Silverchair is back! Seemingly from out of a vast, timeless fog, they reappeared just as enormous as they used to be with their new album, Young Modern, as if years hadn't passed without them around this side of the world. I was bitten by the Silverchair bug in my youth just as many others were, so it was with some joy that I was given the chance to sit down and pick drummer Ben Gillies' brain a little bit just before he was whisked off to a brief pre-show soundcheck party for some contest winners. We settled in upstairs and away from the stage noise, discussing the ambience in the room (ten or so tealight candles, a corkscrew with no bottle of wine in sight, and a table lamp that appeared to not be in working order) as I set up, and then in we dove...

(Cord Magazine's questions are in blue. Artist responses are in grey.)


So I'm really confused, what's this for? We've had the worst day with press today, really. Oh really, what's happened?

Oh we were supposed to have three of them today and none of them came through you know, you're just sitting by the phone like, come onnnn...

Oh phone interviews. Yeah I guess that's just the way it goes sometimes. I dunno. Uh, I'm with Cord Magazine. We're an online magazine [sweet, plug!]. And yeah we were supposed to be doing this at 4:45 and I get here and they're like, 'oh the band won't be here til 5:30.' So I just sat down there and listened to them drum...

...for a half hour, forty minutes! (laughs).

Which is fine, I have nowhere to be. Welcome back to Canada I guess.

Yeah!

I actually have an opening question from a friend of mine who saw you in Oregon.

Awesome.

So this is her like seeing you guys in 1999 and seeing you again now, obviously there's a huge change in your style, but she was wondering about your performance style, which she saw as vastly different - is this something that you guys have now had a chance to consciously work on over these years, or is it just a natural progression from where you were before and whatnot?

Yeah I think it's probably more of a natural thing, we haven't consciously thought we're going to perform in any particular way, so it just kind of happened I guess. And also I suppose, even though we're rock and roll, we're pop, we're performers, you know, we want to kind of get out there and try... not try to put on a show, but you kind of... we just have a lot more fun I think... because we're out there, you kind of... you know before we get on stage basically go down, like when you're waiting backstage, we all kind of give each other high fives a lot of the time and get ourselves pumped up. And then these days it's been like, you know, okay the aim tonight is fun, we're gonna go out there and have a good time, time of our lives and you think, why else are we here, we've gotta have a good time, you know. So it sort of comes like that, I don't know.

So you had mentioned how hard it is sometimes being on the road and not being able to find a good breakfast. Did you get a good breakfast today?

Oh, okay you read the blog! (laughs)

Did you find any fruit up here?

Yeah well it's all right when you're living in the bus because you can see we've got fruit on the rider (points at huge basket of fruit on the counter) so we try to toss that on the bus so when you wake up in the morning, you can actually have some fruit to eat. Yeah, this morning when I woke up there was no fruit left so I had to have... um what did I end up having... I went to a little cafe around the corner called... Moka Chokra or something or... just around the corner from here called Mo... uh... it's got a little monkey...

Oh that place! [I know what he's talking about, there's a monkey cartoon on the awning, but even I can't think of what it's called].

Yeah and had like a little vegetarian... I'm not vegetarian but I just had a little vegetarian sandwich and it was... it was beautiful, real nice, real fresh, but just bloody in the morning... it's just so hard to get cereal on the road.

That seems really unusual for some reason.

Yeah it's always eggs. They cook eggs and bacon everywhere.

I'd get pretty sick of eggs myself, I went through a dietary thing like that myself last year where I could eat unlimited eggs and yeah... too much eggs.

They can get a bit much, can't they?

Also on [the blog] - what a silly bunch of questions to start off with ! - I think I came across the tail end of this conversation and I have no idea where it started, but this thing about guys wearing pink?

Oh that was also on the blog!

Yeah where did that come from?

I don't know! I kind of just... when we first started, Chris and I sort of said, well Dan's gonna try and do a couple as well, but not so much but um, when we kind of said to management we're up to doing... they kind of told us we're going to have to work basically hard... harder than we've ever worked on a record before, you know, to include blogs and making sure we're taking lots of photos, they can put them up, just because it's been so long since we've done a record. Because we haven't done a record in so long the industry's changed a lot so you really have to do all that kind of stuff. So when they're asking, can I do a blog for Myspace, I just thought, I dunno, I just wanna do something to kind of mix it up and have little random things in there as well as like, the shows went great or we're looking forward to touring or I don't know, the tour bus is fun or, you know the kind of standard stuff they like to hear. But then we left a couple little odd things in there as well. So I don't know what the thing with pink is. I guess, um, I just think about guys wearing pink and I think it looks stupid. (laughs) That's just the bottom line!

