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Huey Lewis opened up about being "basically deaf" for almost nine years after living with Meniere's disease.
"I'm basically deaf," the Huey Lewis & the News frontman told Michael Rosenbaum on a recent episode of Inside of You. "I have a cochlear implant on this side, and I have a regular old hearing aid in the other one. They're compatible, and they stream to the computer, and they stream to the phone, but I'm basically deaf." Watch the clip here.
The legendary rocker explained that he first lost hearing in his right ear 35 years ago, in which he then "existed on one ear."
"My life has changed immeasurably," the musician, 76, admitted. "Music is not part of my life anymore, which is a hard pill to swallow."
The "Cruisin'" singer revealed that his cochlear implant "breaks everything down into digital bits," which makes speech easier to understand than music.
"Music occurs in all frequencies," Lewis clarified. "It comes at you in a lot of different frequencies, and the cochlear, which is my only reliable form of hearing, distorts the music a little bit. People sound like they took a hit of helium and then kind of talk like that. It makes pitch impossible to hear, but I can hear conversations."
Lewis announced his diagnosis with the ear disorder in April 2018. He released his final studio album with his bandmates, Weather, in 2020.