Not Dead Yet

by Phil Collins

  Our relationship has become a little fractious by this point. I’ve been spending more and more time in Miami to be with the boys; equally, I believe she has a gnawing feeling that Orianne and I have been drawing closer together again. This certainly doesn’t help things.

  We’re both upset, and upset leads to candor. Dana’s expecting to be married by now, while I have no intention of walking down the aisle for a fourth time. Things are said that need to be said, and some tears are shed. She stays over in my hotel room, albeit at arm’s length, and when I wake up in the morning, she’s gone. After eight years, our relationship is over.

  If my behavior, personally and professionally, is showing all the signs of semi-detachment, it could be because other attachments are throwing me off-balance, in an entirely good way. Dana’s fears are not unfounded. Orianne and I are becoming close again.

  Since she and the boys moved to Miami in July 2012, I’ve been flying there every other week, taking up regular residence at the Ritz Carlton on South Beach. For sure, some of that early contact may have been clouded with a little booze. But certainly since I’ve been dry, the connections and the intimacy have been steadily improving. At the same time, Orianne’s marriage has been disintegrating. We often tell each other that we shouldn’t have divorced, and how much we miss each other, and how much we miss being a family.

  Toward the end of December 2014, Orianne flies back to Switzerland for spinal surgery to release trapped nerves. Unfortunately she has a spasm while under the knife. The result: Orianne is left totally paralyzed down her right side. She won’t be leaving her bed, far less Switzerland, anytime soon. When she calls to tell me, I think she’s joking.

  After spending New Year’s with the boys in New York as planned, I return them to Miami. Following many conversations with her husband, we agree that I should go and visit Orianne first. Arriving in Switzerland, I’m greeted by the sight of my ex-wife wheelchair-bound and a haunted shadow of her former self. We’re both devastated.

  I stay a week before flying back to be both mum and dad for the boys. Orianne is stuck in rehab in Switzerland until early March 2015, when she flies home at last. Both she and the kids, to say nothing of me, are relieved and happy.

  But this has been a time of healing all round. Over the last few months we have been honest with each other, and spoken our true thoughts and feelings. We have made the decision: Orianne and I will reconcile, if not exactly un-divorce. When we tell Nicholas and Mathew, they’re delighted. In fact, Matt says a fantastic thing: “You know, I had a wish on my tenth birthday that this would happen.” The thought that the kids were willing this to happen is very moving.

  Together, we start looking at houses in Miami. My criteria are a place where Matt can have a little football pitch and Nic can have a small studio, somewhere he can rehearse with his band and refine his drumming skills.

  We find the perfect place, which turns out to be Jennifer Lopez’s old house (although I only find that out later when Joely tells me). In June 2015, I sign the papers and we establish a family home in Miami Beach. Now we are four, all over again. Actually, now we are five: Orianne has a son, Andrea, born in 2011, from her second marriage, and he lives with us much of the time. Complicated? With my backstory, nothing’s too complicated.

  It takes until early 2016 for the news to leak that I am back with my third ex-wife. Cue shock and not a little snark in the giddier corners of the international press.

  Whatever, I’m back with my ex-wife and my boys, and we’re all very happy campers.

  —

  The Collins clan is a funny mob. I know how it looks, a fractured, dispersed family, presided over—in the loosest sense of the term—by three-wives Phil. But despite everything, because of everything, we laugh about it. Love will find a way.

  I carry guilt over each of my kids. I carry guilt for everything, frankly. All the times I was away, all the moments I missed, all the periods when a tour or an album got in the way of a happy home life, or repairs to that home life. Music made me, but it also unmade me.

  It won’t do that again. Now I’m back being a dad to Nic and Matt, and I give thanks every time I’m on hand for a football match or a school band rehearsal or bit of homework.

  But happiness begets more guilt: the happier I am with Nic and Matt, the guiltier I feel for not being there for the older ones. I wasn’t there to have those same conversations, enjoy the same domestic bliss, with Joely, Simon and Lily.