All right fair enough! It just sounded like something that had started a long time ago and maybe I was missing the beginning of the conversation or...

No, I actually I kind of wanted to start a bit of a, kind of get some kind of dialogue started on the blog, you know, so I thought I'd just put something out there and see what people wrote back and yeah, it was pretty funny.

On that note about the internet, because the whole world has changed pretty much in the last 7-8 years or whatever, you know, the last time you guys were sort of on this side of the world, the internet was still sort of new and a bit of a fad more than anything else, at least where the music industry was concerned, people were just getting into it. How does this affect... I mean is it more of a help or a hindrance do you think to you guys along the way now?

I think it's a bit of both like it gives you more work, makes you, you have to do a lot more, you have a lot more boxes to tick, you know. But I think it makes it easier to get your band out there and have your music be seen. Particularly for smaller bands that are finding it hard to get a break, the internet gives them a chance. They don't have to have a big record company. They can go do a great recording and go straight to itunes. I mean not that it always works like that, but you don't have to be signed to a record label to have your music available. And like Myspace... and... yeah I think the pros outweigh the cons. But yeah again I think it's fantastic. It's kind of really empowered bands as well. It's not like in the early 90's when record companies were just throwing money left right and centre, they've had to really rein things in.

Yeah we've had a couple of big label offices close down locally...

Like mergers and stuff?

No no, they shut down entirely, they just have a couple reps who work from home now, they couldn't keep the offices.

Crazy, isn't it!

Yeah, it's bizarre. Has it seemed really sudden too, or surprising in any way to have this much fanfare? I mean there's so many accolades coming already for the new album . And I don't know if it's very different for you guys... have you stayed really integrated in Australia versus here? Because in North America, or at least Canada anyways, it sort of seems like there was nothing on you guys for years, and now all of a sudden, boom, it's back, and it's HUGE immediately. Has that been surprising, or how does it feel to have people still around? Like everyone's got a Silverchair story too, everyone I know has a moment.

Yeah! Yeah it is pretty weird you know actually, it kind of - it always felt when we came here... like we came and did a few shows for [2002's] Diorama and it kind of felt like our really hardcore fans were still there but yeah on a really massive scale it kind of, it almost felt like it couldn't happen again, like we were too far gone, people had almost forgotten about us. But yeah, we've got great management as well, they've really done a great job in kind of setting a foundation for this record and I guess you need the good music as well and we're really proud of the record. I think "Straight Lines" as well is one of those kind of songs that can really take you anywhere, you know. It can kind of help you do anything like, so yeah, it's pretty exciting. We're all pretty excited at the moment.

Right on. Do you find that there's a lot of new fans, or a lot more people who are just excited you're back?

I think it's probably a little bit of both. I think some old fans who have kind of been holding out for a new record and also new ones as well, you know, people in their early 20s and teenagers and almost like a whole new generation are getting into the band, so that's pretty cool.

Half going back into that last little question there, did you guys stay integrated into the music scene in Australia over the last number of years?

Oh right, I didn't know what you meant by... yeah yeah we have, yeah!

Okay - is it different over there than it is here, the reaction people have, because you'd still been around, to put it a certain way?

Yeah, it's probably more immediate over there, like we haven't really had to... I mean we've still had to work hard but because Diorama's been a really big album over there and every album's kind of been a slow and steady... um... (elevating hand gestures like he's miming a plane taking off)... ascent? Is there another word for that.. what's the...?

Progression?

(label rep pops in the door as I say this and it gets lost...)

So yeah it's been a slow and steady kind of, you know, it's getting a little bit more successful each time.

Progression, is that the word you were looking for?

Yeah, it's been like each album's kind of just gone a little bit more successful over there, and then in America feels like, you know... I don't really, Canada's always been really cool for us. We kind of haven't got as much of it here but it's been a little bit more like we put out [1995's] Frogstomp and then it went sort of slow and steady like this (straight line with hands), but at the moment it feels like it's starting to sort of lift off again or something.

Yeah everyone seems really excited about it, it's cool. And I have to ask you, how's Dan doing vocally, has he recovered yet with his voice [after postponing the opening tour dates due to larynigitis]?

He's a little hoarse, but he's much better. He's been uh - his little contraption isn't here...

Yeah I saw that when he carried that in (it's a vapourizer).

Yeah his little steam kind of thing that he... just kind of breathes steam all day and he seems all right.

All right indeed... I wander back downstairs past Daniel Johns, who is busy putting together a delicious-smelling plate of catered seafood. I comment on the pleasant dinner time smell in there, and he glances at me with a giggle and exclaims, "Fruits of the sea!"

Check out the 10 Questions with Ben Gillies.

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By Andy Scheffler
Photos : Andy Scheffler
Published : July 2007.