Legendary rocker Jimmy Barnes has opened up about the emotional moment he first met his son David Campbell after abandoning him when he was born.
The Aussie singer, 68, and his son David opened up about their relationship during a joint interview on Richard Wilkins and son Christian’s The Apple & The Tree podcast.
Cold Chisel star Jimmy explained how he told David he was his father when he was 10 years old after spending time with him on several occasions.
‘I used to go see David when he was young but he didn’t know who I was. It must have been so weird for him,’ Jimmy admitted.
‘I’d been on tour with Cold Chisel and I’d be hungover and I’d have a leather jacket on and I’d turn up.’
David was raised by his grandmother, who he believed was his adoptive mother, and thought his teenage mother Kim was his sister.
David used to see Jimmy when he was growing up but believed he was just a family friend, until he discovered the truth.
‘I found out when I was 10. It was very overwhelming,’ David shared.
‘I was having anxiety and I didn’t know who to talk to But this was the easier part of it because working out my sister was my mother [was hard].’
Jimmy added: ‘He got unwell and he’d get migraines and we didn’t know what to do to calm him down. But there is no real way of softening that.’
The singer admitted he felt relived when he told David he was his father and said it didn’t take long before they developed a relationship.
Jimmy also praised his wife Jane, who he met in 1979, as she was determined to help them have a close relationship.
David has previously spoken about his unconventional upbringing, once in a radio interview on GOLD 104.3 in April 2015.
‘I was raised in Adelaide and the woman who raised me told me I was adopted. She [later] told me that she was actually my grandmother,’ he said at the time.
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He added: ‘The woman I thought for 10 years was my sister was actually my mother.’
In a 2008 interview with ABC’s Talking Heads, David admitted he was more shocked to discover the truth about his mother than to learn who his father is.
‘It was quite a shock. It was probably more a shock finding out that my mother was my sister,’ he said, adding that it ‘opened up a whole Pandora’s box of emotions’.