously then earlier about Tokyo and the fact that you go to places and why is it Ibiza then that you've continually gone back to and never because Ibiza is not a massive island.
(26:41):
You continually go back to Ibiza and you don't get bored. Oh, I didn't say don't get bored.
Oh, no, there's a difference. You know, if I like come the end of this season, I would be because I always like I stay in Ibiza town and I would.
I that you know, if I'm there more than three days, four days on the draw, I'll be like, what am I going to do today?
(27:02):
Because I don't drive. So then I end up going to the beach and I know when I get started going to the beach, it's time to go home because I don't.
I'm not one of these people can sit on the beach for like three hours, four hours, just laying on the beach.
You sleep. I get so bored. Yeah, I get so restless.
OK, so you've traveled a lot then through work, but where do you like to travel on holiday, like on your own or with your partner?
(27:28):
I never travel alone on holiday. That's not a holiday. A holiday, you have to be with someone.
I mean, a lot of people go, I like to be on my own on holiday and rest. That's great.
But for me, a holiday is about sharing and and and finding out new things and and with someone else.
So for me, I always travel with Stavi. We always go away with we've been together like three years.
(27:52):
And in that time, we've been so many places, Cambodia, like Vietnam.
So it's a list is endless. I think for me, January, February are the times the best time to go away and just go away.
Do you know what I mean? Without the phone on, without any of that stuff.
(28:14):
Last year, when I was very fortunate enough to go on safari, we went to South Africa, went to Cape Town.
We went to. Yeah, we did. With Stavi. Yeah, we did.
We did nearly three weeks in South Africa. We went to a place called Group Boss, which was like,
but just it was like a safari, but it was an it was a plant safari. It's insane.
(28:38):
It was absolutely insane. It was mental.
You know, just being in the wilderness in the bush and just like being just like drive, looking around, going around, looking at plants.
Now, that sounds so tedious as a part of going on safari.
What do you do? Yeah, normally you go on safari. You look at like we did.
We did both ends. We did that. And then we went off and we and we went on the most incredible safari.
(29:02):
Like it was amazing. I mean, just to spend five days with lions and elephants and giraffes and rhino and hippopotamuses outside your window of the lodge.
It's just it was so magical. Yeah. So, so magical.
I went to South Africa. Oh, when my my daughter, who is now nine, when she was like two and I need to go back to my dad was born in South Africa.
(29:26):
But he's never been back since he was four. His parents both died and he was adopted and he can't go back there.
And I'm like, I'm aware it's just the most amazing place you've got. It really is the most amazing place because I, before I went, everyone was like, oh, it's really it's really it's really unsafe to walk around.
It's really this. It's really that. So I'd kind of set myself up to hate it before even going.
(29:49):
And I remember two days before I said, why are we even going to my stabby's like, because you said you wanted to go.
And I was like, I know, because I was writing a whole thing for the Times Travel because I'm a Times Travel writer.
So I write. So I was doing that for Times Travel. And I was like, why we did this if it's going to be so rough.
So I set myself up for this whole like drama. And there was no drama. It was magical. Every part of it was just so.
(30:17):
So how are you were there writing? So you actually you weren't on a holiday.
It was a holiday. I don't write on holiday. I just go and do the holiday when I come back. Yeah. I talk into a Dictaphone and that's it.
And then we then stabby that films like most of it and we do the videos for it.
So, you know, we we starting our own travel blog, like website called Thank God You're Not Here dot com, which is because I when I was writing for the Times and I was writing, I was columnist for the Evening Standard.
(30:46):
Every week I would get edited and every week they would change. We would write things and they would change it because you can't say this.
You can't. I wrote a whole article about British Airways and I wasn't allowed to publish it because they're one of our sponsors.
And, you know, and I just thought to myself, why am I doing this? Why am I writing stuff that's going to get completely and utterly the bollocks taken out of it?
