I had Careless Whisper on my mind all Christmas Eve. It was, of course, George Michael’s big sentimental 80s hit. It lingered so profoundly that I googled the lyrics to see they had some strange personal resonance. I also cursed Mercury Retrograde.
And now, of course, we hear that the musician has passed, peacefully in his sleep. So…some random pictures and observations:
Princess Diana apparently had a huge crush on George Michael, they met and became firm friends. In a weird way that probably only Generation X people would appreciate, friendships like these in the olden days (intense affinity between females striving to define themselves and gay men) among well-known people were totemic.
George Michael was an intensely talented musician and performer, obviously, and he deserves every accolade for this. But he also morphed into a kind of tabloid persona and at these times, I would have arguments with people insisting he was a Leo.
He wasn’t but it was understandable that they thought this. He was a Cancer and with Cancer Rising – but his Moon (the chart ruler) was in LEO. When he talked about having this character that he sort of pimped out to be the ‘sexy guy’, I feel like that was his Leo Moon writ large.
He also had the asteroid Dionysus rising- as in ‘Dionysian revels.’ Dionysus is the Greek God of wine, sex, pleasure, poetry, music…of losing yourself in sensual ecstasy. Clubbing, dance, drugging, trance, living for beauty, and the moment are all super Dionysian. Another 80s phenom (Frankie Goes To Hollywood reference Dionysus in one of their big club hits of the era). Dionysus the God rode into town on a Panther, looked amazing, fuqed like – well – a God, and was (usually) gay.
George Michael also had a beautiful Neptune-Lilith conjunction in Scorpio and in the 5th House, the performance sector. Neptune is the ultimate Muse and Lilith is the outsider woman.
Yes, I appreciate that the key females associated with the public George Michael were 90s supermodels but still, he gave us something besides his music and the showmanship, epic as it was.
Thoughts?
“Last Christmas, I gave you my heart
But the very next day, you gave it away
This year, to save me from tears
I’ll give it to someone special”
Gone but not forgotten, and despite his many troubles, he still had a self deprecating sense of humour. Search for “George Michael James Corden” and find the original carpool karaoke.
Happy New Year
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgiBdK_-N0Y
just keep on funkin’
hes gonna b buried next to his mum, in highgate cemetary x
The way he turned his arrest into a celebration of outdoor sex and smash hit with “Let’s go outside”! Icon!
A lot of lilithy-cancerian ladies I know identify with him intensely.
What a man.
Rode into town on a panther.
Myst, you summed it up there.
Loved his fallibility when he got arrested after picking someone up in the public toilets. His work for aids charities. His beauty and cool.
Vale gorgeous George xx
I’m Gen X. I’m Greek. I’m a Cancer. I can understand George’s discomfort with fame, yet having a fire moon that makes it hard to hide away.
I never “fancied” George in the traditional sense of the word and looking back over Wham! videos reminiscing … it is so blatantly obvious he is gay. I was 13, living in a semi backwater. So whilst I knew about homosexuality in a general sense, it was not something I had a clear understanding of.
George Michael and Boy George painted the different face of gayness for me in my youth. Prince & Bowie just painted a different picture of sexuality altogether!
I think it was a pivotal time for sexuality in general.
My mum held no homophobic ideology so I grew up very accepting that it was all just a normal part of life variance. Before the 70s and 80s though it was all still “couched” in heterosexual motifs. We Gen X’ers pretty much went “I really don’t give a fuck” … and blew the norms of sexuality and gender identity out of the water.
Funnily enough when I was 8 and reading probably too much Enid Blyton, I cut off all my hair and insisted that everybody called me George.
Another thought … all this rap/contemporary r&b stuff is rabidly heterosexual in it’s motifs. I mean over the top with it to the point of offensive and a complete turn off.
Pluto Libra/Scorp … you got gross and tacky.
I grew up with lots of Greek kids and would occasionally go to the Castelorizian ‘cazzy’ club in our area. Crazy bastards, lovely wild people with an incredible pride in their heritage. Most of them were shaving by the age of 9 and nearly married by 17. I never went near the Greek beauties, too scared of their parents or older relatives 🙂
I adored George – he never left my radar, he entranced me in the WHAM days and featured heavily on the soundtrack of my teenage years.
The song Praying for Time has always struck a chord with me and was my anthem for 2016. We have dealt with family deaths, illness, unemployment and all kinds of stress and strife and through all of it have come out realising that the most important thing we have is our time and we must use it well. Thank you Saturn / Neptune for revealing things to us and George for being amazing for us. Cos you gotta have faith.
