[Duane Heath]

Well, there it is. A Sunday littered with irony. My tiny Stockholm flat
filled with empty suitcases waiting to be packed, my 18 months here coming
to an end in a cul de sac of mixed emotions. South Africa lies in wait, in
another guise, and I will see it, with skin shed and with new eyes.

The last few weeks have been ones of incredible change, and for those of you
aware of the astrological significance of the Saturn return (around the 29th
birthday), you'll know of the pains and challenges of getting that child's
skin off, and emerging as an adult. So much to consider: what to leave
behind, what to carry forward with me at this juncture in my life? Literally
and figuratively as I consider which clothes to pack, which lessons to
embrace, which things to turf, which philosophies to carry forward.

And, in the middle of it all, were the Oils.

On my chair next to me sits two old Redneck t-shirts I received in 1998 and
which I was considering throwing out; in fact they were in the bag labelled
"Salvation Army" when the news came through. You can wear and wash something
only so many times before it becomes transparent! Funny that: I pained over
the decision to throw them for days and days, then finally managed to
convince myself with the argument that the Oils will continue for me with or
without the shirts, I still had their music and I could always get new
shirts to replace the old ones....oh, the irony.

But the worst: less than 24 hours before I learnt of the news, I finished
writing the story below, aiming to sell it to a South African music magazine
on my return. Some of you may remember parts of it from a post I sent a
couple months back; this past week I dug up that old material and for some
reason felt the need to write non-stop for an entire weekend to produce the
article. I learnt of Peter's decision after going to midnightoil.com, for
the first time in about a month, to check some facts for the article! It may
need a bit of rejigging now, but here it is, my farewell tribute to the
Oils. The irony of it all: never did I ever think that the 94 concert would
be my last, but there it is. It was. But if I think back now, I can't see
how it would have ever been topped: my lifetime friends, drenched in the
Durban (my birthplace) downpour, all around me, Peter playing Read About It
with a comment beforehand that he heard South Africans wanted to hear some
of "the older stuff" - and I still wonder whether this had anything to do
with my request to him two days earlier, at the press conference I mention
in the story, to play "something old, like Read About It."

I played Diesel and Dust last night for the first time in months and it felt
like a funeral march; tried Capricornia and my Mac wouldn't allow it. There
you go. Thank you Peter, your music, as I've said in this article, has been
the constant in my life; for me every Oils song is like an instant cue to a
memory on my Life's Top 20 list; I will miss the concept of Midnight Oil, as
I know it, being somewhere out in the world, making music. As Led Zeppelin
said however, "The Song Remains The Same".

I'm reminded of the quote from the surfing film Big Wednesday: "What do you
mean, those guys are so stoked they'll surf forever," say the little
grommets, reacting to Bear, sage of the sea, predicting the end of the
triumvirate of Matt, Jack and Leroy, the film's immortal surfing heroes.
"NOBODY surfs forever," came Bear's reply. And prophetic it  was.

Well, now the tough work lies ahead: collect all the CDs I haven't got, for
some or other reason: Bird Noises, Scream in Blue, Head Injuries (on CD;
have on record and tape), Real Thing. And then starts the hunt for
"unofficial" stuff. And then videos - I haven't one. Help, anyone? And so
we'll go on....and move forward. So shall Peter, so shall the rest of the
band. And so shall I.

And in a week where I've turfed my past to make space for a future filled
with new ideas, I guess I'll just have to make a few concessions. Been
there, done that, but kept the t-shirts.

Swedish band Kent have two lines from the album Isola that sum Peter up
perfectly: "En gentleman ett geni, en superhjälte för dig (a gentleman, a
genius, a superhero for you.)

Cheers for now, Duane (presently in Stockholm, but within a week in Cape
Town via Malmö, Copenhagen, Addis Ababa, Johannesburg, Durban.)

p.s comment and criticism of article welcomed, and feel free to do with it
what you wish. please respect the copyright, though. Thanks.

2/12/02 Oils uncover a new Œgolden ageı by Duane Heath,
duaneinsweden@hotmail.com

Subhead: Midnight Oil have celebrated more highs than lows in a 16-album
career spanning nearly three decades. Their latest CD, produced after a
return trip to the Australian outback which birthed their most famous
record, Diesel and Dust, signals a return to the wide open sound synonymous
with the band from Down Under. Duane Heath explains why heıs still a fan
after all these years...

PETER GARRETT, his head smooth as milk, his face white as an iceberg, takes
a shallow sip of hotel orange juice from a brown plastic cup. Looking up at
his six-and-a-half foot frame, his furrowed face further away than the moon,
I imagine that juice falling forever down the most famous throat in
Australian music, splashing off his soul along the way.

Garrett and bass guitarist Duane "Bones" Hillman, sporting an espresso and a
pair of big eavesdropping ears, are digesting an odd piece of South African
trivia I have just thrown into the conversational mix.

"So, if Iıve got this straight, youıve got the tastebuds of a Zulu king to
thank for the name of your home town?" Garrett asks, awaiting confirmation
of my quirky tale, dug from a musty corner of my mind in a panicky search
for small-talk material (How to know theyıd be so keen to have a bit of a
yarn with the local journos?). I nod.

"Shaka kneels down at the river, has a drink, and says...what was that word
again?" 

"Amanzimtoti, which means Œthe place of sweet waterı."

"And the river he named, thatıs where you grew up?"

