This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.
The original was posted on /r/hobbydrama by /u/BeautifulStream on 2024-12-30 02:26:48+00:00.
Hello, everyone! After spending several hours trawling through posts on this sub, I recently got it into my head to write a post of my own. It took me no time to decide on a topic- that of an incident that rocked not one, but two band fandoms in which I was involved in the early 2010's, and which feels vaguely like a fever dream in retrospect. In covering this incident, I realized I'd have to describe the last 5+ years of the band INXS' existence, so read on for a tale of reality shows, multiple lead singers, and a very confusing song.
(Before we begin, please note that while I experienced most of these events firsthand, I'm sure that there's plenty of information I'm leaving out because I don't remember it or couldn't track down any sources, so if anyone from the INXS fandom happens to be around to help me get the facts straight, I'd really appreciate you chiming in!)
So... who are/were INXS?
INXS was a rock band formed in Australia in 1977, consisting of six members: the three Farriss brothers, Tim, Andrew, and Jon; bassist Garry Gary Beers, saxophonist Kirk Pengilly, and their frontman, Michael Hutchence. If you were alive in the 80's (or if you inherited your entire music taste from your parents, like I did), you've probably heard their biggest hit, "Need You Tonight" (released 1987), at least once. If you haven't, here's a refresher. INXS' upbeat, danceable sound alongside Michael Hutchence's charisma, magnetism, and sex appeal was a winning combination, and the band enjoyed a fair amount of success throughout the 80's. Sadly, the party came to an end in 1997, when Michael Hutchence took his own life right before an upcoming tour. This was, as one would imagine, a hard blow to the band, who essentially went on an extended hiatus for several years.
Rock Star: INXS
Throughout the rest of the 90's, INXS did several one-off performances with various guest singers, such as Jimmy Barnes and Terence Trent D'Arby. One such performance, featuring Jon Stevens on lead vocals, even led the band to make an official offer for Stevens to join them as their new frontman. After a brief tour and some preliminary recordings, Stevens left INXS to pursue a solo career in 2003, leaving the band without a singer once again. It was clear that the band wanted to continue with a permanent singer, so what were they to do? Why, enter the world of reality TV, of course!
Rock Star: INXS was a televised competitive singing contest a la The Voice and American Idol that debuted in 2005. While I have not seen the show (although you can watch it all on YouTube), I do know that the winner of the competition was J.D. Fortune, a Canadian singer with a rock and roll sensibility that seemed like a perfect fit for the band. Later in 2005, INXS released Switch, their first (and what was to be their only) album with J.D. as their new lead vocalist. Switch's lead single, "Pretty Vegas," was unmistakably INXS-like in its sound and feel. Though some fans believed it was tasteless of INXS to "replace" Michael Hutchence via a reality show, it was hard to deny that J.D. had the right spirit, at least. Take a listen here if you don't believe me.
Rough patches
J.D. Fortune went on tour with INXS for the first time in January 2006. I'm not sure how well this tour was received, but it was enough for INXS to continue booking shows AND for them to earn a new record deal. However, in February 2009, trouble arose when J.D. Fortune announced to the press that INXS had fired him. Chris Murphy, the band's manager, put out a statement that did not support this claim... but it didn't refute it, either, stating that "The band have always stated to me that Fortune's services could potentially be contracted again when INXS next tour." Not exactly the kind of statement you'd expect a band to make about their own lead singer, whom one would assume is a bit more important than a contract worker, but hey... Eventually, J.D. clarified his comments in a statement made a month later, explaining that he had been under the impression after completing the last leg of INXS' tour that there had been two more legs left to complete. However, the next two legs were cancelled, and the band refused to return J.D.'s calls for six months. Naturally, upon receiving the silent treatment, J.D. assumed he was out of the band (not helped by his claims that he was dealing with a drug problem while on tour, which alienated the rest of the band from him, although he later retracted this as well and stated that he had been clean for two years, aside from occasionally smoking pot). J.D. also made a point to mention he was "not on a contract. Not at all. I was an equal member of that band according to them." In light of Chris Murphy's claims, this was, to put it mildly, an intriguing statement.
