While speculation continues about the cause of Michael Hutchence's death, it is a sobering thought that his colourful presence will be missed more by tabloid journalists than by music fans.
Hutchence was the quintessential rock star and a string of high-profile relationships kept him in the headlines "for all the wrong reasons", as he once said. However, his band, INXS, despite being one of the biggest bands in the world in the mid to late 1980s, were largely a spent creative force.
Hutchence, who was 37 when he died, was born in Sydney but spent his early years in Hong Kong as a privileged member of the expatriate community - his father was a successful businessman who had a champagne importation business.
After he returned to Australia, aged 12, he briefly went to live in California with his mother when she separated from his father but he returned to Sydney at 17 to fulfil a childhood dream and set up his own rock band.
Along with three school friends, Tim, Andrew and Jon Farriss, he formed a band called The Farriss Brothers, but after a few years playing in local pubs, they changed their name to INXS (pronounced "in excess" - as in the lifestyle they all aspired to) and released their debut album in 1980.
Although their brand of heads down, no nonsense rock 'n' roll (which in the early days was clearly derivative of the Rolling Stones sound) was well received in their native land, they did not manage to break on to the international circuit.
As more albums followed throughout the early 1980s, they refined their sound, adding a more commercial twist to their trademark rock bluster, and honed their act by playing about 300 gigs a year. The release of the Kick album in 1987 turned the band from local heroes into international superstars. With hit singles like New Sensation and Need You Tonight, the album sold over 10 million copies around the world and in the space of a few weeks INXS went from playing pubs to the sort of stadium-sized venues normally frequented by Tina Turner and Bon Jovi.
Hutchence was a marvellous front man - his classic good looks and sex symbol status guaranteed many a magazine front cover and a devoted fan base. Often compared to Jim Morrison of the Doors in his on-stage persona, Hutchence walked it as he talked it and enjoyed all the trappings of the rock 'n' roll lifestyle: the drink, the drugs, the supermodel girlfriends.
Musically, the band were never to repeat the glory days of the late 1980s. Although later albums, like X (1990) and Welcome To Wherever You Are (1992), were commercial successes, they could not emulate the massive global sales of Kick and the band's raunchy rock style soon became unfashionable with the rise of grunge rock (Nirvana et al).
As the attention switched from his music to his lifestyle, Hutchence provided acres of tabloid-friendly material through a relationship with the singer Kylie Minogue, and later a brief engagement to the Danish model Helena Christensen. His relationship with Paula Yates, wife of Bob Geldof, was carried out in secret for a while before press photographers captured the two on holiday together.
A clever, witty and charming man, Hutchence was in Australia to begin a 20th anniversary tour of INXS. He'll be sadly missed, not least by the tabloids.