Music

Boy George age, net worth, real name, relationships and why he went to prison

Boy George age, net worth, relationships and why he went to prison
Boy George is a beloved British singer associated with the 1980s pop scene, but what do we know about him? (Picture: Getty)

He may have famously sung Give me time to realise my crime… but did you realise Boy George once actually went to prison?

The Culture Club singer has had a very colourful life indeed, matching his often colourful hats and make-up.

So what do we know about the life of Boy George?

Whats his real name? How much is he worth? And why was he locked up?

Boy George age, net worth, relationships and why he went to prison
The band Culture Club, featuring drummer Jon Moss second left, catapulted Boy George to stardom when he became their singer (Picture: Getty)

Boy George is a 56-year-old pop provocateur, born June 1961 in Eltham, London.

His real name is George ODowd, and while his life has been full of fame, fashion and love affairs, its also been marred by drug addiction.

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Known for his outrageous and androgynous dress sense, first inspired by the New Romantic movement in the early 1980s, his band Culture Club has given us some golden hits.

They include Karma Chameleon, Do You Really Want To Hurt Me?, and Time (Clock Of The Heart), but Boy George has also had a solo career since the late 1980s.

Boy George age, net worth, relationships and why he went to prison
The sartorially-imaginative singer pictured during a concert in the late 1980s (Picture: Getty)

Georges early life and entry into the music industry, depicted in BBC drama Worried About The Boy, was tumultuous.

His Irish parents disapproved of his feminine behaviour and a teenage George moved into a squat with a man who identified as Marilyn Monroe.

From there George worked in the cloakroom of a trendy club called Blitz, before meeting a drummer called Jon Moss, who eventually became the drummer of Culture Club, and his lover.

George had also had a romance with punk rock singer Kirk Brandon, who then took him to court for libel for writing about the affair in a book.

Boy George age, net worth, relationships and why he went to prison
Boy George in 2006, the year he had trouble with US authorities over cocaine possession and falsely reporting a burglary (Picture: Getty)

Before George joined Culture Club in 1982, he sang under the name Lieutenant Lush in a band called Bow Wow Wow, managed by Malcolm McLaren, who then also managed the Sex Pistols.

Culture Club – whose name referred to the ethnic mixture of the four-piece – had major success for a few years, but tabloid reports of Georges drug abuse ended their initial period of megastardom.

In 1986 the frontman was arrested for possession of cannabis and soon after, keyboardist Michael Rudetsky, a Culture Club collaborator, was found dead of a heroin overdose in Georges London home.

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George also lost his friend Mark Vaultier around that time to an overdose of methadone and Valium at a party that he himself never managed to get to due to his police arrest for drug possession.

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The singers own heroin addiction, and denial of it, even led his brother David to go on TV as a cry for help following Georges arrest for possession of the drug in 1986.

Over the next 30 years George struggled to remain sober, and in 2012 he declared that his practice of Nichiren Buddhism and chanting Nam Myoho Renge Kyo was helping him stick to a peaceful path.

Boy George age, net worth, relationships and why he went to prison
Boy George is now known for judging on The Voice UK after a big comeback (Picture: BBC)

However, Georges one prison sentence was not drug-related.

In 2009 he was sent down for 15 months after falsely imprisoning a Norwegian model in his flat, handcuffing him to a wall and beating him.

George was given early release after four months for good behaviour but was required to wear an ankle monitor and submit to a curfew for the remainder of his sentence.

Boy George age, net worth, relationships and why he went to prison
Boy George performing with Culture Club in July 2017 (Picture: Getty)

Following that episode, Boy George slowly made a remarkable comeback and in 2016 he started judging on The Voice UK.

Hes appeared on other reality TV shows in America and Australia, plus The Celebrity Apprentice.

In 2014, after many failed attempts, Culture Club officially got back together and theyve been recording, as well as gigging, ever since.

Boy Georges net worth is reported to be around £25m.

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