Nothing if not controversial, Boy George turns out to also be incredibly unguarded and full of opinions – which he seems desperate to share.

It comes as a serious shock.

Two years ago he was picking up trash from New York sidewalks, a court punishment for being found in possession of cocaine.

Down and up again more often than a yo-yo, Boy George has a reputation for being very guarded in interviews, particularly since pictures of him carrying out his community service were published around the world.

Except for today. Barely has the first pleasantry been exchanged than the popstar is off, gabbling away at what feels like a thousand words a minute, often answering questions that he has actually posed himself.

Notoriously involved in drugs, it is tempting to wonder if he has taken something immediately before the interview or it would be if he didn't spend most of the interview decrying, and speaking incredibly candidly about, the bad old days when he lived his life in a drug-addled haze.

"Being that f***** up all of the time is actually a bit of a grind," says George. As conversation openers go, it is a surprising one.

"When you're in the middle of it, though, it's impossible to have any kind of perspective on yourself. You don't see that it's boring for everyone else.

"I look at someone like Amy Winehouse now and when you're on the outside you can see that it's just really boring. It's only when you come out of it, like I have, that you realise there really isn't any happiness to be had in all
of that.

"I know how difficult it is to get out of but I also see how difficult and how incredibly boring it is for all the people around you. All my friends were despairing of me back when I was in the middle of that kind of lifestyle."

George is preparing to go out on the road with his tour The Boy is Back in Town, which stops off at Hull City Hall tomorrow night and comes to Bradford St George's Hall on October 18.

The tour coincides with the release of the new single Yes We Can, on October 12.

George segues neatly into talking about his new single from his talk of the days in which he was living in a drugs haze, flipping between talking about Barack Obama and about taking huge amounts of cocaine with alarming ease.

"That despair my friends and everyone around me felt when I was taking drugs has inspired Yes We Can," he says.

"In the end, though, the song becomes a message of hope. I was inspired by the speeches of Barack Obama when I wrote it.

"We've sampled his voice using quotes from some of his inspirational speeches; the song is about his journey and it's also about what I've been going through."

Born George O'Dowd, the androgynous front man of Culture Club scaled the heights of fame in 1982 with the release of the album Kissing To Be Clever. The album's third single, Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?, reached number one in 16 countries and number two in the United States.

A year later Karma Chameleon was played the world over and Boy George became a cultural icon for the Eighties. His battles against drug addiction, however, were never far away.

"People read headlines and assume that's me. But no-one can be summed up in a soundbite. For a long time, I was being very destructive and when people read about that part of you for such a long time, that becomes their picture of you as a person."

George's pinball machine of a mind bounces back to Winehouse, who he talks about several times during the interview.

"The level of publicity surrounding my life was unparalleled and Amy's experiencing a little of what that is like. Music was becoming formulaic and controlled and then she came along. I hope she gets to the point where I was where I thought that I wasn't happy and I couldn't see a happy end. I realised if I didn't get out, I would have a very unhappy ending."

With George promising to play the classic hits from the days of Culture Club, along with his new work, happy endings should be had by all on his latest tour.

Hull City Hall, 01482 226655, October 4. Bradford St George's Hall, 01274 432000, October 18.