[pete mellor]

These are somewhat random thoughts and there may be a tendancy to ramble.

I placed 'The Real Thing' CD into my CD player the other day and for some 
reason the fact that the band had split up finally dawned on me. 'The Real 
Thing' CD is almost plain black with white writing on it, but what leapt out 
was the Sprint logo, and more importantly the fact that there will never be 
another CD produced with that logo on it. It was a strange moment and quite 
emotional. Then I got to thinkin'. Midnight Oil can never be again without 
Peter. That is a fact. I think Jim summed it up quite neatly in the notes 
about the production of 'Capricornia': "...then Pete comes in and emotes all 
over it." There is no voice quite like it in rock music. Bono can sing 
pretty well but does he mean it? With Peter there is absolutely no doubt 
that he means every word and that they bleed forth from him. I think he's 
gonna miss it. Also, most of the songs have Pete's name in there as 
composer.
Okay so that disclaimer is out of the way.
I've never heard the Fuzzface EP (if anyone UK Powderworker knows of a way 
of rectifying this please let me know) but I imagine it's pretty good stuff 
if it came from Jim and Nick Launay. I personally think that 'Too Much 
Sunshine' is the best track from Capricornia and that one was written 
entirely by Jim. My favourite track from Redneck Wonderland is 'Return to 
Sender', another one of Jim's that didn't quite make it onto Breathe. Would 
these tracks be as compelling if not for Peter's vocal? I don't know. The 
two or three tracks on Neil Finn's solo album that Jim contributed to as 
composer are some of the best on there.
It would appear that it is possible to get hold of some Ghostwriters stuff 
so I am about to do that. I downloaded a track from Fibromoon the other day 
and apart from some slightly dodgy lyrics the musicality of the thing was 
intact. Dirty bass guitars and rifle crack snare drum! Beautiful. We know 
Rob can sing.
Most of the tracks from Capricornia arose from Jim, Martin and Rob sitting 
on the veranda with some guitars and working them out. Add Bones to that 
relaxed picture and you have the new Midnight Oil line up.
Speaking of Bones, another singer. A great singer. Rob says he's got one of 
the best voices he's heard and he keeps all the other guys together with his 
affable manner. The Hunting Party was a lovely bit of production with Chris 
Abrahams and Kelpie X helping out (I think Kelpie X is Martin. Am I right?)
Can anyone see where I am going with this?
Basically I hope they stay true to their statement of intent and continue 
making music (hopefully with the Sprint logo). I will miss Peter's vocal but 
perhaps this can be viewed as a good thing for Bones, Jim, Martin and Rob, a 
turning point if you will. Everything will sound different but it might just 
sound fantastic.

If anyone got to the end of this rant I hope it made some sort of sense. 
Essentially this was meant to make me feel better about what great music we 
could be hearing. After all, at the end of the US tour didn't Peter say that 
they had been writing while on the road and that they would be going into 
the studio again in 2003? What will happen to those songs?

Here's hoping,

Pete



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