Stripped and Dangerous

When silverchair played the final show of their North American dates opening for the Red Hot Chili Peppers, the Chilis introduced Newcastle's most famous world rock export to some friends of theirs: two strippers. Singer and guiatarist Daniel Johns tried to keep his mind on the work at hand..."But you were pretty curious to see what was going on so occasionally I'd step away from the mic just to have a bit of a peek," he laughs. "You could see people down in the crowd going, 'What's happening here?' I started laughing and put my head down so it didn't look like I thought it was funny."

Johns talks of the incident like it was a schoolyard prank, not something that occurred on a tour which included a date at Madison Square Garden--the hallowed stage that once hosted the likes of Led Zeppelin, the Who and the Rolling Stones. Yep, to say that silverchair are still unphased by their succes is still something of a majour understatement.

A year ago this month with the help of Tim Rogers of You Am I, the trio ignited the ARIA Awards with a blazing performance of Radio Bridman's 'New Race' that even managed to suitably impress international guest, Meatloaf. It seems that the threesome have transplanted a healthy dose of that electric energy into their second album which was mixed in New York with Andy Wallace, the man behind recordings by the Rollins Band, Slayer, White Zombie, and Johns' beloved Helmet.

"A lot" of the songs on the album are a lot more intense, a lot harder and more energetic." Johns said. "Also, there's one song in particular that sounds like Zeppelin kind of rock. There's some mellow stuff with strings on two songs, some really kind of dark mellow songs. It's got quite a bit variety. It's more complex then the first album."

A much rumoured album of Australian punk covers unfortunately seems to be wishful thinking on the part of some folks, including this writer.

"There's been talk of us doing covers for different things. We've been going to do Girl In A Sweater by the Hard Ons and we're also going to do Julie is a Junkie by the Eastern Dark and Celibate Rifles' songs but we never actually got around to doing them because other things came up. When we get some time off and stuff we're probably going to think of about ten covers songs each night just for like B sides and to play live to make it more fresh, play a different cover each night. I've forgot all the one's we used to know." he laughed.

While no one is likely to forget silverchair in a hurry equally no one could accuse the outfit of draining the punter's pocket either. Their shows are carefully, even strategically oraganised events like their closing of the Royal Easter Show in Sydney before about 35,000 people.

"We weren't nervous, we were kind of freaked out because we didn't ever really want to do a show that big. We like medium sized shows or small sized shows but we thought instead of doing things we've already done before and having the chance of people being turned away if they wanted to see us we just thought we'll do a gig where anyone that wants to see us can come along. It was pretty fun."

"When we saw the crowd we couldn't believe it! It was a really good bill. There was a lot of people curious to see Midget and there was a lot of people curious to see Even and Spiderbait as well, so it was more like a mini festival then just one of our gigs."

School is still an issue but not one that's foremost in the collective silverchair brain. They know that this is their shot, that they're approaching third base and they're making the most of it. "We tend to be missing a bit more school than we did last year but it doesn't realy bother us. We just want to concentrate on the music while we've got it, while we're doing what we want to do and still having fun with it. We're still going to go to school and get all the school work done but we're not going to stop playing really important gigs or stop recording when we've got the songs just for the sake of school because we can always go back to school when we're done with the music.

over the next few weeks silverchair will be touring the country on a double bill with Portland sensations, Everclear who are the hottest tickets in America at the moment.

"They're really good blokes," Johns said. "We toured Europe with them once and it was real pub shows, just between like, 200 and 1,000 people every show. They were real kind of punk rock shows just cramming all these people in and playing and playing really loud. It was really fun because there was no real pressure to play. We were just getting up on stage with eachother. I got up with them one night and we played Sin City by AC/DC and they all got up and sang Paranoid by Black Sabbath with us for the encore in one of the shows. It was heaps fun."

The Everclear tous is something of a double edged sword. Not only does it bring together two world class acts but both appear in the Surfrider Foundation benefit album, Music For Our Mother Ocean. silverchair do a roaring version of the classic, Surfin' Bird.

"I used to surf a lot. I don't surf anymore really. I'd rather just sit at home and do nothing. But I still really like te beach. I like going down to the beach for a swim and taking the dog for a walk."

"We're not a big political band and we don't want to save the earth or anything. We just think it's a good cause, just to clean the oceans so we thought it was a good idea to do the tour."