When silverchair members Daniel Johns and Ben Gillies made smiling references to 'going techno' just prior to the release of their sophomore album, Freak Show, the tone of the quotes suggested they were joking about the ambition.

There they were mock-doof-dancing in suburban Merewether, far from the traditional home of dance music, about to release an album that would solidify their rock roots with further references to metal's past, and some updates leaning toward the pop present.

Now, having presented the Paul Mac remix of 'Freak', (there's also a Paul Mac remix of 'Slave' in the works) silverchair continue to dabble in tech-assisted remixes, this time as part of an exciting album brought to you by Happy Walters, who created the Judgement Night soundtrack, which saw rock heavyweights like Sonic Youth, Pearl Jam and Helmet team up with hip hop names like House of Pain and Cypress Hill. The soundtrack is for the forthcoming Spawn, a celluloid version of a cult US comic, and the brief is pretty much the same, except this time they're taking exclusive tracks from rock heavyweights and offering them to hardcore electronic remixers from the BPM treatment.

At the time of interview, silverchair had just completed recording two tracks at Festival studios in Pyrmont, Sydney. The first is a cover of the Clash's 'London's Burning', for a Clash-approved tribute due out late September (an album which will also include contributions from 311, Bush, Goldfinger, The Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Moby/Heather Nova, Rancid, Tricky, the Brian Setzer Orchestra, the Wallflowers, Hank Williams Jr, and liner notes from Joe Strummer). The second is the as yet untitled Spawn tune, soon to be remixed by Vitro (a young UK rock electronic crossover signed to Andy McDonald's new Independantiente label). The remix track will sit alongside pairings between Korn and the Dust Bros, Slayer and Atari Teenage Riot, Rollins and Goldie, with the possibility of The Prodigy becoming involved on some level strong. Thankfully, by all accounts the song is strong enough to present itself as a contender.

"We're not actually doing the remixing stuff ourselves, but it's still cool to have it", said drummer Gillies of the band's moves towards dance remixes. "You always like to hear the finished product. We only wrote the song today, but the recording went really good. We worked out the different bits of the song, and we hadn't actually run through it from start to finish, and the first or second take we put it down. Daniel had some lyrics worked out because he knew we were going to be mucking around in there. If anyone heard the song without the techno remix they wouldn't think it was us. One section of it has a riff like Sepultura. It's real heavy."

Beyond this recording, Gillies is most looking forward to the end of the year. For starters, he's at a stage where he simply wishes the HSC was over (the exams relevance is diminished by the fact that the band have spent a good part of their final school year touring internationally). The band has employed a tutor to compensate for the fact that they've only attended school for a month of the year so far, the 25-year-old PE teacher tutoring them in maths, English and sport and recreation (other electives include marine studies and music. "In terms of Mozart, and stuff like that that you've gotta study, we're totally shit at it", says Gillies).

But more importantly, he's keen to take the silverchair show on the road on a tour which he hopes will pay back Australians who've supported the band over the past two years, but who've been neglected due to pressing overseas commitments. Set to take place in Summer, the national tour will take in centres which don't see too many large scale rock shows (Darwin included).

For now, Gillies is satisfied with the response to the Brisbane Festival Hall shows, which sold out within five hours of the tickets going on sale, a new record for the venue. It's a pay off after the sameness he's experienced on tour in Europe and the US of late, where he's constantly "tired of travelling, tired of waiting, tired of not getting enough sleep". To his weary mind the biggest highlight of the band's most recent tour was his relative anonymity.

"I had a good time getting around the crowd this time", he says. "No one recognised me because of my hair".

silverchair play Festival Hall tomorrow night, Thursday, June 19. Grinspoon support. Their new single 'Cemetery', with an added CD-Rom feature including a video, is in stores on June 27.

[Thanx Jess for the transript]