(31:13):
The real grit because I want to be honest about things. If something's shit, I'm going to say it's shit. Yeah. I don't want to say like, say, oh, it's all right.
You know, I did like, you know, last summer I did a whole I stayed in every hotel on the island in Ibiza to review them.
So I stayed in Nobu. I stayed and every all of them. I had six senses and all of them and did honest reviews of each hotel.
(31:38):
But before writing them, I went to the management and said, listen, your service is atrocious. This needs to change.
I don't want to write a bad review about you, but I'm going to come back here and stay here again in three weeks, four weeks time.
Let's see if you've changed that. And each time it got progressively worse.
So when I come to writing, you know, places like Nobu, for instance, in Ibiza, our destinations, you know, it costs a lot of money to stay in those hotels.
(32:07):
Right. So the service needs to be incredible. It needs to be an experience.
Nobu, when you go and eat in their restaurants is an experience. Right.
Anywhere in the world. And Ibiza, they got it so wrong. And the placement of it is so wrong.
It's on Talamanca Beach, which is where one of the main outlets of sewage is.
(32:28):
So the beach has been written off for years. So when you're lying there, you're getting wafts of sewage.
We call it Pooh Beach. And the thing about it is like, you know, the service was so bad.
So I wrote about it and they kept changing it. And I was like, we're not doing this anymore. I'm not doing this anymore.
I need to do an honest website where people can come.
(32:51):
We're not going to be there slagging everything off because there's been so many magical places. It just has to be honest.
No one is honest anymore when it comes to that stuff because we live in such a PC world where you can't say what you think because of sponsorship.
Yeah, I think it is very hard there, isn't it? Because if like someone is doing like a press day or a gift set, it's like, oh, well, we need to promote it in the best possible.
(33:13):
My son actually said to me, I want to create a little reviewing site from a kid's point of view, because my children have both had one of me since they were like three weeks old.
And he said, I want to call it Rocko Reviews and I'm going to talk about it from a kid's point of view.
And he was going into hotel rooms. He was opening up drawers going, well, that's a bit rubbish.
That falls out. But he was like, yeah, I want to do it from a kid's point of view.
(33:34):
I'm sorry. I'd much rather see that than read some like lame review of somewhere because they're being paid.
They've got a free holiday for it. I don't need a free holiday. Do you get what I mean?
So you set up the site. So what's the site called?
The site is called ThankGodYou'reNotHere.com.
Right. And when does it launch?
And it's launching just probably next couple of weeks, like just before Christmas.
(33:59):
And it's all the places you've been to.
It's all the places we've been to. We've done videos of them. We're getting other people to do blogs as well.
So when people are going away, we're asking them to do their honest opinion of what that place was like on their phones and then we'll upload it.
So it's kind of almost like a reader's wife's kind of part of it.
Do you get what I mean? Because I want people to be honest. If someone says I've had the best experience of my life at this place, then we'll promote that.
(34:24):
So it kind of has the opposite effect. So instead of people going, oh, we're going to fly you over for a three day press trip, which is great. Thank you.
We just had a... We went on one and we did the one and onlys in Greece. And then we went to Spain. I cannot fault that place.
Yeah. They're all amazing hotels.
The thing about it was incredible.
(34:47):
Where did you go in Greece?
We went to just outside Athens. We went to the new one and only. And then we got a boat from there across to an island called Keio.
And it was just mind blowing on the side of a cliff. All these little... You know, there was not one thing you could say bad about it at all.
And that's why the site's so important because it's not about wanting a free holiday. It's about being honest.
(35:15):
And I think people deserve an honest review. We're not out to ruin people's hotels.
You know, I stayed... There was a hotel I stayed at in Ibiza for the last four years and the food was atrocious. The hotel was handy.
The food was atrocious and the coffee. You know, you're a five star hotel and you're using a coffee machine.
(35:38):
You know, like literally, go and put your coffee cup in there and get the worst coffee in the world.