A tentative reunion
For the next few years, INXS worked on and off with J.D. Fortune. In 2010, they performed at the Winter Olympics with J.D. on lead vocals. Though they claimed the performance was a one-off, they embarked on a world tour with J.D. Fortune on vocals later that year. It took until July of 2010 for anyone in the band to confirm that he had officially returned as the band's lead singer, but by then it had become clear that they were a package deal. In November of 2010, INXS released their second post-Michael Hutchence album, Original Sin, which was a tribute to Michael featuring various vocalists (one of whom was J.D. Fortune). To support this album, the band went on tour throughout 2011... which is where I come in. 2011 was the year I discovered INXS, and the year that they played in my hometown. Being both a hormonal teenager captivated by Michael Hutchence's swagger, and the type of teenager who would write "I'm only 15 and I love this music! Today's music SUCKS!" in the comments of 80's songs uploaded to YouTube, I absolutely refused to go see INXS with J.D. Fortune, as I thought it wouldn't be the same. Nowadays, I kick myself over having I missed that show, especially knowing what was to come later...
"Tiny Summer"
INXS' last gig with J.D. Fortune as their frontman took place on August 14th, 2011. This was the final show of the Original Sin tour, after which the band went quiet... for a few days. It's unclear when this began, as there are only three dates in August- the 4th, the 10th, and the 18th- that the Wayback Machine captured INXS' official site, but the capture from the 18th shows an image of the five original band members and the caption "28 days to hear new INXS music." I know that at the time, I wasn't paying attention to the countdown right from the start, but as the day- September 14th, 2011- drew closer, I became aware, and began to grow excited despite my skepticism towards J.D. Fortune as a vocalist. When most of the bands you love are, as I put it in 2011, "either broken up or dead," you take any scrap of new music that you can get. At last, the time had come, and a new track was uploaded to INXS' site. The song was called "Tiny Summer," and it sounded a little something like... this.
So, uh. Assuming y'all clicked on those two links I shared above... Remember those fun, rocking INXS songs? Yeah... this sounds nothing like those. INXS were no strangers to ballads (see "Never Tear Us Apart," arguably their second biggest hit, and "Freedom Deep," if I may shamelessly plug one of my favorite deep cuts from their catalog), but "Tiny Summer" does not feature the sound that they're typically known for. To say nothing of the rough, demo-like quality of the recording. As well as one glaringly obvious observation... that's not J.D. Fortune singing.
Fortunately, a statement was posted alongside this song, but unfortunately, it did little to shed light on the matter of who the singer was and what had happened to J.D. The statement seems to have been scrubbed from INXS' site and their social media (and possibly, the internet as a whole- if anyone has preserved the full statement, please share it with me!), but I managed to find part of it quoted elsewhere. From Andrew Farriss, INXS' keyboardist and main songwriter:
"Without a doubt, amazing song magic happened when Michael and I were a creative writing team. Recently at a party, I met a fellow songwriter by accident, an Irish bloke, and we sat around playing songs on acoustic guitars. Despite his funny accent, we then spent a few days songwriting and singing together... song magic was in the room again."
Why Andrew didn't just name the singer right away, I have no idea. Because the thing is, the vocals on this song are reminiscent of a certain other Irish songwriter... Bono, the lead singer of U2. To hear what I mean, take a listen to one of U2's own ballads, from their most-recent-at-the-time album, 2009's No Line on the Horizon.
This is where things got a bit wild- not just for the INXS fandom, but for me specifically. Because as a matter of fact, there was one band of which I was a fan at the time which wasn't either "broken up or dead." A ...
Content cut off. Read original on https://old.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/1hpcpfh/music_inxs_tiny_summer_how_inxs_ended_their/