January 7, 2025 • 37 mins
What's a rather poor therapeutic strategy to heal trauma/abuse ..... become a global superstar!
'Unlovable' by Darren Hayes is an autobiography of the solo musical artist and former front man of Savage Garden. It details his childhood growing up in Brisbane, turbulent home/school life due to an alcoholic/violent father, musical ups & downs, struggles with his sexuality & road to healing. It consists of a fair few chapters (20-30ish), inset plate of photographs and told mostly in a chronological style with a couple of flashbacks.
If you got value from the podcast please provide support back in any way you best see fit!
Timeline:
(00:00:00) Intro
(00:03:38) Themes/Questions
(00:21:43) Author & Extras
(00:30:25) Summary
(00:34:14) Value 4 Value
(00:35:59) Join Live!
Connect with Mere Mortals:
Website: https://www.meremortalspodcasts.com/
Discord: https://discord.gg/jjfq9eGReU
Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/meremortalspods
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/meremortalspodcasts/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@meremortalspodcasts
Value 4 Value Support:
Boostagram: https://www.meremortalspodcasts.com/support
Paypal: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/meremortalspodcast
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Kyrin Down (00:00):
What's a rather poor therapeutic strategy to heal trauma and abuse?
Become a global superstar.
Welcome, mere mortalads, to another round of the mere mortal book reviews. I'm your host here, Kyrin Down, live on the 8th of 1st
(00:22):
2025.
Indeed, this is a normal time for me, 11 AM Australian Eastern Standard Time on a Wednesday. I would love if you come come join me live as we do have, someone in the chat right now. Now as you might summarize, this is the podcast which will take me to my ultimate goal of being the best book reviewer in the world.
(00:42):
Okay. No. I'm not gonna be doing that. But we do have, someone who has reached the the heights of stardom and, for some strange and perhaps, unhelpful reasons. We've got the autobiography
here of unlovable by Darren Hayes, who is also known as the front man of Savage Garden back in the.
So this book was published in 2024.
(01:04):
A new book, Kyren, why are you reading this? Well, there's a I've got a special connection to this book, so I'll be talking about that.
376 pages in length. I'd say it took me about 5 hours of reading to get through just because the, the actual writing on the on the pages is is rather large, so it's not a super, super dense book. Now as I mentioned, autobiography.
So this was written by Darren Hayes himself,
(01:26):
and it's mostly
about his childhood
growing up here in Brisbane, which is where I am located once again, why this connection is going to become, rather important and and prominent,
and details mostly
his upbringing. So his turbulent life,
at home and at school,
he had to endure a lot of bullying,
(01:49):
going through the musical ups and downs with Savage Garden
and the albums they produced and touring before then moving on to solo projects for himself.
And
I suppose like just going through various stages of his life,
details, struggles with his sexuality,
and I suppose road to healing from
(02:09):
the many abuses and,
things that were caught up with him and and were causing him a lot of struggles throughout his life.
So this consists of a fair few chapters. It doesn't have a, index at the start, so I I can't particularly
talk about, how many there were. I think there was probably 20 to 30 in total. And I don't have titles such as, like, I don't belong here
(02:34):
or let me quickly find another one. Icarus falls to earth is another one. So,
they're usually just due to what is going on in this this next section of his life.
There's also an inset right in the middle with a I don't know what you call it, a plate, I believe is what it's called, where where the,
the actual feel of the book is different. It's more vinyl,
(02:57):
which will have a lot of photos,
from his childhood,
from his time in Savage Garden. Here's him singing on stage. Here's him with a teddy bear. Very nice.
And the book itself is told mostly in a chronological style. So it does go from
him as a as a young man or as a as a boy
developing into,
(03:18):
I guess, the man he becomes, but with these pretty frequent flashbacks where he'll dive back into,
the
the past. So it'll say something like bolded
interior psychiatric office San Francisco 1999
when in the current time it it would be, you know, a little bit later than that. Okay. Let's jump into the themes and questions. So
(03:41):
all this section
I'm gonna be talking about will be, I suppose, centered around dealing with abuse and strategies to
counteract the suffering that then comes from
that. Another
theme you could take from this book would be homosexuality,
but I think that more connects into
the problems that he was having in his life. And the book is after all called unlovable. So we'll focus on that for the moment.
(04:04):
For those of you who don't know Darren, I will be doing kind of the author section right here. So he grew up in the seventies eighties. He was born in the 19 seventies,
early 19 seventies.
And
throughout his childhood, he had a huge influence
from Michael Jackson, for example,
pop stars
(04:24):
just in
fashion. He was he was very much interested in that. And musically, it sounds like he actually didn't have that much formal training,
at least in the start of his life. And it would be more just him singing along to songs in the car with his his family.
Now,
he always had, I guess, homosexual leanings is what I would say in this book. He was very
(04:47):
effeminate.
He would call boys cute when he saw them on TV, for example. It sounded like a lot of people in his family knew that he was homosexual
or
likely to be.
And this was probably also contributing to his bullying in, in childhood.
But what really dominated
his childhood from from what he talks about in this book was the violence from his father,
(05:12):
mixed in with this kind of feeling like an outsider,
especially in school, which is,
you know, that's way that's way you you feel that a lot. So it sounded like probably 95%
of this was verbal.
His father was,
from what I can tell, very alcoholic,
lived a hard hard life himself
(05:35):
and transferred this abuse over onto his his children. You know, the the cycle of of abuse. I think we've all all heard of that before.
And
with
bouts of, you know, maybe 5% of the time, I don't know, I'll be guessing, but
every now and then of extreme physicality and violence. So what we see in this book would be beatings from his mother,
(05:58):
black eyes. You know, he would get spanked so hard that he'd have bruises.
His at one particular instance, his
mom, brother and sister were all kind of kidnapped
by his father, and he was left at his uncle's house
and blood noses at school,
some of those that he would contribute to other people when he got violent himself. So
(06:23):
these periods dominate throughout the book. 2 thirds of the book is told before he is even 26. He is 52 years of age at this current moment. So even though it was on it was only half of his life up to this period, it it contributes to 2 thirds of the actual book.
And just as he is entering global stardom with Savage Garden, which was ran that first album and touring, so we see most of the book is centered around the, I suppose, the struggles in his life. And it's not so much
(06:52):
about the music
per se. Obviously,
that plays a big contributing part into what's we're actually hearing in the book, but it's not the focus on this. The focus is more on,
the trauma abuse, hence the,
the title unlovable.
So why was he unlovable?
Actually, I'll get onto that in a second.
(07:14):
A little bit of a caveat here. The thing about memoirs is they are a very one-sided
story. And this is a memoir, a memoir from the voice of Savage Garden is the subtitle of this. So, for example, there's a couple of things in here which,
you know, you have to take with a grain of salt or acknowledge, okay, there's gonna be an opposite side of the story. One of this being the the, his bandmate, Daniel Jones. So this is there was a duo,
(07:38):
Daniel Hayes, with the with the black hair and Daniel Jones with the kind of more mousy brown,
and who stated that the reason was Daniel wanted to break up the band because he didn't like the fame and stardom.
