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I'VE HAD TO WRITE ABOUT BOYZONE A COUPLE OF TIMES IN THE PAST. And I've always found it really hard work. The problem was, I've never found them that thrilling a pop proposition. I always thought Boyzone were a bit boring, a bit bland, a bit vanilla, a bit nothing special. And besides, the only thing that I wanted to say about them that one of them, Stephen Gately, was one of them - was the one thing that I couldn't say in print. Obviously, I couldn't resist the temptation to allude to it. But can you blame me? It was the only interesting thing about Boyzone. Usually I'd try and show how bored I was by the Boyzone boys, and suggest that maybe this was just because I'd been spoiled in the past. So I'd drop in a line, by way of a conclusion, that I hoped would explain everything:,
"Boyzone are not Take That."
But maybe that was the point. In pop, every act begins as a reaction to what's come before it. And Boyzone turned themselves into the world's most successful boyband simply by not being Take That.
Take That tore up the boyband rulebook. They made all the things that used to be implicit, explicit, and then turned every button up to ten: "You think we're just making campy records to get 'em shaking their tushes at provincial gay discos? Well, cop a load of our new single, Could It Be Magic - an old Barry Manilow number made famous by Donna Summer that we've got remixed by Ian Levine. You think we're just selling sex? Well, just check out our new video a billion dollar budget Cadinot skinflick with only the cocks and the come-shots cut out. You think we're all a bunch of benders? Well, actually, we might be..." Young girls' hearts turned to jelly. Gay men's cocks turned to rock. Cash tills went ker-ching! And - hey bingo the first "bona" fide pop phenomenon of the Nineties was born.
Countless boybands followed in their wake, but most fell by the wayside. After all, why settle for second-best when you've got the best? The only two boybands that did take off, did so by defining themselves in opposition to Take That. There was East 17, who came on like rough lads to Take That's soft boys - white boys who assimilated black street styles just as shamelessly as Take That had gay club styles. And then there was Boyzone.
If the pop landscape we're now living in is post-Take That, Boyzone seemed to belong to a time pre-Take That, and represented a return to "traditional" boyband values. If Take That equalled SEX!, Boyzone were endously sex-less. Whilst Take That's homoerotic video routines have now become pop cliche (Oh look, there's Westlife/A1 indulging in some goodnatured horseplay on the beach!), Boyzone have marked themselves out as the only boyband who invariably keep all their clothes on in theirs. Boyzone's best-known songs are an endless stream of soppy and sentimental ballads, many of whose sentiments would be better suited to men twice their age (Father and Son, Words, Baby Can I Hold You). Take That were genuinely revolutionary because of the sheer delight that they took in being gay-acting, gay-looking and gay-friendly. But Boyzone have always come across as far more straight and narrow - their official website even boasts that they aren't "constantly surrounded by a whiff of controversy" (in their defence, Boyzone have always played an annual show at G.A.Y - Take That gave up on playing the gay clubs the moment they made it). Wherever Take That equalled danger, Boyzone equalled safety. There was, though, one other difference between Take That and Boyzone. But one where Boyzone had the edge. Much of the reason that Take That so enthralled so many queens was that they became the great gay guessing game. (Are they or aren't they? Which one's your money on?) There was a never-ending stream of speculation about their sexuality, and yet no one could settle on any single truth. But, with Boyzone, it was a different story - "everybody knew" that Stephen Gately was the gay one. With various members of Take That - as with so many other good-looking young male pop stars - you'd hear queens telling incredibly elaborate stories about what someone had told them someone had said such-and-such had allegedly once gotten up to. But it was all smoke turned out without fire. Stephen Gately's homosexuality had long been an "open secret", but one that managed to exist free of the usual rumours. There was no real "whiff of controversy", it was fire without smoke.

Normally when I'm writing a piece like this, about a star who's just come out, I can fill up a few pages with loads of "yes, we'd guessed" stuff. You know - hot gossip, telling quotes, intriguing biographical snippets, curious lines from songs. But with Stephen Gately there is none of the usual "evidence" by which people build up a profile of a suspect star. Fans of Stephen Gately might have been able to tell you his shoesize (seven), his favourite meal (chicken curry), even the colour of his swimming trunks (baby blue), but he was one of those stars that we knew nothing and everything about.
However, over the last 12 months, something happened that made the chatter about Stephen begin to sound deafening - although, rather fittingly, it wasn't as a result of something that Stephen had done. It was simply because of something he hadn't done - got married. One by one, all of his fellow Boyzone band-mates have walked up the aisle and got themselves hitched (Ronan was the last - admirably boasting that he'd kept himself virginally pure until his wedding night last autumn). These four weddings turned out to be Stephen Gately's funeral. The whispers turned into screams. Or, more accurately, sniggers. It can't have been much fun for little Stephen to be asked by Smash Hits or The O Zone over and over again why he was the only Boyzone boy who hadn't got married - though for the rest of us it was as funny as tuck. Some queens got rather excited last year when Boyzone released No Matter What - a song about proscribed love from the Andrew Lloyd Webber and Jim Steinman musical Whistle Down The Wind - which many heard as gay. Within the band it's always referred to as "Stephen's baby" - he had apparently both chosen and championed it. Maybe, just maybe, in a quiet way it was Stephen's coming out?