Ps I was not surprised to find Dionysus conjunct my sun and Venus in Pisces tenth – haha! I’ve always loved a good party. Always last to leave and loudest to laugh.
I have a few George moments. I remember seeing George in the early 80s. I was living around Elizabeth Bay and he was staying at the Sebel Townhouse up the road. That was where all the rock stars stayed at that time, it was very handy to the bars and clubs of Kings Cross and it was still a time when a rock star could wander around the cross and enjoy the delights of Sydney without being hassled. I saw George fully enjoying himself in a couple of those clubs and it’s well known now how much he enjoyed his times in Sydney.
Then a few years later when I was in the holography business George became the first person to use a hologram on the front cover of a single. A friend did the order and Faiths original limited edition single release had the hologram. Does anyone have one ? I did but it’s lost.
I think Prince and George expressed a form of male sexuality that was revolutionary, it changed the lives of a lot of men and appealed to so many women. They introduced a form of sensuality to western men that firmly placed the woman into the lead role, to be adored as the source of pleasure. In many ways this allowed many women to also more freely express. They both understood the concept of bliss and there is no higher teaching.
Thanks George so much for everything you gave us.
^like
Thanks for your comment, memories! David Bowie living at Kincoppol started it all and Marilyn beat up finished it.
Well, when you think about it, “Last Christmas” is Cancer AF
I wasn’t a huge fan but his music was always there in the background and I appreciate that he lived honestly with great gusto. It seems that many of the artists that passed this year really lived their truth. Is this why we grieve for them or us this just what being an artist is? And I guess we don’t get to see many non-celebrities interviewed about their life choices or would care about them as much if we did.
What is it about this year? Is there an astrology signature for this wave of departures? And does anyone know if this is going on in other cultures or just the Western world?
I’ve read that in numerology that 2016 is a number 9 year, which means a year of completion. That’s been the only explanation that remotely makes sense to me in a ‘big picture’ sort of way during this crazy year…
You Have Been Loved.
This was my George song. I had the album and it played through my split from my first husband just after the birth of my cappy daughter. He’d gone and I was so totally alone and desolate. Just me and the child. Glad to know george was a cancer. He definitely hit a spot for me.
Really enjoyed this post … I really liked your comments about The relationship between Princess Di and George was on point ! It really was a great observation … Very much tied to that late 70s – early 90s era. Two such iconic people against the establishment by wanting to be themselves ! And how Super Cancerian is Father Figure … Fathering in a mooney kinda way …
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=m_9hfHvQSNo
I too was listening to George Michael on Xmas Eve in Sydney and my favourites are Different Corner and his version of Somebody to Love. For an album I think Older is great listening. He seemed to have really lived his life as he chose to do so and Dionysus captures his essence. Love the choices of photos Mystic.
53 years hits hard when you are 52 and maybe that’s what people like me are finding difficult with this death. Plus he was part of the soundtrack of our youth.
I love this post and I most certainly had Last Christmas in my mind before the news broke. Moon in Leo … It’s perfect.
Unfortunately, I really don’t think that the deaths of our icons are going to ease in 2017. It’s simply the generation for it.
Yep. If you get past your 50s without any diseasea or simikar u r doing well said from from experience as a youthful baby boomer. Dont know many peeops my age who have not had a scare or are living with some sort of condition
I cried when I heard of George’s passing yesterday.
At that retail job I was doing last month, their Christmas music playlist was very 80s/90s and ‘Last Christmas’ was in heavy rotation. Listening to that over and over reminded me how much I loved George’s voice…..such an angelic, beautiful and strong voice!
Then last week my brother sent me a soundcloud of his friend’s 80’s Christmas radio show and I said to him, oh, does it have George Michael on the playlist? So, he was back on my mind recently when I hadn’t really heard any of his songs in awhile…
I watched the Freedom video last night and a live performance with Elton John of Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me. I showed that one to my millennial housemate, because he hadn’t heard of George. I cried during the video again….
Anyway, George’s music figured prominently in my university years (I am Gen X, too), and in my social milieu, which was a lot of gay men. Freedom was definitely an anthem for us at that time, and that song came out right in the middle of the AIDS crisis, which was especially pronounced here in San Francisco.
It must be difficult to have Crab rising and be such a public figure. I have Crab rising, myself, and often just want to hide away, even though I’m not really an introvert. Anyway, in an article I read last night, George was quoted as feeling like he put on a whole different persona for performing, but privately struggled with depression.
