2013 marks the tenth anniversary of the release of Delta Goodrem’s landmark debut album, INNOCENT EYES. Alongside the classic album and new artwork, this tenth-anniversary deluxe version of INNOCENT EYES will include a brand new recording of the 14 original songs from the record, performed and filmed live in Sydney’s legendary 301 Studios.

Delta and her band recently reconvened at 301 for these very special sessions, to re-imagine and re-record INNOCENT EYES from start to finish. It’s as much a celebration as it is a musical reinvention, the now 28-year-old Delta Goodrem revisiting the songs she wrote and recorded as a teenager that made her into the superstar she is today.


Track Listing
1. Born To Try (Anniversary Edition)
2. Innocent Eyes (Anniversary Edition)
3. Not Me, Not I (Anniversary Edition)
4. Throw It Away (Anniversary Edition)
5. Lost Without You (Anniversary Edition)
6. Predictable (Anniversary Edition)
7. Butterfly (Anniversary Edition)
8. In My Own Time (Anniversary Edition)
9. My Big Mistake (Anniversary Edition)
10. This Is Not Me (Anniversary Edition) (Sneak Peak)
11. Running Away (Anniversary Edition)
12. A Year Ago Today (Anniversary Edition)
13. Longer (Anniversary Edition)
14. Will You Fall For Me (Anniversary Edition) (Sneak Peak)

Deluxe edition includes a video for each song


Track by Track Analysis

BORN TO TRY
The moment I wrote “Born To Try”, I knew it was going to change my life. I remember driving around with the demo of it, which was just a piano and vocal, listening and visualising all the possibilities that i could feel in the air.. Audius, who I wrote it with, would say, “Close your eyes and visualise singing it at the Grammys.” It was the turning point for everything. It changed my life. Everything started moving at a very different pace. David Massey (from Sony in the US) heard it and I was flown over to New York to play it for Tommy Mottola (head of Sony worldwide at the time) and they believed, “This was a very important song.” I flew back home and that week I started my role on Neighbours. They wrote this character for me called Nina Tucker and worked “Born to Try” into the storyline. People felt like they got to know that song through the show. It was very, very special and I’m very thankful to Neighbours. I had a ball being on the show, I loved what I was learning. And then “Born To Try” hit really quick after the episodes aired. The original recording was done live in a room with myself and the musicians just recording it together, I didn’t know them, i was standing in a booth in New York just singing it from head to toe. When it finally came out, that’s when everything got a little bit crazy.

INNOCENT EYES
“Innocent Eyes” is my favourite, musically. It’s always so hard to recreate because of the chord changes. I wrote it with my dear musical mentor Vince Pizzinga – he’s a musical home for me. Calling the album Innocent Eyes, it really said everything i wanted to say. The influence of my classical teachings on piano drove this song. The way we put it together stayed in a classical form too. Vince and i never felt boxed in as writers together. The SKy was the limit. Sometimes there’s magic in the innocence.

NOT ME, NOT I
I had written this piano piece and I originally took it to Kara DioGuardi, who was a massive part of this record. She’s this strong woman with a beautiful heart. I idolised her – I wanted to be like her, as she was this fierce female songwriter i had never met anyone like her in my field. We started an up-tempo version of this song, but I still believed in it in its ballad form and I took it to Gary (Barlow) and Elliot (Kennedy), and rewrote it with them. I think they all had a discrepancy over it because it’s not kosher to bring a song from one session into another, but I also knew there was something special about that piano riff i had written at the time – i didn’t know it wasn’t protocol to do this all I knew was it had to be done in a different way. Sorry guys – but it was worth it. We got a number one out of it!

THROW IT AWAY
I recorded this at Olympic Studios in London with Gary and Eliot. “Throw It Away” resonated with me in the melody and felt like a real “Delta” track to me at the time. It was a real late addition to the album – it was probably one of the last songs recorded.

LOST WITHOUT YOU
“Lost Without You” was a massive moment. After “Born to Try”, “Lost Without You” being the second single, took it all to an incredible new phase. There was a lot of conversations on whether this should be the second single i wasnt sure at the time but my brother and a friend of mine were the ones that convinced me it was the right one. When i think of this song i think about my travels around Europe, discovering all these new cities. The song took on a life of its own which was beautiful to feel.

PREDICTABLE
“Predictable” comes from the inner woman-power of Kara and myself joining forces. I’d got a phone call that wasn’t meant for me and I was a bit shocked and horrified i went to the studio a bit dazed and distressed and Kara was so protective and fired up and said to me “We’re going to write a couple of number ones about this RIGHT NOW” And I believed her. And we did. ha!

BUTTERFLY
“Butterfly” was the third song off the ranks after “Born To Try” and “Will You Fall For Me”. I got sent to Manchester to work with Gary Barlow and Elliot Kennedy, they were just the funniest people I’d ever met they were so welcoming i couldn’t have had a better experience of the next phase of co-writing. Every time I heard this song, I visualised my first arena tour – that’s all I could think of. i heard the choir and the atmosphere in the beauty of that track. and so I opened my first arena tour with that song. It’s always been people’s favourite album track. There’s real beauty in the lyrics and it transports me back into my mind when i could feel something magical happening around me.

IN MY OWN TIME
I wrote this by myself when I was in my Melbourne apartment filming Neighbours i had an upright piano and i was starting to spend more time on my own as my family was from Sydney. So the combination of being on my own, those first few steps into adulthood and all the musical adventures that had started, I was writing abou being creative “in my own time I’ll work it all out … “

MY BIG MISTAKE
I just remember Tim Woodcock being on a couch – he was renting some place in Melbourne flown over from the UK. We’d write lyrics, go get coffee and come back and write some more lyrics to this track Gary and Elliott had sent over. Actually, it wasn’t my favourite on the record at the time but now i have a lot of fun with it..

THIS IS NOT ME
Vince and I wrote this about really getting to know who you are as an artist. When you reflect, going: This is not me, I never said it was, I don’t like it. And then moving forward. Being a young songwriter anytime i learned of something new on my instrument i would create something from it. ( i still do that) this was one of those songs.

RUNNING AWAY
“Running Away” was me talking about finding a bit of freedom – talking about all the things I wanted to be and having that freedom.

A YEAR AGO TODAY
A big musical influence on my life was my Aunty Sandra and she was my godmother and our neighbour growing up. She loved when I played and sang big ballads. When she passed away, I sang at her funeral. She loved my music and would hate it when I did stuff that was too poppy – she’d say that’s not who you are. I’m convinced to this day that my Aunty Sandra had something to do with “Born To Try” – I don’t know why. She was so big on me being true to who I was. I wrote “A Year Ago Today” about her passing away.

LONGER
“Just a minute longer …” I put that at the end of the record. Gary,Elliot, Tim and I creation. I put this as a message at the end of the album saying just a minute longer till the end of the record really ha!

WILL YOU FALL FOR ME
This was the second song written for the album after “Born To Try”. it also reminds me about being in the US playing it on Tommy Mottolas piano at Sony US with David Massey next to me. But I actually wrote it as a birthday present for my boyfriend at the time, he loved it – pretty sure he told me he loved me after he listened that night ha!. it took on a different meaning and life after that moment but a present was were it came from. In my mind i was asking the listener to fall for this record being the last track on the album. I believe in messages in songs.

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