But then Daniel
would go on to say that the reason was,
that Darren was the reason they were breaking up. You know, who who to trust in this situation? I'm sure there was miscommunication. I'm sure those sure there was people saying this, people saying that memory distorts things. Gonna just leave that for the moment.
(08:12):
He talked about how big Savage Garden was.
I grew up, I was born in 1992,
so
I
got a taste of what Savage Garden was because they were very popular in the late nineties, early 2000.
So I do remember as a kid watching
rage, which was the,
think of it like the Australian version of MTV
(08:35):
during that time period of my life, and Savage Garden was very prominent on the I do remember a lot of the songs. Some of them are
to the moon and back is a fantastic song. I love that.
And then even ones like truly madly deeply, you know, the the classics to me. But I was like, are they are they kind of a one hit wonder? So I just remember that that album.
(08:56):
But no. My dad was saying
the they were extremely popular for an extended period of time.
The amount of time they spent
on the number having a number one song on not only Australian
and English charts and other countries, but in the US, the kind of big one was a ridiculous amount of time,
(09:19):
especially for something like I want you.
And the double album success also backed that up as he was talking about things in this book and mentioning songs. I would jump on to to my phone and and YouTube and play a song, and it was like, oh, okay. Yeah. I do. You know, I actually do remember affirmation that is lodged into my brain, even though it's been a long time since I've actually listened to it.
(09:40):
The fact that in my gym right now, there is a remix of I want you, still playing, I think still attest to the the
the fact that they produce some very, very catchy music, you know, that this being what, like, 25 years after I want you was was created
20 more than that,
which is also known as the Chica Cherry Cola song.
(10:03):
I always thought that was chicken cherry cola.
Now that I know which made no sense to me now that I know it's Chica Cherry, it still does not make much sense to me. But
it's a very popular song and lyrics don't need to make sense all the time. So
everything else related to his family, his dad, how he grew up, of course, we're just gonna have to take him as his words because
(10:26):
who's gonna read a book
from his dad's side of the story or his sisters like it? It doesn't make that much sense. So all of that, that little bit of a caveat, we've got out of the way here. Let's jump into, I guess, the the
the actual trauma and abuse and how he tried to to deal with it, the main theme. So
I think his personality very much affected the way that he dealt with
(10:49):
very hard situations in his life. So
obviously,
if you're a young kid, you're growing up in an environment where there's violence, where there's verbal abuse,
where there is,
you know, threats of violence, where
you're very unsure of where you're living.
He moved house.
It sounds like multiple times.
(11:10):
It sounded like a very chaotic environment.
Animals, he was forced to do jobs that, you know, you wouldn't expect
a kid to do.
It sounded like they had a kind of lower class upbringing as well. So money was probably an issue. It was an issue. They didn't have a lot of disposable income.
All of that contributes to a very
(11:31):
stressful
childhood for a kid for sure.
He's a very emotional person, and I think this emotional baggage from his childhood really stayed with him.
If I had
to put a humorous spin on this, crying would probably be his 2nd greatest hobby after singing because, man, he does a lot of crying in this book.
(11:52):
I would I would say probably
mentions crying at least 15 times, if not more. So,
you know, an emotional person for sure.
And
I think he's lived a challenging life because of
obviously, the trauma and abuse, but hanging on to it as well or perhaps being chained to it is is another way of expressing that because
(12:15):
he does
have an attempt at
healing or or dealing with these things. And, he doesn't do it in a great way, especially at the start of his life and talking,
you know, into his early thirties if I had to put a number to it. So, you know, he was semi hiding his sexuality
throughout his time in Savage Garden and certainly
(12:38):
was repressing it when he was
a youngster
and going through high school. And even beyond that, he married
a woman. He had girlfriends for,
you know, periods of years.
He was married to a woman whilst also
discovering and knowing that he was gay.
You know, that that's not very indicative of someone dealing dealing with
(13:01):
these
these things happening to him or, or these acknowledgments of his own personality character
in a healthy way.
He had to conform somewhat to what the music industry wanted of him. So think of the
frosted tip black hair.
Style wise, you know, it seemed to like
(13:23):
he'd have some options as to what he wanted to to appear like. But then the music industry would also push back on this and say, no, like, you need to look like this to appeal to,
you know, our fan base or what we think the fan base is, etcetera, etcetera.
Trying to please people too much.
He had a lot of body issues from the sounds of it because he
(13:44):
wanted to appear, you know, sexually attractive for his partner and not for himself
and not not for the, you know, pleasantness of being healthy
of,
very much still trying to get validation from his father
as he was growing, as as he was entering a period of his life where he was now famous. And so his dad
(14:07):
was was now, you know, supportive of him and and things like this. So we can see his healing and coping strategies were largely ineffective
and just added to his problems
thinking that fame,
money
and validation would solve your problems. I'm I'm not sure there's anyone ever who has said,
(14:27):
yeah, getting famous solved all of my problems and
I'm really happy for it now. It seems to be like
fame is mostly
a big downside to your life with some
small additional perks is is what I've gotten from all of this.
And, you know, he talks about how
(14:48):
he would create an alternative personality for himself
to get through these hard times where, you know, even though he's living in this terrible situation,
the he's going to be a global superstar and everyone's going to love that person. And
then he won't feel
this unlovableness
that he is feeling, you know, when he's an 8 year old and is on the way home from school,
(15:11):
going to a home where he's terrified
and is, you know, peeing the bed, having nightmares,
all these sorts of things. So,
you know, we see okay.
And he also, you know, takes to heart what random reviewers and critiques of his albums would be. He sounded like he was very much
needing
not only the validation of of people around him, but of the world in general of large. And you can't please everyone. That's that's impossible. There's there's people who will fight against you
(15:42):
for
the very reason that you want to be
loved by them. So, yeah, that's that's it's impossible.
We could see it or even just, you know, using money to buy favors
from his friends and, you know, employing his friends,
keeping them around us and entourage
of buying dinners for them of of supporting his, you know, you can understand supporting his mother and and brother, but then it extends to his dad and then extends to his sister to run the fan club. And, man, that was that was even the ones who have, you know, unconditional love for him. He was still
(16:18):
just doing some bad strategies, I guess, to get over what this unlovableness that he felt.
Understandable.
All of this understandable as a kid, as a young adult,
but this is where you'd hope to see that some progress would be made over the years. And I think he does do a better
part of this in the later part of his life.
It's more condensed, so it's hard to tell exactly. But
(16:41):
he does things like moving away from the spotlight,
and and taking time off
completely from the music business. He marries for love. So
his one of his partners that he talks about in the book, who he, I believe, is was married to for the longest period of of,
his life,
you know, he marries him for for love.
(17:03):
He talks to therapists. He takes medication when he's suicidal.
All of these are what you would probably
in call
better strategies of of coping, of even having fun, of living life, of enjoying your life.
And he also seemed to drop a lot of the other bad habits from before.
Some of these were forced upon him
(17:23):
via financial means
of extending himself too far financially. And so then having to,
you know, real back support and can't pay his dad for his lifestyle that he's living anymore or employ his friends and things like this.
