The dream: Be a famous, respected, preferably rich musician. Even better - do it NOW-NOW-NOW before you're too old to enjoy it, before you're finished high school. Seems like everyone's doing it: one look at the pop charts shows over a dozen superstars who aren't even old enough to get into a bar, and that's just this week.
Last month, contemporary teen icons silverchair released what history will recognize as a coming of age album, Neon Ballroom. Crucial to the success of this former hair band's self-relaunch is a collaboration with noteworthy pianist David Helfgott, the man whose life story inspired the Oscar-winning film Shine - the man who spent the last three decades recovering from his status as a child music star. Helfgott was a prodigy, and while the members of silverchair aren't exactly prodigies by definition, they've all been through the fame wringer. Like Helfgott, Ashley MacIsaac was a prodigy, though he suffered neither for or from his fame because of it. Like silverchair, MacIsaac survived teen fame and managed to move on to a new creative phase - the one from which you're likely to know his work.
There's nothing wrong with dreaming, and there's nothing wrong with making "the dream:" come true, but ask Helfgott, MacIsaac or the members of silverchair, and they'll all warn you that it comes at a price.
Back in 1995, a grunge-flavoured band emerged from the other side of the world and surfed a wave of popularity around the globe on the strength of its debut album Frogstomp. Silverchair got noticed for two reasons: their hard music, and their age - the members of the Australian power trio were each 15-years-old.
There are a few things you should remember when you consider the beginning of silverchair's story: they happened years before Hanson and the current collection of imitation kid-rock bands (Wow! They're only 15! Hey! They're only 11! Wow! He's still in Pampers!). And unlike most early teen pop stars, silverchair was not making sweet pop for the 10 and under set - they were making loud, hard rock.
"We wrote [Frogstomp] when we were 14-years-old," says Johns, lead singer, songwriter and guitarist. "It was before we were jaded. It was very honest, straight, traditional rock music."
When fame came calling for silverchair, frontman Johns was the natural, inevitable media focus. That was him in the spotlight - trouble was, there was never time for it to be him in the corner. Five years later, at age 19, on the eve of the release of his band's third album, and admittedly jaded but claiming to be healed Johns has grown to fit one of the sadder music stereotypes: the Byronic, tortured artist.
Johns is slender, his features delicate, his voice soft and his answers reserved. He is practically engulfed by the chair in the interview room, as he leans forward and tangles his slim arms around each other in front of himself while he speaks.
All the more surprising to find that Johns is by no means shy or flighty - just careful. Moreover, he's frank, focused and direct. He went through the wringer, but he didn't lose the ability to communicate.
"On the second album, I got very bitter about the whole industry, and about the direction my life was going," hey says. "By the end of touring Freakshow, I was very frustrated with the album. I liked it, but in terms of songwriting, I didn't take as much time as I should have."
Johns admits that between the three musicians' school and tour commitments, there was little time to commit to creativity.
"It was rushed," he states, plain and simple.
Interviewed separately from Johns, bandmates Joannou (bass) and Gillies (drums) come across like they're on the top of the world - it looks like being teenage stars has done them nothing but good. They talk about how lucky they've been with their careers. They've grown from the lanky long-haired teens seen on the Frogstomp liner notes into big, sturdy (in a stereo typically Australian way) young men. They seem relaxed and self-assured, and maybe even more mature than the average 19-year-old.
But the last five years were by no means without pressure.
"We were either going to school or touring," Joannou huffs. "The time that we did have off was so limited. At times it really felt like a job and was really hard. In ‘99, we're having some time off!"
"Now it's all fresh again," says Gillies. "It's exciting again."
Johns comments on this freshness and excitement: "I made a conscious effort at the end of Freakshow to sit down and focus on writing an album which would be creatively satisfying, and which I could look back on and be proud of in the years to come."
The result is Neon Ballroom, a modern rock odyssey that goes beyond grunge but stops somewhere short of metal, experimenting with sound effects, synthesizers and symphonies en route. "The first two albums were traditional, hard rock music. This album's a lot more ambitious," Johns states confidently.
Joannou agrees: "We didn't want to do something that was just like our other two albums. We all felt the same: we didn't want to labeled as a certain kind of style. You have all your bands and they're either pop or rock or whatever and they always stick to that. We didn't want to do that - we wanted to change and try different things."
It's not hard to hear the difference on Neon Ballroom. The lead track is called "Emotion Sickness," and it features (along with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra) another famous Australian who achieved a different kind of musical fame a t a young age: David Helfgott.
Certainly, to hear about this collaboration is to think: gimmick. Take a band whose claim to fame is its "yesterday's news" status as child-rock-trio, and team it with a man whose life proves that the pressures of being a musical child can nearly destroy you.