But yet you have down the other end an espresso machine that you don't use because it's too much hassle.
You're meant to be a five star hotel. Who's giving you five stars? It's that kind of thing.
Listening to you say, oh, you know, you wanted to make something of your life, you know, it's incredible.
(36:01):
Like what you've done, your music career, you know, you're now a travel writer.
Oh, yeah. We're about to, you know, this year, all of next year, we're releasing music every month.
And we have my own label called You Do You Records, which is kind of just like the next phase for me.
(36:24):
So start producing, go back into studio like I used to do 30 years ago and start producing again.
And I've had the best time doing it. And how do you... I do obviously I want to talk about your book.
And I want to talk a bit more about the clubbing scene and the music because like the clubbing scene,
would you say it's synonymous with drugs?
Well, the clubbing scene. Yeah. Depends what clubs you go to.
(36:48):
Do you know? Listen, if you go out looking for something, you're going to find it regardless of wherever rules are put in place or, you know, stringent security.
Whatever you want, wherever you go, you will find if you want it that badly.
And I kind of sense you don't like to follow the rules. I don't follow the rules. No, why would I?
You know, rules are made to be broken. And at the end of the day, you know, the clubbing scene, clubs change as drugs change.
(37:17):
All right. So I was very fortunate to come from an era in the middle of the 80s when Ecstasy came in to play and we had Acid House
and we had a whole change of key as such within dance music because it suddenly became from a place of love.
Everyone started loving each other again and loving the music and the drugs went with the music.
(37:40):
If you go to a club that's full of people taking cocaine, they're not there for the music.
They're there for the cocaine. Cocaine and music do not go together.
You are not going to have your socks off high on cocaine because all you're going to want to do is chat bullshit to somebody that doesn't want to listen to it.
So, you know, it has a different effect on different clubs.
(38:03):
So, you know, for me now, when you go to festivals or you go to these places, the majority of people who are there are having a good time because they're there because it's music led.
It's not drug led. If you're going out clubbing and you it's always the first experiences about the music.
You don't go because you know the barman sells good tequila or, you know, you're going out clubbing because for that experience and we forget about that sometimes.
(38:29):
You know, suddenly we discover alcohol and then we discover drugs and then we forget about the main purpose of why we went, which was the music.
I think nowadays it's changed a lot again. DJs and clubbing has become so much more about the music again.
I mean, DJing, don't get me wrong, it's always been about that. But what I'm saying is why people go.
They go because there's a headline DJ. They go because they know that that DJ is going to be playing what they want to hear.
(38:54):
And that's it. And then I think to a lot of the extent that everything else comes second to that.
I think it's really important.
You've had your fair share of issues with addiction.
Yeah, of course.
I've picked up your autobiography here. I don't take requests.
And the opening line is actually quite shocking of how it exposes where you were at one point.
(39:18):
I'm going to read the first paragraph, is that right?
I'm pretty sure I'd already shat myself that night.
I say shat myself, but by that stage of a bender, it would just be something like water.
And I say night, but by day five of rollercoasting, freebasing eight balls of coke and then taking three or four a hypno and diazepam
(39:40):
at a time to take the edge off the paranoia and psychosis, day and night had lost all context.
A day could be 72 hours. And the only way I vaguely kept track was by which club night we were at.
Everything had got out of control, the drugs, the sex, the money, everything.
Wow.
When you say it like that, it sounds like it's out of context. It sounds like it's a boast.
(40:05):
It sounds like they're badges of honor, but they weren't badges of honor.
That was my darkest point.
That was like literally, that was, you know, it was survival.
It wasn't, there was no enjoyment within that.
When I wrote that, you know, it took two and a half years to write that book because it brought up so much.
(40:27):
I had to go into intense trauma therapy throughout it.
There were so many parts to that book and so many parts of my life that I was ashamed of.
I carried so much shame with me throughout my life from one relationship to the next relationship.
