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TRIGGER WARNING: This article makes mention of sensitive topics including substance abuse, mental health, and sexual abuse, and may be distressing for some readers.
Aussie icon John Farnham is set to release his memoir The Voice Inside on October 31, 2024. In the lead-up to its launch, many publications have begun to report on some of the biggest shocks to come out of the book.
The brand-new tell-all was written in partnership with award-winning writer and director Poppy Stickell, who also directed John’s documentary, John Farnham: Finding the Voice (2023).
“The Voice Inside charts John Farnham’s very personal and public journey, told in his own words and with his inimitable humour, insight, and humility,” the publishing company wrote in a statement on Facebook.
From his battle with mouth cancer to the abuse he endured from his first manager, John has opened up in this memoir with remarkable honesty. Here are some of the most surprising revelations from the book so far.
BATTLE WITH MOUTH CANCER
John Farnham has been very open about his battle with mouth cancer since the beginning. In late 2022, John was diagnosed and underwent surgery in which all his bottom teeth were removed and his jaw bone was scraped.
“I was told later that someone from the medical team called Jillian a couple of times while I was in theatre – apparently I was very close to dying,” John wrote in his memoir, as obtained by The Guardian.
The 75-year-old further touched on his diagnosis, revealing it “gutted” him.
“My facial disfigurement from the surgery means I can’t open my mouth wide enough for a strip of spaghetti, let alone to sing a top C. At this stage I can’t get the movement to make the sounds I want to make, and that’s where the vibrations and my voice come from. It’s still a very disconcerting thing. And trying hurts.”
DRUGGED BY HIS FIRST MANAGER
In his new memoir, John Farnham has discussed his entry into the music industry as an innocent teenager. Poppy revealed to The Guardian that “it is a very predatory industry.”
John detailed the abuse he suffered at the hands of his first manager, Darryl Sambell, who gave him amphetamines to boost his energy before performances and snuck him sleeping pills in the morning.
“He drugged me for years and I had no f—ing idea,” John wrote in The Voice Inside, as obtained by The Sydney Morning Herald.
“I caught him one day. I was drinking from a cup of coffee and there was a pill only half-dissolved in the bottom. When I asked him what it was, Darryl replied, ‘That’s just to keep you awake.’
“For years, Darryl controlled where and when I worked, what I sang, what I wore, what I ate. He isolated me from friends and family, he tried to keep me away from Jill [Billman, John’s wife], he drugged me, and he made me believe that all my success, everything I had, was because of him.”
John further revealed that he never questioned any of it and instead told himself it was because he was young, stressed, tired, and unsure about his own instincts.
ABUSE
John further touched on the abuse he endured from his first manager, revealing that he was “aggressively sexual” towards him.
“I said it often enough that I can see now that this rejection turned his attraction into jealousy, hatred and a desire for control,” John wrote in his memoir, obtained by news.com.au.
He revealed that he would constantly find himself having to fend off his advances.
“I feel so ashamed of myself for not realising what Darryl was up to or speaking up more often to put him back in his place,” he wrote.
