Why one of Australia’s biggest bands is at war with itself

It’s been 12½ years since Silverchair announced they were going on an indefinite hiatus, and more than 16 years since their fifth and (so far) final album Young Modern was released. But suddenly, one of the most successful bands this country has ever produced is back in the headlines.

And it’s all because the feud between frontman Daniel Johns and bandmates Ben Gillies (drums) and Chris Joannou (bass) has flared up again.

What’s happened?
The ABC’s Australian Story made a two-part documentary about the band, called A Silver Lining, the second episode of which went to air on Monday night. In it, Gillies and Joannou tell the story of their friendship, which has had many ups and downs over the years, their time in the band they formed in Newcastle with their mate Johns when the three of them were about 12 years old, and what has happened in the years since Silverchair effectively broke up.

The hook for all this is the book the pair have co-authored with journalist Alley Pascoe, Love & Pain.

Given how popular the band was almost from the moment their first single Tomorrow was released when they were just 15, the documentary and the book were always likely to gain attention. But what really made people sit up and take notice was when the ABC pulled the first episode off iview last week – over what it labelled a “music rights issue”.

In happier times: Daniel Johns (centre) with Silverchair bandmates Ben Gillies and Chris Joannou in 2002.

“We negotiated with Sony Music to licence the use of Silverchair’s music video clips in the program for broadcast and for ABC iview,” the broadcaster explained in a statement. “Each band members’ approval was required. While Ben Gillies and Chris Joannou approved the use, Daniel Johns said he would only approve if he had access to an advance copy of their book, which was not a decision for the ABC or Australian Story.”

The rights governing terrestrial (broadcast) television and streaming often vary, and the producers got around the impasse by making two versions of the program. The TV version included music and video clips, the streaming version contained music only, with no clips. But when Sony queried the version on iview, the ABC removed it. The broadcaster is now “reviewing its position”. As of the time of writing, episode one is not available on iview but episode two is.

What does Daniel Johns have to say about this?
In a long post on Instagram, Johns said he “would have preferred to say nothing” before outlining what he said were “the facts”.

He said Australian Story’s producers had reached out to his team on August 11 to let him know about the program, and a little later asked him if he would be interviewed for it, a request he “respectfully declined” because, he said, “I haven’t been involved in the book nor am I aware of the contents. I’ve asked on many occasions to read the book but haven’t been sent a copy, consequently I was uncomfortable being interviewed to help promote it”.

He had been asked to clear seven songs for use on iview, he said, and responded that “I would be open to approving all songs provided I received a copy of the book to ensure I wasn’t having my songs used to promote something I had no visibility on. I was told again that Ben and Chris would not give me a copy to read. That’s why the iview use was denied.”

Publisher Hachette was contacted for comment, and asked if Johns’ account was accurate, but did not offer a response.

Of particular concern to Johns was the proposed use of Ana’s Song, a track he wrote about his own struggles with anorexia. In the first part of A Silver Lining, Gillies briefly addresses the subject, saying he “didn’t even know what anorexia was” at the time the song was written, and that he thought “it was really brave of him” to write and sing about it.

That doesn’t sound so bad. So, what’s really going on here?
In the series, Gillies and Joannou address their lingering sense of dissatisfaction with the way Silverchair ended, with a whimper rather than the bang they felt they deserved, in 2011.

“We owed it to ourselves to have that conversation,” Gillies said in the second episode. “But that isn’t what we did. We just put out a press release, and then we didn’t speak. ”

“I remember hearing that press release being read on radio,” added Joannou. “And just feeling a big emptiness, and I guess sadness that it had gotten to that point.”

For Johns, who has publicly discussed his diagnoses of post-traumatic stress disorder, calling time on the band was driven by a profound existential crisis.

“I don’t want to be Silverchair, I just don’t want to be,” he told Carrie Bickmore on The Project last year, in an interview to mark the launch of his multimedia work and exhibition FutureNever. “That was a hard thing to walk away from because that was my entire identity, but if I didn’t do it I was going to end up like some of these other people … you can read between the lines.”

His relationship with his former bandmates was, he said, now defined by “bitterness, jealousy, anger … one of the guys in particular has taken a real shining to kicking me while I was down, when I was in rehab and stuff, saying I was exploiting mental health to sell records … they’ve not shown me any respect.”

His relationship with Joannou, he clarified, was relatively passive. But Gillies “for some reason has a real issue with me being successful without him. That’s sad because I wish him all the best, honestly, but unfortunately he doesn’t want me to branch out.”

Johns also said last year that he had been forced to re-record his own compositions “because the recordings were denied by another band member”. That suggests there may have been more than a touch of tit-for-tat in the latest exchange.

So, a Silverchair reunion isn’t on the cards?
Although producer Adam Zammit claimed in the series he would give the band $10 million to reform (a steep increase on the $1 million Johns turned down some years ago), his money seems safe.

Joannou, whose post-band life has included a stint as a restaurateur, a battle with cancer, and a heart attack, is now selling motorbikes for a living. Johns told The Project he had reached out to his former bandmates to play with him on FutureNever, but it went nowhere. And Gillies told Australian Story, “in my mind, Silverchair is done. That moment, that part of my life is finished.”

Fans might prefer to wait ’til tomorrow in hope, but a change of heart seems highly unlikely.

Contact the author at [e-mail], follow him on Facebook at karlquinnjournalist and on Twitter @karlkwin, and read more of his work here.

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