So,
and some of them are choices that he actively makes to live in better locations to,
(17:44):
you know, move away from New York City, which was depressing him, and and move to to California
and, San Francisco in particular, I believe. So
he seems to be on a better path. And, it's it's very good to hear that at the end of this book,
Some things still indicate that he's probably
still viewing,
I guess the
(18:06):
the validate or still us seeking perhaps validation from other people,
such as when he talks about how it was really nice that homosexual was being viewed positively, which was, his one of his later albums as a solo act,
being produced out.
You know, that's still slightly worrying. You know, it's it's nice for sure to have people say nice things about you and your work. So,
(18:30):
that that's that's okay. But I guess only if it's in small doses and you're still
deriving the
vast bulk of your pleasure from the act of creating the work of,
you know, it's hard because when you're an artist, you're releasing these things to the world. You want you want validation, I guess,
and success
and success is a measure of creating good things. And
(18:55):
I understand that. But
I, for example, hope that he would not take to heart anything that I say being just a random dude on the Internet. And aren't we all just randomly
random people on the Internet at the end of the day unless you are
very, very close to him. So
it's funny. I actually feel a rather strong affinity
(19:15):
with him,
despite how many differences, you know, I'm a straight uncreative engineer who shuns the spotlight.
So
that's completely opposite to his personality, which is, you know, flamboyant
gay,
attention seeking
creative to the max. So
(19:36):
although there's very much differences,
I think it's because our reactions to situations
and interpretation of events is is kind of similar.
It seemed to be rather delayed. He would take time to
acknowledge or realize the way that I'm feeling is related to this. And it would perhaps be years after the fact where he's like, you know, I'm I'm not in love with my husband anymore.
(20:02):
Even though
he was probably feeling this without within his body much earlier, and he talks about how he has, I can't remember the animal. It was bees or wasps inside of his stomach, which were indications of
of a negative event happening in his life, particularly, you know, if his father shows up randomly at this caravan park, even though they've been hiding out there,
(20:26):
to spare themselves from him,
The he he feels at first and then interprets it later, which is very much what what I tend to do as well.
He's got this people pleasing agreeableness, you know, hands up. That's that's me to a fault.
A hidden force of will, a little and some scary anger and rage, which he he which scares him himself. I think I've got a bit of that in me.
(20:50):
And also an ability to
live a life that is not normal to to
reject the 9 to 5 and
and do and follow your own path. So
the only the only big difference, I guess, between us is, you know, I'm so, so happy and glad that I had personally an ideal childhood
(21:12):
and simultaneously
sad that he had to endure what he had to endure and that he didn't have that
because,
you know, if I look at my mom and dad, they they gave me
they gave me the the comfort, the security,
the love that I think he he didn't and that that really messed him up for for a long, long time. And it sounds like he's doing better, but these sorts of things, you know, perhaps they never go away. So
(21:38):
that's on the trauma and abuse and dealing those coping strategies. Let's jump on to the extra author, some extra details and a little bit of a connection. So, you know, the whole book is about Darren Hayes. So I'm not
don't think I need to give extra about the actual author.
Instead, I want to explore why I read this book in the first place. So
(21:59):
one thing I find weird,
and to be frank, I rather detest is about the biz. And this could be the Hollywood business. This could be scientific papers, it could be award ceremony, ceremonies, artists, influences, etcetera.
Is this listing out of everyone who has ever had a minor role and touch of playing
(22:19):
in whatever it was that was created?
There's a lot of that in this book.
I think this is mostly a kyren problem
that I just dislike and that it doesn't. Other people don't seem to find this as annoying and detestful as as I do.
And
I think this is because probably when I see it, I see it mostly as name dropping for the sake of name dropping. I knew this person, I got to meet this person, we did this together.
(22:48):
Whereas a lot of it is probably them just wanting to acknowledge, hey, you know, Savage Garden, the success of that was not just 2 people, wasn't just Daniel Jones and Darren Hayes.
It was
a huge assortment of
people
from the actual creation of the music to the promotion of it to the logistics
of touring,
(23:09):
there was a tremendous amount of stuff that was going all within that. And so it's right to acknowledge those people as well, especially if you have an opportunity in a 376
page book. So
I get that. I get that.
And it works because this is a real big lead into the most important paragraph
and sentence in this book, which you will find on page
(23:31):
117
and in the acknowledgments.
So
here we are. I have to thank my music teacher, Susan Lansdowne, for first spotting my ability to sing. In year 8, when I was a completely terrified newbie, she noticed my fledgling voice and recruited me for the school choir. This might sound like something very normal, but back then, I was one of only 2 boys in the choir. It was considered very gay to sing in the choir. So of course, at first I refused, but then I heard them. They weren't they weren't singing religious songs or classical music, but pop music. I instantly
(24:01):
knew what to do. I joined.
And then right here in the acknowledgments
at the end of the book, we have,
this sentence here.
Thanks to my first high school music teacher, Susan Lansdowne. May you rest in peace.
So
if you are not a fan of the mere mortals podcast,
the other podcast I do with my friend, Juan, who also,
(24:24):
appears on here,
you will not know that Susan Lansdowne was my mom.
So she passed away last year in May of
2025.
And, yes, indeed, she she was, the high school music teacher of of Darren in, I believe it was in grade 8 and grade 9, which would be the equivalent
(24:46):
of age 13 14
in,
in in the rest of the world.
So,
you know, my my mom was not a name dropper.
And while I and some select other people in in her life knew
that she she taught Darren and had an influence on them. She, you know, most people didn't.
(25:08):
And there was actually a bit of a shock at her
memorial when
Darren very, very kindly sent in the letter,
which was read out during the memorial service,
and people were like, holy shit. You know,
Darren Hayes is is is, sending a taking the time to write a handwritten letter to to my mom.
(25:28):
I believe it was handwritten. Actually, I'm not 100% sure of that.
So,
Sue, who was
my my mom's
colleague at at Maple Park High School. So this was the, the high school that he mentions in the book. As I mentioned, Darren was was born in Brisbane and lived here.
So this is where I'm at at the very moment. This is where I grew up at the same time.
(25:53):
Did I ever cross paths with him, you know, potentially as a baby
when my mom
brought me to school and when he was still in high school, I believe.
But, you know, that that's
a little bit off the of the fact. And, Sue,
who was Darren's music teacher in the later years of his of his high school career.
(26:15):
When Darren was coming to
Australia for his Do You Remember Tour in 2023,
organized to to say like, hey, we'd love to come see your concert and and, you know, perhaps get a chance to meet you and things like this. And Darren, once again, very, very kindly,
allowed,
my mom, Sue, and and her some immediate family members to, to come see him,
(26:42):
do the rehearsal pre. I can't remember what it's called pre pre stage rehearsal, pre pre pre rehearsal,
and a little bit of meet and greet with a bunch of other kind of mega fans
where once again he had some very, very nice words to say. And then we got to see the concert afterwards. So,
you know, he's a
a very lovely man for for writing that
(27:04):
and saying those things and for,
you know, giving my mom that last,
you know, last bit of joy, I guess, in in one of the
very tough periods of her her life, before
before her life got very, very tough and,
and things like that. So,
(27:24):
yeah, big, big acknowledgment and
a huge thank you to him for
for saying those things
about her. And it was it was very, very, very lovely. And I know it meant a lot to her and to to myself and my family as well.
