Picture the scene. A comprehensive school in the tough industrial town of Newcastle, Australia. A classroom full of surf kids and hardnuts. Enter a scrawny blond lad,pale-skinned, a bit on the feminine side, pretending he's Mr T, hulking, mowhawked black dude from 'The A-Team'. Like his hero, the blond kid has a mess of gold chains around his neck. He makes an awkward and ill-advised attempt to breakdance. He promptly has the shit kicked outof him.

This is a scene from the childhood of Daniel Johns, silverchair's troubled and precociously gifted singer, guitarist and songwriter. It's always the kids who stand out from the crowd who get picked on, and from an early age, young Johns stood out in Newcastle with his misguided notion of style.

"I was really young when I tried to dress like Mr T," Daniel recalls with a smile. "I used to be quite good at breakdancing, and I had all these chains on and everything. I tired to be like Mr T with the exception of the mohawk and the dark skin. Being white, I can't really achieve the full Mr T look, but my mum wouldn't even let me have a mohawk.

"It would have been so cool if I'd done it," he adds with a rueful shake of the head. "I'd love it if there were pictures of me with a mohawk. I'd be so proud." When silverchair shot to fame off the back of their mega-selling firstalbum 'Frogstomp', Daniel dressed like a young Kurt Cobain, a likeness amplified by his straggly blond hair and grunge-icon status. Johns still wears Cobain approved silk shirts over fading T-shirts, but a lot of the gear he's bought recently, baggy trousers and the like, are from dance music stores.

"A lot of people think I'm a raver because I wear a lot of dance clothes," he explains, "but the stuff I wear is stuff that's comfortable, with the exception of all the things round my neck.

"I wouldn't say these chains aren't uncomfortable, but they're not exactly comfortable either," he chuckles. "They're something different to wear.

A millionaire at an age when most people are scraping together pocket money by delivering papers, Daniel could buy tons of swanky designer-label gear if he wanted,but it's just not his style. Or rather, he just doesn't see the point of spending a huge wad of cash on a simple shirt.

"I'm not impressed by that kind of stuff at all, although," he concedes, "you can tell they're good clothes. If I got designer things for free I'd wear them, but I wouldn't buy them, because it's just giving money to people who've already got too much!" What would you wear to a wedding, then?

"I've got a couple of old 70s suits that I got second-hand," he says. "A black one and a dark grey one. They've got flares and big labels. They're not designer suits. They're very cheap, but I really like them. As long as it looks cool, it doesn't matter how cheap something is."

As if to back up this last statement, Daniel picks out an old T-shirt as his very favorite thing to wear. It's just a cheap black shirt with has shrunk a little over the years to fit his skinny frame. The print on the front features a decidedly harmless-looking cartoon alligator.

"I bought this shirt from a second-hand store when I was 13," Daniel says. "It's been my favorite thing for seven years. I liked it because it has an alligator on it and I was fascinated by them at the time."

Who needs posh gear? Not this Mr T fan, that's for sure.