And that's not just a loving relationship like a boyfriend or a partner.
(40:50):
That's a friendship, any kind of relationship with my parents, everything.
I had so much shame because of the stuff that happened in my life that I'd never dealt with.
When we don't deal with problems, they become so big and we become so ashamed of them
that we try to block them out and we move on to the next drama.
(41:11):
And that's kind of what happened.
So when we wrote that, it kind of is just like it's the most honest it could be because I kept going back and changing it.
Because, well, no, that's not right.
The more I kind of worked on myself, the more honest I got.
So that book started off as a totally different book.
And by the end of it, I handed it in and that night, the next night, I woke up crying in the middle of the night
(41:39):
and I rang Hannah, who was my publisher, and I said, I need to get the book back.
I need to get it back.
And she was like, why?
And I said, because I don't want people to hate me.
I don't want people to hate me.
I said, I'm all right where I am in life.
Why would they hate you?
And she was like, because of the shame that was attached to it.
Because there were so many stories in there that I thought people were going to judge me on.
They were going to turn their back on me.
(42:03):
Because that's the reason why I did what I've done most of my life.
Back then, use drugs or alcohol or use people or use other things was because I was never comfortable within my own skin.
So when you come to write that stuff and people are going to read that stuff about you,
(42:24):
I've not written, you know, I always say this to people, it's not the Gruffalo.
I've not written like this, like, happy little let's skip through the woods and take grandma some sandwiches book.
It's a book of my life.
So people know everything about you.
And, you know, it's so that was so daunting in within itself.
And then, of course, when the book came out, I remember going to get the first copy.
(42:46):
I was in Ibiza and I was there for my partner's birthday and everyone was at the villa.
And I said, I'm flying back to London tomorrow because I had to go and do a job.
And I published a FaceTime, you know, just before your book comes out there, you have a publishing call.
And they're all like sitting there and they had the copy.
And I was like, oh, my God, that's my book.
My head stood on end.
I said, can I get a copy?
(43:07):
And they went, we've only got one here, but you can you can have this.
So I got off the plane at City and I went straight to on the embankment to come out house and got the book.
And I remember sitting in the cabin.
I opened it on FaceTime to stab it and I was like, I just burst out crying because it was that relief of suddenly.
Oh, my God, this is it. It's here.
And then two weeks later, after it had been released, you know, I was at the airport and this woman came up to me.
(43:35):
She said, can I talk to you?
And I thought, oh, here we go.
And she went, I just want to give you a big hug.
And she was with her husband and her kids.
And I was like, what?
And it was just when I read your book and I just think I want to give you a big hug.
And I was just like, she said, your honesty blew me away.
And that was the first realization that I've done something good because I've still got that point of me where I had to destroy destroy it within internally.
(44:02):
My head had to destroy it because I thought that I still wasn't worthy.
I still wasn't good enough.
So how how did addiction affect your life?
Majorly, you know, it became it.
I didn't have a life in the end.
It wasn't a life.
It was a survival.
You know, towards the end, all I ever thought about was dying every day.
(44:25):
You know, it it completely and utterly I lost everything.
I lost every bit of self worth, every bit of self esteem.
I had no respect for myself.
So therefore I didn't respect anyone else.
All I knew was how to survive.
And the book, you know, in the book, I talk about that journey, but addiction took me to the very, very, very, very bottom of the food chain.
(44:56):
I was the lowest of the low.
And when you get that low, there's only one place you can go.
You either die or you go up.
And I went up.
You know, there was this moment in within which I describe in the book where the pilot like came back on and it was a flickering pilot like that one bit of hope that made me think I can I can change.
(45:18):
I can change.
What do you think it was?
Love.
It was love.
It was love from someone that I was with at the time who had been with for like nearly 10 years and he'd been through everything with me and we'd gone through this whole three years, four years, five years of drama.
(45:41):
And then that one night he came and I was in a place of despair.
