![]() While the title track and leadoff single creeped onto the lower rungs of Billboard's Top 40, none of the album's subsequent singles charted in the States, and barely made a dent in the rest of the world.īut sales were hardly the band's biggest concern. Even after recharging with some time off - and switching labels - the band was unable to stall its worldwide commercial decline in the U.S., the album peaked outside the Top 40, and in most other territories (including their native Australia), it stalled before reaching the Top 10. If Elegantly Wasted had a happy gestation period behind the scenes, its birth was fraught with the same sales woes and personal issues that had plagued INXS in the years leading up to its release. The album was recorded in about eight days." "Many of the songs were first and second takes, just like being a bedroom production. Over a period of nine months, very casually, on weekends here, a week there, whenever we felt like it, we were writing songs and recording them," Hutchence told the Orlando Sentinel. "Andrew and I haven't written this way in a long time. As Hutchence would later recall, although it took an extended period of time for the band members to find their way back together, the material fell together relatively painlessly once he and Andrew Farriss resumed regular communication, the album quickly started taking shape. With Andrew Farriss alongside veteran hitmaker Bruce Fairbairn behind the boards, INXS started work on the set of songs they'd ultimately dub Elegantly Wasted. While Hutchence slowly worked his way through his solo LP, the group landed with Mercury Records, where they started work on their 10th album in late 1996. "It just seemed like the logical time to take a break." This helped to create a situation resulting in a lot of personal and business friction within the band, as well as the record label," Hutchence explained. As a band, we've recorded an album every 12 to 18 months over the last five or six years. "We really wanted to get off the old carousel for a while. It all contributed to an air of exhaustion around the group, and slowed their return after the conclusion of their longstanding association with Atlantic Records following the relative failure of the Full Moon, Dirty Hearts LP. Multi-instrumentalist Kirk Pengilly was working his way through a divorce after a brief marriage to singer Deni Hines, and the Farriss brothers - bandleader Andrew, drummer Jon, and guitarist Tim - suffered the death of their mother. ![]() Hutchence's troubles earned the most attention, but much of the INXS lineup was coping with some sort of turbulence or emotional trauma during this period. Frontman Michael Hutchence, who'd already dabbled in extracurricular activity with his Max Q side project in 1989, started working on a full-fledged solo LP in the years after Full Moon, Dirty Hearts, and his tabloid-friendly lifestyle - including his affair with Paula Yates, then the wife of Boomtown Rats frontman Bob Geldof - only furthered his reputation as a debauched star. ![]() There was a period, in fact, when it seemed like the group's break might end up being permanent. ![]()
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