I love his recording of Stevie Wonder’s ‘They Won’t Go When I Go’.
If you haven’t cried yet, you will now………
https://youtu.be/-AlPZ4_LsSs
The lyrics seem so fitting, too, even though this wasn’t originally his song–
No more lying friends
Wanting tragic ends
Though they do pretend
They won’t go when I go
All those bleeding hearts
With sorrows to impart
Were right here from the start
And they won’t go when I go
And I’ll go where I’ve longed
To go so long
Away from tears
Gone from painful cries
Away from saddened eyes
Along with him I’ll bide
And they won’t go when I go
Big men feeling small
Weak ones standing tall
I will watch them fall
‘Cause they won’t go when I go
And I’ll go where I’ve longed
To go so long
Away from tears
Unclean minds mislead the pure
The innocent will leave for sure
For them there is a resting place
People sinning just for fun
They will never see the sun
For they can never show their faces
There ain’t no room for the hopeless sinner
Who will take more than he will give
He’ll give, he’ll give
He ain’t hardly gonna give, oh yeah
The greed of man will be
Far away from me
And my soul will be free
They won’t go when I go
Since my soul conceived
All that I believe
The kingdom I will see
‘Cause they won’t go when I go
And I’ll go
Where I’ll go
No one can keep me
From my destiny, yeah
They won’t go when I go
HOW is it even possible to never have heard of George???
Has this millennial avoided ALL media? So okay, I know a lot of millennials don’t listen to the radio but I’m sure George has been referenced in movies and tv shows.
He must not like music or something. I mean, there were plenty of artists who weren’t around when i was a kid but i took the time to find out. (i’m Gen X btw)
My housemate is 21 years old, and from a small town in France…. Once I showed him the video, he said he vaguely knew who George was. He had definitely heard of Elton John… I don’t know, man…. I asked him what kind of music he likes and he said mostly electronic, I guess like EDM stuff….
And here is his Cancerian influence:
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/dec/26/the-philanthropic-acts-of-george-michael-from-5k-tips-to-nurses-gigs?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
Thanks for posting Amelie, what a lovely heart and soul he had.
I don’t normally go in for celebrity grief. My Aquarius Moon simply says ‘they were just people’. But this. It’s too much. I’m devastated. Vale George Michael.
Beautiful voice, like caramel, or velvet? Such a romantic and sexy man. Loved him on Extras (loved David Bowie on Extras too), such self- deprecating humour, his voice was/is so alluring? I can’t find a word to aptly describe his beautiful, resonant voice. His music is so unabashed, heartfelt. I hope he had happiness 🙂
This year, to save me from tears, I’ll give it to someone special – Indeed. The universe called his heart back this Christmas.
I was a shade young to be a huge fan but he seemed like a fixture in the media for the majority of my preteen and teen years.
Faith always made me feel happy when it came on the radio and Freedom with it’s supermodel roster is such an iconic snapshot of my transition from 6th grade still playing with dolls to 7th grade sneaking out and drinking pilfered strawberry daquiri out of plastic pop bottles feeling soo grown up.
RIP to another icon. Hope there’s a killer party happening in the cosmos right now.
Mystic, I love your comments about the relationship between George Michael and Princess Diana…so on point. Due to a combo of too young/not allowed to listen to mainstream music during my religious fundamentalist upbringing, I never was a huge fan, but as a queer lady I looked up to him for his extreme outness and general persona. I’m also Cancer sun/rising/Dionysus and Leo moon, and my Leo side definitely shows strongly…
This one has hit me hardest of all for some reason. Beautiful George, indeed.
Me too.
Me too.
Hit me hard too. I’m thinking it was the eighties aspect. Had so much fun then. And we all thought we were so powerful and super badass when really it was a time of innocence compared with the shizz we have to deal with today.
so true about the innocence. Pre internet days. People use to talk to one another when they went out. Now we’re so “connected” but disconnected as well.
This is freaky – me too! Thursday I was doing my marathon cookie baking and had teh Christmas jamz going in the background for mood. “Last Christmas” came on when I stopped and suddenly thought to myself “Huh, George Micheal. Haven’t heard anything about him in a while – I wonder how he’s doing?” Immediately after that thought, the playlist in my head turned on and I heard the chorus singing the words “Freedom, freedom, freedom…”. I had always liked the song, so didn’t think anything of it at the time. When I heard of his passing shortly thereafter, it weirded me out knowing I was thinking about him wondering how he was while hearing “Last Christmas” and “Freedom” at the same time, which in retrospect must have been a bit of a musical premonition that he was leaving us. RIP George!
