'Diana whatcha doin' with a guy like him/ Diana I'd die for you, please let me in/ Diana can't you see you drive me wild/ Diana I bet you're just a reckless child"
Bryan Adams wrote those lyrics in 1985, when he was just a starstruck young Canadian rocker with a crush on the distant and glamorous Princess of Wales.
Now, many people will be examining those words, as well as other songs the notoriously private Adams has written or sung in the intervening years -- like Can't Stop This Thing We Started and Thought I'd Died And Gone To Heaven, perhaps? -- closely in the wake of reports that he and Princess Diana had an affair after her divorce from Prince Charles in 1996.
Rumours of the affair started circulating earlier this year after former royal butler Paul Burrell released his book A Royal Duty, in which he referred to Diana's nine secret post-marital lovers -- one of whom was "a leading musician."
But it was Adams' former girlfriend, Danish actress Cecilie Thomsen, who let the cat out of the bag this week by admitting the existence of the affair in an interview with the Danish magazine Billed Bladet that was picked up by Britain's Daily Mail newspaper.
"I knew Diana had an affair with Bryan," Thomsen was quoted as saying. "Ours was a stormy relationship, and Bryan's affair with Diana didn't make it any easier." Thomsen also admitted to feeling "mixed emotions" when she attended Diana's funeral with Adams.
Adams, who turned 44 yesterday, reportedly called the story "pure conjecture and supposition," but he did admit earlier this year that he had met Diana "many times" and that they had become "very good friends by the end of her life."
Indeed, Adams enjoys a friendly relationship with several members of the royal family, which came about through his charity work. He first met Diana, who was apparently a big fan of his music, at a Vancouver concert in 1986, the year after Diana was released as the b-side of Adams' big hit Heaven.
In 1994, Adams moved to London and began to circulate in the high-fashion scene. Since then he has participated in numerous charity events patronized by the princess and her former husband, including the Queen's Jubilee concert and, most recently, the Fashion Rocks Princes Trust benefit, where he performed his song The Only Thing That Looks Good On Me Is You for an audience that included Prince Charles.
Adams has also pursued a parallel career as a photographer, and is working on his third book of fashion and portrait photography to benefit breast cancer charities. His subjects have included Canadians Shania Twain, Celine Dion, Linda Evangelista and Margaret Atwood, as well as Chrissie Hynde and Queen Elizabeth. Indeed, a photograph of the Queen that Adams took in 2001 is about to be issued as a Canadian stamp, which Adams told the Vancouver Sun he was "thrilled and honoured" by.
Adams has never been eager to talk about his music, let alone his private life. He was reportedly involved with Thomsen for 12 years until they broke up in 2001, but is also rumoured to have been besotted by English supermodel Kate Moss, another of his subjects. In a strange coincidence, Adams was riding his motorbike in London with an unnamed friend in May when he was hit by an air rifle in an apparently random attack.
At presstime Adams was en route to Western Canada, where he is scheduled to perform several concerts, including a benefit for forest fire relief and the Grey Cup halftime show in Regina on Nov. 16. His publicist, Marlene Palmer, said Adams was "literally unavailable for comment."
EXCERPTS FROM THE SONG DIANA
Oh the first time I saw you was in a magazine
The next time you was walking 'cross my television screen
I knew right then and there that I had to make you mine
The day that he married you I nearly lost my mind...
Since I saw that picture of you
Nothing matters I just wanna lay ya
We can make it, you and me
So come on baby, come on baby, oh -- oh yeah ...
(Yeah, here's how I see it)
Your one choice if you get away, leave it up to me
I'll bring you lovin' if you bring your limousine
Diana you really got a hold on me
Diana you gimme your tears I'll set you free
Diana yeah -- yeah
