Midnight Oil

[Powderworks] Sails Hardly for Gigs - Sounds too Sweeping

ALEXEI alexeis@usa.net
Mon, 20 May 2002 16:56:58 +0300


No comment.  I haven't had a live Oils exposure anywhere close to yours.  And
your explanation may very well be true.  The actual reason some tracks are not
played live by the band anymore, though, may transcend it...  However, I was
not really offering unsolicited expertise... the string was a chance for me to
say once again that I like Sails very much :-)

John McColl <johnmccoll@yahoo.com> wrote:
I have seen the Oils play the following live, When the
Generals Talk, Best of Both Worlds, Sleep, Minutes to
Midnight, Jimmy Sharman's Boxers, Kosciuosko, Who Can
Stand in the Way, Helps Me Helps You and Harrisburg.
That's most of the album ! And they all sounded great,
but I guess you'd have to hear thenm first to comment.

I think they are playing tracks that are better known
in the US while they tour here, makes sense to me.


--- ALEXEI <alexeis@usa.net> wrote:
> Red Sails is an excellent work.  Why not play
> something from it?  Hmmm... 
> Definitely, "Kosciusco" and "Best of Both Worlds"
> and "Helps Me Helps You" are
> quite convertible to the pure guitar and drum
> combination and can be played at
> gigs without detriment to their original effect. 
> But Sails in general is way
> above the charming simplicity of instrumentation...
> to me, it veers off the
> original Oils' musical path and is an attempt if not
> to move to a different
> sound, then to probe beyond the already reached
> horizons.  I think the heart
> and soul of Sails is "Bells and Horns", with its
> twists in pace and
> orchestration, and though it's on the way out of the
> album, it sort of
> determines the sound of the album in general--sudden
> switches between acoustic
> and electric, frugal and symphonic, instrumental and
> purely vocal bits, etc. 
> Even the studio environment, if I hear it correctly,
> sounds like one in which
> a chamber orchestra would record: soft, no reverb,
> locked in a small,
> sound-absorbing space... very unlike a rock band's
> sound setting...
> 
> Anyway, what I'm driving at is that little of Red
> Sails can be played live in
> a setting other than a chamber hall.
> 
> Cheers, all,
> 
> Alexei
> 
> 
> Jeff and Jane Scott <jscott@iinet.net.au> wrote:
> At 19-05-02 07:59 PM -0400, Tom Davies wrote:
> >On Sun, 19 May 2002, John Palmer wrote:
> >
> > > As far as 'Kosciusco' goes, I know it has been
> stated on this list that
> Rob
> > > says they don't play it anymore because he can't
> get his voice up that
> high
> > > anymore.
> >
> >I've heard that before, and I've often wished they
> would just change the
> >song a bit so that Rob doesn't have to sing that
> really high part. It
> >would still be a great, great song if it were sung
> lower. I don't know
> >enough to say exactly how it should be transposed,
> but I'm sure it could
> >be done if Rob wanted to do it. Or if Peter wanted
> to take over lead
> >vocals on that song -- I can imagine him sounding
> great singing it, in a
> >lower register of course. There's just so much
> power, so much punch, in
> >that song.
> 
> 
> Peter has sung it at times in the past.  I guess
> these days with so many 
> songs to choose from it's easier just to play
> something else.
> 
> 
> jeff...
> 
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=====
John McColl

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