“All we have to do now, Is take these lies & make them true somehow…All we have to see, Is that I don’t belong to you, And you don’t belong to me yeah yeah! Freedom, freedom, freedom – you got to give for what you take…” Love, LiberatingVenus
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=diYAc7gB-0A
Thank you for sharing. I hadn’t seen that in years.
He also had Apollo rising in Cancer.
Interestingly Dionysius was another form of Osiris it is said by Isidora. I suppose most things Greek are truly Egyptian.
“Plutarch.. notes that the procession for the Apis bull looks very much like a Dionysian procession, thus both Osiris and Dionysos are Gods connected with the bull. Both Gods are torn to pieces—Dionysos by the Titans and Osiris by Set. Both Gods are resurrected afterwards; Dionysos by being born again of Semele and Osiris by being magically born again after Isis reassembles Him. Both Gods are Lords of Moisture, both are associated with trees. One of the sacred plants of Dionysos, ivy, is called by the Egyptians, “the plant of Osiris.””
Osiris is Lord of Renewal. I like the idea that George might personify the ecstacy of light filled, drug induced renewal.
I think his cheekiest public renewal was after being caught by the police in a public loo & publically shamed, which he then turned into the hit “Let’s go outside” and sassily dressed up in camp police officer uniform making fun of the incident.
(My Dionysius is in Virgo/3rd conjunct my Pluto/IC fwiw)
If like gives you a scandal just own it. 😉
Dionysious dominated the 80’s…wine, dancing excess!
I wonder if his Lilith had anything to do with ‘Outside’. It’s such a great ‘fuck you’.
its amazing that song.
how to own your own scandal eh?
never got tired of the video either, its fantastic!
just really sad…sooo many amazing songs….heart failure at 53 though?
and on christmas day…sheesh. rest in peace x
I mean….. Father Figure…. just unbelievable songwriting.
omg yes…father figure…awesomeness
This is the song that has been playing in my head all day.
Beautiful George. His death has hit me harder than the other heroes who passed this year; I got a little teary which surprised me.
But his heavy placement of canny Cancerian smarts & Leo soul warmth makes sense for me feeling moved by him, being heavy in those energies myself. He seemed very loving and generous to me? Even his duets and welcoming of other famous types into his life and work were more notable and successful than some other celebrities. I love his duet with Aretha, “I knew you were waiting for me”, such an anthem.
He was too young. Dionysian but such an Icarus figure too I think. Fame’s seering hot eye seemed to overwhelm him a bit…
Yeah, I knew you were waiting was the first song I played when I heard. Been singing it all day.
The 80s hair and lifestyle of excess did nod to Leo so didn’t realise he was a Kataka. Although I remember how supportive and nurturing he could be to friends- remember when Gerry left the Spice Girls. A true talent and artist, he will be missed. He was the soundtrack of my youth but continued to evolve.RIP George
I want your sex was on high rotation in the 90’s for me when starting my first relationship post divorce. Great memories. RIP.
George Michael popped up on our Spotify playlist on Christmas Eve. I began telling Miss 16 about him and his special place in pop culture and how she must listen to “Faith” then I thought “oh, we will find out soon that he is dead”. And we did.
wow, that’s trip…although not unexpected this yr :-(. This not-quite a premonition seems to be a bit of a theme. Lots of my friends are claiming to have been unexpectedly playing his music that night or the day before. I hadn’t thought of him in aeons (not a huge fan, although can appreciate his talent) but the night of the 23rd I got stuck in a conversation about 80s music with some random guy who just kept banging on about George Michael this, George Michael that…
So sad by this. Yes,he was definitely our Gen X Greek God that is for certain. I still love the sumptuous aspect of of absolute beauty that is his Freedom film clip and his posse of super models.
He totally personified the 80’s for me. I know that careless whisper and freedom made him but I will forever be doing a Molly ringwald side to side shuffle to wake me up before you go go and jumping in with, “I gave you my heart” whenever someone dares to pause after saying,” last Christmas”.
I used to think Leo too. Total showmanship.
Oh go away 2016. I loved the way he just lived his truth.
Totally agree, usually a massive disaster dominates a year but in 2016 it was music idols. Sucks
We can all be thankful that Keith Richards will live another 12,000 years at least 😉