Many know 72-year-old Colin Hay as the indomitable force behind the ’80s band Men at Work. But for a whole generation, the introduction to his incredible solo work came through Zach Braff‘s sitcom Scrubs. For me, it was Braff’s writing and directorial debut Garden State that opened me up to him at the perfect time in my life. As a moody, emo teen, hearing his husky, gentle voice made me weep with yearning after I heard “I Just Don’t Think I’ll Ever Get Over You,” as it did to dozens of other teens throughout the early aughts.
And he certainly knows it. In an interview with Joe Weil for WBZ News, he admitted that Scrubs really revived his career.
“I’d been touring for years before that, and it had been building slowly. I was building an audience, and it was quite humble in numbers, so to speak,” he explained. “I mean, when I first went out on the road, I was playing to hardly anybody — 40, 50 people — and eventually it started to grow. But I think that when the Scrubs thing happened, first of all, it was a very popular show but still kind of cool, and there was something culty about it — something you had to know about. So I was on that show, and it just increased my audience. However you consumed music, but certainly playing live, I started to get another generation of people coming to see me play live — lots of them — and that’s still happening. I’m forever grateful that I got to be on that show and that they used a bunch of my songs.”
Fans filled the comments section with affirmations that it was exactly how they were introduced to him and waxed poetically about how wrong it is that he’s so underplayed.
“That cameo was great,” acknowledged one fan. “I never pay attention to cameos, but this one hit me. That acoustic ‘Overkill’ is haunting and beautiful!”
“I became a fan from seeing him on Scrubs. I remember seeing him in the credits as ‘Troubadour.’ Love his music,” added another.
“Every time I hear that song, I think of this version of it, because it is so wonderful,” said another.
His solo career really began at 40, after he reinvented the electro-pop version of himself that he had formed with Men at Work. He told Billboard that those early days of shows with humbling 30-40-person crowds helped him hone his storytelling skills. He met Braff just as the actor was starting out, and Braff pledged to get his songs in front of show creator Bill Lawrence. Lawrence ended up writing the episode “My Overkill” after being inspired by his work.
This story was originally reported by Parade on Oct 29, 2025, where it first appeared in the News section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
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