Lips Unsealed (16 page)

As I waited for a cab, I was positive that plainclothes detectives had me under surveillance. Several walked slowly past me, turned, and made eye contact, which I assumed meant they wanted me to know that they were aware of me. How? Well, either they had hidden cameras in the bathroom or they had noticed that I was completely gone. There was also the possibility I was paranoid.

On my fourth attempt, I finally made it back to London. There, I found the girls in their own state of disarray. Charlotte vanished for a week, and none of us had a clue where she had gone. We were extremely concerned until she popped up again not much the worse for wear. Gina was constantly fatigued or sick and going through her own struggles. Then, in the middle of making the album, Jane decided she wanted to sing some of the songs, and she kind of flipped out when she was told no.

As I knew, the word “no” was a hard thing for any of us to hear. We were not told no that often, certainly not as much as we should have been. I understood Jane’s problem. She was cute, full of personality, and she wrote some of our best songs; she had an ego like anyone else, yet she stood off to the side, and it bugged the crap out of her—until finally she blew.

Jane resented me for getting all the attention. She’d had moments like this before. Sometimes it was about boys, and sometimes, like this time, it was about the spotlight. I didn’t think it was true, and in fact I knew reviewers paid as much, if not more, attention to the songs as to me. Unfortunately for her, the band was built around one lead singer, around that singer’s look and sound, and that job belonged to me.

I suppose we could’ve talked it out, but that wasn’t the way I handled problems. My way was to ignore them, to pretend they didn’t exist. If I didn’t confront Jane, she wouldn’t confront me about any of my problems. And that’s pretty much the way the Go-Go’s functioned in general. No one busted anyone. And maybe that’s why, despite all the crap and chaos going on in the band, the five of us still hung out together.

But that was about to change. One day Jane just couldn’t take it anymore. She smashed the mirror in her hotel room and flew back to the States. When she returned, she had decided to leave the band and pursue a solo career, though she kept that news from us for a few more months.

In many ways, it’s remarkable we were able to make an album given the nonstop drama. Even more remarkable, I think it’s the best
Go-Go’s album. There’s no doubt that when we were in sync, the five of us had a special chemistry and spirit. Like on “Head over Heels,” a great song, classic Go-Go’s, and still among my favorites to perform. It perfectly captured our state of mind at that point in time. “Beneath the Blue Sky” was another favorite of mine, a beautiful song whose vocals were, unfortunately, too complicated for us to ever do live.

As for the others, well, Jane wrote “Forget That Day” about a guy she had met in Amsterdam, and “I’m the Only One,” while a good song from Kathy, never felt to me like it belonged on a Go-Go’s record. A number of songs probably shouldn’t have been on the album but made it anyway because people insisted on publishing credits. And then there were those I didn’t get. “Turn to You,” for instance, was one of my least favorite songs (the video was even more hideous, I thought), and yet the
Rolling Stone
album review that would appear a few months later called that particular tune the “best in the bunch.” Go figure.

By February, we were back in Los Angeles with an album that, despite all the personal ups and downs we went through while making it, generated a buoyant optimism at the record company. As we rehearsed for a new tour, we got behind it, too. On March 15, “Head over Heels” was released as the first single, and the next day IRS put out the entire LP. There was no chumming the water; this album was going to live or die on our shoulders. It didn’t look promising.

A
Los Angeles Times
review a few days after the album’s release called it “awkward,” noted the absence of catchy pop hooks, and said “the songs demand more work from the listener, and the elaborate melodies certainly demand more of singer Belinda Carlisle.” Unfortunately, I agreed. Deep down I knew that I had bitten off more than I could chew on that album. Unlike the other girls, I hadn’t worked on my craft as hard as I should have.

I would develop into a decent singer later, but at the time I didn’t improve as much as I would expect myself to if I was able to go back and do it over again. But my vocals were the least of our problems.