The thing is funny, one of those things he mentions in this book, that time period in his life when he was in Brisbane for this tour and,
(27:49):
you know, I got to see him on stage and kind of, you know, he'd be he'd
be 5, 10 meters away, and he'd just be talking to
a kind of small group of people of us. And
the one thing that he mentions in this book, which was kind of startling was, you know, he seemed to be saying,
not not things like this, but acknowledging, like, you know, it's been rough
(28:12):
being a solo artist
of the finances of that, but, you know, I'm such a pleasure to be here. I'm having a time in my life. I love performing for you. Very happy guy.
What he mentions in the book was that he was going through a challenging divorce at that time.
Financial pressure of the tour was he was losing money with this tour, I believe, or or certainly with some other ones,
(28:34):
and was having suicidal thoughts even then,
which is is rather shocking. It's like, wow. You know,
you you never know what's going through someone's mind, and what position they're in.
Even if they you think they might be on top of the world. You know, it sounded like he was going through a very tough period when I personally got to see him. But he did have sick abs is what he also mentioned, so
(28:56):
maybe it was all worth it.
Yeah.
Not only was he amazing songwriter, but it carried over into the actual writing of this as well of the book. So
I was surprised at how well he weaved the stories together
and really exposes inner struggles.
Now, all of this was super real to me because he's talking about, you know, my childhood in some senses because I grew up in Brisbane. I lived
(29:21):
right next to the Hyperdome where he talks about going and performing there and, and where,
it was close to where Daniel Jones lived. I believe
he went to Mabel Park. My mom taught there. I know that school. You know, if he was to talk about classrooms or the entrance into it, I would know what that looks like because I've been there so many times with my my mom and dad.
(29:43):
Every reference that Aussies just take for granted talking about
lolly's servo, Gabby's formal, the esky.
That language
transports me back to that time of me as a kid.
He has to spell it out for foreigners in this book, I Americans,
which does become a bit tiresome probably for for them to
(30:05):
to read like oh okay this is what he meant and then also for me because I know what he meant
but it does help me visualize instantly
that time period of of
of Brisbane and in the late 90s early 2000 for myself so that that was very good. I did enjoy
that. Summary, similar book recommendations.
(30:27):
Look, there's a strange book for you review because I live through part of this. So there's a deep personal connection for me whilst reading this.
My dad was the one who actually gave this to me
to to read because he he got it himself, and he actually went to, I believe, Darren's
tour of the book when it was in Brisbane
(30:48):
just last year in 2024.
So he bears his soul and I get the feeling he's not fully finished through his journey of of heartbreak and
love of rejection and acceptance
of failure and success.
It's it's,
it's an evocative book when you're reading it. Now, look,
(31:09):
personally, there was probably a little bit too much of the
I hesitate to say victim mentality, but it
was all about his struggles. And I would have loved to have known
more about the,
you know, actual singing training that he went through of
the
financials of, you know, what it was like to run these tours? How
(31:32):
how did these things occur? Why was he losing money?
The I'm not sure I'd love the I'd be interested in the music business as a whole. And I know that if he talked about it, I would be absolutely disgusted at what actually goes on in there.
You know, personal more positive things, I guess about of his life, because it was very
(31:54):
about all the hard things. And, you know, it's not particularly fun reading about these things, but it is true
life. So, you know, put that with a grain of salt there. So rating wise, like, how do I give this? Do I rate it based on
my personal connection or what I think the average
person would potentially get from this book?
(32:14):
If it was just a personal one, you know, I'd probably put it in the 7 7 ish category because
there were these instances where I was like, I knew my mom's gonna get mentioned, but he's talking about Brisbane that that connects pretty deeply with me. But for the average person
who is not a mega fan, especially of of either Savage Garden or Darren Hayes,
(32:34):
I'm not I'm not so much sure that you're really gonna get anything from this. So I'd give it maybe like a 5 and a half out of 10
for that respect. So unlovable by Darren Hayes.
You know, it's a
it's a book which has
a close connection to me, but is something I would never read normally.
(32:57):
And hence going on to the similar books recommendations. You know, I don't read biographies very
often.
And if I do, it's going to be on a historical character.
Johnny in the chat actually mentioned that
the present tense writing of,
autobiography is drives him up the wall, which there's all of this in this as he's
talking about his childhood.
(33:19):
It's not this
detached
version. It is more the
living in as view viewing his childhood from the current present tense.
And so
that that contributes to partly why I don't really read recent books. I also
(33:39):
don't particularly like that.
If you want similar books, recommendations, you know,
type in
your your favorite musical pop star from the nineties or the 2000.
There's almost certainly they've got a book. And
if not an autobiography,
there'll be a biography or memoirs or things like this. So
(33:59):
do that.
I think the only biographies
we have on this channel of Elon Musk actually, and maybe a historical figure or 2. I did one of of Gandhi.
So yeah, if you if you want that out, check that out on the channel.
Last sections here value for value. This is
a podcast which is always gonna be available anytime, any place, anywhere for anyone.
(34:22):
And,
there's never gonna be any sponsorships, nor advertising,
nor,
you know, this book, I'm sure had a bit of press related to it, of perhaps he was, you know, sending out free copies to
to people to review or things like this.
I didn't get any of that. And nor do I want any of that. And if I ever, if that ever does happen, it probably means I'm not going to review the book to be honest.
(34:48):
The the reason I do this is because I love reviewing books. And
I love imparting
what I've learned from these to to the people at home. So So if you get any value from this, I just ask that you return it and you can do this many ways time, talent and treasure
time. Join me live as Johnny is here right at this moment or, you know, give a little like a share a comment on this on
(35:11):
either YouTube or via any of the social media platforms.
Create a clip from this. If you feel like doing that, you can do that as well. Talent, I would love to know similar books, recommendations,
things that you think I would enjoy, or perhaps even recommendations or things not to enjoy.
I would love to really dive into that how I could also even
(35:31):
perhaps make this better for you.
And then finally, treasure, there is a PayPal link down below.
This does cost money to to host the audio to
create the time to do this to replace equipment when necessary.
So all of this is very much appreciated if you
support the show
(35:51):
in a financial sense, and we like to, talk about that and acknowledge you for doing that when when that does happen.
Alright.
Final final section here live.
I am, as I mentioned, live here 11 AM Australian Eastern Standard Time on a Wednesday. So, you know, plug that into a computer and and find out when that is for you.
(36:13):
I would really appreciate,
as I said, recommendations, but what what's coming up next? So I am doing a kind of it's not a book review because I've already done it a bunch of times, but the Alchemist,
the, The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho or also known as o alchemista
(36:34):
by Paulo Coelho. So I'm gonna talk about translations
at some point.
That will probably be in 3 weeks time.
Next week, I plan on doing a review
of Daybang by Roosh V. This is gonna be another fun
personal connection book, and also one that you're probably not going to be able to find very easily. So that one's going to be fun. And
(36:55):
2 weeks time I'll be doing
what's it called? It's called
to all about cancer.