  We’re a work-in-progress—name a family that isn’t—but I think we’re pretty good, considering. Joely started acting, has won many awards, and is now a producer working in TV and online. She lives in Vancouver, with her Dutch husband, Stefan, and beautiful daughter, Zoe. Born on October 26, 2009, she made me a grandfather at the ripe young age of fifty-eight. They’re wonderfully happy, and an example to all.

  All respect to Simon: he made it tough for himself by trying to follow the old man’s line of work. He’s had some trying times, personally and professionally, but he’s worked hard at it. He’s a fantastic drummer and as a singer he’s found his voice. He’s won many an accolade in the progressive rock world, and he’s done brilliantly to build a fan base and find an audience. To even be able to make records, and to do so on your own terms, in the modern music industry is a huge achievement. He’s a strong-headed musician who knows what he wants. Lord knows where he got that from.

  Simon and I finally got to drum together in 2008 on his album U Catastrophe. He wrote a track for us both to play on, “The Big Bang,” and I flew to Las Vegas where he was recording. It’s an incredibly fast piece, slightly modeled on the Genesis drum duets, and he really put me through my paces. I barely made it. It’s a thrilling track, and I think that collaboration with my oldest son may have been, without my knowing it, my last hurrah as a drummer. Which seems kinda fitting.

  Lily’s another credit to her parents. A teenage stint modeling became a storming acting career. At the time of writing she’s filming the lead role in a new drama series, based on F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Last Tycoon, for Amazon. She’s been in a couple of heavyweight Hollywood films, including The Blind Side (with Sandra Bullock), and Mirror Mirror (with Julia Roberts), in which she plays Snow White, and she stars opposite Warren Beatty in his new film Rules Don’t Apply. Socially conscious and engaged, and a great public speaker, she’s also involved with an anti-bullying project in LA.

  Brother Clive is still drawing cartoons for a living, and has been honored internationally numerous times. He was awarded the MBE in 2011. I am deliriously proud of him.

  Sister Carole is as giggly as she ever was, and has been very happily married to Bob for forty-two years. Following her long stint as a professional ice skater, she carried on Mum’s job of being a theatrical agent. She featured in Buster as a nosy neighbor, a part she played very well (due to her acting skills, I hasten to add).

  Unfortunately, my dear mum couldn’t be with us tonight. After suffering her first stroke in April 2009 she’d gone downhill steadily before passing on November 6, 2011, only two years shy of her century.

  I was able to spend some time with her before the end. I’d fly in from Switzerland and visit her at Barbara Speake’s house in Ealing, sit by the bed, stroking her head as she fell asleep, thinking, “If only I could have done this with my dad.”

  The one positive thing is that Mum’s condition brought Carole, Clive and I much closer together. Because of the geographical distance between us all, we’d become used to not speaking for huge lengths of time. With Mum sick, we were talking all the time and visiting her in hospital.

  My mum enjoyed my career, and knew she’d done right by helping and encouraging me. But I still find it hard to deal with the fact that Dad died without seeing any of my success. Where is he, and what does he think of it all? I hope he’s forgiven me for avoiding the office job at London Assurance. I hope I’ve made him proud.

  I’ve been lucky, of that I have no doubt. I’ve had a long career, and on
the whole I think the music has worn well. On the one hand, certain moments from my back catalogue are pinned to a place and time. If a TV show or film wants immediate aural shorthand to evoke the high eighties, it seems they can’t go wrong with “In the Air Tonight.” On the other hand, it’s brilliant to hear younger artists outing themselves as fans. My approval ratings in the hip-hop community are particularly high. Being covered by Lil’ Kim, Brandy, and Bone Thugs-N-Harmony is a real thrill, Kanye West called me an inspiration, and there was an entire album, Urban Renewal (2001), of hip-hop and R&B covers of my songs. This makes me very happy.

  There seems to have been even more of an uptick recently. Pharrell Williams was asked to remix Face Value. His response: “Why do you want to do that? I like it the way it is.” Lorde is a big fan, and so is songwriter extraordinaire and OneRepublic frontman Ryan Tedder. And then there’s Adele.

  Such were the depths of my Drinking Years, I managed to miss her rise. In fact, I’d not even heard of her. But when she contacted me in October 2013 with a view to writing together for her third album, I was only too happy to meet. I did a lot of homework and was totally impressed. She’s a huge talent, one of the most important of this era.