I didn’t know what to do with my life. After we returned from London, a stewardess friend of mine set me up with her cousin, a nice, very religious, normal guy from Northern California with whom I spent time, but
I knew he was a fake boyfriend. I used him to fill a void. I had to have someone around. I never wanted to be alone. God forbid I face myself.

Then I decided I didn’t want to be with anyone. With a long summer tour ahead of us, I thought it was a good time to be by myself, a free spirit not beholden to anything but my own whims and wiles. What a crock!

In reality, I sat in my condo with the lights off and the curtains drawn, doing lines and smoking cigarettes. But my well-being was secondary.

In mid-March, after months of declining energy and nagging illnesses, Gina saw a doctor and was diagnosed with a heart murmur. She wore a monitor on her chest during several rehearsals. I couldn’t have been more mistaken in thinking it wasn’t serious. Along with the other girls, I went with Gina to her doctor’s office and sat with a slack jaw and a face pale with worry as her doctor explained that she had a marble-sized hole in her heart, a birth defect that had finally caught up with her, and needed open-heart surgery.

An operation was scheduled for ten days later. Then the five of us did what we did best—we went into denial.

We rented a Cadillac and a Jaguar, packed enough drugs and alcohol to ensure that we didn’t think about Gina’s upcoming surgery, and drove to Palm Springs. We checked into a bungalow at Two Bunch Palms, a rustic spa to the north of the desert outpost. But I don’t recall booking any spa treatments. We slept during the day and partied at night. Gina didn’t partake, of course, but the four of us did enough to keep her spirits high.

A week later, she went in for open-heart surgery and came through without a hitch. I visited her a few days later in the hospital. Despite the IVs and monitors, she looked healthier than she had in weeks. Color had returned to her face. When the nurse left the room, I sat down on the side of her bed and jokingly whispered, “I have some coke. Do you want any?”

BY SUMMER 1984, Gina was fully recovered, and the band was sharp and well rehearsed. I decided not to think about questions dealing with our future, like the one
Rolling Stone
writer Chris Connelly posed in his review of
Talk Show
when he asked if the album would revive the Go-Go’s cooled career.

We were hopeful upon the album’s release, but we knew where we stood when “Head over Heels,” our first single, peaked at number 11, and the album itself didn’t break the top 25. We didn’t know if it would go gold, which meant selling half a million copies. We didn’t need to be told it was a disappointment, and none of us talked about how it would affect the band, or at least we didn’t talk about it openly. Perhaps that was because it already had affected us.

At the end of June, as we set out on tour, the Go-Go’s were divided into two camps. There were the good girls, Jane, Kathy, and Gina; and then there were the bad girls, Charlotte and me. Drugs and sometimes people’s egos were usually the issues that created such factions. Those were very much issues when we were on the road, as were uncertainty, disappointment, and ennui.

As a house divided, it was difficult and often tense since we knew we were all saying things about one another in private, yet we also knew there wasn’t that much to say that we didn’t already know.

Our best times were still onstage when we came together and then afterward when we hit the town. Like in New York. After playing Radio City Music Hall, there was a party for us at Private Eyes that drew all of Manhattan’s in crowd, including Liza Minnelli and Andy Warhol, whose
diary noted, “It was just the party of the year.” I don’t know why he would have said that; he also gushed about getting free drinks.

Most of our nights were pretty crazy, thanks largely to being on a monthlong tour with INXS. The Australian rockers weren’t just an amazing band; they were pretty amazing partiers, too. They were riding high on the single “Original Sin” off their newly released album,
The Swing
. All of us clicked immediately. We were kindred spirits. I don’t know if that was a good thing, but it made for fun on-and offstage.

That was particularly true in the case of INXS’s lead singer, Michael Hutchence, and me. We were attracted to each other as soon as we met. He was a sexy, sensual man, with great eyes that didn’t suck you in as much as they made you want to
jump
in. He had all the goods to make him a great lead singer: hot looks, an animal-like sexuality, a mysteriousness, and the ability to deliver to an arenaful of people and touch the person in the back row. That’s raw power, and it was packaged perfectly. Imagine trying to deal with that force of personality when he’s right across the table from you.

