Midnight Oil

[Powderworks] Toronto show

James A. Smith jasmith@cim.mcgill.ca
Sun, 28 Oct 2001 07:38:15 -0500 (EST)


Just woke up after last night's show and am getting ready to drive from
Kitchener (1 hr west of Toronto) to Montreal.  It was great meeting so
many 'workers.  Let's see... Chris Rea, Chris Hall, Garrett (pronounced
"jeret"... never figured that out via email!! :-)) Hachkowski and his
wife, Irena (did I finally get that right?), Melissa (from Buffalo,
right?), Jonathan Hart and his friend, Paul, Curtis (evil bastard), Indi
(in the white version of the 2nd 'workers shirt that I was also
wearing).  

Anyone else that I'm missing?  Oh yeah, and some annoying guy
not on the list that's been to the last five or six shows in the
States.  He's also going to be in New York.  Watch out for him... he's
about 220 lbs, 6', short hair.  He was pretty drunk and was complaining
about "all the Diesel and Dust crap" that the Oils had been playing during
the tour.  He shoved a bunch of people to get one of Rob's drumsticks (the
fourth or fifth by his count) and generally didn't play very nicely.

The show started out pretty tame.  They opened with Redneck, and Peter
looked annoyed for the first three songs or so.  Then Rob got his smaller
up-front kit, Martin switched to a thinner, hollow-bodied guitar and they
all started to loosen up (and once they did the crowd did, too, and
a good time was had by all).  Jim had a mike the whole time.

I won't attempt a complete setlist.  Garrett and someone else copied that
down.  Other little tidbits... the place was packed and sang along to lots
of the songs.  "Too much sunshine" was great.  I think that four new songs
were played, including "Capricornia" and "Lurijita Way" (sp?).  There were
two encores, including "In the Valley".  The last encore ended with "Read
About it" (I think, which was labelled "rock out" or something on the
setlist).  US Forces was an option on the setlist but wasn't played,
although a great version of "Put down that weapon" was.  "King of the
Mountain" was great. "Hercules" was phenomenal -- wow!!

Rants... we got one about "Liz" prior to Trug.  There was a mention or two
about our southern neighbors and the difficult times right
now.  Otherwise, Peter was pretty laid back.  He had some fun
with Bones at one point.  Bones set up the strings of his bass guitar
for the last note on one song and Peter plucked it and had a good
laugh.  Guess that you had to be there.

Alright, gotta get some breakfast in me and then have to head down to
Montreal.  I am so pumped!!

See you all in Montreal! :-)

-James