Lionel Richie used to call Michael Jackson “smelly” because the late King of Pop rarely changed his clothes.
Lionel Richie used to have an unflattering nickname for his pal Michael Jackson
The veteran singer was close friends with the late King of Pop prior to his death in 2009 – co-writing their 1985 song We Are the World and making him godfather to his daughter Nicole Richie – and he’s today revealed the singer had questionable hygiene habits so he and producer Quincy Jones came up with an unflattering nickname for him.
Richie told the Guardian newspaper: “[Jackson was] eccentric and extremely chaotic … Quincy and I called Michael smelly.”
The Hello star told the publication Jackson used to wear his clothes until they disintegrated, revealing he once gave the singer a pair of jeans and a new pair of underpants and forced him to change because the smell was so pungent.
However, he later found the fresh garments discarded on Jackson’s bedroom floor, adding they were “lying there like roadkill”.
Richie also opened up about Jackson’s poor hygiene in his new memoir Truly, writing: “His day-to-day life was what you could call eccentric. Like an absent-minded professor but still a kid …
“Michael would laugh too [about his nickname], realizing that he was oblivious to the fact that he hadn’t changed or washed his clothes for a couple of days or so. We all have our quirks.”
Richie added: “He was on tour performing in the elaborate costumes made for him by his stylists, or he was in his pyjama bottoms and slippers in the studio or he was in his going-out attire.
“Or he was at home in something loose and comfortable so he could practice his dance moves and play with his menagerie of pets.”
The singer went on to explain his pal struggled to get his clothes dry-cleaned because so many people would snatch his belongings and keep them as a souvenir.
He added: “[Whenever he] came to visit me, he was wearing whatever – jeans and a t-shirt. And the jeans were either falling off him or too short to even be jeans and, well, smelly …
“Everybody kept something for a souvenir. He just got into the habit of wearing the same pants until they were unwearable.”
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