WHET Darren Hayes? (Savage Garden)

Doing comedy podcasts now with his partner

This video still makes me cringe.

He's a delight. The podcast is a side interest. At the moment he's living in California with his husband Richard, and has been writing an original musical (not a jukebox hits thing) for the last two years.

That video was meant to be a cringefest.

r3 Thanks, Darren. Is that podcast any good?

His cover of Dress You Up sounds better than Madonna or Darren Criss.

Sorry to disappoint, R4 I'm just an acquaintance in the UK. I'm not really a podcast fan, so you'll have to ask someone else.

His relationship with Daniel (Jones) was just so tragic. They were so good together.

As of March 2018

I love his voice. It’s very sensual and has an androgynous quality that’s appealing. He should be way way bigger than he is.

So he still dyes his hair darker eh, R8...

He is a natural blond like many Aussie men, and looks like a totally different person when golden. A dark dyejob makes him look more feminine and vulnerable somehow, but also much more striking (due to contrast) which helps in performing arts.

R8: Is he depressed? Why is he taking such pictures? He looks tired and unkempt. Darren can look better than this. He needs to get some rest and comb his hair, find some good clothes. It's not as if he lacks the financial means.

R9: Maybe he would be if he made more of an effort with his appearance. He's a very fine singer-songwriter.

" WHET " is just stupid.

His album a few years ago “Secret Codes and Battleships” is really good.

I really like his SG and solo music. I’ve folleed his career for many years.

He does a movie review podcast called “We paid to see this.” He’s a huge Star Wars fan.

At one point he talked about launching a stand-up comedy career and an acting career. But I don’t know if he’s doing much more than the podcasts these days.

He has the tea on all of the Sony people who tried to destroy George Michael.... he went through the same ringer with those people,

You can find a bunch of his covers of Prince songs on YouTube. My favorite is his version of “Eye Wish U Heaven”

No ones cares if you don't like it, r12. It's DL tradition and here to stay.

Two scandals come to mind:

He was sent up on charges in the UK for racism.

Comedian Simon Amstell publicly outed him and Darren asked him what his problem was and asked him if he wanted him to fuck him in the ass.

He doesn’t seem too keen on Australia. Was the press and/or fandom tough on him down under?

[quote]He was sent up on charges in the UK for racism.

He accepted a section 5 caution for Disorderly Conduct (an official telling off) after getting into a slightly-drunk shouting match with a doorman. The police couldn't find a single witness who heard a racist remark. The doorman was out to make a bit of cash.

The criticism of Australia is because (until the recent change in the law) it didn't accept the legality of his marriage. So, his husband had to travel on a visitors visa, go through different customs checks and would not be recognised as a next of kin if anything happened while they were there.

Is the husband a Yank? I thought he was an Aussie.

I love Kath and Kim but they made a pretty nasty homophobic joke about him. The show makes fun of everyone but still.

Richard is English.

He wasn’t exactly “out”.

He was married to a woman and closeted at the time Savage Garden came to prominence.

It’s very difficult to believe that anyone bought him as straight-married back in the 90s, yet they did.

I suppose he got away with it because a fashion for men in pop then was a femme flamboyance in dress.

The cherry cola song was catchy but that treacly, twee "Stand with you on a mountain" song makes me cringe.

Are these duds still performing?

How embarrassing.

R11 He is depressed because his career has stopped and he'll be 50 soon.

He has some residual guilt about betraying his wife, and also his singing partner.

I thought he split with his wife very amicably. He says they’re still friends and always were, and they parted ways early in both their lives so it isn’t as if he wasted decades of her youth & fertility.

Daniel seems happy in his own career and marriage now, too. If Darren is depressed about anything it’s probably just the usual boring angst everyone has about growing older (which is harder in Arts & Ents).

Maybe he needs something new to talk about in his music, which in turn would beget a new gimmick. That is, if he still wants to be a performer anymore, anyway.

What was the deal with Daniel and Darren? I heard they lived together in LA (in a one room hotel room) while waiting for their record deal to come through. I can believe Darren was madly (truly and deeply) in love with the straight Daniel and it caused Darren heartache. A lot of their songs come through with that kind of angst. Absolutely tragic they don't communicate as they are both in the States now.

I only heard grapevine rumors that they had a sexual relationship sometime in ‘97-98 that turned sour, because Daniel only thought of it as “road head” and friendly DL experimentation while Darren fell in love. It is a tragic story, and one many of us can relate to sadly.

Darren could have done better than Daniel lookswise, so lord knows why he was pining.

Bump for the Garden.

Anyone ever see them live? I always wanted to, but never got the chance before they disbanded.

D x D definitely emanated bf-vibes in some of the early promo pics...

Baiting, dating, or just platonic twin-flaming?

Suggestive EP covers probably didn't help matters...

the Spotify ID picture they chose for Savage Garden is SO SAD. just Darren and Dan smiling at each other :(

That ultra cheesy song by him, "so beautiful " is one of my guilty pleasures.

His solo stuff is crap. The other sexy guy in Savage Garden was responsible for their success.

I want to see his peen.

Anyone know when his depression started?

The way he talks about it implies that a correlation with Daniel breaking up with him...

Isn’t his partner older and unattractive ?

Sensual

R36 The duo stuff is mere pop

Some of his solo material sounds like it belongs in a musical or on someone else's album. It's good but the narrative voice is not "him", sometimes.

Wonder if he writes for other people?

R42 His solo not too poppy. A good thing.

Love it! Fabulously cute and untalented!

