There is a popster who has sold more than 20 million records, who is drawing crowds to some of the most prestigious halls in the land and who is, as we speak, standing on stage as hoardes of women/girls are screaming and singing his songs.
The curious thing is this: this pop star could stand next to you in the supermarket queue and the chances are you'd never know it. And how perfect is that? As the front half of Australian duo Savage Garden, Darren Hayes became one of the biggest stars in the world and their two albums sold squillions. Now solo, Hayes is carrying on where he left off, selling bags (it has gone platinum, already) of his album, Spin.
It's not hard to see his appeal. There is something very touchable about Darren. He is blond, but not too blond; good looking but not too good looking; fit, but there is no six-pack. He can move, but he is no Michael Jackson. His music is absolutely solid - well-structured, well-executed, well-performed - without being radical or ground breaking, and he comes across as a genuinely nice bloke.
If all this makes him sound ordinary, it shouldn't. Doing simple things well is the hardest thing in the world. Live, his voice sounds just as pure as it does on record, but what really got me was how screamable the cross-generation crowd were. When he unzipped his leather jacket - scream. When he took off his shades - scream. When he messed up the intro to a song and burst out laughing - scream. It was like The Monkees never went away.
He ran through his hits, from Savage Garden oldies to recent hits such as Insatiable, and all the time the crowd were with him. The remarkable unremarkable pop star.
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