Immediately after Stephen came out, Heat magazine took a cruel delight in dredging up some old teeny press interviews where Stephen was asked which women he fancied. His answers (Janet Jackson, Baby Spice) were presented as - hilarious in retrospect - denials. What Heat chose to ignore was that to ask such questions - which assume heterosexuality and preclude homosexuality - is just as much of a collusion with the closet as the predicted answers. It isn't ever thus. If you bought the copy of Smash Hits which was in the shops when Stephen came out, you'd find a different approach. They'd apparently abandoned asking Stephen which women he fancied and were now pushing other, more open lines of enquiry: "You're mates with lots of pop girlies, how did you get to know Emma Spice?" "Which pop lady would you like to be friends with?" ("Madonna" that's my boy) Small steps. But ones that suggest a world of difference. Or even that Stephen was changing. But then Boyzone appear to have been undergoing some collective changes of late as well. Speculation's been rife that their days together are numbered, and that they're about to split. They've just released their greatest hits album - which in pop terms usually means "that's all folks" - and, tellingly, the final track was the (just released) first solo single by Ronan Keating. Ronan has also, just as tellingly, begun pursuing alternative careers; TV presenting and managing a boyband of his own (Westlife). Hmmm...
In last month's Q magazine, there was a feature (it had a final paragraph tacked on in the light of the latest "revelations") that said little, but suggested much. Trailed as Booze! Burgers! Oral Sex! On Tour With Boyzone, its subtext was "we're not as boring as you thought we were". Its point, presumably, was that Boyzone were trying to make that tricky transition from boyband to a man's band. In the music business, such an attempt by teeny pop stars to move on up and into a more adult constituency is known as "doing a George Michael". But who would have predicted that Boyzone would "do a George Michael" by virtue of one of them doing what George Michael is now best known for, and falling out of the closet?

Stephen Gately's "coming out" wasn't a shock ("yes, we'd guessed"), but it still seemed a little strange. Whilst it would be cute to think that we now live in such groovy times that gay celebrities are just gagging to declare themselves out, proud and fighting, the truth is somewhat different. We're still stuck in an age where public figures don't come out, they're forced out; George Michael, Ron Davies, Nick Brown, Peter Mandelson, Ocean Colour Scene's Simon Fowler. And, more often than not, they're dragged out by the tabloids. When you heard that Stephen Gately had "come out" to the super soaraway Sun, were you surprised? Or just suspicious? Readers of The Sun are probably used to being told what they should be thinking. But, on the morning of Wednesday June 16th, The Sun went one better and told them what they should be feeling. Readers were told to brace themselves for "the most moving show business interview you will ever read". "Boyzone Stephen" was telling the world "I'm gay and I'm in love."
Before "the most moving show business interview you will ever read", we got a touching little preamble - presumably for the benefit of any Sun readers foolish enough to question who the goodies and baddies in this fairy tale were. "For six years he has avoided questions about his sexuality. Now - after learning that someone was planning to sell a twisted version of his story - he has made the momentous decision to be honest to himself and his adoring fans. And he has chosen to do so in The Sun. Stephen slumps back on a sofa and utters three simple words that will change his life forever: 'I am gay'.
"You can just picture the scene, can't you? Actually you'll just have to picture the scene, because even though this is a "WORLD EXCLUSIVE" and one of the biggest show business stories of the year, The Sun curiously neglected to send along a photographer. Stranger still, although The Sun thought it necessary to tell us the sort of furniture Stephen was slumped on, they forgot to mention any other details about where this interview took place. We can only speculate which city, which country and indeed which planet - they were on.
What followed was one of the most unmoving show business interviews I've ever read. Stephen's words seemed trite and cliched. They couldn't have been any duller if a press officer had knocked them out on his behalf one afternoon. We learn next to nothing about his lover Eloy De Jong, formerly of Dutch boyband Caught In The Act (who were huge in much of Europe, where the story was as much of a double whammy as it would have been here if Stephen had come out as the lover of, say, Gary Barlow). Far more illuminating was the accompanying The Sun Says editorial: "Three weeks ago Boyzone's Stephen Gately asked The Sun to help him come out. He believed that a former friend was about to sell a story about his love life that would upset his family and fans. We told him to think hard before making his decision...
"The Sun does not out gays [their emphasis]. But on this occasion Stephen courageously insisted we go ahead with our interview [their non sequitur]. We are proud to carry his words and it is important to understand that Stephen has approved [my emphasis] every word we carry today."
