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Kate and I were bound in this insane gay son-mother way. But if you attempted to cross her, she was ferocious. Whereas Martha was very quiet, a little cooler. I tended to loaf around, I was needy of attention, always lapping it up. I liken it to the relationship between a cat and a dog. The minute you went for a pinch of skin, she turned into this tigress. I was keen to dominate most situations – and Martha expressed a kind of brutal self-defence method from very early on. I was never the protective older brother. I was a precocious two-year-old and had a lot of attention until she arrived. Legend goes that when my parents brought Martha back from the hospital after she was born, everybody crowded around her, so I took a glass of grape juice and poured it on her. And he’s even more talented than he thinks he is. He has taken hard knocks really well, with a lot of reflection and acceptance. It was like going back to a cellular level. So we sewed ourselves together again, repaired ourselves. The love that our mother gave us needed to be replaced. But when Mum died, we needed to support each other and become incredibly positive about one another. In our early 20s, we wanted to do our own thing, so we did, for 10 or so years. Losing Mum (in 2010) made Rufus and I much, much closer. He was able to see the red flags and guide Rufus. Rufus likes to brush shoulders with famous people that’s something he feels comfortable with. But he had enough people in his life who could help him through that, like Elton John. I couldn’t encourage him to go to rehab, because I myself am not sober. I wasn’t going to cross that threshold – it was a different group, (crystal meth) was something else. I’d be with him at the party, but then he would disappear behind a curtain and you’d lose him. I was right there with Rufus as a young person – we did a lot of drugs together. Deep down, I already knew that it was not going to happen to me. I had already started writing songs and, like any artist, I had a fantasy about becoming famous, too. I’d never been exposed to that in music before my parents’ success was up and down. A feeling from the label of: OK, throw some money at this guy, he is amazing. With Rufus’s first record (1998’s eponymous album), there was a lot of hope. I had started writing songs and I had a fantasy about becoming famous, too It’s a classic divorced-kids kind of thing. We made his life difficult, but a moment later we were totally adoring. There was resentment and anger towards my dad – Rufus and I would speak French to each other, which he didn’t understand. We had to hide our love for Dad’s girlfriend because my mother was angry. We were affected by that, but banded together. My brother and I unfortunately witnessed our parents bad-mouthing each other. I was less than a year old when my parents split up. At night we would often try to out-sing each other see who could stay up the longest, singing as loudly as possible. When we were kids we lived in Montreal with our mum, but would spend long summer weekends in New York with our dad. He is convinced I tripped him deliberately.
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#Rufus wainwright songs cracked#
One time he fell, cracked his skull open and ended up going to hospital. When he was about the age in this photograph, six or seven, there was a high, exterior staircase outside our mother’s house. But something shocking happened that traumatised him. Once, when I was a toddler and starting to walk, I ran down the hallway and he stuck his foot out. Throughout our childhood, Rufus and I fought about everything. Rufus is based in Los Angeles with his husband and daughter, and is touring the UK this month. Martha lives in Montreal, with her two children and partner. Similarly prolific, Martha has released seven albums, the latest of which she is now touring. The children of two famous folk singers, Loudon Wainwright III and Kate McGarrigle, their bohemian childhood was split between Montreal and New York, before Rufus rocketed to fame with his self-titled debut, a further nine albums and two operas. I nternationally revered singer-songwriters Rufus and Martha Wainwright are as known for their theatrical artistry as for inter-familial rifts. Later photograph: Florian Thoss/The Guardian. Styling: Katharina Kosellek. Set design: Cinzia Grundke.