But to actually hear the song is to realize that even if the prodigy angle is a gimmick, it's appropriate. Helfgott's hard, frenzied and on-the-edge style of keyboard work fits exactly into the erratic, discomfiting feeling that is "Emotion Sickness."
"The prodigies are alright - it's the parents who need advice," a jocular Helfgott comments, discussing the silverchair project via email. "I have had plenty of emotion sickness myself."
The collaboration was originally management's idea - "We have the same lawyer," Helfgott quips - but the band agreed without hesitation. "Daniel wanted a manic piano part," Joannou says. "It suited the song. He wanted it so it wasn't typical - didn't want something that was nice and kinda polished. He wanted something that was manic and off-chords. David Helfgott was the perfect man for the job."
Johns was honored to meet Helfgott. "I'd always admired his style of playing," he says. "And admired what he'd been through."
Though decades spanned the space between them, Helfgott and the members of silverchair had a shared experience that transcended age: they had all suffered overexposure in the spotlight of teen fame. One wonders what it was like when they met: how would three young guys who had survived teen stardom relate to a man who had been damaged significantly -in some ways, permanently - by the pressures of being a child prodigy?
"He came into the studio and spent the whole day there," Gillies remember. "A guy wrote the music for him. He just came in with his wife, sat down and bashed it all out. It was good. You could have a small conversation with him, but he talks really fast and repeats a lot of stuff. He had a nice, um, aura about him."
"Yeah, he was very affectionate," adds Joannou. "He would always hug you and he was always trying to kiss you...I don't think, unless he was sitting at the piano, that there were many times he was just standing by himself. He always had to be near someone. But it was cool - that's what he's like."
Helfgott describes the lads as likeable and "very natural." When asked if he had offered them any advice about how to deal with the pressures of fame, he replies that he didn't need to: "They seemed fine... They don't let the pressure get to them, which is great."
For Helfgott to state that personal pressure management is "great" is, of course, an understatement. Helfgott was pressured from an early age to be an outstanding classical pianist, and the strain of fame (combined with the expectations of his father) yielded a nervous breakdown during a performance. Helfgott was 16 at the time, and, as Shine documents, it took the better part of his adult life for him to recover.
Although Helfgott's case was both extreme and unique, Johns' post-Frogstomp career also practically drove him to the breaking point. "After suffering a few psychological problems I went and saw some people," he admits. "I was taught to separate the rock lifestyle from reality. Basically I'm two separate people: I'm silverchair Daniel, and I'm real Daniel when I'm at home. I learned to separate and draw the line."
The need to keep a personal identity separate from a career persona is something manic Canadian fiddler Ashley MacIsaac can relate to. A child prodigy in traditional music circles before he started his alt.rock career, MacIsaac began performing in concerts as a step dancer in his Nova Scotia home at age eight. When he was 13, he started touring Canada and the U.S. as a Cape Breton fiddler, crossing the continent in the company of musicians four times his age.
"It was hard because I was still a kid but I played the part of an adult," he remembers. "It was really weird. By the time I was 14, I was coming to Toronto and playing for 500 people to do square dances, and they were all over 50, and they looked at me as being one of their friends. That's how I became a bit of a weirdo."
MacIsaac doesn't regret the way he grew up, but he says that child prodigies often feel like they exist for other people rather than for themselves.
Granted, MacIsaac's show business launch came at an especially young age. "My earliest performance I can remember, I was two," hey says. "I was in Santa's Village in New Hampshire. There were two monkeys doing a show, they were dressed up in suits and ties. I got to go on stage with them... I got in this little car and drove around in a circle with the monkeys. I can remember going: "Wow. Everybody's watching these monkeys and everybody's clapping for them , and they're fucking monkeys!" I was like: ‘I wanna be a monkey!"
In some respects, his dream came true. For an audience, part of the appeal of seeing a child prodigy perform is comparable to watching monkeys drive a car: it's the novelty of the situation, the sheer weirdness. That's certainly what silverchair was thinking when they named their second album Freakshow.
But for all the pressure that audience, fans, and domineering parents can put on a child branded a prodigy, it seems they put as much pressure on themselves to excel. The teenage Helfgott was self-driven to master the most difficult pieces of piano music (hence the infamous "Rach 4" sequence in Shine). Silverchair's Johns is obsessed with honesty, mentioning the term in reference to any one of his albums or songs. MacIsaac is driven through his performances by personal perfectionism: "You gotta get things right," he says. "If it's perfect to you then other might like it."
