05 July 2011
You don’t wanna repeat yourself, but at the same time you don’t want to shoot yourself off to the old folk’s home.”
In a day where a pop icon’s reinvention has become an art form, it’s all about meticulous planning and an avant-garde PR team. Rising to fame in the early ‘90s as one half of multi-Platinum selling Australian duo Savage Garden, and following this with a nine-year solo career, Darren Hayes soundtracked an epoch, marking himself as one of our most talented pop exports. After an ever increasing hiatus between his past three records, this lull takes the cake, with four years of ambivalence in the lead up to October’s Secret Codes and Battleships.
Hayes has his Australian manager, Cathy Oates to thank for dragging him back into the limelight; he was walking his dog near his London home when Oates, who he shares with Angus & Julia Stone, phoned in a wake up call.
“I was walking my dog and she was like ‘what are you doing? This is ridiculous!’” says Hayes, 39. “She really set forth this plan which was that she wanted to go and get me a new major publishing deal, a new major record deal and get me a great touring agent.”
Oates made every one of these things happen and although Hayes signed on dubiously with Mercury Records Australia, he admits he’s now “obsessed” with the Universal Music sub-label. “A lot of artists have this fear of a major label, I’ve certainly had it, because I experienced it. You can have your record killed at the hands of an A&R committee.”
Hayes is referring to his second solo record, The Tension and Spark, which he released through Columbia Records in 2004 to a chartless fate. Hayes parted with the label in 2006 to start his own independent venture, Powdered Sugar.
Like most of pop’s luminaries, Hayes has undergone a series of reinventions as he’s dabbled in different genres, and although some of his fans didn’t follow the osmosis, Hayes says they were necessary stepping stones.
“It’s like I was a carpenter who made houses and I made pretty good houses, but I got bored so I started making pottery and the pottery was fine,” he laughs. “But no-one was really asking about it.“
Still, with a new label behind him and the guarantee of creative control and a wider audience target, Hayes says he was very conscious of the pitfalls associated with a comeback record. “The quick fix solution is to be trendy and make a record which is sort of, disastrously hip. This isn’t that at all,” he says. “I always want to make sure that there’s a reason for me to bring out a record. The best reason is that I believe in it."
This time around Hayes reunited with US producer Walter Afanasieff who worked on Savage Garden’s Affirmation and his first solo record, Spin; guitarist Rex Goh who he hadn’t recorded with in 15 years and enlisted some of the industry’s best collaborators including Grammy Award winning mixer Robert Orton, Carl Falk who co-wrote the album’s first single Talk Talk Talk, Steve Robson (Taylor Swift, Leona Lewis), Phil Thornalley (Pixie Lott, Natalie Imbruglia), and long- time collaborator Justin Shave (The Potbelleez). With a team of pop masterminds behind him, it’s surprising to hear Hayes’ managers sent him back to the drawing board halfway through the recording process.
“I felt like I was almost there and they had to sit me down and say ‘you’re not there yet, you have to keep going, there’s one more song you haven’t written yet’,” he says. “They were so right, my favourite song of the record was written as a result of my managers telling me to go and write one more song.”
That song is Blood Stained Heart, an emblematic track which covers the thread of Hayes’ labour. “[It’s] about the worst day, the worst night, the worst year of your life... You’ve got nothing to hope for but you’ve just got each other,” he explains. “It’s basically that moment where you wish you could take the bullet for somebody... It’s hopeful though. The songs are saying don’t give up on us because without you there’s no point to this story. It’s a two-person film here. It’s not gonna work as a soliloquy.”
Secret Codes and Battleships is out this October through Mercury Records.
In a day where a pop icon’s reinvention has become an art form, it’s all about meticulous planning and an avant-garde PR team. Rising to fame in the early ‘90s as one half of multi-Platinum selling Australian duo Savage Garden, and following this with a nine-year solo career, Darren Hayes soundtracked an epoch, marking himself as one of our most talented pop exports. After an ever increasing hiatus between his past three records, this lull takes the cake, with four years of ambivalence in the lead up to October’s Secret Codes and Battleships.
Hayes has his Australian manager, Cathy Oates to thank for dragging him back into the limelight; he was walking his dog near his London home when Oates, who he shares with Angus & Julia Stone, phoned in a wake up call.
“I was walking my dog and she was like ‘what are you doing? This is ridiculous!’” says Hayes, 39. “She really set forth this plan which was that she wanted to go and get me a new major publishing deal, a new major record deal and get me a great touring agent.”
Oates made every one of these things happen and although Hayes signed on dubiously with Mercury Records Australia, he admits he’s now “obsessed” with the Universal Music sub-label. “A lot of artists have this fear of a major label, I’ve certainly had it, because I experienced it. You can have your record killed at the hands of an A&R committee.”
Hayes is referring to his second solo record, The Tension and Spark, which he released through Columbia Records in 2004 to a chartless fate. Hayes parted with the label in 2006 to start his own independent venture, Powdered Sugar.
Like most of pop’s luminaries, Hayes has undergone a series of reinventions as he’s dabbled in different genres, and although some of his fans didn’t follow the osmosis, Hayes says they were necessary stepping stones.
“It’s like I was a carpenter who made houses and I made pretty good houses, but I got bored so I started making pottery and the pottery was fine,” he laughs. “But no-one was really asking about it.“
Still, with a new label behind him and the guarantee of creative control and a wider audience target, Hayes says he was very conscious of the pitfalls associated with a comeback record. “The quick fix solution is to be trendy and make a record which is sort of, disastrously hip. This isn’t that at all,” he says. “I always want to make sure that there’s a reason for me to bring out a record. The best reason is that I believe in it."
This time around Hayes reunited with US producer Walter Afanasieff who worked on Savage Garden’s Affirmation and his first solo record, Spin; guitarist Rex Goh who he hadn’t recorded with in 15 years and enlisted some of the industry’s best collaborators including Grammy Award winning mixer Robert Orton, Carl Falk who co-wrote the album’s first single Talk Talk Talk, Steve Robson (Taylor Swift, Leona Lewis), Phil Thornalley (Pixie Lott, Natalie Imbruglia), and long- time collaborator Justin Shave (The Potbelleez). With a team of pop masterminds behind him, it’s surprising to hear Hayes’ managers sent him back to the drawing board halfway through the recording process.
“I felt like I was almost there and they had to sit me down and say ‘you’re not there yet, you have to keep going, there’s one more song you haven’t written yet’,” he says. “They were so right, my favourite song of the record was written as a result of my managers telling me to go and write one more song.”
That song is Blood Stained Heart, an emblematic track which covers the thread of Hayes’ labour. “[It’s] about the worst day, the worst night, the worst year of your life... You’ve got nothing to hope for but you’ve just got each other,” he explains. “It’s basically that moment where you wish you could take the bullet for somebody... It’s hopeful though. The songs are saying don’t give up on us because without you there’s no point to this story. It’s a two-person film here. It’s not gonna work as a soliloquy.”
Secret Codes and Battleships is out this October through Mercury Records.
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