Missy Higgins reveals private heartbreak moments before huge TV gig

Missy Higgins has revealed one of the biggest televised shows of her career was also one of the worst nights of her life.

Australian singer-songwriter Missy Higgins’ current tour is a celebration of her debut album, The Sound of White – but it was her newest, yet to be released material that really resonated at Sydney’s ICC Theatre on Saturday night.

Higgins divides her show into two sections, with the post-intermission act serving as a faithful run through her debut album, a 12 x platinum smash that was released 20 years ago this year.

But, earlier, fans were also treated to half a dozen selections from her upcoming sixth studio album, The Second Act, which Higgins explained deals with the breakdown of her marriage to the father to her two children, comedian and playwright Dan Lee.

Higgins spoke in sometimes devastating detail about the break-up to the sell-out ICC crowd, confessing that she “hates” being a single mother and has struggled to process the end of a marriage she assumed would be for life.

Missy Higgins on stage during her current Aussie tour. Picture: Nighthawk Creative

Her new album deals with the breakdown of her marriage to husband Dan Lee. Picture: Sarah Matray

And in a preamble before one of the most bruising songs from her new record, Blue Velvet Dress, she even revealed the very night the relationship came to an end: New Year’s Eve, 2021.

Higgins was booked to perform at the Sydney Opera House forecourt as part of the ABC’s live New Year’s Eve coverage. As she told the crowd, it was backstage in her dressing room that she realised her marriage was over for good.

The timing couldn’t have been worse, as she then had to put on the song’s titular blue velvet dress, strap on a guitar and play her hits for a live TV audience of millions. Higgins said it had been a night of extremes, as she publicly marked the start of a new year while privately grappling with the realisation her marriage was over.

In a statement on her website about the upcoming album, Higgins revealed that she views it as a sequel of sorts to The Sound of White.

Higgins performs on New Year’s Eve, 2021, with the Sydney Harbour Bridge in the background.

In her new song Blue Velvet Dress, she shares devastating details about this particular night.

“I wrote all those songs on the first album when I was in my late teens when I never thought anyone would hear them, so they were very personal, like I was writing my secrets in a diary”, she explained.

“I did less of that on later albums for lots of reasons but lately I realised I’d gone back to that confessional mode of songwriting. I guess it’s been my way of dealing with the end of my marriage. So, I feel like I’ve come full circle … I was starting life from scratch at 20 and now, like lots of people, I’m figuring out how to start life all over again at 40.”

Higgins initially announced her separation from her longtime partner on social media six months after the fact.

“Six months ago Dan and I separated,” she wrote on Instagram in mid-2022.

“I became a single parent. Something I never thought would happen and something I’m still trying to grapple with, to be honest.”

“I’m still grieving. I realised this today as I was walking through the bush crying like a lunatic in the rain. Grieving the way I thought things would turn out,” she wrote.

Missy Higgins’ The Second Act tour continues with sold-out shows in Sydney, Geelong and Canberra next month. Her new album The Second Act will be released on September 6.

Originally published as Missy Higgins reveals private heartbreak moments before huge TV gig