Queens of the Stone Age frontman Josh Homme has opened up about his near-death experience during an interview with comedian Marc Maron on his WTF Podcast. Last week, QOTSA announced that they would be embarking on a co-headline tour of Australia with Nine Inch Nails.
Between conversations about the frontman’s days with stoner rock legends Kyuss, which involved run-ins with strung out ice-heads, the artist described his battle with MRSA, an antibiotic-resistant form of the staph bacteria, and being declared legally dead after choking on surgical tubes.
“I was stuck in a room for four months and I had all these tubes in my leg,” said Homme. “And it was painful. And after two months in bed you go, ‘I’ve got two months left. How do I do this?’ It did the greatest thing it could ever do to me: It zeroed me…And I’m really thankful for it.”
The illness delayed the production of QOTSA’s most recent album, with Homme dealing with what he described as “rickety emotions.” “The physical scars heal quick,” he said. “It’s the mental ones that are tougher.”
Homme described how overwork and exhaustion led to his contraction of the bug, saying:
“I’m in three bands and I love to produce records of other bands, and I have a family that I love. I wanted to be everything for everybody and do all of that…I think I just really beat myself up until I got really sick and needed surgery, because it was physically manifesting itself.”
Homme said transcendental meditation helped him mentally recover after the gruelling period of ill-health. “There’s no dogma,” he said of the practice. “No one’s telling you anything…I didn’t want anybody to preach at me, including myself.”
Homme also claimed that the period led to a new camaraderie in his band, saying “Because of that process, we’re really tighter as a band and as friends. I was in the fog and they came in the fog with me, and I came out of it. There’s a lot of trust.”
Homme and his band will be touring Down Under with Nine Inch Nails, supported by wife Brody Dalle starting March next year, with a show at the Sydney Entertainment Centre.
(Via Rolling Stone)