  In November that year, during a visit to London, she comes to see me at the Dorchester Hotel. She calls from the lobby, I tell her the room and she arrives with a security chap. Once he’s established she’s safe with me, she asks him to wait downstairs.

  And there we are, just me and Adele. She’s exactly as you’d expect: a friendly, not to mention sweary, north London girl, her down-to-earth personality entirely untouched by her being the pre-eminent artist of the day and the all-conquering savior of the music industry.

  I make her a cup of tea and try to hide the shiver of nerves. I feel like I’m being auditioned, but that’s my insecurity. For all I know, Adele’s thinking, “Blimey, fahkin’ Phil Collins is fahkin’ older than I thought!” For some people my image is trapped in a particular pop video in a particular year. Let’s hope it’s not “You Can’t Hurry Love.”

  She pulls out a USB stick, plugs it into my laptop and plays a piece of music, mentioning a Fleetwood Mac type of feel. It’s great. And it’s quite long. I’m not sure how to respond, or what’s being asked of me, so I say, “I’d need to hear it again.”

  Adele says, “I’ll send it to you and you can finish it.”

  I learn the piece at my piano in New York, then add some parts to it in my little studio down the road in Manhattan. After a while, I email again: “Are you waiting for me, or am I waiting for you?”

  “Oh, no,” comes Adele’s apologetic reply, “I’m moving, I’m changing email addresses, I’m looking after the baby, etc….”

  I later read her saying that it was all too early in the writing and recording process for the album that would become the blockbusting 25; that she wasn’t ready; that she still thinks I’m awesome. That’s cool. It was a lovely little interlude and, for sure, great for my self-esteem.

  Unfortunately, before I can start swaggering around town, calling myself Adele’s new best mate, it’s time for more medical issues.

  In October 2015 I wake up in Miami with a horrendous pain down my right side, and I hobble in to see the lovely, not to mention legendary, Dr. Barth Green. You might call him the Adele of the spinal surgery world.

  His considered medical opinion is that my back—not to put too fine a point on it—“is totally shot.” But not to worry, Dr. Green has the technology and he can rebuild me. He hauls me into the operating theater, installs eight screws into my spine and reassures me that all should now be well.

  I hobble home to recuperate, whereupon I promptly take a tumble in the bedroom and fracture my right foot. Back into hospital, back into surgery. During physical therapy, I take another fall and refracture the foot. “Interestingly,” in the course of these foot-based traumas, I learn that the “sprain” I suffered after landing heavily at the end of “Domino” on the 1986 Genesis tour of Australia had actually chipped off a piece of bone. Also “interestingly,” I Iearn that it might be the case that all those vocal cords–easing cortisone injections have combined to make my bones somewhat brittle. I could laugh, if I wasn’t in so much pain.

  All things considered, it seems that bits are falling off me. Am I paying the cost for all those years of drumming? Having started at the age of five, it’s sixty years at the time of writing.

  Exiting from hospital and recuperating, I’m finally forced to pick up a stick. Unfortunately it’s a walking stick.

  Ironically, this period coincides with my being required to make myself presentable for the international press. I have to start the long-lead promotion for the 2016 reissues of my solo albums. The year-long campaign is going under the title “Take a Look at Me Now,” just at a time when I’d probably rather people didn’t take a look at me, this limping, hobbling semi-invalid.

  Still, my spirits are up in these media encounters. For the first time in what seems like forever, the interviews and the resulting published stories are garlanded with praise. It’s all a bit giddy. So, whether due to my enthusiasm, or the writer’s enthusiasm, or a combination of both, a news story breaks in Rolling Stone. “Phil Collins Plotting Comeback,” runs the headline. “I Am No Longer Retired.”

  I am on record in the magazine as talking in some detail, viz “I got very involved in these reissues…I’m easily flattered. If people rediscover the old stuff and show interest, it would be silly to not make more music…” And then: “I don’t think I want a very long tour. But I would like to play stadiums in Australia and the Far East, and that’s the only way to do that. But there’s a part of me that just wants to do theaters, so we’ll see.”

