The shocking story behind a brain injury that changed Michael Hutchence’s personality and sparked a downward spiral has been revealed.
More than 20 years since his the star’s suicide a crucial detail that sparked the Australian rock legend’s demise has only just come to light.
In 1992 Hutchence was punched by a taxi driver during a late-night pizza run in Copenhagen.
Details of the one-punch attack were revealed by his former partner, supermodel Helena Christensen, in a documentary about the INXS frontman’s life, Mystify: Michael Hutchence.
The shocking story behind a brain injury that changed Michael Hutchence’s personality and sparked a downward spiral has been revealed (Hutchence pictured in Germany in 1990)
![Details of the one-punch attack were revealed by his former partner supermodel Helena Christensen (pictured left with Hutchence), in a documentary about the INXS frontman's life, Mystify: Michael Hutchence](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2019/04/28/00/12802548-6967817-image-a-131_1556406435989.jpg)
Details of the one-punch attack were revealed by his former partner supermodel Helena Christensen (pictured left with Hutchence), in a documentary about the INXS frontman’s life, Mystify: Michael Hutchence
Ms Christensen recounts the moment she witnessed the taxi driver yell at Hutchence to move out of his way before getting out of his car and punching him, ABC reported.
The punch was so forceful it pushed the singer backwards and he fell, smashing his head on the curb and leaving him unconscious in the middle of the street.
‘He was unconscious and there was blood coming out of his mouth and ear,’ Ms Christensen recalls in the documentary.
The supermodel rushed Hutchence to hospital but thought he wouldn’t live through the night.
But when he woke at the hospital, Ms Christensen says he wasn’t the same person.
‘This dark, very angry side came out in him,’ she says.
Ms Christensen said his personality changed from ‘joyful, sweet, deep and emotional’ to ‘ dark and very angry’.
In the week and a half he stayed at the Danish hospital, he was aggressive and would push away doctors and nurses, insisting he was fine to go home.
In the following month, he spent the entire time in the supermodel’s apartment refusing to eat and vomiting blood.
![More than 20 years since his the star's suicide a crucial detail that sparked the Australian rock legend's demise has only just come to light (pictured with Kylie Minoque in 1992)](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2019/06/29/02/15400950-7194505-Despite_his_story_being_rehashed_in_the_press_a_crucial_detail_t-m-7_1561772917226.jpg)
More than 20 years since his the star’s suicide a crucial detail that sparked the Australian rock legend’s demise has only just come to light (pictured with Kylie Minoque in 1992)
![The punch was so forceful it pushed the singer backwards and smashed his head on the curb, leaving him unconscious in the middle of the Copenhagen street](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2019/06/29/02/15400958-7194505-image-a-9_1561772948660.jpg)
The punch was so forceful it pushed the singer backwards and smashed his head on the curb, leaving him unconscious in the middle of the Copenhagen street
The couple then travelled to Paris where they visited a specialist, who confirmed that Hutchence’s sensory interest in food and wine was erased in the attack.
He also sustained multiple brain contusions and began taking drugs to deal with the pain caused from the injury.
Christensen says the incident contributed to Michael’s depression and eventual suicide in a Sydney hotel room five years later.
‘When Michael hit his head, he came back a different person and I’m sure doctors were prescribing all sorts of weird and wonderful concoctions,’ bassist Garry Gary Beers told Sunday Night in 2014.
‘He was a dick and it wasn’t him, that’s the thing. It wasn’t the Michael we knew and that’s what was so surprising. He couldn’t smell, he couldn’t taste, he was drinking wine by the bottle ’cause it was just like nothing to him.’
While he was public about losing his sense of smell and taste, Hutchence swore Ms Christensen to secrecy about the attack.
![Christensen says the incident contributed to Michael's depression and eventual suicide in a Sydney hotel room five years later (pictured in London in 1990)](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2019/06/29/02/15400944-7194505-Christensen_says_the_incident_contributed_to_Michael_s_depressio-m-11_1561773012367.jpg)
Christensen says the incident contributed to Michael’s depression and eventual suicide in a Sydney hotel room five years later (pictured in London in 1990)
![Australian director Richard Lowenstein (pictured) said not even the band members knew the full extent the Hutchence's injury until they saw the documentary in full](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2019/06/29/02/15400934-7194505-image-a-12_1561773022422.jpg)
Australian director Richard Lowenstein (pictured) said not even the band members knew the full extent the Hutchence’s injury until they saw the documentary in full
‘She didn’t even tell her parents for 20 years, so her interview was very revealing. And then the coroner’s report was even more revealing — of what he was hiding,’ Australian director Richard Lowenstein told ABC Radio National’s Stop Everything.
The director said not even the band members knew the full extent the Hutchence’s injury until they saw the documentary in full.
Mr Lowenstein obtained the singer’s full unedited coroner’s report through British journalists and obtained the advice of neurologists and psychologists.
He said it was a ‘revelation’ about Hutchence’s downward spiral, with a ‘perfect storm of suicide risk’ in the report.
Mystify is over 90 minutes of montage from the rock legend’s life, with footage sourced from old interviews, outtakes and home videos shot by Hutchence himself.
Mr Lowenstein revealed his media silence after Hutchence’s 1997 death helped him gain the trust of those who were closest to him.
Lowenstein’s film features interviews with the rock star’s ex-girlfriends Kylie Minogue, 51, and Helena Christensen, 50 – who has not spoken publicly about her relationship with the rock star since his death.
‘I hadn’t gone to the press in the 20 or so years since he passed away so they knew their precious footage was in safe hands,’ the director told Today Extra.
The unseen excerpts from Hutchence’s life includes private footage showing Minogue and Michael holidaying together in Europe.
![Christensen says the incident contributed to Michael's depression and eventual suicide in a Sydney hotel room five years later (pictured together)](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2019/06/29/02/15400946-7194505-image-a-13_1561773058365.jpg)
Christensen says the incident contributed to Michael’s depression and eventual suicide in a Sydney hotel room five years later (pictured together)