'It wasn't what people thought': Daniel Johns explains troubled past

DANIEL Johns has revealed he self-medicated with alcohol to manage a severe anxiety disorder he had for 15 years.

The Silverchair frontman told Andrew Denton’s Interview he struggled with feeling “constantly panicked” for more than a decade before he got help.

During his first talk show interview in 12 years, Johns attributed his worrying public behaviour in 2015 and 2016 to his anxiety.

“I wasn’t well, but it wasn’t what people thought it was,” Johns said.

“I have had a pretty serious anxiety disorder for 15 years and it got really bad at a point, I was not coping and I didn’t know how to deal with it.”

Johns said he has since managed to get his anxiety under control after therapy and taking medicine to stop him from shaking.

When asked by Denton if he also had a “problem with addiction” at the time, Johns said he had been trying to self-manage his condition.

“I was medicating my anxiety with alcohol, a lot, and I didn’t know what it was. I was misdiagnosed a lot of things,” he said.

“I didn’t know what I had, so I didn’t know how to deal with it, and the only thing that I found that worked was alcohol, so I was drinking alcohol to keep that at bay.

“But it didn’t work, and then I got diagnosed with this — I don’t want to say what it is — this anxiety disorder, and now I am a perfect specimen.”

Johns has returned to music with electronic two-person duo DREAMS alongside former Emipire of The Sun lead singer Luke Steele.

The new venture is a personal victory for Johns, who was left unable to write music at the height of his anxiety battle.

“If that gets out of control music doesn’t come anymore, there’s too much doubt and too much fear it won’t come out,” he said of the years following Silverchair’s disbandment.

“I couldn’t write words because I was so scared about what I was going to say, because I didn’t feel good, so I didn’t want to write.”

Born in Newcastle, Johns rose to fame as the lead singer of Silverchair before the group parted ways in 2011.

His debut solo album Talk was released in 2015 to critical acclaim, while at the same time his behaviour began sparking public concern.

In February of that year Johns was convicted and fined for drink driving and in July was hospitalised after falling outside a Sydney bar.

Photos emerged in late 2016 of the singer stumbling out of a cafe shirtless and wearing lipstick.

Johns was married to Natalie Imbruglia from 2003 to 2008 and was most recently linked to Michelle Leslie.

Former lingerie model Leslie was convicted in 2005 of possessing two ecstasy tablets.

Interview with Andrew Denton continues next Tuesday on Channel 7.

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