Without a doubt, one cannot become a child prodigy without being personally driven already to develop talent at an early age. But add to that sense of commitment the pressures of performance, the expectations of an audience, and the fact that the child star still has to deal with all the normal crap in growing up - the byproduct is one volatile situation.
But ask them straight out whether they'd change anything about their careers as young stars, and all of the musicians featured in this story say they're proud of the lives they've led. Emotional turmoil or no, they probably wouldn't change a thing.
As MacIsaac says without hesitation:"No regrets."
Gillies maintains that he and his two friends have been lucky -he's heard far worse stories. Joannou's more optimistic: "I think we've had a dream run."
"Fame is pretty much the same in all fields," Helfgott states. By implication, the pressure of fame is comparable at all ages - it can be ugly, it can be cruel, and if it doesn't kill you, it definitely makes you stronger.
Or as Johns sings in "Abuse Me," from the Freakshow album: "C'mon, abuse me more - I like it."
Root Canal
Dentist Drills and Guitar Fills
The A to Z of silverchair
BAND: Helmet ALBUM: Meantime (1992) One needn't look further than debut effort Frogstomp to hear a distinct Helmet influence. Opening track "Israel's Son" has the chunky riffs, the meaty chords - that dentist-drill metal sound. You don't need to mention Helmet as influences anymore, guys - we know. Silverchair even invited andy Wallace (Helmet's Betty) to mix Frogstomp.
BAND: Led Zeppelin SONG: "Kashmir" (Physical Graffiti, 1975) Back in silverchair's humble beginnings, they were a quartet called Innocent Criminals who practised in a garage and performed at a community fair for $10 each. During their jam sessions, they boys would play covers by their favourite bands, including Black Sabbath, Deep Purple and Led Zeppelin. These covers set the tone for the raw, dark sound that was to become Frogstomp. silverchair's fascination with Middle Eastern instruments, including timpani and sitar, on "Petrol and Chlorine" (Freakshow) is an indirect homage to Led Zep's "Kashmir."
BAND: The Smashing Pumpkins SONG: "Tonight, Tonight" (Melon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, 1995) It's no secret that The Smashing pumpkins are standard setters, and silverchair seem to be taking a cue from the as well. Soon after the Windy City alt-rockers employed strings on "Tonight, Tonight," silverchair caught on by using strings on "Cemetery" and more recently on the epic track "Emotion Sickness" off Neon Ballroom. And, wouldn't you know, soon after The Pumpkins dabbled in electronica on Adore, the boys introduced a keyboard player to back them up on their Neon Ballroom tour.
BAND: Korn ALBUM: Life is peachy (1996) silverchair name the hard ‘n heavy Bakersfield band Korn as a big influence on Neon Ballroom, and it shows. Check out Daniel ripping off Jon Davis' self-described trademark "force" singing style on "Spawn Again". Daniel has also been spotted making Davis-like gestures onstage as part of his emulative efforts.
BAND: Minor Threat ALBUM: Minor Threat (1984) Daniel is admittedly very influenced by Minor Threat, the Washington punk band that coined the term "Straight Edge" (describing a lifestyle free from drugs and smoking, and usually adopting a vegetarian/vegan regime). A vegan himself, Daniel sings about animal exploitation on "Spawn Again" ("We're trading soul just for steak"). Songs citing the ill effects of alcoholism and drug addiction can be found on Frogstomp ("Madman") and Freakshow ("Petrol and Chlorine"), respectively. Johns seems to be influenced by more than Minor Threat's morals -"Lie to Me" is short and punky, as is "Findaway".
BAND: Nirvana and Pearl Jam SONG/VIDEO: "Formeldahyde" (Bleach, 1990), "Jeremy" (Ten, 1991) Daniel Johns may "look like Kurt and sing like Eddie" according to Courtney Love, but the comparisons go further than long greasy hair hanging in the eyes (though Daniel's donning Jackie-O shades and sweaters didn't help either). Songs about suicide ("Suicidal Dream"), tortured screams, negative lyrics... and the boys themselves will readily rhyme off bands like Soundgarden and Pearl Jam as major influences. They even snagged the producer of Pearl Jam's "Jeremy" video for their "Tomorrow " video, and the result is two very similarly disturbing vids. During live shows, Daniel has been known to play a short, instrumental jazz-jam entitled "Out of Tune Jam" which has been compared to Nirvana's "Formeldahyde." Even Freakshow's "Freak" bore arguable comparisons to "Heart-Shaped Box" and "Stay Away." "Cemetery" (same album) was reminiscent of "Something in the Way." And the piece de resistance, Neon Ballroom's "Anthem for the year 2000," is definitely "Smells Like Teen Spirit" for the new millennium.
