Billy Idol Says He’d ‘Probably Be Dead’ If He Stayed on Hard Drugs
Billy Idol is opening up about his lengthy battle with drug addiction. In a new interview, Idol said that he’s still struggling with drug issues, but that he’s “stopped the hard stuff.”
“I’d had the motorcycle accident because I was a drug addict, and I had to cure that. And it took a long time,” Idol said in the interview. “I mean, I’m not 100 percent. I stopped the hard stuff, and I don’t drink much – things like that. I had to solve this problem about myself with the drug addiction, and that’s what was happening to me in the hospital bed – I was kind of realizing I was going to face up to the thing that I hadn’t quite faced up [to] that had been kind of ruling my life for about 10 years.”
He added that getting away from the hard drugs has probably saved his life. “Thank God I got away from it because, yeah, I would probably be dead,” he explained. “I’d be dead right now or in prison… Drug addicts, we’re very clever. We’re not going to let you know; we’re going to hide it. We’re going to lie to you. We’re not going to tell you the truth. We’re going to lie, lie, lie, lie, lie. So, that’s the problem with drug addiction: We’re not being honest about it. Hiding it and doing it in secret, trying to get away with it.”
Idol added that his personal experience is part of why he’s involved with the NARAS MusiCares program, which assists artists struggling with drug addition.
“Have you found yourself on the other end of the conversation, trying to help others go through it because you’ve ridden back into town and you’ve survived it?…” he said. “Hopefully, that’s something that will help musicians – they can go to this foundation and ask for help if they really want to clean up.”
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