Darren Hayes’ new album, “Homosexual,” has a dance-pop style, is full of life and color, and showcases 14 bold and brave songs.
Track List:
1. Let’s Try Being In Love
2. Do You Remember?
3. A Little Death
4. Poison Blood
5. Hey Matt
6. Homosexual (Act One)
7. Music Video
8. Euphoric Equation
9. Nocturnal Animal
10. Feels Like It’s Over
11. All You Pretty Things
12. We Are Alchemists
13. Homosexual (Act Two)
14. Birth
Here is what Darren had to say about his inspiration behind the making of his album, “Homosexual”:
“I named my album ‘Homosexual’ for a variety of reasons. The most obvious is that I’m a gay man who grew up in an era when that word was used to shame and vilify people like me, so I wanted to reclaim it. I’m also a recording artist who came up in an era where being openly gay was frowned upon and I experienced firsthand, the attempted erasure of my true identity from the marketing department of a major record label.”
“But perhaps the most important reason I chose this title is that in 2022, I’m living in a time and in a country where the freedoms of LGBTQI+ people are more at risk than they’ve ever been. Moments like the ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill in Florida, or the constant attacks on trans people, have made it clear to me that now is the time to be as loud as possible about who I am. So on the front cover of my album, I’m proudly lounging upon my version of a stairway to heaven. Emblazoned across me, in the brightest hot pink neon, is a word the 11 year old me used to be terrified of. I lounge proudly underneath the electric buzz of this symbol, this term that used to be used to denigrate people like me. Now it’s my word. Now it means whatever I want it to mean. If you haven’t worked it out yet, I think it means something magical, amazing, unique and essential. My name is Darren Hayes. And I’m a proud Homosexual.”
Kristin’s thoughts: Some of my top picks from the album are “It Feels Like It’s Over,” “Poison Blood,” “We Are Alchemists,” and “All You Pretty Things.” It’s unbelievable how long ago his previous album “Secret Codes and Battleships” came out. I can’t believe it’s been ten years. I’m really happy that Darren (the King) is back! *cue the music from the Lion King*
In the article below, Darren Hayes talks about how music executives tried to straightwash him and control his image, thus not allowing him to be his true authentic self.
On how Darren felt about watching openly queer acts rise to fame like Lil Nas X and MUNA:
“I felt a sense of grief because I just thought, ‘Wow, I love how proud, how joyful and how fully formed this generation is,’ and that was not even a possibility for me.”
On Darren’s new album, Homosexual:
“I always felt like I never really was able to have as much control as I wanted to. It took me years, but I was determined to make a record in the vein of the way George Michael made Faith.”
Darren on growing up and enduring the abuse from his alcoholic father (Robert Hayes) towards himself and the domestic violence towards his mother (Judy Hayes):
“The first person who called me — I hate saying this word — ‘faggot’ was my dad, he says, recalling nights when he and his siblings would fight Robert with hockey sticks to stop him from coming after Judy.”
“We would have to almost knock him out so that we could get my mother into a car. We were too young to drive, but my sister would drive the car to motels. We were children that learned how to patch up walls, so there would never be a social worker or anyone that could know.”
Darren did not just face bullying and homophobia from his own father, but he also faced it at school which caused him to suppress his sexuality.
“I didn’t know any gay people. I’d never had any sexual experiences. I just thought, ‘I guess this is just what it is.'”
Shortly after collaborating with Daniel Jones while teaching preschool, Darren wed his high school love, Colby Taylor, in 1994. While they were recording their first album for Savage Garden, Darren found himself in a gay district where he entered a theater to watch gay porn. This experience left him feeling both alarmed and aroused, prompting him to quickly exit the theater, burdened by shame and guilt. This incident led him to reach out to an emotional support hotline, where he was advised, “Honey, you’re gay. You need to go home and tell your wife.”
Fortunately, when Darren confided in his wife, she was understanding. Initially, she thought he was simply bisexual, but as time passed, she came to realize that he was truly gay.
“She thought I was expressing to her, ‘Hey, I’m into men,’ but I don’t think she realized I was really saying, ‘No, I’m realizing that my whole life up to this point has been this thing to please other people.'”
Darren and Colby attempted counseling with a religious therapist, but it did not help with his sexuality. In fact, it caused him emotional distress and made him feel suicidal. In the end, Colby urged Darren to embrace his true feelings, leading to their separation in 1998, and their divorce was finalized two years later. Sadly, during this period, Darren was also experiencing issues with Daniel Jones, which ultimately resulted in the breakup of their band ‘Savage Garden.’
Darren on the breakup of the band and his sexuality:
“What’s really lovely is actually the music and the band was my wonderland. That was my escape. Daniel was incredibly accepting of my identity. It was when Savage Garden ended that my mental health really took a dive. The band was the only thing that was keeping me from really dealing with the fact that, ‘Wow. I have to deal with my sexuality.'”