And I was, he shouldn't have been there because it was in the back room of a club that he'd been barred from because he used to come to work and drag me out the DJ box and say to the promoters, you're going to find him dead on the floor, your toilet, you're going to have his blood on your hands.
And I'd be like bar him.
He's mental.
(46:02):
He's just getting in the way of my of me having a good time.
That's, you know, the insanity.
But you know, the thing was all he was doing was trying to save my life.
And that one night he came and that dad robbed his house.
And broke in his house and robbed his house where I was living, but he threw me out.
And I robbed his house and stole his brand new jeans and I'd stolen his credit card.
(46:23):
Oh, you know, the usual.
And I was off and he came to the cross that night and I was in the back room.
And I just, he walked in and someone was like, he's here.
And I was like, I can't deal with this.
And I used to sit rocking backwards and forwards.
I had no teeth at this point.
I'd pulled them all out.
I was dying.
I was literally one step away from dying.
(46:47):
I weighed about seven stone.
In fact, I know exactly how much I weighed.
Just over seven stone.
I was emaciated.
And he came and literally was like, and I thought, oh, please don't start fighting me tonight.
Because I just robbed your house.
You know, I just sit there thinking I can't deal with this.
You know, the selfishness that comes with addiction.
(47:08):
I can't deal with it.
I just robbed his house.
But I couldn't deal with it.
But he came and he just put his hand on my shoulder and looked at me and said, what happened to you?
And that was it.
That was that bit of life where the life suddenly got switched on because I looked at him and I just burst out crying.
I said, I don't know.
And we left.
And then two days later, because it was a Friday, on the Monday, I went to my GP.
(47:32):
And I said to the doctor.
So you hadn't done anything up until that point going to seek any help or anything?
Because I was helpless.
I'd got to that point where.
What was I going to do if I ever stopped taking drugs?
What was what would I do?
Because drugs were my life.
That's all I did.
At what point did you actually start drinking and taking drugs?
(47:53):
When I was 16.
16.
Started in the King's Road after work.
I would go to the Chelsea Pub on the King's Road.
And I would sit there with my friends drinking snake bite.
And then they would all go home and come 11 o'clock.
I'd still be the last one there.
And kind of that's where it started.
(48:14):
It started with alcohol.
And then I would drink into blackout.
And then slowly but surely someone once said to me, oh, if you take this, you'll be able to stay awake longer and drink longer.
And that's kind of how it started.
And it just slowly but surely crept in and it become.
I was having a good time.
It wasn't suddenly the first day I had a drink it all went to doom and gloom.
(48:38):
I had a good time for a very long time.
But I didn't know how long that time was going to go on for.
So I tried to cram as much in as possible.
And of course lost my way.
Like most people do when they're in that situation.
You say that somebody said to you about if you take this, then you'll be able to drink a bit more.
You've actually told this story many times.
But did you experience the first time you experienced cocaine was with a global rock star?
(49:03):
Yeah, it was. It was at Freddie Mercury's house.
And I told that story.
I said about that story at the end of an interview once.
And it suddenly became a tagline. Freddie Mercury gave me my first line of cocaine.
It wasn't actually Freddie.
It was like there were six other people there.
There was a tray going around.
So it was at Freddie's house.
(49:24):
Freddie didn't come up and go, you want this.
But it was within that situation.
And yet again, it's another one of those lines that sounds like it's a boast.
Or the other one was, oh, I spent over a million pounds on drugs.
That's not a boast.
That's heartbreaking.
Do you know what I mean?
(49:45):
Because it wasn't even about the money.
It was about what it did to me.
It literally left me worthless.
But look, you did incredibly turn your life around.
It's amazing.
And you got help.
So what advice would you give to anyone that was dealing with addiction right now?
(50:06):
Open your mouth.
Because if you don't open your mouth, you don't get fed.
The minute that you say to someone, I've got a problem.
The minute it takes such power to say those words, I need help.
