Silverchair’s Ben Gillies: ‘I thought I was going crazy’

Thrust into a world of fast living as a teenager, Ben Gillies and his Silverchair bandmates were unprepared for adoration, scrutiny and fame. It took a major toll.

Silverchair’s Ben Gillies has been on a mental health journey that began more than two decades ago when doctors first diagnosed him with an acute drug-induced psychotic episode.

It came in 2002 — about the time the band released hit album, Diorama. Gillies and his Silverchair bandmates Daniel Johns and Chris Joannou were global superstars.

“I was smoking a lot of marijuana and I took some ecstasy tablets,” Gillies said in the latest episode of the Mental As Anyone podcast.

“I had — and this is a doctor’s diagnosis — an acute psychotic episode. An acute drug-induced psychotic episode. I thought I was going crazy and I thought I was seeing things.

“It was really scary. I think the first time I had one, I was actually at Daniel’s house.”

Former Silverchair band member Ben Gillies pictured near Newcastle. The award-winning musician talks mental health on a new episode of Mental As Anyone podcast. Picture: Richard Dobson

The pair hadn’t “had a big night”. Gillies was so scared his mum drove to pick him up.

“That sent me on a mental health journey of 20 years, like seeing doctors and psychologists and on and off medication and just trying to manage it and trying to ultimately, you just want an answer.

“I say if you’ve got a pain in your back, or whatever it is, ultimately, you just want to go to a doctor, and say ‘tell me what it is and what I can do to treat it or fix it’.”

Gillies, 44, estimates he has experienced around 12 episodes since.

“I read an article about a lot of misdiagnosis in the mid 90s or 2000s … of 20 year old men that had been diagnosed with schizophrenia that actually had just had these acute episodes,” he said.

“That was literally the final puzzle piece for me. That was the last thing I needed to hear. I’ve reconciled it in my head and I can put it to bed.”

Chris Joannou, Daniel Johns and Ben Gillies in 1999.

Gillies often wonders what life would have looked like had he not been part of Silverchair.

The band remain icons of Australian popular culture and music.

They rose to global fame as teenagers out of Newcastle in the early 1990s, forming as a band when they were aged 12, signing to a record label two years later and releasing their Tomorrow EP at 15.

Frogstomp was their first full album, followed by Freak Show, Neon Ballroom, Diorama and Young Modern.

They tied with John Farnham for winning the most ARIA Awards with 21 wins from 49 nominations.

“There’s no rule book for three 15-year-old’s that have no experience in the industry and their parents have no experience in the industry,” he explained.

“That definitely made teenage years interesting.”

In the earlier days, Gillies was “blissfully unaware” of everything outside of music – fame and finances.

‘ONLY THREE PEOPLE KNOW’

Later though, they had to run Silverchair like a business, which ultimately impacted creativity and relationships.

“There’s only three people that will know what it’s like to be in Silverchair, no one else will ever know what it feels like. We were always very passionate about the music but there was definitely external pressures,” he said.

“I think there was some fallout … there’s been fallout for all of us, for Chris and Daniel and I, we’ve all struggled with it in our own way and we’ve dealt with it in different ways as well.”

Gillies wonders if his mental health struggles were born out of his life with the band or if it would have manifested anyway.

“I do feel like, although our experience was extraordinary, some of the mental health challenges that we’ve had to kind of navigate, I feel like personally, I would have had to navigate them anyway in some form,” he said.

Newcastle band Silverchair, members: Daniel Johns, Ben Gillies and Chris Joannou were teens when they became global sensations.

“Maybe it is genetic or for whatever reason, but I do feel like they were bubbling within me, band or no band, but I think the band maybe it’s on steroids.”

The episodes Gillies has experienced lasted anywhere from five to 10 minutes.

With age, he has learnt strategies to get through them.

“The more knowledge you gain, the more comfortable you are with it,” he said.

“And the more I’d be like, ‘OK, I’m having this experience, I just need to breathe, and I just need to wait until it passes, even if it’s really scary’. I know I’m going to be okay.”

He continued: “There’s the acute drug use and acute psychotic episodes that I had … but what that actually boiled over was anxiety … so that’s probably been my biggest struggle. I know that if I don’t drink or do drugs, then I won’t have the acute things, the acute psychotic episodes, so just don’t do that and you’ll be fine.”

Gillies lives with wife Jackie, a psychic medium and transformation coach and star of The Real Housewives of Melbourne, and their twin boys, Bonham and Rocco.

“I’m taking meds,” he said.

“And I see a psychologist as well, just as more of an American style bit of maintenance rather than, I have a problem. I just feel so much lighter afterwards.”

As for drinking, Gillies said he has had “a couple of little bumps in the road” but has been mainly sober for the past nine years.

“I felt my drinking escalating,” he said of giving up booze.

Jackie and Ben Gillies at the Greenroof Bar and Restaurant in Newcastle. Picture by Peter Lorimer

“I just started drinking more and more. I could be a social drinker and then all of a sudden, it was like someone turned on a light, if I had one drink, I’d have to get absolutely written off.

“I could just feel all my relationships breaking down. That’s such an important part of being human, those connections with the important people in your life.

“That main one being Jackie and I could feel the strain on our relationship and basically Jackie said, ‘look, I’m not gonna stick around and put up with it, so you need to do something’.

“And I stopped cold turkey. It was really tough.”

* A new episode of Mental As Anyone drops each Tuesday morning at 6am

Do you need help? Lifeline: 131144; Beyond Blue: 1300224636; Kids Helpline: 1800551800.

Originally published as Silverchair’s Ben Gillies: ‘I thought I was going crazy’