The emperor of maladies
is what that book was called. I haven't learned the author's name yet, so I'll be doing that shortly as well. Then I got plenty other books sitting on my nightstand over there if I can see it. Nope. You can't. It's just over there.
(37:17):
So plenty of things coming up. I think Juan's,
got scheduled a book review of another Ryan Holiday book as he likes to read Ryan Holiday. So very much coming up on the Mirror Mortals book reviews. We will be doing this
consistently.
Consistently
is what you can expect from us. So I hope you're having a fantastic start to the new year, and I will see you for the next book review. Ciao for now. Kyron out. Bye.
What's a rather poor therapeutic strategy to heal trauma and abuse?
Become a global superstar.
Welcome, mere mortalads, to another round of the mere mortal book reviews. I'm your host here, Kyrin Down, live on the 8th of 1st
(00:22):
2025.
Indeed, this is a normal time for me, 11 AM Australian Eastern Standard Time on a Wednesday. I would love if you come come join me live as we do have, someone in the chat right now. Now as you might summarize, this is the podcast which will take me to my ultimate goal of being the best book reviewer in the world.
(00:42):
Okay. No. I'm not gonna be doing that. But we do have, someone who has reached the the heights of stardom and, for some strange and perhaps, unhelpful reasons. We've got the autobiography
here of unlovable by Darren Hayes, who is also known as the front man of Savage Garden back in the.
So this book was published in 2024.
(01:04):
A new book, Kyren, why are you reading this? Well, there's a I've got a special connection to this book, so I'll be talking about that.
376 pages in length. I'd say it took me about 5 hours of reading to get through just because the, the actual writing on the on the pages is is rather large, so it's not a super, super dense book. Now as I mentioned, autobiography.
So this was written by Darren Hayes himself,
(01:26):
and it's mostly
about his childhood
growing up here in Brisbane, which is where I am located once again, why this connection is going to become, rather important and and prominent,
and details mostly
his upbringing. So his turbulent life,
at home and at school,
he had to endure a lot of bullying,
(01:49):
going through the musical ups and downs with Savage Garden
and the albums they produced and touring before then moving on to solo projects for himself.
And
I suppose like just going through various stages of his life,
details, struggles with his sexuality,
and I suppose road to healing from
(02:09):
the many abuses and,
things that were caught up with him and and were causing him a lot of struggles throughout his life.
So this consists of a fair few chapters. It doesn't have a, index at the start, so I I can't particularly
talk about, how many there were. I think there was probably 20 to 30 in total. And I don't have titles such as, like, I don't belong here
(02:34):
or let me quickly find another one. Icarus falls to earth is another one. So,
they're usually just due to what is going on in this this next section of his life.
There's also an inset right in the middle with a I don't know what you call it, a plate, I believe is what it's called, where where the,
the actual feel of the book is different. It's more vinyl,
(02:57):
which will have a lot of photos,
from his childhood,
from his time in Savage Garden. Here's him singing on stage. Here's him with a teddy bear. Very nice.
And the book itself is told mostly in a chronological style. So it does go from
him as a as a young man or as a as a boy
developing into,
(03:18):
I guess, the man he becomes, but with these pretty frequent flashbacks where he'll dive back into,
the
the past. So it'll say something like bolded
interior psychiatric office San Francisco 1999
when in the current time it it would be, you know, a little bit later than that. Okay. Let's jump into the themes and questions. So
(03:41):
all this section
I'm gonna be talking about will be, I suppose, centered around dealing with abuse and strategies to
counteract the suffering that then comes from
that. Another
theme you could take from this book would be homosexuality,
but I think that more connects into
the problems that he was having in his life. And the book is after all called unlovable. So we'll focus on that for the moment.
(04:04):
For those of you who don't know Darren, I will be doing kind of the author section right here. So he grew up in the seventies eighties. He was born in the 19 seventies,
early 19 seventies.
And
throughout his childhood, he had a huge influence
from Michael Jackson, for example,
pop stars
(04:24):
just in
fashion. He was he was very much interested in that. And musically, it sounds like he actually didn't have that much formal training,
at least in the start of his life. And it would be more just him singing along to songs in the car with his his family.
Now,
he always had, I guess, homosexual leanings is what I would say in this book. He was very
(04:47):
effeminate.
He would call boys cute when he saw them on TV, for example. It sounded like a lot of people in his family knew that he was homosexual
or
likely to be.
And this was probably also contributing to his bullying in, in childhood.
But what really dominated
his childhood from from what he talks about in this book was the violence from his father,
(05:12):
mixed in with this kind of feeling like an outsider,
especially in school, which is,
you know, that's way that's way you you feel that a lot. So it sounded like probably 95%
of this was verbal.
His father was,
from what I can tell, very alcoholic,
lived a hard hard life himself
(05:35):
and transferred this abuse over onto his his children. You know, the the cycle of of abuse. I think we've all all heard of that before.
And
with
bouts of, you know, maybe 5% of the time, I don't know, I'll be guessing, but
every now and then of extreme physicality and violence. So what we see in this book would be beatings from his mother,
(05:58):
black eyes. You know, he would get spanked so hard that he'd have bruises.
His at one particular instance, his
mom, brother and sister were all kind of kidnapped
by his father, and he was left at his uncle's house
and blood noses at school,
some of those that he would contribute to other people when he got violent himself. So
(06:23):
these periods dominate throughout the book. 2 thirds of the book is told before he is even 26. He is 52 years of age at this current moment. So even though it was on it was only half of his life up to this period, it it contributes to 2 thirds of the actual book.
And just as he is entering global stardom with Savage Garden, which was ran that first album and touring, so we see most of the book is centered around the, I suppose, the struggles in his life. And it's not so much
(06:52):
about the music
per se. Obviously,
that plays a big contributing part into what's we're actually hearing in the book, but it's not the focus on this. The focus is more on,
the trauma abuse, hence the,
the title unlovable.
So why was he unlovable?
Actually, I'll get onto that in a second.
(07:14):
A little bit of a caveat here. The thing about memoirs is they are a very one-sided
story. And this is a memoir, a memoir from the voice of Savage Garden is the subtitle of this. So, for example, there's a couple of things in here which,
you know, you have to take with a grain of salt or acknowledge, okay, there's gonna be an opposite side of the story. One of this being the the, his bandmate, Daniel Jones. So this is there was a duo,
(07:38):
Daniel Hayes, with the with the black hair and Daniel Jones with the kind of more mousy brown,
and who stated that the reason was Daniel wanted to break up the band because he didn't like the fame and stardom.
But then Daniel
would go on to say that the reason was,
that Darren was the reason they were breaking up. You know, who who to trust in this situation? I'm sure there was miscommunication. I'm sure those sure there was people saying this, people saying that memory distorts things. Gonna just leave that for the moment.
(08:12):
He talked about how big Savage Garden was.
I grew up, I was born in 1992,
so
I
got a taste of what Savage Garden was because they were very popular in the late nineties, early 2000.
So I do remember as a kid watching
rage, which was the,
think of it like the Australian version of MTV
(08:35):
during that time period of my life, and Savage Garden was very prominent on the I do remember a lot of the songs. Some of them are
to the moon and back is a fantastic song. I love that.
