But it was incomplete. It lacked a counterpoint. It needed a voice that could answer Michael from across the void.
As Michael’s recorded voice pleaded to slide away, Bono closed his eyes and began to improvise a response. His voice climbed into that famous, passionate register, cutting through the dark atmosphere of the track like a searchlight. Michael Hutchence feat Bono - Slideaway (NEW)
Michael’s voice filled the room. “I just want to slide away... and disappear.” But it was incomplete
The air in the studio was thick, not with smoke, but with the heavy, electric weight of memory. It was late 1999, and the world was bracing for a new millennium, but inside these walls, time was standing perfectly still. As Michael’s recorded voice pleaded to slide away,
The song begins with Michael, isolated and weary. But as the chorus hits, Bono’s voice enters, wrapping around Michael’s like a safety net. Where Michael pulls down into the shadows, Bono pulls up toward the light. It becomes a soaring, tragic, and beautiful conversation between two legends.
Michael Hutchence had been gone for two years. The shockwaves of his sudden passing in a Sydney hotel room in 1997 had settled into a dull, permanent ache for those who loved him. He left behind a vault of unfinished solo work—songs that captured a man trying to shed the skin of the leather-clad INXS rock god to reveal something raw, electronic, and deeply personal.