April 24, 2020 / 571 reads
TVLINE conducted an interview with Bret Michaels. A few excerpts follow below.
TVLINE | Any thoughts on Masked Singer experience?
Everyone I've worked with there -- and I've worked on a lot of different reality TV and different shows -- everyone there treats you great. But it is, without a doubt, like the Secret Service. I'm thinking to myself the whole time, "There's no way you can hide this." I've never seen a show take so serious the hiding of your identity. That was the most painful part for me, because I'm a handshaker, hugger, talker, how you doin'? And I'm walking by everybody on the crew, and I knew them from other stuff, I'm thinking, "I'm a real-life Spider-Man. I'm Peter Parker and I can't tell nobody in this outfit!" [Laughs] I want to walk up to them, give them a big hug, ask them how the family's been. And they're walking by me, you feel like a ghost. There's no talking, no contact. It is surreal.
TVLINE | I'm wondering what 1990 Bret Michaels would think if he knew that in 2020, he'd be singing in a banana costume and loving it.
[Laughs] Now you remember, in my career, we've had not only many years of playing -- if the world ever goes back to almost-normal again, to be able to go out and do the stadiums that long into it, and just remember, we were announcing I was playing solo shows and then I did a... I love having a great time. This may have been one of my actual outfits at a backstage party in the '80s. [Laughs] I think I may have worn this outfit on one of my let's just say good, insanely wild nights. It may have been a good night in Minnesota, if you know what I mean. [Laughs]
TVLINE | Were you always rocking a bandana under the mask?
Always. Listen, that's my power. That's my energy. Brings me good mojo... By the way, I hope you're safe and healthy and doing well.
TVLINE | You had a moment when you were performing "Achy Breaky Heart" that you forgot the lyrics, and in a subsequent clue package, you mentioned that it was a byproduct of some health problems you've had. Has that happened to you in concerts, as well?
Let me answer that in two phases. Number one: Absolutely in my real life since the brain hemorrhage, which, are you ready for this -- how ironic on this show, this is my life coming together, all of this by the way, I'm not going down this road but in my autobiography -- or auto-scrap-ography, volume I -- this is all in there. All the moments of my life. I handwrote this myself. Every moment of impact and the pictures to prove it. Here's what I was going to say: Today marks the 10th anniversary of the survival of my brain hemorrhage. I mean, how ironic is that on the same exact night as [my leaving] Masked Singer?.. The universe is incredibly awesome, how it all came together. I'm playing "Knocking on Heaven's Door," sitting at the piano, in my Banana outfit, marking the exact timeframe that this airs when I was getting my brain operated on. That universal moment of all that coming together, singing that song, how ironic is that?!
...But leading it back to the show, I am such a fan guy. I said, "Put me out there. Let me start in the crowd." ... Well it got super late and they put me out in the crowd during "Achy Breaky" and I'm trying to sing in a voice that's not mine so it's not recognizable and as much as I love the song, I've never performed the song ever in my life. So all of a sudden you get out there and the crowd's slapping -- I'm telling everyone, "Feel the peel!" -- so while I'm messing around, having fun with everybody, the song started. I'm going, "Uh-oh!" It wasn't a matter of forgetting the lyrics. I was singing the chorus twice. So I immediately went into survival mode. Waited for the second beat of the chorus to come around, I got everybody clapping their hands. I give full credit to the dancers and the choreographer -- who, by the way, after that gave up on me. [Laughs] I say that to protect him... The second I got out with the crowd, my legs took on a life of their own.
