GOD SAVE THE QUEENS: THE ROCK AND THE ROLL OF JOSH HOMME

The Queens of the Stone Age frontman has survived brushes with death to come back stronger as the ultimate rockstar-buthis attitude has always been built on authenticity

- Lisa Wright

Josh Homme - the piratical leader of renegade rock'n'roll titans Queens of the Stone Age; a musician deeply embedded into the fabric of modern rock (Dave Grohl, Iggy Pop and Alex Turner have all called upon his services), and a frontman whose loose hips and considerable charm once gave him the early nickname Ginger Elvis - has that most humanising of things: a bit of a cold. He slumps face first onto the sofa of his posh London hotel, a 6ft 5in tree felled at the ankles, and groans. He would quite like a respirator, he jokes, but in the absence of the required tech, we will crack on.

Bleary-eyed from a 17-hour drive from Antwerp last night - the previous stop on a short, stripped back European tour celebrating their recent Alive in the Catacombs film ("We won't play many gigs like this. This will not last," he warns) - it's endearing to see the towering frontman of one of the world's most beloved rock bands in a moment of such normality. But then again, over recent years, Homme has been laid bare not just musically (though their performance in the hallowed, gothic Parisian tunnels, as seen in the film, did necessitate a total reworking of their material), but in his life as a whole.

"Anyone that's been through a family separation knows the f***ing terror, but when you've done so well that it becomes fodder for people to pretend they know [what's going on] and there are kids involved," he begins, referencing his much-publicised split from ex-wife and Distillers singer Brody Dalle, "and then people die around you, and then they keep dying, and then you almost die, those things as difficult as they are have been gifts to get somewhere. Metamorphosis is painful.

"Do you think a caterpillar crawls into a chrysalis and thinks, 'This is great in here?' That shit f***ing hurts. But my grandpa was famous for saying life is hard because it's worth it."