Emotional Rescue
Overcoming the hurdles of a maturing teen band,
silverchair's third album finds them older, wiser, and deeper
By KATHERINE TURMAN
Raygun, May 1999

"Emotion Sickness," the first song off silverchair's provocative third album Neon Ballroom hints- musically and lyrically- at its creator's state of mind. The tune is darkly epic and evocative, written during a despondent three-month period in Daniel Johns' young life.

"I was living in a house, alone, because I wanted to be for a while," the nearly emaciated silverchair singer/guitarist begins in a slow aussie drawl. "I was having some anxiety troubles... I don't know what it was related to. I wanted to be alone and write, and get it out through music- it's the most therapeutic form of expressing yourself- rather then sitting in a chair and talking to someone and feeling uncomfortable."

His self-therapy succeeded, at least on a creative level, making Neon Ballroom not only the young trio's best outing to date, but even dare we say, sophisticated. Lush strings, epic melodies and heartful emotions link diverse songs from "Black Tangled Heart" to the delicate, hit-bound "Ana's Song(Open Fire)" to the aggro "Spawn Again"- which Johns notes, "throws the album off with its hardness, going from really mellow to really intense. It gives a bit more width to the wings."

silverchair's first two albums, 1995's Frogstomp and 1997's Freak Show, were decent rock records that recieved a postive if not totally overwelming response from the public and press. But Neon Ballroom has upped the ante, proving that some younger artists are able to express more than mmm-bop, translating often-pained, passion-and-pathos-filled into music. The 12-song LP,produced by Nick Launay(Midnight Oil,PiL), is practically a diary of Johns' intenal musings and angst, some of which manifest themselves in lyrics such as "I'm just the kind to bring you down/equalize the pressue it's all too much/sex drugs and image are just enough to get you by in the real world," "refrain confess,contain repress/pretend I'm dead, abuse myself, confuse myself" and "I love the pain..."

Other inner thoughts, which may have not yet been exorcised via the musical process, seak a subconscious escape. " I have dreams about going after people with knives," says Johns, softly offering this account of one recent nightmare : "I was running and all these people were throwing knvies at each other, and it was dark and scary and cloudy, like a labyrinth, I fell in a hole and blood started falling in, and I was drowning in it. So I got this knife from a guy who had been stabbed and was making me drown in blood, and threw it and killed him." In short, Freud would have a field day with the endearingly scrawny blonde singer.

Thankfully for all concerned, not all John's thoughts, dreams or songs are that apocalyptic. Today, he's ensconced, with bandmates Ben Gillies and Chris Joannau- both more chipper and healthily complecated than their bandmate-in a penthouse suite at West Hollywood's ritzy Sofitel Hotel. Fresh fruit, juice and pastries await nearby, while a rack of hip designer clothes is at their disposal for a photo shoot. The walls, covered with bright Provencal print fabric, don't quite suit the character of a young band that, despite dark-isg musical vision of its frontman, are still easygoing,down-to-earth, recent high school graduates who've managed to tour around much of the world several times while their mates stuggled with math and science.

Tanned and affable, Gillies unhesitantingly drops his trousers(revealing silk mickey mouse boxers) to try on the duds the stylist has provided for the group, while the slightly more reluctant Joannau browses the numerous shirts. Despite Johns' smudged eyeliner, his fragile inescapable resemblance to the late Kurt Cobain and his admission that he's "not the most stable person in the world," drugs-apparantly of the legal type- have helped sort out his mind a bit. "At least now I can laught and be a little normal whereas before, someone would make a joke and I'd be [he makes a poker face], "My only way of dealing is through lyrics and music, but even then, sometimes that isn't enough," says the 20-year old. "That's when you've got to resort to tablets, anti-depressents, and that's a stage when some people go into the hard drugs. I got medication that helps level out my moods. And that's what a lot of the songs are about. I wasn't a happy camper.

"I regret some of it," Johns continues on his self-imposed isolation- where he drew the blinds, turned off the lights and watched movies, racking up an astonishing $1,600 tab in one year at the local video store. "But I don't regret writing the album. I'm very proud of it. I regret wasting a long time of my life sitting in a house not seeing friends, just sitting in a cave," he adds with a smile.

Now back in the light- somewhat, at least- the effort seems worth it. Though it's common for bands to deny past efforts in favor of the new record, silverchair seems to have an accurate take on their place in music.

"We were lucky to release an album that was a style of music which was very popular at the time, so we didn't have to do much," Johns says of their first album, which got them compared to Nirvana and Pearl Jam and dismissed as simply more "grunge." Their second outing sold half the number of their debut, but the band claims to have taken it in stride. "We expeced it," says Johns. "That was at the time everyone was saying 'Rock is dead, Prodigy is it, and dance music is the new punk rock.' I thought, 'Whatever, we're not going to follow any trends.' For the first two albums, it was always in that traditional hard rock music vein, Zeppelin and stuff. The second album was more of an extenstion of the first.

"With this album, we had time to sit down and make sure we did something different and creatively gratifying, rather than rushing something out to get radio airplay."

Indeed, more time and thought was put into Neon Ballroom, and it shows.Two months of recording in Australia included the work of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, a collaboration with classical pianist David Helfgott(the inspiration of the film Shine),and backing vocals new South Wales Public School Choir.

All of which was planned by Daniel, during his extended. home cinema-filled, writing process. "You know how after you watch a movie you can loose yourself in it and be really captivated by it?" Johna aska. "I wanted to have an album where you can turn out the lights and listen to the music and get lost in it, and captivated by certain moods. Which most albums and our last two-don't."

"When I was writing I knew exactly what instruments I wanted on them," he continues. "The songs with strings were written with the intention of having strings. I knew what arrangements I wanted, and what parts I wanted to provoke certain moods in people."

Though there are classical influences, and silverchair's offical bio relates that the songs essentially began as poems. Daniel easily confesses he doesn't have a favorite poet or even like poetry, nor did he listen to classical music during Neon Ballroom's inception. But string arranger Jane Scarpantoni spoke Johns' language despite any technical gaps. "She knew exactly what I wanted after a few meetings," relates Johns. "By the time the orcestra went to record them, I knew the parts were right. She was classically trained but had a rock mind. She understand my language; I describe things more as scenery or pictures, and she latched on and got the right kind of mood."

Johns is aware of the album's grandiosity, and cops to Neon Ballroom's intentionally anthemic structures. He even calls "Anthem for the Year 2000", the albums first single and video, "black comedy," and admits the word "anthem" was a good one before it became overused. " 'We Will Rock You' that's an anthem," Johns says without irony. "I just wanted to write a stadium rock song without being pretentious or wanky."

"Well you didn't suceed," chimes in Gillies, grinning at his bandmate. In truth, though, he did. Lyrically "Anthem"'s one of the album's more outward looking songs, about how Australian youth is generally viewed by its elders.

"There's a political party, One Nation, who was about imposing a curfew on youth, and it was a big issue in Australia," Johns explains. "It wasn't just about that party, it's about any generation treating young people as an experiment, trying to get the world how it was in the 50's,"

"[The song's] got very sarcastic lyrics. It's more addressed to anyone who judges young people by the crimes they see on telly. It's very fales. We're in the fortunate position where we don't have to seek employment," Johns realizes. "But I feel sorry for young people who do and they're already pre-judged."

silverchair should know. Pre-judged by their age for the last two albums, much of that seems to have subsided. So when they're 40....

"At 40 I won't be doing interviews. No way," Johns says quickly. "I like Ozzy Osbourne still, but I think there's very few people in the rock world who can still pull it off. The good thing I've always liked about silverchair is its fresh, and if we're not young, as long as the music sounds fresh and youthful," he reasons. "I don't want to sound like we've been in the industry a long time and we know what the formula for a hit is so we just keep producing the same crap. It's good to go out on top when you're still happy with your music. Then you can look back and be proud of everything you've done."

Like Soundgarden? "Yeah. I mean, I was disappointed when Soundgarden broke up, because I was a fan, but if they'd put out an album that was bad, I would have remembered them by their last album."

Clearly silverchair are savvy, and have thus far made the right decisions for themselves. "We've been told that if we appealed to different market, like if we'd done more teen magazines, we could sell three times the amount of albums that we did." says Gillies, who admits he had fun at a recent interview with a youth-oriented mag that discussed girls...and more girls.

"But we wanted to try to appeal to the people who were like us," Johns adds "and I think we're all pretty glad we did it, because it gave us a chance at longevity that we wouldn't have gotten if we were a 'teenage rock sensation'."

Despite their serious conversation silverchair hasn't lost the restlessness and spontaneity of youth waxing ecstatic about "Neightbors," the Australian night-time soap that spawned both Kylie Minogue and Natalie Imbruglia. "It's a great show," grins Johns, "cheesy but cool, and we recorded the theme to it just for fun." Other recorded amusement includes their submission for the new Clash tribute album("London's Burning"), as well as recent covers by Minor Threat and Black Flag.

Looking back on the last year of his life, Johns realizes that the concept of suffering for your art is cliche, but also notes that "a lot of people who get into art form have some form of mental.... something in their head which is unstable." In fact, in the wonderful "Ana's Song(Open Fire)", "Ana" is a composite of "different mental disorders- anxiety, eating disorders, depression... anything people can fall back on and be an excuse."

While his fragile sensitivity is appealing, as well as both seemingly real and dangerous, Johns seems to be taking good care of himself, and he's buffered by two ebullient, more generally sunny musical souls.. All three, however, are able to count their blessings. In fact, during recent rehersals for a headlining US theater tour, the trio were working up the songs from Frogstomp, an album that's ancient history for them.

"Frogstomp seems like ages ago," Gillies relates. "Listening, I had a bit of a chuckle to myself, but I still think it was such a good start. Up to now, I think we've had any band's dream," the drummer concludes. "We didn't have to do boring shit, and we've been really fortunate from the start."