RANDOM SIGHTS + SOUNDS

Darren Hayes first began his career as part of the Australian pop duo, Savage Garden with Daniel Jones, who found immediate global success with their self-titled debut album in 1997. "I Want You", "To the Moon and Back", and "Truly Madly Deeply" were hit singles from the record and their follow-up album, "Affirmation" brought them even more popularity with "I Knew I Loved You", a worldwide smash. However by the end of 2001, Savage Garden was no more. Hayes continued his music as a solo artist, releasing his first album, "Spin" in 2002. After his follow-up album, Hayes parted ways his major label, Columbia Records, later forming his own label, Powdered Sugar in 2006.

It was during this period that Hayes began his process of coming out as gay, beginning a relationship with Richard Cullen although he did not reveal any of this publicly at the time. The couple married in 2013 and announced their happy union to the world. With his fifth studio album, boldly titled, "Homosexual", the now fifty year old performer proudly proclaims that he no longer feels any shame for who he is with the goal to reclaim the word from something viewed as negative. This dance-pop album is filled with the type of love songs that Hayes had written since the start of career yet they are told from a point of view involving maturity, honesty and newfound joy. Here are two songs from Hayes' new album and one of my favorites from his time with Savage Garden with the video featuring Kirsten Dunst (!) as Hayes' love interest:

A "new" song from the original line-up of the rock band, Queen has just been released. Originally recorded back in 1988 during the sessions for their final album together, "The Miracle", "Face It Alone" features Freddie Mercury's singularly passionate vocals on this mournful ballad. This song came to be heard only by accident as band members, Brian May and Roger Taylor had found the tape recently but it was in such bad shape that they thought it could not be salvaged. But they did give the track to an engineering team who were miraculously able to piece the song back together. This really is an amazing song (recorded while Mercury had been diagnosed with HIV and in failing health) and it's really great to hear this band together again.



Here is a collection of some new songs I'm loving right now:

In 1990, Sinéad O'Connor, the Irish rocker with the shaved head, was a rising pop star, in part due to her wildly successful cover of Prince's song, "Nothing Compares 2 U" which was enhanced by the music video, played in heavy rotation on MTV, that featured a close-up of the emotive singer shedding actual tears while performing the ballad. But that momentum began to slow down first after she refused to have the American National anthem played before her concerts (enraging Frank Sinatra) before coming to crashing halt after her 1992 television appearance as the musical guest on "Saturday Night Live". O'Connor performed an a cappella version of Bob Marley's "War", then tearing up a photo of Pope John Paul II to protest his silence on the sexual abuse of children in the Catholic Church. This act outraged many people at the time and even though she would be vindicated for her actions years later after the Church acknowledged the abuse, O'Connor's career, while she continued to make music, would not really recover.

The fascinating documentary, "Nothing Compares" by Kathryn Ferguson explores O'Connor's life before this troublesome incident, allowing for some explanation for behavior many might consider strange and erratic. She grew up in an abusive household as a young girl in Ireland who later suffered extreme trauma while staying at the Magdalene asylum for over a year as a teenager. Music was where O'Connor found solace and after the drummer for the band, In Tua Nua heard her sing, he had her record a song with the group. Although they decided she was too young to join their band, O'Connor was determined to continue on a music career, placing an ad in a rock magazine and meeting musician/producer, Colm Farrelly who would help her form a band and inspire her sound that would lead to her debut album, "The Lion and the Cobra" in 1987. O'Connor did not participate with this film, with Ferguson using off-camera interviews with people who had worked with the singer, previous interviews and plenty of performance footage by O'Connor to help shape the documentary. And you will not hear "Nothing Compares 2 U" in this film, just outtakes from the music video, as the estate of Prince would not allow the song to be used, most likely due to some of the unpleasant comments O'Connor had said about the late singer over the years.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS

Wishing everyone out there a safe and happy holiday. Now a little music for your listening pleasure:

"Christmas In Killarney" - Bing Crosby (1951)

"Der Trommelmann" - Marlene Dietrich (1964)

"Someday At Christmas" - Stevie Wonder (1966)

"Thank God It's Christmas" - Queen (1984)

"It's The Most Wonderful Time of The Year" - Johnny Mathis (1986) 

"The Christmas Song" - Toni Braxton (2001)

FOCUS ON: QUEEN

Queen was a great rock band, no doubt about that but what made them great was how they added a little something extra that made their music much more exciting, powerful and memorable than your average rock song. The band, made up of Brian May on keyboards/guitar/vocals, Roger Taylor on drums/vocals, bassist, John Deacon and lead vocalist, Freddie Mercury, were open to using any form of music, combined with traditional rock guitar and layered vocals to help make their own fresh and distinctive sound. Queen never worried about following any rules and would wind up paving the way for other artists to feel free to open up the idea of what rock music could potentially be.

