At 21, the 6'3 hunk from Glasgow, Darius Danesh, is fast becoming one of Britain's rising stars in the music biz. He first became a household name 18 months ago after a somewhat infamous appearance on ITV programme, Popstars (which should really be renamed as Flopstars considering the current state of Hear'say).
He then became one of the stars of another ITV programme of the same nature - Pop Idol! With a whole new look and attitude, the 'new' Darius showed himself to be the entertaining, charismatic, talented, gorgeous and genuine future star he really is. With brilliant performances week in week out, Darius owed the crowd and drove the girls wild with hi sexy voice and hip shaking dances! Nobody was prepared for Darius's turn around, and when he took 3rd place in the competition, even Simon Cowell wanted to sign him up to his label, BMG. The son of Iranian born Dr Booth Danesh and Scottish mum, Avril (a GP), Darius was raised in Bearsden, an up-market suburb of Glasgow, with his two younger brothers, Aria (18) and Cyrus (6), and was educated at the ?,555-a-term Glasgow Academy.
There, his star potential shone through as he starred in numerous productions, including Oliver, and mesmerized the younger students with his guitar playing. Darius has just signed a 5 album ?m record contract with Mercury Records after turning down a deal with Pop Idol Judge, Simon Cowell. He says if he had of signed with BMG he would have been selling himself out and just using the Pop Idol hype to sell his record.
The record in question was to be a cover of the Tom Jones classic, It's Not Unusual, which Darius performed on the show (much to the delight of his female fans!) and was to be released 4 weeks after Gareth Gates' release of Unchained Melody (which was released only 3 weeks after Will Young's Evergreen/Anything Is Possible).
Not only did Darius want to have artistic freedom, and the chance to release original material, he wanted to allow Will Young to enjoy his moment of glory as Pop Idol winner, which is already being overshadowed by the engineered success of Gareth Gates. Signing with BMG wouldn't have allowed him to do this. Darius released his debut single "Colour Blind" in August 2002, the song got alot of airplay on both radio and tv stations all over the country. The song was set to be a smash hit! That is exactly what it did, the single went straight in at number 1 in the UK singles charts.
|
