Neon Ballroom
| Neon Ballroom | ||||
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| Studio album by Silverchair | ||||
| Released | 8 March 1999 | |||
| Recorded | 9 May – 7 October 1998 | |||
| Studio | Festival Studio, Pyrmont, New South Wales, Australia | |||
| Genre | Post-grunge, alternative rock, art rock | |||
| Length | 49:36 | |||
| Label | ||||
| Producer | Nick Launay | |||
| Silverchair chronology | ||||
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| Singles from Neon Ballroom | ||||
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| Professional ratings | |
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| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   |
| Entertainment Weekly | B |
| Rolling Stone | |
Neon Ballroom is the third studio album by Australian alternative rock band Silverchair, released in 1999 by record labels Murmur and Epic.
From May 1998, Silverchair worked on their third studio album, Neon Ballroom, with Nick Launay (The Birthday Party, Models, Midnight Oil) producing again. The band had originally intended to take a 12-month-break after the release of 1997's Freak Show, but in the end they decided to devote their time to making new music.
In 1999, Johns announced that he had developed the eating disorder, anorexia nervosa, due to anxiety. Johns noted that the lyrics to "Ana's Song (Open Fire)" dealt with his disorder ("And Ana wrecks your life/like an anorexia life"), where he would "eat what he needed [...] to stay awake." He revealed that his eating problems developed from the time of Freak Show and when Neon Ballroom was written he "hated music, really everything about it", but felt that he "couldn't stop doing it; I felt like a slave to it." Johns sought therapy and medication but felt "It's easier for me to express it through music and lyrics".
Neon Ballroom was an overhaul of the band's musical style found on its first two albums, Frogstomp and Freak Show. "Anthem for the Year 2000", for example, retained much of the band's youthful rock energy but featured a new rock song structure and various electronic effects. Eight years after the album's release, Silverchair frontman Daniel Johns said: "To me, I honestly feel like our first record was Neon Ballroom. I've never felt any different. I don't feel like our first two albums were Silverchair: that's our teenage high school band. I don't like them at all. I listen to them and go, 'That's cute', especially the first one, because Frogstomp we were 14. But the second one we're like 16, I'm like 'You're getting older. You're running out of chances'".
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