And the minute that you say that is the minute that the ball starts to roll.
I think the thing is that where we live in such a judgmental society of anyone that has a drug problem,
(50:31):
I deal with it all the time.
I get so many people messaging me on Instagram or on Spire social media, which is a great platform to do that.
But I reach out to me about their children or their partner or their wife or their husband and say, listen.
And I always say, they go, oh, we're thinking about doing an intervention.
I'm like, why don't?
(50:52):
So the worst thing you could do speaks to the person and show them that you you're there to support them, not to judge them.
Because the first step normally with people is, oh, my God, I can't deal with this.
Oh, my God, why are you doing this to us?
It's not about you. It's not about anyone.
You know, you know, someone's in a relationship like when their husband's a drug addict, you know, take it.
(51:15):
They find out that they think they personalize it straight away and they're like, oh, my God, how's he doing this to me and the kids?
He's not your second. You're not even in the equation.
He's doing it to himself to destroy himself. And that's addiction.
So what I will say to people is always support that person, show them however painful it is to watch.
Just say, look, I'm here for you. I'll do this with you.
(51:38):
Let's talk about this. Just keep talking about it.
But in a way that shows them that you care, because being judgmental is not going to get anyone anywhere.
You know, it's like walking past that person on the begging outside Tesco's.
You know, it's quite easy to walk past them because they're drinking a can of lager, you know, and look down your nose at them, because that's what most people do.
(52:00):
They ignore them. You know, it's that one day that person might be the one that saves your son's life.
And I say that because I was that person.
You know, I was that person sitting there picking up dog ends off the street or lying unconscious on the floor.
That was me. I got walked over and walked past many times.
And, you know, today I'm in a position where I can help to change people's lives by making sure that my life is changed.
(52:27):
Well, I'm sure like people listen to this will be like, thank you. Thank you.
And, you know, take something from that advice.
Addiction is it takes no prisoners. It's the worst thing because it happens to so many people on so many different levels.
You know, it's not about sitting on a park bench drinking cider.
It's not about ending up with no teeth in a nightclub and being on crystal meth.
(52:52):
It's about so many other things, you know, work addiction, sex addiction, food addiction.
The list goes on. You know, if you see someone and you think you're working so many hours.
Why? You know, at the end of the day, all of those things I just mentioned,
all have one primary purpose and that's to have you dead at the end of it.
(53:15):
Because that's what addiction does. It wants you in a room on your own, isolated, wanting to kill yourself.
Whether it be food, work, sex, all of those things.
And don't underestimate any of those things because they're all when it becomes an addiction, it becomes a problem.
The other thing that I think is incredible, you grew up in a time where homosexuality wasn't openly talked about.
(53:39):
And pop stars like you and George Michael, you felt you couldn't be public about it.
I could. I was always public about it. I was always having sex in public.
But you know, I was always public about it. But you know, whereas George and even the other George, Regina,
even he would say that he preferred a cup of tea over sex so that he didn't have to answer that question.
(54:03):
Because we lived in such judgmental times. We just come through the AIDS crisis.
People wanting to burn down your house if they thought you were gay because you had AIDS.
That's the world we lived in. It's really hard to explain it to a lot of people
because they don't understand the actual savage times that we went through.
(54:27):
What was that? I mean, you lost a few friends.
Well, I lost my entire peer group at one point. All of my friends, circle of friends one by one.
My partner, I lost loads of people. You know, the thing about it was we lost more than people.
We lost so much more because it put us back and people just didn't want...
(54:48):
If you were gay, suddenly you could give someone a disease because the media painted us with such an awful, awful, awful brush.
It was unreal because we all deserved it. We deserved to have AIDS. We brought AIDS on ourselves.
It was a bizarre time. And you know, the sad thing is it feels like it's 2025 around the corner.
(55:12):
It feels like we're going backwards in so many ways.
The things that we thought in 1985 that we wouldn't have a problem about in 2025, we have a bigger problem about.
