“The band’s back together again.” Although that line opens the first song from Silverchair’s newest album Young Modern, drummer Ben Gillies insists that they haven’t gone anywhere.The Australian five time multi-platinum act has been together for 15 years and during this time they’ve made a gigantic leap from being the preteen poster children for grunge to having an 80 piece orchestra accompany them on their new record. Despite the success, Silverchair went on a brief hiatus in 2002. Now, the band is back and is armed with a full U.S. tour and a fresh sound. Ben recently spoke with Late Night Wallflower about frontman Daniel Johns’ bout with reactive arthritis and its effect on touring, their hiatus, and recording in America for the first time.

Before embarking on this full U.S. tour, you guys played two dates in both New York and Los Angeles. How was the response?
The response to those shows was incredible. We really hadn’t done any shows in the U.S. up until then for about four or five years. We were just amazed that people still remembered us. They seemed to really appreciate that we were back in town and we were pretty flattered at the response. It was fantastic, and its been happening on this tour too.

As you mentioned, you said that you were surprised that people still remember Silverchair, so, do you find touring in America frustrating because you have to constantly reintroduce yourself?
Yeah. It feels like we have to always bring people up to speed as to where we are musically and that we haven’t gone away, but, that’s just part of being in a band. We’re doing as much as we can to promote the new record and to make people aware that we’re still making music.

Is the reason why you guys don’t tour America that much because of Daniel’s arthritis?
No, not really. He’s definitely been unlucky and it’s been unfortunate the times he has been sick in the past but I think at the moment he’s probably the healthiest that I’ve ever seen him.

It was pretty frustrating on the last record when we wanted to tour and Daniel wouldn’t be able to go because he was bedridden, but, I guess at the end of the day it’s more important to be healthy.

For Young Modern you guys recorded in L.A. Was that the first time Silverchair recorded outside of Australia?
Yeah, I guess we really wanted to get out of our comfort zone and not have any of the distractions from home. That was a lot of the same during the making of the record. Even when we were rehearsing and doing the preproduction work for the album, we hid in these little shacks in the country in Australia and lived and breathed music. So, we wanted to continue that and we thought that getting out of Australia would be helpful and bring some fresh, creative ideas. It worked too. It really did inspire us and got us really excited. Especially in L.A., it’s a pretty crazy city.

Speaking of being inspired and the overall morale of the band, you guys began a hiatus in 2002, what sparked that?
It was the end of everything and we did a small tour for Diorama in the U.S. and in Australia, actually it was a pretty big tour in Australia. After all of the health issues with Daniel we kinda had a bit of a rough trot because we felt as though Diorama wasn’t very commercially accessible. Diorama felt like it was the return the band and I think we felt disappointed when we couldn’t give it the tour that it deserved.

When you are living and breathing the one thing for so long it can definitely take its toll. I think all of us just thought that we needed a good break from the band to decide if we really wanted to continue.

Surely Silverchair serves as a large part of your identity considering that you guys were in a band since you were preteens. Did you feel lost when you went on hiatus or did you fear that there wouldn’t be another Silverchair album?
Yes, Silverchair is a massive part of all our lives. I think we have been in the band for almost half of our lives, that’s pretty crazy.

I don’t think I was ever really scared of us never doing another record. I wasn’t really thinking about it, I guess I continued doing music during the hiatus and started a band [Tambalane] and made a record. Daniel was in The Dissociatives, and Chris was doing The Mess Hall, and I think that was probably one of the reasons why we were so excited about coming back to Silverchair. It didn’t feel like we were being forced into it or that we were running home, or anything like that.

I think that was one of the first times all three of us had questioned if it was something that we really wanted to do. It wasn’t until we played Wave Aid [a tsunami benefit concert based in Australia] that we realized that we would be mad if we didn’t do another record together.

We were all doing other stuff at that stage and we got a call from our manager. He told us about the benefit concert and that it would obviously make sense for us to play it. We hadn’t played together in two years and we had only two rehearsals, but, we got on stage and had the time of our lives. Afterwards, we were just thinking, “Jeez, we are so stupid to even consider not doing another record!” We just had so much fun. Playing with other bands made us realize that the musical chemistry that we have is something that doesn’t come around too often. Silverchair was the only band that we had ever been in and we had to go through all of those experiences to realize what we’ve got.

While you were speaking, you mentioned your work in a side project. How did your role in the side project differ from your role in Silverchair?
In the project that I was in I got to do some writing. I still wasn’t the frontman of the band, I was still doing the drums, but the perception in Australia was that it was my band and I guess I had to step up to the plate a bit more and take an active role.

With each new album the band’s sound naturally changes. Do you think by retaining the band’s name hinders your growth in the eyes of the public? When I was researching, so many journalists refer to you guys as “that grunge band from the ‘90’s”. Do you get tired of that?
Yeah, I think that is one of the missions that we are on with this record. [Grunge] is so ten years ago and we’ve so moved forward. All of our albums have been successful in Australia and the perception of us over there is pretty much the way it should be. People just don’t see us as the “teen grunge sensation”; we’re just Silverchair.

It is a lot harder in America because we feel like we have to keep proving ourselves. That can be a bit frustrating at times, but, I guess you have to turn it into more of a positive than a negative thing and look at it as a challenge. Also, if we weren’t successful at that young age, you never know if it would’ve happened or not.

After playing for 15 years, I think success is to continuously make good music, raising the bar each time, and being able to pull it off. Even if we didn’t go to number one all of the time in Australia, I still think we wouldn’t be any less successful. We have been really proud of our music and each record sounds like a progression. All that stuff, selling out shows and number one albums is fun and great, but, as long as you keep making good music, then you keep winning.

Silverchair’s Official Website

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