Hi Everyone,

Don't faint.. but yes.... here it is.. your new update!!!

I know that I have now become the most unpopular woman on the Savage Garden planet and you are all tearing your hair out waiting for a new update! I know ... I know... and all I can do is apologize, on behalf of myself and my brand new TOP OF THE LINE computer that I have that has spent all of it's short time with me NOT WORKING!!! You have no idea how unbelievably frustrating this has been! I mean... what is it with me and technology??? Everything I touch turns to DISASTER!!!!

Anyway... enough of my groveling.. let me tell you what Darren and Daniel have been up to the last couple of weeks.

When we last met (oh so long ago), Darren and I were on our way to Australia for the first round of promo on the AFFIRMATION promotional trail.

It was a great trip.... although extremely busy and very exhausting.

The best way for me to describe it to you is to give you a day by day run down......

26 august
Darren and I depart the USA for Australia. We are seated in first class and as we enter the cabin I start to jump up and down in excitement, as this is my first international first class trip. Darren wastes no time telling me that it isn't cool to look so gleeful in first class, and that I was embarrassing him. I quickly assume the casual slouching stance that is recognized as acceptable behavior amongst our fellow first class travelers.

SATURDAY, 28TH AUGUST
We arrive bright and early in Sydney and are greeted at the airport by Dave Lawrence, the sales and marketing manager at Roadshow Music. He takes us to our hotel which is just GORGEOUS!!! It was the Quay Grand, which is next door to Circular Quay. I was very impressed with my room and the view it had of the park.. until I saw Darrens and realized that his room was one better. The room appeared to be floating on the harbor as it opened out directly onto it and his view was of the Sydney Harbor Bridge and the Opera House. Just beautiful!!!!

Saturday night we got the ferry over to Manly and met up with a load of friends at the Manly Skiff Club for my cousins birthday party. Darren had obviously taken his funny pill for the day because he spent the majority of the night regaling everyone with hilarious stories of his life over the past few months (needless to say a lot of them were at my expense.. but I just smiled at him indulgently). I think he really enjoyed just unwinding and spending time with people who were not remotely involved in the music industry, or even Savage Garden. As you can imagine.. it is a pretty full time job being a pop star! There is no escape!!

SUNDAY, 29TH AUGUST
Daniel arrives in Sydney and is also given a room with a harbor view. (Mental note to self: rooms with a harbor view are available only to those with credible celebrity status). We were so excited to see him.. which is sort of crazy as we'd only seen him the week before in LA.. but it felt so long ago!

That afternoon the guys were special guests at a media listening party for AFFIRMATION. Roadshow had flown in key media people from around Australia, to be the first in the world to hear the entire album. Our backdrop for the afternoon was a stunning house, also on the harbor, and the atmosphere was relaxed, friendly and soooo Australian and COMFORTABLE!! Needless to say the album was a hit with all and sundry and Daniel was so at ease that I had to monitor his conversation with radio programmers. He kept promising them interviews at extremely early hours of the morning! When he agreed to jump out of an airplane for a promotion on one particular radio station, I knew it was time to take him home!

MONDAY, 30TH AUGUST
I KNEW I LOVED YOU is premiered around Australia at 8.00am on every radio station. Daniel is woken at 7.45am by B105FM for the aforementioned radio interview he has agreed to.

We then spent the rest of the day in and out of radio stations and I think they did more interviews in that day then they have done in a couple of years! They spoke to everybody!

That night we went for a dinner with the Roadshow staff at an Italian restaurant called BELMONDO's. Always a source of embarrassment to Darren and Daniel, I decided to pick the moment we were to enter the restaurant to break my shoe. I was oblivious to the stares we received from the other diners when they spotted Savage Garden in the restaurant... and the very uncool girl (ie. me) beside them with one bare foot. ("Yes.. I'm just in from Manhattan... everyone is doing it.. one shoe on, one shoe off... it's very VERY chic, you know"). The guys did have the good grace to keep their laughter to a minimum.