Don't know about you, but I always have a bit of a problem believing anything The Sun Says, and I was instantly suspicious about this. My suspicions were confirmed the next day, when The Mirror ran an interview with Stephen's mother - "My Son Was Bullied Into Admitting He Is Gay. Mum blasts The Sun over 'blackmail"' - where Margaret Gately claimed that The Sun "persuaded Stephen to admit his secret sexuality by saying a member of the band's road crew had approached them to tell the story... Stephen did NOT want to go public but realised he had no other option."
A few days later a frankly bizarre article in The Guardian by former Mirror editor Roy Greenslade leapt to the defence of The Sun; "Quite why Mrs Gately made her accusation of blackmail is unclear..." Well, maybe because she thought it was true. She wasn't alone. In The Sun's sister paper, The Sunday Times, columnist India Knight wrote that Stephen had "effectively [been] blackmailed into a confession by some creep selling their story to a tabloid newspaper". Private Eye alleged that "Gately didn't get much help from his pisspoor PR agents, the aptly named Outside Organisation. Faced with what could only be called blackmail, his agents rejected two options which were open to them - sending their client to the police or, more effectively, to The Mirror. Instead, they gave The Sun exactly what it wanted." Finally, in an interview with The Irish Times, Boyzone's manager, Louis Walsh, "introduces the subject himself. And no, 'it was not a carefully orchestrated publicity stunt,' he says. Gately's announcement was forced, he maintains, by The Sun saying it was going to 'out him'." I was even cynical when, the day after they published the "interview", The Sun published a selection of the e-mails and faxes which "flooded into our offices backing the 23-yearold's brave decision to 'come out' in a moving declaration to The Sun. It was the biggest response The Sun has ever had to a showbiz interview - and not one of the messages criticised him." So I logged on to Boyzone's official website, and had a look at the messages fans had left there (http:/www.boyzone.co.uk/boyz-cgi/chatboard).
In the three days after Stephen's announcement, about 300 people had left messages. A few fans seemed oblivious and applauded the thrilling new website design. Of the rest, only a handful were hateful - all boys. Just under ten per cent of postings were from gay men. The rest were from women, the vast majority teenaged or under. I thought they were fascinating. But this was the most fascinating of the lot: "I saw the boyz performing in Italy on 15th June and Steve cried on stage. I didn't understand what was happening. When, the day after, I read Steve's interview, I was shocked. I couldn't believe it. - Giorgia."
Several others registered their shock, at the news, but should we be surprised? "I just want to make sure is it true all the kind of stuff saying that stephen gately is a gay??? I mean I like him since I was 12 years old and now I'm already 16. I read all the articles about him saying that he will wait for the right girl and all those kinds of things and suddenly got this news saying that stephen gately is a gay. I just couldn't believe it. Well, it's not that i don't like him anymore and i will always be his number one fan no matter if the news is true or not. i just want to get it clear. I hope that you will answer my question, thanx - chin hsu yee." "I just wanted to say that I will still love Boyzone no matter what! I hope that Steve finds happiness with whoever he settles with. Bloke Power! My sister kept telling me Steve was gay, but I never believe it cos I knew it wasn't true! Well, it is true and i wanna say i still lurve Steve! - Eilidh."
But many fans didn't seem at all surprised: "Well Steve, just when I was going to ask you to marry me! No I'm only joking. Well done for coming out and I'm sure you've got all your true fans' support - Claire". "I think what he did was very brave, and you could see it coming a mile off. I don't know why but I always suspected. Maybe it is the way he puts himself across!!!
The following reaction was typical; "Hi Steve, you were very courageous!!!!!! I am very proud of you, you are the best singer because you have a lot of courage because you said to all fans that you are gay and i suppose that you had to break a lot of hearts but i was your fan and i'm your fan now even if you are gay because i love your music and your voice!! good luck for your boyfriend (1 think that he is very lucky) I hope that you are happy with him and i hope you are full in love) You're the best! - Ludovica". I found the messages from Boyzone's girl fans quite beautiful and rather moving - and I can't say that about anything Boyzone have recorded. Their fans were unflustered, and still loved their Stephen. Maybe they were just joining the ranks of straight women who've found that their dream man dreams of other men, and that their ideal husband is just not the marrying kind? (Incidentally, if any of these girls had logged onto boyzone.com they'd have accessed some heavy-duty gay porn.) Stephen Gately, whether willingly or not, has broken down the last door on the popwill closet. The music business has always argued that boyband boys could never come out, because their fans would never accept it. They have. Girl Power! As ever, the music business has proved to be reactionary, and the fans progressive. Boyzone might have to harked back to an earlier age, and the tabloids might still be up to their old tricks, but these girls are children of the modern world; of Impact ads and Ricki Lake, of George Michael and Peter Mandelson, of EastEnders and Emmerdale, of docusoaps and Queer As Folk. We've seen yet another celebrity come out in a place where some presumed he could not. And we've seen, once again, that the world has failed to fall apart. Whatever next?

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