Jane’s Addiction frontman Perry Farrell has claimed that the Los Angeles Health Department publicly sought to investigate him after he was faced with a false rumour that he had contracted AIDS.
Farrell, who battled heroin addiction in the early 1990s, says the investigation began when he was performing at Glastonbury in 1993 with Porno for Pyros, the band formed in the wake of Jane’s Addiction’s initial split.
“I was dating this girl (who, by the way, Robert Plant ended up dating after me – sloppy seconds from me),” Farrell told NME in a new interview.
“She was my drug dealer’s daughter, but she was of age and she was a model. Very white hair, blonde hair, natural. This was when AIDS first started and the mother thought that I had contracted AIDS; she said she’d heard that I was spreading it.
“That can get real hot. It got all the way back to the LA Health Department and they made a public announcement to find me and bring me in because I was giving people AIDS.”
Explaining the origin of the rumour, he went on: “This is all a real story! That’s why when you can see on the ‘Ritual’ album [Jane’s’ 1991 classic ‘Ritual De Lo Habitual] cover that there’s a positive test on the album cover. It’s a little-known fact, but I was also tripping at that time making this test positive because it was on my mind.”
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While Farrell did not have the virus, he explained that the constant rumour made him “really hurt inside”.
Farrell’s comments come after he revealed that Jane’s Addiction are aiming to release new music in 2021.
The band have yet to follow up their 2011 studio album ‘The Great Escape Artist’, although they have released a number of live records in recent years, as well as the standalone single ‘Another Soulmate’ in 2013.
“I wouldn’t think albums, I’d think songs,” Farrell told Classic Rock of the band’s new material.
“Maybe writing some new ones. Not this year, ’cause we’re getting late in the year. But I can tell you in the next month or so I’m gonna be finishing up a couple of Jane’s Addiction tracks.”
In the same interview, Farrell also spoke about how his voice box was removed and “put on a table” during his recent spinal surgery.