You know, still with the stigma that's attached to HIV AIDS, there's so much stigma still attached to it all around the world.
(55:35):
But yet, you know, it's no longer a problem. If you do something about it, you know, literally you can have an injection now that stops you transmitting.
You know, people become undetectable. They can't transmit. There's so many levels to it.
But yet there's still so much shame attached to it. Still people won't talk about it because of that past trauma.
(55:58):
That trauma is still not dealt with. It's never been brought to the table.
You know, it's kind of like, you know, recently there was that program on TV about the postman.
You know, like the postmasters all being like put sent to prison.
And that brought it all to the surface and suddenly everyone felt sorry for them.
(56:22):
So say one day we might get to a place where what went on to those people that died at that point in time or those families of people that had HIV and AIDS.
One day we might get that and we might get the apology that we all, my community, deserve.
Is that not something you think actually, you know, why don't you make the way?
(56:44):
We're doing it in other ways. You know, there's lots of film opportunity for our book, for my book.
And one of the writers wants to focus on 85 to 95 and that's Irving Welsh.
He's one of the scriptwriters on it. And for him, that's a really big era that he wants to write about.
(57:06):
I think that, you know, it's a sin touched on it, which is really great because it kind of brought it to the surface.
But it didn't go into it because it wasn't about that.
I just think that there's an awful lot of love that needs to be given back to that community.
And it really does. And I just think, you know, when it comes to LGBT plus, we're moving backwards in so many ways, you know, in the most.
(57:37):
Just across the pond, what's going on to our community, just to, you know, around the world, we're living in such troubled times.
It's kind of sad. It is really sad. You get what I mean?
Can you explain that a bit further when you say it's really, really sad?
Well, you know, there's so much war going on in the world right now. There's so much.
(57:58):
There's so many unfreedoms. People aren't allowed to be who they want to be anymore because of fear of this.
You're damned if you say something, you're damned if you don't. You get attacked for saying stuff.
You get attacked for this. You get attacked for your sexuality. You get attacked for your religion.
You get attacked for so many things. And that's the worst side to social media because as soon as you say anything or you raise your head on social media in any way on that,
(58:24):
then there's a million and one people that want to shoot you down.
But you're honest on social media?
I'm honest on social media. I'm honest because I have to be. Do you get what I mean?
You can't please everyone. The minute you try pleasing everyone, it's game over, isn't it?
So we mentioned your autobiography, I Don't Take Requests. Where did that come from, the title book?
(58:48):
Because I've never, you know, it's of course it's to do with being a DJ and not taking requests, but it's a lot deeper than that.
You know, when I was a kid and my mum would go, you're not leaving the table until you've eaten your greens.
And I'd be like, I'm not eating fucking greens. And I'd sit there all day long and I would chew it in my mouth and give it to the dog under the table.
Because the minute you tell me to do something, as that problem child with ADHD, it was not going to happen.
(59:15):
Don't follow the rules.
Shall we just be quiet? I ain't going to be quiet. You know, and I've never ever taken requests in that respect.
Never?
Well, no, no. When you read the book, you'll understand why it's kind of like, maybe if I had, my life would have been a different life entirely.
But you know, when people go, oh, when you, I've read your book, is there anything you would change?
(59:37):
I started the book by saying there was nothing I would change and there's so much I'd change.
But you know what, my life is who I am today. The reason I'm not stacking shelves today is because of what went on in my life.
You know, I've gone to rock bottom and I've climbed back up. I've done so many things.
You know, I'm in a position now since that book came out where I no longer have that shame.
(01:00:01):
I no longer carry that shame. I no longer hate myself for the past Tony. I'm really much about the present.
I love who I am today. I love what I have in my life. I don't take it for granted. There are moments I take things for granted.
Of course, we all do, you know, but then it literally snaps back in. I just think, oh my God, I'm so blessed to be here.