"Yip, although the waterıs not quite as sweet anymore."


It feels like yesterday, that October afternoon in 1994. If I try hard
enough Iım sure I can still smell Bonesıs cup of dark roast, look up and see
the bottom of Peterıs bald chin. Eight years! What would we do without
memories? Where would we store all those wonderful emotions?

South Africa, riding a wave of post-election euphoria all the way to the
beach, was attracting international artists by the bucketload, all of them
keen to be painted with the same brush that coloured the Rainbow Nation.
Midnight Oil arrived in the spring of ı94, giving three performances and a
single press conference.

Johannesburg invited summer along to the Ellis Park party and got gifts of
sunrays in return, plus Sting thrown in to keep the 70,000-strong crowd
busy. The rain stayed far away, in Durban...four days later 5000 fans on a
tennis court at Westridge, under dark and warm summery skies heavy with
rain, drummer Rob Hirst a blur of sticks and cymbals during ŒU.S. Forcesı,
the bandıs classic 1982 anti-American tirade ­ still so relevant 20 years on
­ and the drops frozen as in the ghosting white flash of a camera...

Eight years ago now. Have I mentioned that? Itıs not as if Iıve been
counting, but it has been a long time between concerts. Fortunately, the
breaks between studio bookings havenıt been as protracted. 1996 saw the
exhaling of Breathe, a study in serene liquidity, only to be followed by the
angriest of them all, 1998ıs Redneck Wonderland, Garrettıs scathing attack
on his own countryıs hypocritical politics. The record didnıt exactly set
sales on fire, but light a few blazes under their countrymen the Oils
certainly did.

So what to make of Capricornia, their latest studio effort? The band named
the record after the 1938 novel by Xavier Herbert about racial issues in the
Australian outback. Itıs also the place they returned to, for the first time
since the brainstorming that led to Diesel and Dust. The Oils hopped into a
couple of 4x4s and headed for the Western Desert, like they did in 1985, and
camped for a few days under the same trees where they wrote ŒBeds are
Burningı, Garrett said in a recent interview.

Capricorniaıs ten tracks screeched through me like one of Garrettıs muddy
Landcruisers eating into an empty horizon of squat scrub and middle-distance
mirages conjured from tar and sun. The similarities between Diesel and Dust
and Capricornia jump out at you, like an out-of-focus memory dug out from
the good old days made increasingly lucid the higher the volume gets turned
up. I find that same space, those same empty, dusty roads, I wandered along
while listening to ŒThe Dead Heartı and ŒPut Down That Weaponı.

Through a wormhole of the mind I submerge, reaching out across a
decade-and-a-half to that time, picturing my own version of the new track
ŒLuritja Wayı ­ a hired VW bus like a white skyscraper among flat, dry
plains of the parched Karoo, on its way to the coast, stuck lonely miles
between sub-tropica and my final destination somewhere in the Cape, lost.
And still other memories, more lucidity neatly packaged: working for nothing
in a dusty surf shop in the summer of 1989, spending  salaries on surf wax
and KFC burgers, driving customers away in herds with the shopıs tune
selection: Blue Sky Mining alternating incessantly with Beds, the LPsı
static scratches ingraining themselves into my memory in a December of
north-easters, sandy shorebreaks, and endless days with the friends with
whom I discovered the Oils: Ben, Todd, Bruce, Shaun, Jeff, Simon.

Nearly a hundred months ago now, and many of those faces faded within the
fabric of time, our different roads diverging as life cycles go their
separate ways. And yet the Oils remain as my constant, wherever I am in this
world. From Durban to Joıburg, from Cape Town to London, from Finland to
Denmark, from Sweden and back to the fairest Cape again, I am about to come
full circle upon leaving the Arctic Circle. Still, thereıs that nagging
feeling...when will I hear them again? Will I ever hear them again?

*
A Saturday in Stockholm. I sit, waiting for my coffee to cool, and watch the
first snowfall of the autumn repaint the trees outside my flat. The phone
rings on time, just as weıve agreed. Two rings; my hands sweaty on the red
receiver. Could be a wrong number. Donıt get your hopes up. After all, itıs
been... I lift life into the earpiece: "Hello?" My pulse at light speed.
Heart in sixth gear. Then the recognition. Eight years is a long time, but
the voice is unmistakable. Itıs Peter Garrett. All the way from London. And
heıs singing. Singing ŒBeds are Burningı for old timeıs sake. Live. In
concert! And then ŒGolden Ageı, off the new album, to melt away all my years
of waiting. His voice echoes, two thousand kilometres away, with memories
and ghosts across a sketchy line and a North Sea frigid with missed
opportunities and new horizons. I listen, frozen, as flakes nestle on my
windowsill, the frosty crystals a billion white flags of seasonal change.
Never for me does a voice resonate so between the past and the present.
Diesel and Dust will always be there, filed under ŒGreat Memoriesı, but
Capricornia pulls me back to the here and now, to the dynamic present,
making me realise the "good old days" are at once all around me and still
unborn: "Tell me what you see, tell me what you hear, if itıs the same as me
itıs the Golden Age."

"Thanks, Todd," I say, "It was a long wait."

"You enjoy the concert, mate. Iıll keep the phone on until the batteries
go."

İ 2002

­ The day after this story was written, Peter Garrett resigned from Midnight
Oil, thus bringing to an end a 25-year career as lead singer of the band.