  Did I really say all that? It was probably the medication talking, though it’s an interesting suggestion. The man who’s declaring this is a chap with a limp who can barely walk, far less rock. Rumors of my comeback may have been exaggerated, not least by me.

  At home in the U.K., even BBC Radio 4’s very serious current-affairs show Today considers my reported emerging from retirement a newsworthy item at breakfast time. A nation chokes on its cornflakes, then digs out its eighties/nineties party gear.

  This book, although called “a memoir,” would not have been possible without the help of many people.

  Firstly, I need to thank Craig McLean, who listened to me going on and on for months, and then had to transcribe my ramblings into some sort of order, present them to me and stand back while his fine work was decimated by yours truly. Infinite thanks, mate.

  Also to my editor, Trevor Dolby, who, just when I thought I’d gotten it right, jumped in with something even better. TD, thank you, sir.

  Thanks, too, to Lizzy Gaisford in Trevor’s office, who steadied the ship and carried out all the tasks that no one wanted to do. Thanks also to all at Penguin Random House U.K., especially: Susan Sandon, Jason Smith, Charlotte Bush and Celeste Ward-Best.

  Thanks, too, to Kevin Doughten, my U.S. editor, who kept an international eye on things. And all at Penguin Random House U.S., especially: David Drake, Molly Stern, Tricia Boczkowski, Christopher Brand and Jesse Aylen. And the lovely Lorenzo Agius, who took the jacket photograph.

  Of course, a life is empty without the people who fill it, so I thank, from the bottom of my heart, my children. Joely, Simon, Lily, Nicholas and Mathew, I have learned from you all. I may be Dad, but you have all taught me.

  My partners in life. Andy, Jill, Orianne and Dana. Thank you for putting up with me. You all will always have a place in my heart.

  To all the musicians who have put their careers on the line by working with me, tons of love and thanks.

  Dear Tony Smith, thanks for your wisdom, love and guidance.

  Also thanks to the long-suffering Jo Greenwood at TSPM.

  Danny Gillen, and Steve Jones, my “go-to guys,” and also my mates.

  And to all the fans who have stood by me through fax and thin.

  Love you.

 
PC

  All images in the photo sections are courtesy of the author, with the following exceptions:

  INSERT 1

  Genesis Archive (Photo 1); Ronnie Caryl (Photo 2); Ron Howard/Getty (Photo 3); Tim Stewart (Photo 4); Armando Gallo (Photo 5 and Photo 6); Graham Wood/Stringer/Getty (Photo 7); Herbie Knott/REX/Shutterstock (Photo 8)

  INSERT 2

  Keith Waldegrave/Associated Newspapers/REX/Shutterstock (Photo 9); David Bailey (Photo 10); Polaris/Sam Emerson (Photo 11); Times/REX/Shutterstock (Photo 12); Kmazur/Getty (Photo 13); Patrick Balls (Photo 14); Aldo Viola (Photo 15 and Photo 16)

  Every reasonable effort has been made to contact all copyright holders, but if there are any errors or omissions, we will insert the appropriate acknowledgment in subsequent printings of this book.

  TEXT PHOTO CREDITS

  Prologue: Greeting the audience on The First Final Farewell Tour, 2004/5.

  Chapter 1: A very young PC on Mum’s lap in our swish Zephyr 6. No seat belts! Circa 1956.

  Chapter 2: The Mod, taken by Lavinia in our living room at 453 Hanworth Road, circa 1966. (© Genesis Archive)

  Chapter 3: At the Converted Cruiser Club HQ on my sixteenth birthday, 1967. (© Genesis Archive)

  Chapter 4: Phil Spector and George Harrison at Abbey Road, 1970. (© Bettmann/Contributor/Getty)

  Chapter 5: Genesis mean and moody in a field, circa 1973. (© Barry Wentzell)

  Chapter 6: Peter Gabriel in his frock and wearing the fox mask, circa 1972. (© Armando Gallo)

  Chapter 7: The new Genesis line-up with drummer Bill Bruford at the back, circa 1976. (© Waring Abbott)