It’s been almost two decades since Daniel Merriweather stormed the charts with his debut album but he looks utterly unrecognisable now.
In 2009, tracks Change and Red landed in the UK top 10 as the Australian star released his debut album Love & War.
Daniel, now 42, was a fresh-faced singer at the time and had risen to prominence when featuring on Mark Ronson’s debut album Here Comes the Fuzz.
The Australian singer keeps away from the spotlight nowadays, rarely posting any pictures on social media, especially not selfies.
In one surprising post, he gave a glimpse into his style as he showed off finger tattoos and an eye patch as he wore an all black outfit to a friend’s fancy dress party.
Daniel kept the majority of his face covered as he wore a balaclava, posting a snap with friend Sophie where he was barely recognisable.
The singer appears to have a few tattoos, with one poking out of his sleeve and lettering across his knuckles.
When he was 18, Daniel reportedly got a tattoo which read ‘love or money’ in Latin on his inside forearm.
After being discovered, he was signed to Mark Ronson’s label and performed with the famed producer at the Brit Awards in 2007.
Daniel featured heavily on Ronson’s track Stop Me which mixed The Smiths’ Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before and The Supremes’ You Keep Me Hanging On.
Despite providing vocals, he confessed he had never heard the Smiths’ version before working with Ronson.
Rumours began to swirl that Daniel was working on a solo album around the time he performed at Glastonbury with the DJ.
His first and only studio album landed in 2009, Love & War, with lead single Change peaking at eight in the charts.
The second track Red did even better, landing Daniel a top-five slot in the charts, however, this success was not replicated.
The third and fourth singles failed to impress and landed in the low 100s, although the album itself was met with positive reviews.
Daniel did not return for a follow-up album but featured on other artists’ tracks in the 2010s and toured as the opening act for Corinne Bailey Rae.
Returning in 2019, the singer released a trio of singles, including Everything I Need, and seemed to hint at a second album finally in the making.
That sophomore record never manifested and Daniel has largely stepped away from the spotlight, except when wishing his friends happy birthday.
He has just released a song called Orbital, which he said is ‘about how it felt for me to recently find out that I am native to a country, that for my whole life, I was told my ancestors stole’.
Daniel added: ‘It’s about wanting to fly into Orbit and see this speck of land from above and realise that no one owns the land, no one owns the earth and no matter what anyone tries to tell you; you deserve to be wherever you are, just as much as anyone else.❤️’