Chrissie Hynde, 2023.
Photo: Getty Images, Matthew Baker. All rights reserved.
Pretenders frontwoman Chrissie Hynde has shared that she feels “guilty” for the untimely deaths of her band members in the ’80s. Band co-founders Pete Farndon and James Honeyman-Scott died shortly after each other as a result of their drug use.
Honeyman-Scott succumbed to cocaine intoxication in 1982 at the age of 25, just two days after Farndon was fired from the band for his heroin use. Farndon drowned in a bath a year later when he lost consciousness after an overdose.
“I’m guilty,” Hynde tells Record Collector. “If it’s true, then it’s not a big word. It’s only a big word when you feel guilty without being guilty. But if you’re really guilty, then you should raise your hand and say ‘guilty as charged’.”
The singer continues: “I didn’t try to get her off drugs and I was even a part of it. It’s not like I was her mother and we went on tour and it was all very hard. I had problems with Pete — so maybe it’s not his fault, but I wish I had done some things better.”
Hynde also says that since Farndon and Honeyman-Scott’s deaths, the band no longer feels like the real Pretenders. “Since Pete and Jimmy died and because I had to replace people, it’s now more of a Pretenders tribute band called The Pretenders,” she says.
The Pretenders released the 1982 single “Back On The Chain Gang” as a tribute to Honeyman-Scott, who was still alive at the time the song was written.
On Friday (September 15th), “Relentless”, the Pretenders’ 12th studio album, will be released. This will be followed by two gigs in Liverpool and Kingston Upon Thames.