And then even ones like truly madly deeply, you know, the the classics to me. But I was like, are they are they kind of a one hit wonder? So I just remember that that album.
(08:56):
But no. My dad was saying
the they were extremely popular for an extended period of time.
The amount of time they spent
on the number having a number one song on not only Australian
and English charts and other countries, but in the US, the kind of big one was a ridiculous amount of time,
(09:19):
especially for something like I want you.
And the double album success also backed that up as he was talking about things in this book and mentioning songs. I would jump on to to my phone and and YouTube and play a song, and it was like, oh, okay. Yeah. I do. You know, I actually do remember affirmation that is lodged into my brain, even though it's been a long time since I've actually listened to it.
(09:40):
The fact that in my gym right now, there is a remix of I want you, still playing, I think still attest to the the
the fact that they produce some very, very catchy music, you know, that this being what, like, 25 years after I want you was was created
20 more than that,
which is also known as the Chica Cherry Cola song.
(10:03):
I always thought that was chicken cherry cola.
Now that I know which made no sense to me now that I know it's Chica Cherry, it still does not make much sense to me. But
it's a very popular song and lyrics don't need to make sense all the time. So
everything else related to his family, his dad, how he grew up, of course, we're just gonna have to take him as his words because
(10:26):
who's gonna read a book
from his dad's side of the story or his sisters like it? It doesn't make that much sense. So all of that, that little bit of a caveat, we've got out of the way here. Let's jump into, I guess, the the
the actual trauma and abuse and how he tried to to deal with it, the main theme. So
I think his personality very much affected the way that he dealt with
(10:49):
very hard situations in his life. So
obviously,
if you're a young kid, you're growing up in an environment where there's violence, where there's verbal abuse,
where there is,
you know, threats of violence, where
you're very unsure of where you're living.
He moved house.
It sounds like multiple times.
(11:10):
It sounded like a very chaotic environment.
Animals, he was forced to do jobs that, you know, you wouldn't expect
a kid to do.
It sounded like they had a kind of lower class upbringing as well. So money was probably an issue. It was an issue. They didn't have a lot of disposable income.
All of that contributes to a very
(11:31):
stressful
childhood for a kid for sure.
He's a very emotional person, and I think this emotional baggage from his childhood really stayed with him.
If I had
to put a humorous spin on this, crying would probably be his 2nd greatest hobby after singing because, man, he does a lot of crying in this book.
(11:52):
I would I would say probably
mentions crying at least 15 times, if not more. So,
you know, an emotional person for sure.
And
I think he's lived a challenging life because of
obviously, the trauma and abuse, but hanging on to it as well or perhaps being chained to it is is another way of expressing that because
(12:15):
he does
have an attempt at
healing or or dealing with these things. And, he doesn't do it in a great way, especially at the start of his life and talking,
you know, into his early thirties if I had to put a number to it. So, you know, he was semi hiding his sexuality
throughout his time in Savage Garden and certainly
(12:38):
was repressing it when he was
a youngster
and going through high school. And even beyond that, he married
a woman. He had girlfriends for,
you know, periods of years.
He was married to a woman whilst also
discovering and knowing that he was gay.
You know, that that's not very indicative of someone dealing dealing with
(13:01):
these
these things happening to him or, or these acknowledgments of his own personality character
in a healthy way.
He had to conform somewhat to what the music industry wanted of him. So think of the
frosted tip black hair.
Style wise, you know, it seemed to like
(13:23):
he'd have some options as to what he wanted to to appear like. But then the music industry would also push back on this and say, no, like, you need to look like this to appeal to,
you know, our fan base or what we think the fan base is, etcetera, etcetera.
Trying to please people too much.
He had a lot of body issues from the sounds of it because he
(13:44):
wanted to appear, you know, sexually attractive for his partner and not for himself
and not not for the, you know, pleasantness of being healthy
of,
very much still trying to get validation from his father
as he was growing, as as he was entering a period of his life where he was now famous. And so his dad
(14:07):
was was now, you know, supportive of him and and things like this. So we can see his healing and coping strategies were largely ineffective
and just added to his problems
thinking that fame,
money
and validation would solve your problems. I'm I'm not sure there's anyone ever who has said,
(14:27):
yeah, getting famous solved all of my problems and
I'm really happy for it now. It seems to be like
fame is mostly
a big downside to your life with some
small additional perks is is what I've gotten from all of this.
And, you know, he talks about how
(14:48):
he would create an alternative personality for himself
to get through these hard times where, you know, even though he's living in this terrible situation,
the he's going to be a global superstar and everyone's going to love that person. And
then he won't feel
this unlovableness
that he is feeling, you know, when he's an 8 year old and is on the way home from school,
(15:11):
going to a home where he's terrified
and is, you know, peeing the bed, having nightmares,
all these sorts of things. So,
you know, we see okay.
And he also, you know, takes to heart what random reviewers and critiques of his albums would be. He sounded like he was very much
needing
not only the validation of of people around him, but of the world in general of large. And you can't please everyone. That's that's impossible. There's there's people who will fight against you
(15:42):
for
the very reason that you want to be
loved by them. So, yeah, that's that's it's impossible.
We could see it or even just, you know, using money to buy favors
from his friends and, you know, employing his friends,
keeping them around us and entourage
of buying dinners for them of of supporting his, you know, you can understand supporting his mother and and brother, but then it extends to his dad and then extends to his sister to run the fan club. And, man, that was that was even the ones who have, you know, unconditional love for him. He was still
(16:18):
just doing some bad strategies, I guess, to get over what this unlovableness that he felt.
Understandable.
All of this understandable as a kid, as a young adult,
but this is where you'd hope to see that some progress would be made over the years. And I think he does do a better
part of this in the later part of his life.
It's more condensed, so it's hard to tell exactly. But
(16:41):
he does things like moving away from the spotlight,
and and taking time off
completely from the music business. He marries for love. So
his one of his partners that he talks about in the book, who he, I believe, is was married to for the longest period of of,
his life,
you know, he marries him for for love.
(17:03):
He talks to therapists. He takes medication when he's suicidal.
All of these are what you would probably
in call
better strategies of of coping, of even having fun, of living life, of enjoying your life.
And he also seemed to drop a lot of the other bad habits from before.
Some of these were forced upon him
(17:23):
via financial means
of extending himself too far financially. And so then having to,
you know, real back support and can't pay his dad for his lifestyle that he's living anymore or employ his friends and things like this.
So,
and some of them are choices that he actively makes to live in better locations to,
(17:44):
you know, move away from New York City, which was depressing him, and and move to to California
and, San Francisco in particular, I believe. So
he seems to be on a better path. And, it's it's very good to hear that at the end of this book,
Some things still indicate that he's probably
still viewing,
I guess the
(18:06):
the validate or still us seeking perhaps validation from other people,
such as when he talks about how it was really nice that homosexual was being viewed positively, which was, his one of his later albums as a solo act,
being produced out.
