Here we explore his life and career, from his early days in London to his recent comeback albums. On 12 August 2021, Idol's music video "Bitter Taste", directed by Stephen Sebring, was uploaded to YouTube. Idol announced his new EP The Roadside, which was released on 17 September.[53] Another EP, The Cage, was released on 23 September 2022.

By this time, his son Willem (born in 1988) was old enough to question what had happened, and it was this that finally put the brakes on his drug use. "I had young children and eventually you think about, do they want a dad who's a bit messed up? And they don't want that." It will likely come as a surprise to no one that at the height of his rock 'n' roll rabble-rousing, Idol never met a giant truckload of drugs he didn't immediately want to ingest. He later embarked on a successful solo career that made him one of the most popular artists of the MTV era.
Then came 1983's Rebel Yell, a double-platinum smash that produced three hit singles and made Idol an international superstar. 1986's Whiplash Smile and 1990's Charmed Life kept the hits coming, but in 1993, his career hit the brick wall that was Cyberpunk, an ambitious, sci-fi blending of electronic and live instrumentation that confused fans and drew mockery from critics. One would be forgiven for thinking Idol simply dropped off the face of the Earth after that, but he never really went away. It may comfort you to know that as the world changed around him, he remained very much Billy Idol, the man who rocks to live and lives to rock.
Billy Idol's first attempt to break into movies came at the height of his '80s success, as then-manager Bill Aucoin decided that with the Rock God title already under his belt, film stardom should naturally follow. According to VH1's Behind the Music piece on Idol, Aucoin spent months pitching an adaptation of the rock 'n' roll vampire novel King Death, with Idol sexlife in Pittsburgh the lead, to various studios, finding no takers. Idol would later call the whole idea a "debacle" that led to a parting of the ways with Aucoin, but by the early '90s, he had warmed to the idea. Billy Idol's solo work had always relied on a deft blend of shredding guitars (courtesy of axe prodigy and collaborator Steve Stevens) and synthesized instrumentation, but 1993's Cyberpunk went all in on the latter part of that equation.
Idol spent the second half of the 1990s focusing on his personal life out of the public eye. It may have been ahead of its time, but those few people who comprised the internet community in 1993 weren't impressed, and neither were Idol's fans. Despite lead single "Shock to the System" being a minor success (thanks in part to a video directed by special effects wizard Stan Winston), the album went nowhere, and it would be Idol's last studio effort for over a decade. He did, however, have other career opportunities lined up — opportunities that may have proven a great deal more lucrative if that pesky motorcycle crash hadn't hobbled him for the better part of a year. Idol's recovery was slow, but it didn't stop him from shooting a video for lead single "Cradle of Love" (in which he's seen only from the waist up, in video monitors) or touring in support of Charmed Life later that year. Perhaps the accident jogged something in his spiky head, but it was at this point that he decided it was time to update his sound for the digital age, even though it was the early '90s and nobody really knew what that meant yet.
The set was released as an album as well, and later that year, Idol's first Greatest Hits compilation hit record stores, which are things that used to exist. Included was a cover of Simple Minds' "Don't You (Forget About Me)," which was penned by Idol's faithful producer Keith Forsey. It would have been a fitting swan song to the rocker's career — but Idol had other ideas.

He even appeared in a Season 5 episode of Bam Margera's Viva La Bam, in which viewers might have expected him to turn up completely inebriated and injure himself in true Jackass fashion. But, no, his appearance was a special surprise for Bam's mother, April, who was celebrating her 49th birthday, and who had always been a massive fan. Once again, it seemed like Idol was entering the lovable old rock 'n' roll codger stage of his career, which simply had to be winding down at this point — but, once again, he was quietly getting ready to remind the world that he literally couldn't stop rocking if his life depended on it. Even music industry observers were caught by surprise – Rolling Stone's review opened, "Did somebody say, 'New Billy Idol Album?' Thanks, God!" It seemed like some kind of minor miracle that a) the album existed at all and b) it was pretty good.

ASCAP Pop Music Awards

Stevens had departed to pursue a solo deal prior to the recording of Charmed Life, and for this latest project Idol enlisted a stable of studio musicians (along with longtime producer Keith Forsey) to lay tracks in his PC-based home studio, complete with an early version of ProTools. In keeping with the record's futuristic aesthetic, it was among the first to be promoted with an electronic press kit, came with a screensaver on floppy disk, and even included Idol's email address, for the few people who knew what that even meant at the time. On 16 February 2010, Idol was announced as one of the acts to play at the Download Festival in Donington Park, England. He stated, "With all of these great heavyweight and cool bands playing Download this year, I'm going to have to come armed with my punk rock attitude, Steve Stevens, and all of my classic songs plus a couple of way out covers. Should be fun!"[42] In March 2010, Idol added Camp Freddy guitarist Billy Morrison[43] and drummer Jeremy Colson to his touring line-up. Having waited 12 years between Cyberpunk and Devil's Playground, Idol decided it would be prudent to keep himself in the public eye with a quick follow-up.
His look, sound, and rock 'n' roll swagger were a perfect fit for the fledgling cable channel, and the dark and striking video for "White Wedding" propelled the single up the charts and helped make his 1982 solo debut album a modest success. William Michael Albert Broad (born 30 November 1955), known professionally as Billy Idol, is an English singer, songwriter, musician, and actor. Idol achieved fame in the 1970s on the London punk rock scene as the lead singer of Generation X. He later embarked on a solo career which led to international recognition and made him a lead artist during the MTV-driven "Second British Invasion" in America. Billy Idol is a British-American singer, songwriter, musician and actor who rose to fame in the 1970s as the lead singer of the punk rock band Generation X. The episode led to a well-received 2001 appearance on VH1's Storytellers series, in which Stevens and Idol — backed by Billy's current band — knocked out a killer semi-acoustic set full of hits, covers, and even a few Generation X tunes.