Given the homophobic shove he got from much of the English-speaking media after coming out (go to certain archives like ONTD! and look for the decade-old articles in his tag, you’ll see what) I’m surprised he ever attempted a comeback at all, let alone a relatively successful and positive one. Good for him; I probably would have said “stuff it” and gone into house development with my piece a la Jeremy Renner.

I still rmemember how he almost got viciously outed on British fluff telly show POPWORLD, by Channel 4 presenter & comedian Simon Amstell (best known for the quiz show NEVER MIND THE BUZZCOCKS) who was Out himself already. The actual explicit admission and the confrontation they had about it was filmed but never made it to air, but can tell something went down by the sexuality digs littered throughout and by the end of interview where there’s a weird conspicuous edit and tense grimacing. Awkward.

Ew. Gross.

I wanna hear this musical he’s working on. Are musicals even a thing Down Under?

[Quote] Are musicals even a thing Down Under?

Is that a serious question?

Apparently he’s a top, which I can’t get my head around because he’s so tiny.

He's difficult to dislike because he's so grateful for his success, though it helps that he's cute like a Bush-baby.

[quote] DARREN: "Incredible that people were paying me to get on an aeroplane and come & sing...*whispers* I would have done it for free!

Dirrin! Miss this bloke.

He’s covered Madge. Is he a fan?

He gives good blowjobs.

SOMEONE is sitting on a toasty THOT story, eh R53?

R52 so in that clip he hadn't sung in five years before getting up there to sing? In that case it was an impressive performance.

How much is he worth after taxes? Curious as to what his lifestyle is like now....

Love him. He was on Bill Maher's old Politically Incorrect show and was intelligent and witty.

The relationship with Daniel Jones does seem like a classic break up. Jones was the musical genius and for their 2nd album Affirmation - they never worked in the studio together. Hayes had moved to San Francisco and was partying up with the likes of Brian Boitano. Jones married his gf and Hayes seemed to go off the deep end.

An old VHI House of Blues concert for SV, Darren sang almost the entire concert to Daniel Jones, flirting outrageously with him. Jones seemed to take it well but it was kind of odd.

When he had the dark hair, in the early Savage Garden days, he always struck me as a poor man's Brian Molko. I hated all of Savage Garden's songs, but like his solo work. Daniel Jones has always seemed like a closeted, pompous, aloof stick in the mud.

[quote] When he had the dark hair, in the early Savage Garden days, he always struck me as a poor man's Brian Molko.

I miss that andro-goth/glam/cyber look of the 00s.

[quote] An old VHI House of Blues concert for SV, Darren sang almost the entire concert to Daniel Jones, flirting outrageously with him.

Does anyone have links to video of this? I've looked several times and several dozen pages deep but nothing turns up.

R60 does VH1 have a site? They might have it their archives. It originally aired in 1998.

R59 Molko was SO PRETTY. Definitely a comphet crush of mine.

I miss those days too R59.

He was beautiful in his prime R62. An androgynous angel.

I think the Darren/Daniel rift must partly be about some jealous sexual thing, because in this day & age when the only money to be made in the music industry is via touring (and especially reunion tours) there is no way either of them leave comeback money on the table. There’s stubborn and then there’s stupid.

Unless they’re dragging out the possibility and holding out for even more moolah, but in five years no one will care or know who they are so it’s a fine line to walk. Their outright utter disgust with the idea rings true, though, and that makes me think that there is a fucked-up personal & emotional reason they can’t stand on a stage together or even bear to talk at length about the other in an interview.

He wrote the title track on Steps' album from last year.

Steps is still together?

Injustice that the world lost Savage Garden yet we still have Steps.

I love him. Beautiful voice. Sexy in his prime. He isn't looking too hot these days sorta looks like a serious librarian now. But if he wanted to he could look hot again he still has the pretty facial structure.

It seems Darren has a crush on Harry Styles. He also follows Conan Gray on IG.

This is sweet

R30 I've seen Savage Garden perform live before, they were good.

I really love Darren's voice and all his solo albums, he's one of my favourite male singers (I have a strong tendency towards female vocals and there's only a few male singers I actually would say I'm a fan of).

Some of his songs hit me right in the feels in a way that nothing else does. I like his 'We Are Smug' side project too.

Would love for him to come out with another huge double album like "This Delicate Thing We've Made". Not absolutely every track is incredible and the same high standard but overall it's a fucking masterpiece.

Darren has taken a long break. I wish he would make more music. I know it's tough since he is more of an artistic type who makes the music he wants to make rather than hop on trends. It's hard to not sell out to make a profit. I think most of us accept Savage Garden will never reunite. Both guys are content with their lives.

Darren just had a bunch of IG stories answering fan questions. He said he is working on new music. He really loves his twinks, he follows Timothee, Zayn, Harry, Conan and Avan on IG.

Hopefully he gave up music

I interviewed him on the phone and in person several times. Intelligent, funny, humble.

It was my understanding that Daniel and Darren were never close - it was a working relationship. Daniel didn't like fame and wanted to retire with his millions and Darren wanted to keep going.

Sony did a crap job with his first solo album - tried to make him a Justin Timberlake with over-produced songs.

His second and third solo albums are fantastic.

He is prone to depression. This is a chemical balance that many people have. He has had this his entire life.

he had a pretty fucked up childhood - drunk, raging, mean dad that often physically and mentally abused and abandoned the family. Dad is sober now.

I've seen him perform live several times - great performer - pitch perfect instrument. His voice can sound a little breathy but it's actually a strong instrument (kind of like a boy kylie).

Be wary of scammers

He did an interview a few weeks ago. It was very, very bitter.

He's obviously very depressed now he has no PR staff to guide him. He spoke out quite belligerently against his partner saying they couldn't bear to look at each other.

r77 so they don't want to stand with each other on a mountain?