Brian May and Roger Taylor first performed together along with Tim Staffel as singer and bassist in the blues-rock band, Smile in 1968. Staffel attended art college with Freddie Mercury, who was then known by his real name, Farokh Bulsara and he became a fan of the group. Smile toured throughout London before signing with Mercury Records where the band recorded several singles.

Tim Staffel decided to leave Smile in 1970 to join another group and Bulsara soon joined the band as lead vocalist. They changed the name of the group to Queen and Bulsara, now known professionally as Freddie Mercury, helped encourage the band to move away from traditional blues-rock and to be more experimental with their sound. While performing on stage, they used different bass players before settling on John Deacon in 1971 to join the group before the recording of their first album.

After several delays, Queen finally released their self-titled debut, "Queen" in 1973. While it received some critical acclaim, the album sold poorly. The group's second album, "Queen II" in 1974 fared much better, reaching the top five in the UK and the lead single, "Seven Seas Of Rhye" went to number ten on the pop charts.

By the release of their third album, "Sheer Heart Attack" later in 1974, Queen moved more towards a traditional rock sound and finally found success outside of England. The first single, "Killer Queen" went to number twelve in the US on the Billboard Hot 100 Charts as well as the album reaching that same position.

With their new found fame, Queen toured the world to sold-out shows that included elaborate costumes and a dramatic stage show filled with lights and visual effects.

In 1975, Queen released, "A Night At The Opera", an expensive production that features diverse musical styling and experimentation. One of the highlights of the album was the song, "Bohemian Rhapsody" written by Mercury that was very unusual because of it's incorporation of a ballad opening, an operatic middle section and a hard rock guitar closer. The main resistance to having this song as a single was it's length. It was over five minutes long which was unheard of at the time but Mercury refused to have it edited down. The song was leaked to a radio station in it's complete form, ultimately becoming a smash hit, with it going to number one in several countries and it is one of Queen's most popular songs.

Throughout the rest of their career, the band continued to experiment by mixing together a wide variety of musical genres such as ragtime, gospel, world, folk and funk with their rock sound to make very distinct Queen records. Queen would have many more hit songs that have become rock anthems including, "We Will Rock You", 'We Are The Champions", "Another One Bites The Dust" and "Under Pressure", a duet with David Bowie. They also created the music for the soundtrack of the 1980 film, "Flash Gordon".

By 1988, many people were alarmed by the gaunt appearance of Freddie Mercury. There were rumours going around that he had AIDS but he denied this, claiming that he was simply just overworked. He continued to work with his band on two more albums, "The Miracle (1989)" and "Innuendo (1991) when on November 23, 1991, a statement was released that confirmed that Freddie Mercury did have AIDS. He died the next day due to complications from the disease. A tribute concert was held in his honor in April of 1992 at London's Wembley Stadium. It was attended by 72,000 fans and raised over twenty million dollars that went to several AIDS charities.

The surviving members of Queen continued to perform together either by sharing vocals or using guest singers. In 2004, Brian May and Roger Taylor teamed up with Paul Rodgers, lead singer for the rock bands, Free and Bad Company, to form a group called Queen + Paul Rodgers. John Deacon decided to retire and did not participate on the project. The group toured for a year and released an album, "The Cosmos Rocks (Amazon Exclusive)" in 2008 before splitting up amicably.

A rock musical was produced using the music of Queen titled, "We Will Rock You" opening in London's West End in 2002. The show became very successful and has been staged in many cities around the world. A feature film is in the works, to begin possibly later this year, about the forming of the band and may star comedian, Sacha Baron Cohen as Freddie Mercury.

Queen recorded fourteen studio albums, had eighteen number one singles and sold over one hundred and fifty million albums across the globe. They were inducted in to The Rock And Roll Hall of Fame in 2001.

Here are a few of my favorite Queen songs:

Killer Queen - Queen (1974)

Somebody To Love - Queen (1976)

Bicycle Race - Queen (1978)

Don't Stop Me Now - Queen (1979)

Another One Bites The Dust - Queen (1980)

Queen decided to make a video of  "Bohemian Rhapsody" in 1975 to help promote the song and it is considered to be one of the first "true" music videos:



This is an odd little video for the song, "I Want To Break Free", which features all of the band members in drag. Why? Well, why not?: