Adelaide, Dec. 19, 1997

silverchair - Magic Dirt - Rash
19th December
Adelaide Entertainment Centre
By SARAH MASTERS

From the moment the lights went down for silverchair's set to begin the people on the floor were ready to rock. Even before the band were visable on stage the girls had started screaming which added to the excitement and anticipation of the crowd.

The band had so much energy it seemed like everyone down the front were buzzing from the intake. Daniel posed for photographers, sticking his fingers up and waving his arms around. Chris seemed on the go for the whole set, never still for a second and Ben played his drums with authority.

The production sure does make a difference! The heater lights and other lighting effects makes the show just that bit more visually exciting. This show there was heaps more interaction between the band and the audience. The standout moment for me at this gig was the Mexican wave by the people in the seats -- not only was it really cool it looked wicked too.

I think No Association rocked the most on the night with nearly the whole floor moshing.

Technical difficulties occured in the Freak remix where Daniel's mic came unplugged and some words were cut off. When the mic was dropped on the ground Daniel joined Ben on the drums and continued singing when it was put back together. Daniel jumped off the stage in front of the barrier and screamed the last couple of lines, climbed back onstage and then the band made their getaway.

I can't wait to see silverchair on their next tour.

It was Thursday the 18th of December. Me and my friend Ryan were at my house just chilling out when we realised it was 4:30 p.m., so we walked down to the hotel where silverchair were staying. As this was all perfectly organised we got there and in came a white van with Queensland plates. Ben and Chris jumped out, as did their bodyguard and former tutor Jim Welch. We walked up and Ben recognised me and my friend but he couldn't quite remember who we were. After a short history lesson, Ben remembered and we entered the hotel. silverchair signed in and headed upstairs for a short afternoon nap after their long drive from Ballarat.

About an hour and half later Ben, Chris and Jim came out and headed into town for dinner at Fast Eddie's Cafe. (In the photo at right, Ben is checking his wallet after dinner -- do you think he picked up the bill?) Following the meal we left Fast Eddie's and silverchair (minus Daniel, who was still on his way from Melbourne) went off to see the movie Titanic while we cruised back to the hotel.

The next day, when we arrived at the hotel from my house (which isn't very far away), Bailey and a few other stage crew members came out of the hotel and spoke to us. After a short conversation with Watson and Bailey we got VIP passes for soundcheck and backstage (thanks to Ben and Paul Gould, the stage monitor engineer) and made our way to the venue.

We arrived at the Adelaide Entertainment Centre at about 1:45 p.m. We waited until all of the crew members got there before we went in. We walked down the massive ramp at the back of the venue and down into the backstage area. The place was huge. The stage was about 75 percent set up when we arrived. We just wandered around and grabbed a few pictures here and there during the stage and lighting setup. We got to go on stage and just watch everything -- it was unreal.

Then at about 5 p.m. the band arrived for soundcheck and played Spawn a few times and Abuse Me with funny lyrics. "C'mon, suck Ben's dick, he likes it!" Daniel sang. We watched and laughed and took photos. Then soundcheck was over and it was time to go line up with our friends outside.

Once we were in, we watched the support bands from the side. Rash rocked (they are one of my favs) and so did Magic Dirt. But when silverchair came out it was General Admission Mosh time! The lights went out. The crowd went nuts and on came the three famous fellows we know as silverchair.

The spotlight turned on, it was on Chris, and he started playing the Israel's Son intro. The crowd went sick! After the intro, out blasted the intro chords of Slave and the lights went out. Then 20 seconds later, again out blasted the intro chords. Then what we had all been waiting for -- the song started and the mosh went fuckin' wild.

Next up was Roses, after which Daniel spit and said, "I have lots of phlegm, lots of snot. Yeah, snot -- snot, snot... and lots of phlegm." He then sit again.

Abuse Me followed, and afterward Daniel said, "Hey, we have a cool trick to do. If you're in a shop and the girl that is serving you is being, well, a real... bitch, here's a thing to say to her. After you have received your goods -- only AFTER you have received your goods, you say to her 'thankslut' instead of 'thanks a lot.' Ya get it? 'Thankslut?' Anyway..."

He paused just before playing The Door, looked up at the crowd in the seated area and said, "You guys on the floor rock, the floor rocks, yeah, the floor, the floor, the floor rocks. But you guys in the seats -- OH MY FUCKIN' GOD! Some people just don't seem to understand the concept of ROCK!"

After all the people on the floor abused the seat holders Daniel yelled out, "WAIT!! there's something I've always wanted to see! All you people in the seats do a Mexican wave starting from the left here. Just pretend your at the footy or something. 1, 2, 3, go!" and the crowd in the seats did a great Mexican wave. Daniel yelled, "YEAH! YEAH! FUCKIN' YEAH! FUCKIN' STADIUM ROCK! YEAAHHHH, FUCK YEAAAAHH!" Then he said, "I'm sorry, folks, but I like the people in the seats more now! You guys on the floor are gonna have to do something special to be my favourite again! Get naked and dance around in a circle or something -- JUST FUCKIN' DO IT! Look, she's doing it!" After a girl flashed her self at Daniel, he said, "Look we can all do it!"

The rest of the set was great as well. It was the most unreal silverchair gig I had ever seen. I can't wait till the next one.

For the first four songs, it just didn't seem as though Daniel was really into it, but after Pure Massacre, it was a very good show. Daniel was very funny, the crowd really dwelled on the music and the show, and the band rocked out. It was a fitting end to the tour for much of the crew as they weren't making the trek to Perth (obviously one can't drive trucks for two days and make a show the next day).

A lack of tightness may have been a result of having to adjust to the acoustics of the venue, as it was in the large, indoor-stadium style, with a concrete floor area, and seats rising up from the balcony to the top. This made the sound in the centre seem very tinny for the drums and the heaviness of the bass was lost.

Ben was his usual intense self, but seemed to be smiling and having more fun doing it than usual. Chris was going harder and was more animated than usual, right from the very first notes. He was almost on his knees half the time, walking back and forth from front of stage to near his rear amps constantly. He was truly going off and being energetic.

The floor area seemed to contain mostly older people (16 and up), while younger children and teens filled the seats. There were around 7,000 in attendance. The mosh extended across the width of the floor and back to the front of the soundboard at its peak during Israel's Son and Freak. Those further back were scattered and standing and dancing gently.

Set list and stage comments:

Slave (with Israel's Son intro)
Roses

Daniel: "Thank you, thanks very much, err, duh, Ad-e-laide, (drawn out, syllable by syllable) ad, lad, ladelaide, ad-e-laide, yeah. Ready?"

Abuse Me
Pure Massacre

Daniel: "Thanks, thank you all very much. Thanks slut, that's a little trick, OK, I'll tell you a little thing we do. You walk into a shop and there's some girl working behind the counter, and she's being a real, like, you know, bitch, she's treating you mean, instead of saying 'thanks a lot' after you've received your goods, AFTER you've received your goods or you may not receive them, say 'thankslut,' (run together, said really fast), get it? 'Thanks slut,' but she thinks you're saying 'thanks a lot' (big cheers). Yeah, I'll play, all right, I'll play this song by myself."

Cemetery
Suicidal Dream
Pop Song For Us Rejects

Daniel: "Thank you, thanks very much. (drinking water and spitting lots) All right, Adelaide, I got lots of phlegm today -- phlegm, phlegm, phlegm, snot, snot, snot, spit, slobber. Yeah, all right, the floor rocks! (cheers) The people on the floor are rocking, the people in the seats, oh my fucking God, yeah, look at the floor man, fuck your hands, wooo, hands hands hands, heads, yeah, torso, breasts in the front row, what else could ya want, what else could ya want but rock, and the people in the seats don't seem to understand the concept of rock. Is there any light up there, Hugh? Can you get lights? (full house lights come on) Yeah, wooo, there's the seats people! Rock on, come on, seats, wake up, you too can be like the floor, look at the floor, they fuckin' hate you. There's a war going on, floor verse fucking seats and the floor has a deep hatred for you seated people and I wouldn't take that fucking shit off a bunch of bums on the floor. I'm just kidding, you floor people, you fucking rock, so do you seat people, just not as much, I wouldn't worry about it, it's not gonna be detrimental to your career or anything, but if you want you can stand up and move and get spat on and cum on yourself and blow your nose in people's ears and that's rock! Yeah, like, sorry."

The Door
Faultline

Daniel: "Thanks. The top was really good then, the people in the seats were good, positive reinforcement. The people in the seats are rad. I dunno if you can tell I'm lying, but I am, 'cause I couldn't see you, it's just dark, but I'm sure you were. (low house lights go on) Hey, I can see people standing now, it's cool, ahhh ahhh ahhh oh fuck! I just thought of the raddest thing and if you don't do it I'm gonna feel like a fucking idiot but it would be rad if you do it. Can you turn the lights up a little bit more please, Hugh? (full house lights come up) Awesome! Wait, do a Mexican wave! Let's pretend we're at the football, start it, start it, all sit down and do a wave, don't be fucking pussy-footing around and just fucking do it, ya ready, start! (Daniel screams) Yeah, yesss, yesss, yessss, fucking stadium rock! Yeah! The top's my favourite now! Sorry, bottom, you can't do that shit, unless you think of something really fucking special, yeah, have you got any ideas? I've got an idea, all get naked and dance in a circle, that would be awesome, look all these people ready to get naked are standing there saying 'take my clothes off' and no one's doing it! Look, all these people wanna get naked but no one's doing it. Do it! Oh yeah! (laughs) Look at the shirts! (many shirts come off and a girl sitting on someone's shoulders at the front lifts her shirt and flashes her breasts for all the band and crowd to see) Ohhh! (laughs) There we go, yeah, look the crowd loves it, it's very discriminatory but you know if ya wanna do it, you can do it, look at this we're gonna get, we're gonna go to jail, all right, jail! Who's been to jail here? Has anyone in the crowd been to jail? (a few hands go up) Yeah, ya have not, ya haven't been to jail, maybe I reckon a percent, 1 percent of this crowd's been to jail, Ben's been to jail, Ben went to jail for illegal pornography in a barn. All right, we're gonna play now as its starting to get really fucking boring."

No Association
Spawn
Israel's Son
Freak

Daniel: "Thanks. Um, we're here to masturbate and to thank all the um, lighting and P.A. people who have been touring with us for 20 shows around this country called Australia, ah, and yeah, thanks to everyone, all the crew and all that crap, the truck drivers, thanks, thanks, thanks, thanks, fucking thanks! All right. (burps) This is for Adelita. Hit it, Ben."

Nobody Came
Freak remix

After Daniel's little solo piece of notes while setting up the remix, it appeared as though he wanted to do an extra song. With guitar in hand, Daniel moved to the microphone, but the remix music started. He motioned to Ben to go back up to his regular drum kit and to someone on the side to stop the remix music, but Ben was already about to start playing the drums in front, the music had already started playing, and so about 30 seconds into the music, the seemingly annoyed Daniel rushed over to give his guitar to Bailey, got the microphone and started his screaming Freak routine.

It was very clear when the show had finished that the crowd was happy with the show, with the way it ended and its length.

The second-to-last Summer Freak Show was definitely a hit. The show kicked off with Rash from Adelaide, who competently set up the scene for the night. I saw Rash at the Adelaide Uni Cloisters 'chair gig earlier this year, and they seem to be sharper and more alive on stage. All of their songs were well received, except one (which they anounced as being a "brand new" song) which was very boring. They performed a tribute to the Bloodsucking Freaks, whose now legendary antics at the last show almost ended their career.

Magic Dirt were passable, but the vocalist would benefit from being a little more sober. She sang well, but her banter between songs got extremely boring. Their set was average as compared to their recorded songs, but they were fun to watch and listen to and did the job.

silverchair opened with some bass from Israel's Son before leaping head long into Slave. Daniel Johns has lost weight this year, and looks quite different now than the Johns that we saw a couple of years back. Drummer Ben Gilles also sports a mohawk. They ground through their set with emotion and flair, and the voice of Daniel filled every centimetre of the joint. For me the highlights were Roses, which was a great example of Ben's pounding drum style, and the awesome Freak remix to end the set. Ben's drumming is frantic and powerful, and reaches out and grabs thoses in the audience. Missing from their set were Madman and Tomorrow (unless they did an encore that I missed), which was a bit dissapointing, but in some ways it shows their evolution as a group that they don't have to rely on any one song.

Set list (as I remember, in no order):

Slave
Roses (powerful and rich)
Abuse Me
Suicidal Dream (brilliant, dark and moody)
No Association (I thought it sounded a bit empty)
The Door
Pop Song For Us Rejects
Faultline (very strong)
Pure Massacre (once again, something lacking)
Spawn (dark and scary!)
Freak
Israel's Son
Nobody Came
Freak remix (stunning, a masterpiece in live performance)

The crowd was quite young, with many seeing the 'chair for the first time. Overall, it was a brilliant and classy show, which all thoroughly enjoyed.

"Put your hands in the air if you've come here to rock," yelled silverchair frontman Daniel Johns to the 5500-strong moshing throng at the Adelaide Entertainment Center last night.

A sea of youthful arms punched the air, and the noise was pure adolesent energy in one simultaneous squeal.

And the three young Australians who arguably have less to worry about their impending HSC results than any other school leavers launched into their blistering onslaught.

The admiration on the faces of of the invariably young, predominantly female front rows told the story, with lingerie piling up on stage.

Crowd controlers and crowd surfers played out their their respective roles with no hard feelings.

silverchair's need to distance itself from its phenomenal past also showed. Johns' dreadlocks and drummer Ben Gillies' mohawk attested to that, as did Johns' handy tips on how to sneakily abuse shop girls when they were "being bitches," and unfavorable reactions to the people in the seated sections.

If they felt they had to bury their G-rating forever, they succeeded.

But any lingering skepticism that the Newcastle trio were a cute novelty act which would sink into anonymity once the media tired of the "Nirvana in pyjamas" angle were shattered, once and for all.

What fans of all ages instead saw was a band that earlier this year sold 1.5 million copies of its latest Freak Show album, and was finally freed by age to be judged on its music alone.

And the verdict from the pit was unanimous -- the music said it all. [Thanks to Matthew Wenzel for the transcript!]