Darren Burn - Bubblegum kid of tragedy

[beccabear67]

I've seen him in The Insomniac, hard to say if he had a great acting talent from it. I think for a young kid to succeed in music they have to have an extraordinary voice/talent and he was good but not extraordinary, as say Michael Jackson was to most who heard or saw him early on. Child 'stars' and bad endings sadly are not so rare.

I can see if one was the same age at the time one might feel attached regardless of whether they were all that brilliant. I'm somewhat like that with Nicola Cowper having seen her in two tv serials. Some Darren Burn songs I've listened to I noticed they double-tracked his vocal throughout so perhaps EMI people felt he wasn't as strong as all that. Some might thrive and build their repertoire given the same hand dealt (if given half a chance and being keen) while others get derailed for whatever reason. David Bowie started in his early teens and it was close to a decade before one of his songs broke through (with timing from the first Moon landing).

[Bryan Rayner]

SUNDAY MIRROR, JULY 29th, 1973.

[Bryan Rayner]

DARREN BURN, EMI 1973. With his pet Highland Terrier, Dandy MacTavish.

[DavidRayner]

Excellent quality colour photos of Darren on a double page spread featured in IT'S HERE AND NOW magazine dated December 29th, 1973. It seems that Darren could play an acoustic guitar. These photos were taken inside Darren's then home at 17, Queen Elizabeth's Drive, Southgate, Middlesex.

[DavidRayner]

FROM 1973.

DARREN BURN, photographed by famed society photographer Terry O'Neill in July, 1973, which is now half a century ago. His father, Colin, a retired top executive with EMI died in 2009, aged 76, and his mother, Johanna, died in December, 2021, at the age of 85. Terry O’Neill has also passed on now, too. The original of this photo may well have been in colour, with this monochrome print designed for newspaper publication as a press photo.

[DavidRayner]

Darren's mother, Johanna, passed away on Wednesday. December 22nd, 2021, aged 85.

[DavidRayner]

Re: Darren Burn - Bubblegum kid of tragedy

I've just learned from the IMDb and Wikipedia that John Pitman, who interviewed Darren on both the Man Alive and People programmes, passed away on February 14th, 2018, aged 77. So both interviewer and interviewee are gone now.

[DavidRayner]

Re: Darren Burn - Bubblegum kid of tragedy

The 1988 interview has now been uploaded to YouTube. The interviewer is the BBC's John Pitman, who had interviewed Darren fifteen years earlier in the Man Alive programme. In the 1988 interview, he is very self-depreciating and blaming his parents, especially his mother, for the 1973 - 1974 disaster at EMI.

[DavidRayner]

Re: Darren Burn - Bubblegum kid of tragedy

Darren Burn, 1973.

[DavidRayner]

Re: Darren Burn - Bubblegum kid of tragedy

I’ve just received from an eBay seller in Stockton on Tees an interview with Darren cut from the music paper Disc and dated July 28th, 1973. I won't reproduce it all here, but in it he says that one of the recordings he made at his first recording session was There’ll Never Be Anyone Else But You, a track that was subsequently never released. I wonder if EMI still have it in their vaults, as it would be very interesting to hear it. Darren also says that he found True Love Ways very difficult to sing, although you’d never guess that from listening to it. The article also reveals that he called his father Colin. “I always have”, said Darren. When asked what Colin Burn did at EMI, Darren says: “Sits in his office and chain smokes.”

A Very Happy Christmas and a Prosperous New Year for 2018 to everyone on the forum.

[DavidRayner]

Re: Darren Burn - Bubblegum kid of tragedy

An old editing copy of the 1973 BBC2 Man Alive film Twinkle Twinkle Little Star has been uploaded on YouTube. It was filmed during July and August, 1973 and first transmitted on Wednesday, October 24th, 1973. The programme features Darren, then The James Boys and Ricky Wilde and then back to Darren again for the last 25 minutes of the programme. It covers the launch of his first single and the publicity surrounding it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQ1NGOiCWiQ&t=812s

[DavidRayner]

Re: Darren Burn - Bubblegum kid of tragedy

Although there were only four singles by Darren released (two in 1973 and two in 1974) they are always available on eBay.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_od...+BURN&_sacat=0

[Mulletino]

Re: Darren Burn - Bubblegum kid of tragedy

Someone once said to me that even though Darren had a fabulous singing voice, being a trained choir boy, even if he'd become a big hit with the record buying public, he wouldn't have had a very long shelf life.

A bit like Aled Jones?

[DavidRayner]

Re: Darren Burn - Bubblegum kid of tragedy

And as it turns out he was way more interested in 11 year old girls than he should have been

I saw a documentary once showing the hysteria at one of Gary Glitter's concerts in 1973 and all these young girls were throwing their knickers at him. What they saw in him, I don't know. I've still got all the singles I bought in 1973, but there are none of Gary Glitter's among them. I didn't like his records at the time and so I never bought any.

[DavidRayner]

Re: Darren Burn - Bubblegum kid of tragedy

That's odd consideirng David Cassidy & Donny Osmond were having plenty of success at the time, & still fairly young.

Yes, but David Cassidy was 23 years old in 1973 and Donny Osmond was 15. So maybe Darren would have been more successful with them if he'd been a few years older. It's hard to say. Certainly, his voice would have broken by the age of 14 and perhaps he wouldn't have been able to reach the high notes like he did in 1973. Someone once said to me that even though Darren had a fabulous singing voice, being a trained choir boy, even if he'd become a big hit with the record buying public, he wouldn't have had a very long shelf life.