Darren required extensive therapy and was prescribed medication for his mental health. He also had to begin his own journey, launching a solo career that led to his first album, “Spin,” released in 2002. Sadly, Columbia Records prioritized their sales over Darren’s well-being, focusing more on how his sexuality might affect profits.
“They were obsessed with controlling my image in a way they had never been before.”
A big example of the record labels straightwashing happened during the shooting of his music video “Insatiable.” His original vision for the video was different than theirs; they had filmed an alternate version behind his back and put it all on his tab, which cost Darren Hayes personally around a million dollars. Also, for that music video, they thought his naturally curly hair looked too gay. Silly, I know, so they forced him to straighten it for the filming.
Because the label stopped promoting him, Darren had to move to the United Kingdom in 2004, which seemed to be the only country that accepted him at that time.
“I couldn’t work out, at the time, why I went from having six months of, like, ‘We need you in the country to do all the TV shows and live appearances,’ to suddenly, ‘We’re pulling you from all that stuff. ‘Because I had friends at the label, some of whom were queer, I found out a year or two after the fact what the trickle-down opinion was.”
Following the launch of his fourth album, “Secret Codes and Battleships,” Darren chose to pause his music career. He relocated to Los Angeles, California, with his husband and enrolled in the Groundlings Theater School for a while. During this time, he met his current friend, Johnny Menke, and his wife, Katie Menke, who was expecting a daughter. This daughter, named “Lilah,” would later become Darren’s goddaughter.
Darren had this to say about getting to babysit Lilah for the Menkes during that time:
“I got life, and that managed to pour itself back into my music and gave me that space to look back on my own childhood. I’m so proud of the fact that there’s never been a moment where she’s ever felt anything but loved in my care, and I’m so glad I got to prove that to myself.”
Fortunately after quite the hiatus, Darren would go on to release a new album named “Homosexual” after being moved by a film about a gay romance called “Call Me By Your Name.” The film affected Darren deeply, causing him to leave the theater in tears, which inspired him to create the song “Let’s Try Being In Love.” This album includes elements of Darren’s life and what is important to him, such as themes of his sexuality, his battle with suicidal thoughts, and his tribute to the queer community and those who lost their lives in the Pulse Nightclub shooting in Orlando, Florida, in 2016.
Kristin’s thoughts: Kudos to Darren for now being brave enough to tell his story and be true to himself. Similar to him, I have faced homophobic comments because of my bisexuality, so I understand how damaging such words can be to one’s self-esteem. I hate that he has gone through such ill treatment.
Here is why, after 20 years, Darren Hayes still refuses to talk to Daniel Jones and how the Savage Garden breakup still negatively impacts him today.
On KIIS with Kylie and Jackie O, they had made a comment claiming Darren was the one who had left the bad, to which he corrected them by saying the following:
“Well, hang on, let me clarify that. I loved it; I would have been in that band forever.”
They proceeded to ask him if Daniel had been good to and supportive of Darren, and this is what he said:
“Uh, no.” I was really supportive of him; he absolutely hated the experience of being famous. He decided before the release of that second album (1999’s Affirmation) that he didn’t want that life—which is totally his right. A week before Affirmation came out, we had the number one single around the world (I Knew I Loved You), and Daniel had a life crisis and decided he didn’t want to do it anymore. We had to convince him: ‘Could you just maybe tour the album, and let’s work this out later on?”
The band would continue to go on for another couple of years before the messy split.
This is what else Darren had to say about the situation:
“His leaving was a huge rug pulled out from under me, and for contractual reasons we couldn’t really talk about it. He held that press conference where he said, ‘Oh, this is the first I’ve heard of it,’ which was such a stupid thing to say, because people thought I’d left the band.”
That press conference was held at the Brisbane Botanic Gardens on October 5, 2001. Daniel Jones had told the media that he was disappointed with the split, and he claimed Darren Hayes had not consulted him about the breakup of the band.
During other interviews Darren said the following:
“It is pretty obvious now who was behind the split, he’s never made music since.”
In an interview with News Corp in 2015, Daniel referred to his time in the band as: “like a bad road trip.”
Darren had this to say about him forgiving Daniel on the matter:
I have so much forgiveness for him now. I don’t like the way he went about it, but I’ve forgiven him.
When Darren was asked whether him and Daniel still speak, after scoffing he said:
Oh no. Nooo. When someone does that to you and doesn’t apologise … I mean, Kyle still believes the lie; that’s a pretty major betrayal. It affected my career and my life. Going solo wasn’t a planned thing.
The Savage Garden breakup not only deeply hurt Darren emotionally, but it also impacted his career. The executives in charge were concerned that his sexuality might hurt record sales, so they started to try and control his public image. They were not fans of his solo work and refused to promote him because they believed he appeared “too gay.”