We talked backstage in his dressing room and in mine. We also sat on the stage and then shared tea at a table in the catering room backstage. He was full of conversation about any subject, yet when he listened I felt like there was no one else in the world talking but me.

I knew something was going to happen between us before there was any discussion or a move in that direction, and I warned myself in the strongest of terms that he wasn’t the kind of person to get serious about. Once I was satisfied I could handle that, which was about two days into the tour, I gave in to Michael’s charms and we hooked up.

We had fun, and I had to keep reminding myself not to let him get under my skin. He had a serious girlfriend, but he admitted that he also had many “friends” and preferred that arrangement. That was one more reminder that if I let him into my life he would be the death of me. I didn’t need to have any more messes in my life.

We watched each other perform, partied after the shows, and eventually disappeared into one or the other’s hotel room for the night. His charms were strong, and I quickly felt close to him. I felt like he understood me. He had that way about him, yet I constantly reminded myself
to keep a distance and protect my heart. I was partying pretty hard at the time, harder than even Michael, and at one point the girls in the band asked him to speak to me after I lost my voice from doing too much coke.

He wasn’t the kind of guy who was going to save anyone, but he tried. He talked to me about the responsibility the singer had to the band, the record label, and the fans. He was extremely thoughtful and insightful about the special place we occupied in the imaginations of our fans.

“They fantasize about much more than is really there, don’t you think?” he asked.

“Very much,” I said, and for a moment I considered confiding how little I thought of myself, and how frightened I was that people were going to find out that I was nothing more than an imposter.

It would have been very easy to go there, but I feared it would have been letting Michael too far inside me. Ultimately I knew that revealing myself to him would only result in disappointment. As a result, I thanked him for sharing his concern but kept on doing my thing, which disgusted my bandmates so much that at one point on the tour they actually quit talking to me. It didn’t last long, and neither did my summer fling with Michael. At the end of July, we said good-bye and Michael and I had a sweet, romantic, and passionate last night together that was a little sad and something of a relief and, in retrospect, kind of interesting in that we promised to remain friends, which we did until his death.

There was also a much bigger, more important breakup in front of me.

Toward the end of the INXS tour, Jane informed us that she was leaving the group. She said she would stay through the tour’s last stop in Texas in October, but then she was going out on her own. When asked why, she said that she’d simply had enough and needed to do her own thing. She had considered leaving before, she said, but stayed through this album and tour out of loyalty to the band.

I understood Jane’s reasons. She was articulating frustrations that had built up over months, if not years. I had been acutely aware of her
feelings when we had recorded our album in London, and frankly, by now, it was an old story, one I was sensitive to but couldn’t do anything about.

I had plenty of sympathy for Jane, and I understood if she wanted to sing and write all the material on her own album. My big fear was the future of the Go-Go’s, and likewise my future, which was tied to the band.

We’d been together for seven years. All of us had grown up and changed. We weren’t kids anymore. Now we had lawyers and business managers. When we had gone to England to make
Talk Show
, I had feared it might be the beginning of the end of the Go-Go’s, and with Jane’s departure, it looked like the end had arrived.

We continued on through August, performing in Northern California and working our way to Los Angeles. When we got home, I learned Michael Hutchence was also in town and hoping to see me. I considered it, and knew we would have a good time if we got together. But I was feeling extremely vulnerable and didn’t know if I could handle seeing him. In the end, I sent word that I was busy.

It was one of the rare times I said no. I heard he was upset, but I did what I had to for my own self-preservation.

In the meantime, Los Angeles was the place to be. The Summer Olympics had started on July 28 and the city was filled with athletes and parties. The air crackled with electricity, especially at night. I attended a night of events and a party at the invitation of Tom Hintnaus, an Olympic pole vaulter who was more famous as a Calvin Klein underwear model.