(01:00:26):
You know, I can get to the airport and moan about children, families getting on before me because I should be on the plane first.
You know, I will do that. And then I think, hang on, how blessed are you to be up the front on the plane?
You know what I'm saying to you? Wait, who cares? Do you know what I mean? I still do it, but you know, I do it in a way that's funny.
(01:00:49):
And my partner's like, Stabby rolls his eyes. But you know, I'm in a position where I can be loved now because I love myself.
I've never ever had that before. I could never be with one person and now I'm so content with being one person.
OK, we've got to talk about Stabby. So you never expect to settle that?
No, no, no, no. In a million years, marriage is, you know, with something everyone else did.
(01:01:13):
I couldn't think of being, I used to think, oh my God, being with one person is the most boring thing in the world
because I was so scared of intimacy that I was on the other end of the spectrum.
I talk about it in the book about sex addiction. Sex addiction is probably one of the most loneliest places on the planet.
It really is because you are just giving your soul away. You're giving so much away to strangers because you can't cope with intimacy.
(01:01:41):
And now I'm so, you know, I used to be scared of it so much of intimacy. I used to like make jokes about it all the time.
Now, because I'm lovable, it means I can love. And I've just, you know, if you told me, oh, you're going to get married in 2025,
you know, at the age of 60 almost, do you get what I mean? I would be like piss off.
(01:02:05):
But yeah, you know, I've waited a lifetime for that person because I met him 12 years ago.
It's not a lifetime because you've got a lot of life to still live.
But we met him, I met him 12 years ago. He came into my life and for one night and we went different paths.
And then 10 years later, because it was like when I met him, 10 years later, he came back into my life.
(01:02:28):
And it was at the end of a relationship that I'd been in for eight years, one of the most toxic times of my life.
And your world changed. My world has changed. My world's completely changed. I have real happiness.
I love it. I love it when you literally, your face just like that. I have real happiness. I laugh like I've never laughed before.
(01:02:52):
You know, I look at him sometimes and I just think, you know, it's a remarkable thing.
And I'm just so blessed to be getting married. I'm getting married in a club called The Limelight that is in the book
where in 85 to like 95, that was the place to go. And we're getting married in that building because it's really significant
(01:03:14):
that all the people that are no longer with us that used to be in that building can be with us.
It's just got its full circle. There's so many levels to it. Yeah, I've never.
Where are you going on your honeymoon? Have you got that planned?
You know what? I don't know that one. That's the one thing I don't know. Where are we going to go on honeymoon?
We haven't got that far. Do you know how hard it is to plan a wedding? Jesus Christ.
(01:03:39):
You know, it's like, it's crazy, isn't it? But you know what? I'm really happy about it.
Some mornings I think, oh my God, what are you doing? You know, why?
Only for like a fleeting moment of like, because of fear. I still get feared around around the most simplest things.
Wedding invites. Oh my God. Tablecloths. Stupid things.
(01:04:03):
What date's the wedding?
I don't know. May 31st. Last day of May. Yeah.
Well, it's been absolutely amazing, Chetie. Thank you so much. Thank you so, so much.
But I can't let you go without asking you one final question.
Well, you do a lot of travel. You talked about sex addiction.
(01:04:24):
Are you a member of the Mile High Club? Of course I am.
Yay! I want to know. I mean, come on. Seriously. More than once?
If you're doing long haul anywhere in the world and you're with someone, of course you're going to have sex.
Not many people say they have. A lot of people would like to be a part of it.
(01:04:45):
You know, yeah, a long time ago I joined the Mile High Club and I, you know, yeah.
Wow. Thank you so much. You are officially a member of the Mile Fly Club too.
Thank you so much. Thank you so much and good luck with the wedding. Have an amazing day.
Thank you.
And thanks to all the listeners out there. We love having you all as members of the Mile Fly Club.
(01:05:06):
So stay tuned for more fantastic episodes coming soon.
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