Benjamin Gillis, best known for being the drummer for the drummer of the Australian rock band Silverchair until 1992 recently took to social media via Instagram to reflect on the twenty-fifth anniversary of ‘Freak’ – which was the first single off the group’s second album, Freak Show, released in 1997. Freak would get in the top thirty on the Billboard charts but see significant radio success in the group’s homeland of Australia as the track would be a number one hit. Silverchair recently gave their thoughts on this iconic group.
Fans would react to Gillis’ post on social media via Instagram – one user named mikedivirgilio85’s mikedivirgilio85 wrote the following We love ya mate! People sometimes forget that Silverchair was THREE people. While waltzxo stated: “my favorite song off this album is no association but great album”
Silverchair would form in 1992 originally in Newcastle, South New Castle with the aforementioned Ben Gillies on drums, Daniel Johns on vocals, and Chris Joannou on bass. The group would go on to sell 8 million albums worldwide and win more ARIA music awards than any music artist in history. The video, for ‘Freak’ which was filmed on in Los Angeles, California, on December 5 and 6, 1996 won the International Viewer’s Choice Award for MTV Australia at the 1997 MTV Video Music Awards. One of the members of the acclaimed rock group Devo, Gerald Casale would direct the video. You can view the comments by Gillis below.
“25 years ago today we released the single Freak. I remember band rehearsal above my parent’s garage. We called it the loft. Dan turned up with a riff & a rough melody. Then we all started jamming and molding the song. At the time, it was my favorite drum part that I came up with. After some nips & tucks from management and some pre-production, it became the track you know today.”
