Fortune Shines as INXS "Star"

INXS hopes to have found a new sensation in the form of a onetime Elvis impersonator.

The Australian band tapped J.D. Fortune as its lead singer on CBS' Rock Star: INXS Tuesday, ending 13 weeks of American Idol-style competition among 15 performers.

"We're a band now," the 31-year-old Canadian singer told E! Online after his win.

"We're complete. That's an amazing thing. And I don't think age has anything to do with it because music is a language, and if you speak it fluently you can speak to other people in that language. And we all speak it fluently."

Fortune--who once paid the bills by imitating the King and, when that failed, lived out of a car--was true to his name, beating out Chicago rocker Marty Casey and Australian performer MiG Ayesa in the one-hour Rock Star finale.

The three performers each got to choose a classic rock cut to perform in front of INXS, cohosts Brooke Burke and Dave Navarro, the 12 eliminated contestants and a live audience at the same Los Angeles studio where American Idol is taped. (Producers built a replica of downtown L.A.'s Mayan Theater inside the complex; the Mayan was the site of the band's final L.A. concert with the late Michael Hutchence.)

Ayesa, who gave up a lead role in the London-based Queen musical We Will Rock You to pursue the INXS gig, kicked off the show with a polished version of Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody." Fortune followed with an uptempo take on the Rolling Stones' "You Can't Always Get What You Want." Casey ended the set with an intense rendition of Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here."

After a brief deliberation by the band members--Andrew, Tim and Jon Farriss, Kirk Pengilly and Garry Beers--Ayesa was given his walking papers. (Thus disproving an Internet conspiracy theory that he was the show's ringer brought in by the band and show producer Mark Burnett.)

The five band members then took the stage and performed one INXS song with each of the finalists. Crowd favorite Casey sang "Don't Change," while the brash Fortune, who was portrayed during the season as the most focused contestant, belted out "What You Need." After another deliberation, Tim Farriss announced Fortune as the new frontman.

After the finale, which was taped at 10 a.m., and post-show mini-concert during which the new INXS broke out some new material, including the song "Easy, Easy," Fortune met with the press.

"I'm going to sleep all day," he said, adding that his second rock star indulgence would be to "hang out with INXS all the time."

Fortune will get his wish soon enough. He's due in the studio to lay down vocals on the band's full-length album, Switch, on Nov. 29, with a world tour commencing in early 2006. Switch represents INXS' first new studio set since Hutchence's suicide in 1997.

"He's very passionate," bassist Beers said of his new mate. "He's got a lot of energy. And we feel comfortable about what he?s going to bring to INXS and appreciate what we are offering him more than anybody. He's now an equal member of the brain trust of INXS performance-wise and in the studio. And that will unfold as we go along."

The band, with Fortune in tow, will now write songs together in addition to rehearsing tunes from INXS' back catalog of hits in advance of the fall release and impending word tour.

Already, "Pretty Vegas," a song Fortune cowrote with Andrew Farris during Rock Star, is set to become a new single. It will be released Wednesday on Epic Records.

The tune was the second-best-selling single on MSN Music as of Tuesday, behind, ironically enough, Casey's original song "Trees."

Despite losing out to Fortune, the 31-year-old Casey won't disappear. Tim Farris said during the finale that INXS "would like to talk to you about possibly opening up for us on our upcoming world tour."

As for the other aspiring Rock Star contestants, they told the audience in between takes at the taping that they were all continuing to pursue musical careers.

Meanwhile, show mastermind Burnett said he's already looking forward to a new edition of Rock Star with a different band. "We're in a lot of discussions with people," he told E! Online. "I think that you're very, very likely to see Rock Star: Season Two."