You know, that's still slightly worrying. You know, it's it's nice for sure to have people say nice things about you and your work. So,
(18:30):
that that's that's okay. But I guess only if it's in small doses and you're still
deriving the
vast bulk of your pleasure from the act of creating the work of,
you know, it's hard because when you're an artist, you're releasing these things to the world. You want you want validation, I guess,
and success
and success is a measure of creating good things. And
(18:55):
I understand that. But
I, for example, hope that he would not take to heart anything that I say being just a random dude on the Internet. And aren't we all just randomly
random people on the Internet at the end of the day unless you are
very, very close to him. So
it's funny. I actually feel a rather strong affinity
(19:15):
with him,
despite how many differences, you know, I'm a straight uncreative engineer who shuns the spotlight.
So
that's completely opposite to his personality, which is, you know, flamboyant
gay,
attention seeking
creative to the max. So
(19:36):
although there's very much differences,
I think it's because our reactions to situations
and interpretation of events is is kind of similar.
It seemed to be rather delayed. He would take time to
acknowledge or realize the way that I'm feeling is related to this. And it would perhaps be years after the fact where he's like, you know, I'm I'm not in love with my husband anymore.
(20:02):
Even though
he was probably feeling this without within his body much earlier, and he talks about how he has, I can't remember the animal. It was bees or wasps inside of his stomach, which were indications of
of a negative event happening in his life, particularly, you know, if his father shows up randomly at this caravan park, even though they've been hiding out there,
(20:26):
to spare themselves from him,
The he he feels at first and then interprets it later, which is very much what what I tend to do as well.
He's got this people pleasing agreeableness, you know, hands up. That's that's me to a fault.
A hidden force of will, a little and some scary anger and rage, which he he which scares him himself. I think I've got a bit of that in me.
(20:50):
And also an ability to
live a life that is not normal to to
reject the 9 to 5 and
and do and follow your own path. So
the only the only big difference, I guess, between us is, you know, I'm so, so happy and glad that I had personally an ideal childhood
(21:12):
and simultaneously
sad that he had to endure what he had to endure and that he didn't have that
because,
you know, if I look at my mom and dad, they they gave me
they gave me the the comfort, the security,
the love that I think he he didn't and that that really messed him up for for a long, long time. And it sounds like he's doing better, but these sorts of things, you know, perhaps they never go away. So
(21:38):
that's on the trauma and abuse and dealing those coping strategies. Let's jump on to the extra author, some extra details and a little bit of a connection. So, you know, the whole book is about Darren Hayes. So I'm not
don't think I need to give extra about the actual author.
Instead, I want to explore why I read this book in the first place. So
(21:59):
one thing I find weird,
and to be frank, I rather detest is about the biz. And this could be the Hollywood business. This could be scientific papers, it could be award ceremony, ceremonies, artists, influences, etcetera.
Is this listing out of everyone who has ever had a minor role and touch of playing
(22:19):
in whatever it was that was created?
There's a lot of that in this book.
I think this is mostly a kyren problem
that I just dislike and that it doesn't. Other people don't seem to find this as annoying and detestful as as I do.
And
I think this is because probably when I see it, I see it mostly as name dropping for the sake of name dropping. I knew this person, I got to meet this person, we did this together.
(22:48):
Whereas a lot of it is probably them just wanting to acknowledge, hey, you know, Savage Garden, the success of that was not just 2 people, wasn't just Daniel Jones and Darren Hayes.
It was
a huge assortment of
people
from the actual creation of the music to the promotion of it to the logistics
of touring,
(23:09):
there was a tremendous amount of stuff that was going all within that. And so it's right to acknowledge those people as well, especially if you have an opportunity in a 376
page book. So
I get that. I get that.
And it works because this is a real big lead into the most important paragraph
and sentence in this book, which you will find on page
(23:31):
117
and in the acknowledgments.
So
here we are. I have to thank my music teacher, Susan Lansdowne, for first spotting my ability to sing. In year 8, when I was a completely terrified newbie, she noticed my fledgling voice and recruited me for the school choir. This might sound like something very normal, but back then, I was one of only 2 boys in the choir. It was considered very gay to sing in the choir. So of course, at first I refused, but then I heard them. They weren't they weren't singing religious songs or classical music, but pop music. I instantly
(24:01):
knew what to do. I joined.
And then right here in the acknowledgments
at the end of the book, we have,
this sentence here.
Thanks to my first high school music teacher, Susan Lansdowne. May you rest in peace.
So
if you are not a fan of the mere mortals podcast,
the other podcast I do with my friend, Juan, who also,
(24:24):
appears on here,
you will not know that Susan Lansdowne was my mom.
So she passed away last year in May of
2025.
And, yes, indeed, she she was, the high school music teacher of of Darren in, I believe it was in grade 8 and grade 9, which would be the equivalent
(24:46):
of age 13 14
in,
in in the rest of the world.
So,
you know, my my mom was not a name dropper.
And while I and some select other people in in her life knew
that she she taught Darren and had an influence on them. She, you know, most people didn't.
(25:08):
And there was actually a bit of a shock at her
memorial when
Darren very, very kindly sent in the letter,
which was read out during the memorial service,
and people were like, holy shit. You know,
Darren Hayes is is is, sending a taking the time to write a handwritten letter to to my mom.
(25:28):
I believe it was handwritten. Actually, I'm not 100% sure of that.
So,
Sue, who was
my my mom's
colleague at at Maple Park High School. So this was the, the high school that he mentions in the book. As I mentioned, Darren was was born in Brisbane and lived here.
So this is where I'm at at the very moment. This is where I grew up at the same time.
(25:53):
Did I ever cross paths with him, you know, potentially as a baby
when my mom
brought me to school and when he was still in high school, I believe.
But, you know, that that's
a little bit off the of the fact. And, Sue,
who was Darren's music teacher in the later years of his of his high school career.
(26:15):
When Darren was coming to
Australia for his Do You Remember Tour in 2023,
organized to to say like, hey, we'd love to come see your concert and and, you know, perhaps get a chance to meet you and things like this. And Darren, once again, very, very kindly,
allowed,
my mom, Sue, and and her some immediate family members to, to come see him,
(26:42):
do the rehearsal pre. I can't remember what it's called pre pre stage rehearsal, pre pre pre rehearsal,
and a little bit of meet and greet with a bunch of other kind of mega fans
where once again he had some very, very nice words to say. And then we got to see the concert afterwards. So,
you know, he's a
a very lovely man for for writing that
(27:04):
and saying those things and for,
you know, giving my mom that last,
you know, last bit of joy, I guess, in in one of the
very tough periods of her her life, before
before her life got very, very tough and,
and things like that. So,
(27:24):
yeah, big, big acknowledgment and
a huge thank you to him for
for saying those things
about her. And it was it was very, very, very lovely. And I know it meant a lot to her and to to myself and my family as well.
The thing is funny, one of those things he mentions in this book, that time period in his life when he was in Brisbane for this tour and,
(27:49):
you know, I got to see him on stage and kind of, you know, he'd be he'd
be 5, 10 meters away, and he'd just be talking to
a kind of small group of people of us. And
the one thing that he mentions in this book, which was kind of startling was, you know, he seemed to be saying,
not not things like this, but acknowledging, like, you know, it's been rough
(28:12):
being a solo artist
of the finances of that, but, you know, I'm such a pleasure to be here. I'm having a time in my life. I love performing for you. Very happy guy.
