Silverchair frontman Daniel Johns has explained his side of the story after the first half of an ABC documentary featuring his former bandmates was surprisingly pulled from streaming.
Last week, it was reported that Australian Story had been forced to remove the first half of a feature documentary on Silverchair from ABC iView, with “rights issues” being cited as the reason for the removal.
The documentary was told from the perspective of Silverchair members Ben Gillies and Chris Joannou, but Johns was absent. Titled A Silver Lining Part One, the doc was made to coincide with the upcoming release of Gillies and Joannou’s memoir, Love and Pain.
After Part One was pulled from dreaming, Johns took to social media to share a statement, pleading for an end to “unhelpful speculation.”
“I would have preferred to say nothing but here are the facts,” he wrote on Instagram.
“Australian Story reached out to me via my team ‘as a courtesy’ on Aug 11 to let me know that they were doing a story on @bengillies888 and @chris_joannou_. I was and remain incredibly supportive of them telling their story.
“I was asked at the end of filming to be interviewed about their contribution to the band and although I wished them all the best, I respectfully declined for one reason.”
While Johns isn’t involved in any way with his former bandmates’ memoir, he revealed that he’s “asked on many occasions” to receive a copy to check it out, although no copy was forthcoming. “Consequently I was uncomfortable being interviewed to help promote it,” he wrote.
Johns revealed that he was asked to clear seven songs to soundtrack the series, including “Ana’s Song”.
“I said to Sony and ABC 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,” he continued.
“I was told again that Ben & Chris would not give me a copy to read. That’s why the iView use was denied. @leigh_sales posted on Sept 12 that the Australian Story would not be available on iView due to ‘rights issues’, she later deleted this post and ABC proceeded to feature the story on iView without a license in place.
“Sony reached out to have them take it down, it took ABC 3 days to remove it at which point most people had already viewed the story.”
Johns concluded by making a few things clear. “As always, I wish Ben & Chris nothing but success and happiness. I have never sought to block their book, I merely asked to receive a copy in advance to fact check it. I was concerned about my personal health records being discussed, I don’t think that’s unreasonable. Everyone is tagged, if I’ve got it wrong please provide the evidence or kindly please stop the unhelpful speculation.”
View this post on Instagram
