Innocent Criminals Page
March 30, 1996
Silverchair's next album will be recorded in June and July, and eight songs have already been written for it.
That word came from singer/guitarist Daniel Johns, who appeared on Australia's national modern rock radio station Triple J.
According to Melissa Duca, who reported from Australia for the Innocent Criminals page, Johns served as Michael Tunn's guest host on Triple J's Request Fest as they counted down the station's top albums of all time. (silverchair's debut frogstomp came in at No. 3.)
Johns told the audience that the band would spend two weeks during the June/July holidays in the recording studio, and that they would put much more effort into the new album than the nine days spent on frogstomp.
Slave and Learn To Hate will definitely be on the album, according to Johns. He stressed that Slave is the only song to sound remotely like Helmet, one of silverchair's favourite bands.
"At present, the album has no title," Melissa reports, "but he suggessted Nameless, and then quite seriously, he put forth the idea of having nothing but a question mark on the new album."
Johns alluded to a rumour making the rounds in Australia that he had dyed his hair pink. "It was, at the time, completely untrue but since they were discussing this on the radio, they both decided to.... make it come true," Melissa said. "So Daniel had his head in a bowl of water for a lot of the segment and came out of it with pink hair."
According to Melissa, Daniel spoke easily and freely when he thought he wasn't on the air. "He was just talking away about different bands when he suddenly stops and goes, 'Uhh, are we on... is this on air?' Michael laughs and says, 'Yeah.' to which Daniel quietly freaks out and goes, 'Oh, I'd better stop talking then!"
Melissa said Daniel seemed "nervous and fretful" during most of his time on the air. He inadvertently let the audience know where he was planning on going to dinner that night with his new pink hair -- McDonalds near the Sydney Entertainment Centre.
It was not immediately known if he actually showed up after announcing his dining plans to the whole of Australia.
"The poor guy couldn't wait to get out of there I think," Melissa wrote, "although he actually laughed a lot." She said he
mentioned that silverchair and Everclear mucked around with Paranoid by Black Sabbath on the last show of their
recent European tour. "He said it was hell!" Melissa reported. "Everclear couldn't sing it and silverchair couldn't play it! Daniel
had a ball!"