Kristin’s thoughts: As I write this in 2026, I’ve read the book “Unlovable,” which came out on November 5, 2024, and watched Darren discuss the breakup in YouTube interviews. And I must say that honestly, I can’t help but feel some resentment towards Daniel. At the peak of Savage Garden’s success, right after their second album, “Affirmation,” was released, he suddenly tells Darren he wants to leave the band. I understand he has the right to do so, but I think it was a poor choice. I didn’t appreciate how he handled the situation; he promised Darren he would say it was his decision to leave, but when it was time to be honest, he made it seem like it was Darren’s fault. This hurt Darren deeply and led some to blame him for the breakup. When Darren confronted Daniel about it, Daniel’s response was essentially, “I have to look out for myself. ” What a joke. You can find out more about how Daniel treated Darren in the book “Unlovable.” Another thing I disliked was how Daniel suggested Darren might need to fix his teeth to stay in the public eye. Poor Darren really wanted a friendship with his bandmate, but Daniel never truly returned that sentiment, which is his loss.
Darren Hayes’s “All You Pretty Things” is a beautiful tribute to those who lost their lives on June 12, 2016, at 2am in the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando, Florida. The song came out as a single on August 19, 2022, and was included in his album “Homosexual” on October 7, 2022.
This is a quote by Darren Hayes on his thoughts and feelings about what happened that fateful day when Omar Mateen took the lives of many innocent people who just wanted to hit up the club for a night of fun:
“The Pulse tragedy felt particularly personal to me because it was one of the first mass shootings that had occurred since my husband and I moved back to live permanently in the United States. It broke my heart that this violence was unleashed upon an already marginalized group of people in a space that was supposed to be a place of celebration and refuge.”
On the song’s inspiration, the musician continues, “I wanted to write a song that honored the victims without being mournful, to take the focus away from the perpetrator and put it back on the tremendous love and connection that is the foundation of a queer community and one that can never be erased.”
In the article it also goes on to mention how Darren found healing and freedom with being able to release his new album, Homosexual, and finally be true to himself. And here is some of what he had to say about it:
“My album title “Homosexual” is a personal reclamation of a pejorative and re-inventing it as something shame-free for me. I’ve been on a personal journey to rid myself of the shame I felt as a young man and my own internalized homophobia the kept me from loving myself as a teenager.”
“It’s also political — we live in time where a Michigan town would rather close a library than have a queer book in it — so in an era of ‘Don’t Say Gay’ I feel compelled to push back against the stigma. I’m proud of who I am, and I’m rejecting past narratives and definitions associated with the word. I’m injecting joy and pride into a cold, clinical word.”
“I’m also a recording artist who came up in an era where being openly gay was frowned upon and I experienced first hand, the attempted erasure of my true identity from the marketing department of a major record label. But perhaps the most important reason I chose this title is that in 2022, I’m living in a time and in a country where the freedoms of LGBTQI+ people are more at risk than they’ve ever been.”
“I lounge proudly underneath the electric buzz of this symbol, this term that used to be used to denigrate people like me. Now it’s my word. Now it means whatever I want it to mean.”
“If you haven’t worked it out yet, I think it means something magical, amazing, unique and essential. My name is Darren Hayes. And I’m a proud Homosexual”
“I would say my new album honestly saved my life. I was in a dark place, emotionally, not understanding that just like my sexuality, my creative outlet is a huge part of the person I am, and by denying that, I was denying an essential part of me.”
Kristin’s thoughts: What a touching tribute and love-filled words from a kind soul. I am so proud of Darren, and I wish him all the best as a lifelong fan.
Darren Hayes gets candid about his struggles with depression in his single titled “Poison Blood.” Below are some lyrics from that song that will just tug at your heartstrings and bring tears to your eyes.
“And it’s not that I don’t want to live, it’s the pain that I wish I could kill. All the times that I wanted to die, I made a choice I was gonna survive.”
This is what Darren Hayes had to say about his raw and emotional song, “Poison Blood” and the meaning behind it:
“‘Poison Blood’ is a song about choosing to stay when everything else in your life is telling you to leave. I have a family history of depression and suicide and I talk openly about my own diagnosis in the hope that I might inspire someone who is struggling to seek help, as I have proudly done many times throughout my life.
I describe my depression as a blessing, a gift and a curse all at once. I wouldn’t wish it upon my worst enemy and yet I’m aware I am a deeply sensitive person, and that my unique brain allows me to feel depths of emotions that many people don’t experience.
So I have learned to use those moments to channel melodies and stories that I hope are so real and so relatable they might reach someone else who is in pain, like me, and remind them to stay, like I choose to, every single day.”
Kristin’s thoughts: Like Darren, I too suffer from depression from my painful upbringing; I have done so ever since I was a young child. I also struggle with immense and often debilitating anxiety, having to rely on anti-anxiety medication just to survive. So, I can completely empathize with what he has gone through. I wish life had been easier for him, but I do hope his future days are full of joy.