What he mentions in the book was that he was going through a challenging divorce at that time.
Financial pressure of the tour was he was losing money with this tour, I believe, or or certainly with some other ones,
(28:34):
and was having suicidal thoughts even then,
which is is rather shocking. It's like, wow. You know,
you you never know what's going through someone's mind, and what position they're in.
Even if they you think they might be on top of the world. You know, it sounded like he was going through a very tough period when I personally got to see him. But he did have sick abs is what he also mentioned, so
(28:56):
maybe it was all worth it.
Yeah.
Not only was he amazing songwriter, but it carried over into the actual writing of this as well of the book. So
I was surprised at how well he weaved the stories together
and really exposes inner struggles.
Now, all of this was super real to me because he's talking about, you know, my childhood in some senses because I grew up in Brisbane. I lived
(29:21):
right next to the Hyperdome where he talks about going and performing there and, and where,
it was close to where Daniel Jones lived. I believe
he went to Mabel Park. My mom taught there. I know that school. You know, if he was to talk about classrooms or the entrance into it, I would know what that looks like because I've been there so many times with my my mom and dad.
(29:43):
Every reference that Aussies just take for granted talking about
lolly's servo, Gabby's formal, the esky.
That language
transports me back to that time of me as a kid.
He has to spell it out for foreigners in this book, I Americans,
which does become a bit tiresome probably for for them to
(30:05):
to read like oh okay this is what he meant and then also for me because I know what he meant
but it does help me visualize instantly
that time period of of
of Brisbane and in the late 90s early 2000 for myself so that that was very good. I did enjoy
that. Summary, similar book recommendations.
(30:27):
Look, there's a strange book for you review because I live through part of this. So there's a deep personal connection for me whilst reading this.
My dad was the one who actually gave this to me
to to read because he he got it himself, and he actually went to, I believe, Darren's
tour of the book when it was in Brisbane
(30:48):
just last year in 2024.
So he bears his soul and I get the feeling he's not fully finished through his journey of of heartbreak and
love of rejection and acceptance
of failure and success.
It's it's,
it's an evocative book when you're reading it. Now, look,
(31:09):
personally, there was probably a little bit too much of the
I hesitate to say victim mentality, but it
was all about his struggles. And I would have loved to have known
more about the,
you know, actual singing training that he went through of
the
financials of, you know, what it was like to run these tours? How
(31:32):
how did these things occur? Why was he losing money?
The I'm not sure I'd love the I'd be interested in the music business as a whole. And I know that if he talked about it, I would be absolutely disgusted at what actually goes on in there.
You know, personal more positive things, I guess about of his life, because it was very
(31:54):
about all the hard things. And, you know, it's not particularly fun reading about these things, but it is true
life. So, you know, put that with a grain of salt there. So rating wise, like, how do I give this? Do I rate it based on
my personal connection or what I think the average
person would potentially get from this book?
(32:14):
If it was just a personal one, you know, I'd probably put it in the 7 7 ish category because
there were these instances where I was like, I knew my mom's gonna get mentioned, but he's talking about Brisbane that that connects pretty deeply with me. But for the average person
who is not a mega fan, especially of of either Savage Garden or Darren Hayes,
(32:34):
I'm not I'm not so much sure that you're really gonna get anything from this. So I'd give it maybe like a 5 and a half out of 10
for that respect. So unlovable by Darren Hayes.
You know, it's a
it's a book which has
a close connection to me, but is something I would never read normally.
(32:57):
And hence going on to the similar books recommendations. You know, I don't read biographies very
often.
And if I do, it's going to be on a historical character.
Johnny in the chat actually mentioned that
the present tense writing of,
autobiography is drives him up the wall, which there's all of this in this as he's
talking about his childhood.
(33:19):
It's not this
detached
version. It is more the
living in as view viewing his childhood from the current present tense.
And so
that that contributes to partly why I don't really read recent books. I also
(33:39):
don't particularly like that.
If you want similar books, recommendations, you know,
type in
your your favorite musical pop star from the nineties or the 2000.
There's almost certainly they've got a book. And
if not an autobiography,
there'll be a biography or memoirs or things like this. So
(33:59):
do that.
I think the only biographies
we have on this channel of Elon Musk actually, and maybe a historical figure or 2. I did one of of Gandhi.
So yeah, if you if you want that out, check that out on the channel.
Last sections here value for value. This is
a podcast which is always gonna be available anytime, any place, anywhere for anyone.
(34:22):
And,
there's never gonna be any sponsorships, nor advertising,
nor,
you know, this book, I'm sure had a bit of press related to it, of perhaps he was, you know, sending out free copies to
to people to review or things like this.
I didn't get any of that. And nor do I want any of that. And if I ever, if that ever does happen, it probably means I'm not going to review the book to be honest.
(34:48):
The the reason I do this is because I love reviewing books. And
I love imparting
what I've learned from these to to the people at home. So So if you get any value from this, I just ask that you return it and you can do this many ways time, talent and treasure
time. Join me live as Johnny is here right at this moment or, you know, give a little like a share a comment on this on
(35:11):
either YouTube or via any of the social media platforms.
Create a clip from this. If you feel like doing that, you can do that as well. Talent, I would love to know similar books, recommendations,
things that you think I would enjoy, or perhaps even recommendations or things not to enjoy.
I would love to really dive into that how I could also even
(35:31):
perhaps make this better for you.
And then finally, treasure, there is a PayPal link down below.
This does cost money to to host the audio to
create the time to do this to replace equipment when necessary.
So all of this is very much appreciated if you
support the show
(35:51):
in a financial sense, and we like to, talk about that and acknowledge you for doing that when when that does happen.
Alright.
Final final section here live.
I am, as I mentioned, live here 11 AM Australian Eastern Standard Time on a Wednesday. So, you know, plug that into a computer and and find out when that is for you.
(36:13):
I would really appreciate,
as I said, recommendations, but what what's coming up next? So I am doing a kind of it's not a book review because I've already done it a bunch of times, but the Alchemist,
the, The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho or also known as o alchemista
(36:34):
by Paulo Coelho. So I'm gonna talk about translations
at some point.
That will probably be in 3 weeks time.
Next week, I plan on doing a review
of Daybang by Roosh V. This is gonna be another fun
personal connection book, and also one that you're probably not going to be able to find very easily. So that one's going to be fun. And
(36:55):
2 weeks time I'll be doing
what's it called? It's called
to all about cancer.
The emperor of maladies
is what that book was called. I haven't learned the author's name yet, so I'll be doing that shortly as well. Then I got plenty other books sitting on my nightstand over there if I can see it. Nope. You can't. It's just over there.
(37:17):
So plenty of things coming up. I think Juan's,
got scheduled a book review of another Ryan Holiday book as he likes to read Ryan Holiday. So very much coming up on the Mirror Mortals book reviews. We will be doing this
consistently.
Consistently
is what you can expect from us. So I hope you're having a fantastic start to the new year, and I will see you for the next book review. Ciao for now. Kyron out. Bye.
Popular Podcasts
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com