Darren Hayes talks about the Betrayal that caused Savage Garden to break up
Darren Hayes has written about how the breakup of Savage Garden was so bad that the bandmates still don’t talk to each other 20 years later.
In a new, honest interview, former Savage Garden frontman Darren Hayes talked about how he and bandmate Daniel Jones broke up and how they haven’t talked in years because of a “major betrayal.”
In 2001, when they were at the top of the charts, the Aussie pop duo broke up. They had only put out two albums and a string of hit singles.
Hayes told KIIS’s Kyle and Jackie O this morning what the real reason for the breakup was after host Kyle Sandilands mentioned that Hayes had “left” Savage Garden.
“Well, let me be clear: Daniel left Savage Garden,” he said to clear things up.
“I loved it, and I would have stayed in that band for a long time.”
Co-host Jackie O asked if Hayes and Jones had been “good and supportive” of each other while they were in Savage Garden.
“Uh, no. I really stood by him, even though he hated everything about being famous. Before his second album, Affirmation, came out in 1999, he decided that he didn’t want that life, which was his right. We had the number one song in the world (I Knew I Loved You) a week before Affirmation came out, but Daniel had a life crisis and decided he didn’t want to do it anymore. We had to persuade him: “Could you maybe just tour the album, and we’ll figure out the rest later?”
The two kept going for two more years, with Hayes becoming more of the public face of Savage Garden. In 2001, they had a “messy” public breakup.
“His leaving was a huge blow to me, and we couldn’t really talk about it because of our contract,” he said.
“At that press conference, he said, ‘Oh, this is the first I’ve heard of it.’ That was such a stupid thing to say, because people thought I’d left the band.
Jones told the media at a press conference in Brisbane’s Botanic Gardens on October 5, 2001, that he was upset that Savage Garden was breaking up and that Hayes had ended the band without talking to him about it.
Hayes said that it was “pretty clear” who was to blame for the split.
“He hasn’t made any music since then.”
Jones did work behind the scenes for the Australian pop groups Aneiki and Bachelor Girl for a short time after the band broke up, but she later went into real estate.
“I’m able to forgive him so much now. Hayes said, “I don’t like how he did it, but I’ve forgiven him.”
But when asked if he and Jones still talked, he laughed.
“Oh no. Nooo. “When someone does that to you and doesn’t apologize, that’s a pretty big betrayal,” he said. “Kyle still believes the lie, so that’s a big deal.”
“It changed both my job and my life. It wasn’t something that was planned.”
During their short career, Savage Garden had two US number one singles and sold millions of albums in the US. Hayes’ first solo album, Spin, came out in 2002 and just made it into the US top 40.
He said that his record label “freaked out” about his growing sexuality, which hurt his solo career in the most profitable market for Savage Garden.
“The US record label didn’t like my solo career at all, so they didn’t do anything to promote it. I used to sing with Pavarotti and perform at the Olympics. Then they told me, “We can’t put him on TV because when he moves, he looks too gay.”
Hayes came out to the public in 2006 when he married his partner, Richard Cullen. He said that being the headliner at this year’s Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Parade made him feel like he could finally be himself in his music.
Now, he’s not holding back. His soon-to-be-released fifth album, his first in more than a decade, is called simply Homosexual. Hayes said that at age 50, he was finally ready to have a party for himself.
“I worked at a big record label for a long time where that was a problem. During my time away, I realized that when I was most successful and well-known, I was never really praised for who I was,” he said.
“I wanted to get rid of that shame so badly.”