TUESDAY, 31ST AUGUST and WEDNESDAY, 1ST SEPTEMBER
We bid farewell to Daniel as he heads back up to Brisbane and Darren embarks on his solo press days. Let me tell you... did they squeeze in some stuff on the promo schedule... OR WHAT!!!! He was doing photo shoots for one magazine after another! You'll see some shots that I have put on here for you. He did an entire shoot in bed, which was very sexy.. even if I do say so myself. He also did a shoot for the cover of Cream magazine where he was made up to look very trashed and quite gothic. It was a bit of fun. You'll notice on the photos I have put up which shots these are. My favorite photo shoot he did was for the JUICE year book. It was shot in a tattoo parlor.. and Darren was styled in a very very different way for him. You'll have to wait and see it. I was going to take a digital picture of it for you.. but the camera decided to run out of batteries at that very instant. I have NO IDEA who could have POSSIBLY forgotten to charge it before we left the hotel!!!

Darren and I fly to Brisbane for the first rehearsal the band have with Darren doing vocals. I stay with Daniel and once again greet him with an emotional and excited hello. He gently reminds me that I don't need to be quite so happy to see him, as it has after all only been a few days. FRIDAY, 3RD SEPTEMBER and SATURDAY, 4TH SEPTEMBER We receive the first edit of the video clip for I KNEW I LOVED YOU. I captured a digital photo of the guys and the rest of the band watching it. The clip looks great and should be on a television screen near you very soon. It was great seeing the band again and Darren loved getting behind a microphone and performing the new songs live for the first time. I was banished from the rehearsal studio, but was allowed in JUST LONG ENOUGH to get these photos for you. The good news is that they have found their new backing singer... although she didn't rehearse with them on the first day. Her name is Angie Becker and she has sung with people such as INXS and Terence Trent Darby. They were going to get a singer based in the USA.. but in the end.. Brisbane won out. I think it just feels right that the Savage Garden touring band are made up of all Australians. She is a really nice girl and is a welcome addition to the team.

Darren spent the rest of his time in Australia with his family.. which was great for him as he rarely gets a chance to see them.

MONDAY, 6TH SEPTEMBER
Darren and I fly back to America, but rather than stopping in California, we flew straight to New York. This was 25 hours of traveling!!! I thought I was going to go insane! We actually had an extremely turbulent flight from Australia to LA and at one point the plane was just out of control!! Even the air hostesses looked scared and one of them told us that it was the first time in her entire career she had been worried. It was at this point (as I was squeezing the life out of Darrens hand) that I realized I had accepted a job that threatened my life on a daily basis! If it's not an earthquake.. it's a plane crash!!!! Darren was constantly trying to remain calm and soothing in the face of my insanity.... but actually I think he found a bit of pleasure in teasing me about my fear of flying.

So... it is now 5.00am and I'm still WIDE AWAKE!!! It is the MTV Awards tomorrow night (or should I say tonight)... and I just know exhaustion is going to set in! The good news is, Darren is sound asleep and will be in fine form to party! I'll give you an update on his week in New York when next I log on.

I just wanted to let you all know that I will be doing my best to keep you as updated as possible... but as the promotional whirlwind has once again commenced... it sometimes may not be possible to speak to you every week, to the day. As you can understand, things change and it takes a lot of time getting the Savage Garden 'show' on the road... so please be patient. The website is designed to let you in, see things from our point of view. Sometimes it's a very DISORGANIZED world that Darren and Daniel live in. I know you understand. As soon as I have a story to tell, or a digital picture that I can download for you, you'll see it on this website!

Hi also to CarlaM, our new board moderator. Please make her feel welcome as she is actually a personal friend of Darrens. Thanks Caedn for all your help to this point.

See you next time.
Leonie

P.S. The photos from the last update are finally up! Make sure you check them out.