We weren’t alone among new combinations busting out. With punk’s fierce have-a-go attitude, everyone was in a band now, everyone fancied themselves a chance. The ever-present challenge for this crate full of innocents was how to make ends meet. One or two gigs a week hardly covered expenses, let alone gave band members enough to live on, and many bands went on the dole just to survive. Our solution was to forgo the inner-city scene and the pretensions to cool that went with it, and head further out to the suburbs where most people actually lived.
There was a palpable sense of excitement as the boys finished their studies at the end of 1976 and a few months later, I finished mine. Now we could go anywhere any time; now things could really take off.
No one could have expected what happened next: the death of my beloved mum in the early hours of the morning in April 1977, when our family home in Lindfield burned down—and everything in my world suddenly came to a shuddering halt.
6
LOSSES AND GAINS
DURING THE COURSE of writing this memoir I came up against a giant stumbling block—the death of my mother. I knew I’d need to address it; after all, she was a central figure in my life, and the circumstances of her death were already publicly known. But even though I thought I’d come to terms with losing her, the thought of revisiting that night and trying to understand her death in the broader narrative of a rollercoaster life, with all the inevitable ups and downs, filled me with dread. I wanted to retell this part of my story honestly, but at the same time I was fearful of rendering it in too extreme a way. My feelings and those of my brothers ran deep; we loved her so much. How to find the words to sum up this cauldron of emotions without seeming trite?
Some commentators later singled out this traumatic event as an explanation for my extreme stage performances and a take-no-prisoners approach to life in general. They may have been right, though it’s not a theory I’ve ever been particularly interested in addressing. I’m a fairly private person and I’ve always hated the idea of parading misery to gain sympathy or publicity. All I can say is that the grieving process took time, it was so searing and personal, but it was my pain and I felt I best honoured her memory by bearing it alone. Furthermore, I am hardly the only person to have experienced a family tragedy. They are a constant of life, and I’m only too aware that others had gone through a lot worse.
Now I can see that Mum lives on in me and my brothers, and in our children. In the end, I have let her voice guide me. She was someone who fully embraced life, greeting friend and visitor alike with open arms. ‘Make the most of life,’ she’d exhort us, and that is what I’ve tried to do. Because no matter what befalls you along the way, in the end it is all you have.
…
When the house in Eton Road burned down I was the only other person at home. Woken by the popgun sound of windows shattering, I tried to reach Mum’s bedroom upstairs, which was already engulfed in flames, but was driven back by the heat and thick smoke.
I ended up sitting, howling, in the gutter, covered in only a blanket offered by kind neighbours, as the house turned into a blazing inferno in minutes. By the time the fire engines arrived it was way too late. The sound of her screams still haven’t completely faded away.
I was in so much pain, numb with shock. My brothers and I closed ranks and battled the cloud of grief that enveloped us as we tried to make sense of what had happened. The coroner’s report was brief: ‘But as to the cause of such fire, the evidence adduced does not enable me to say.’
When the tragedy struck we lost everything. It turned out the house wasn’t insured; neither Mum nor Dad believed in it. And, like Dad when he died, Mum didn’t have much in the way of savings, and with a bank overdraft there was a mortgage to repay.
An uncle lent us a one-bedroom flat in North Sydney as we pulled ourselves together, sleeping on three single mattresses on the floor. We were consoled by close friends and sympathetic strangers, including the Chatswood police who investigated the incident—no easy job.
We took whatever jobs we could find, including cleaning taxis in the early hours of the morning as they returned to base, the drivers bleary-eyed and punch-drunk after a twelve-hour shift. As the city slumbered, Andrew and I would wash out the 3 a.m. leftovers, and whatever else had happened on the back seat.
The night after the fire, the Oils were booked to perform at French’s. Its minuscule, dingy basement was the in place to play and we were building a loyal following. Mum had come to see one of our first shows there, and of course ended up in animated conversation with a bunch of strangers, who were bemused that someone over fifty was actually in the room.
Even though I could still smell the singed hair on the back of my arms, we played the show. I was determined not to fold up and crawl into a hole, even though for more years than I care to remember, I would wake during the early hours and be taken back to that moment.
In the weeks that followed the fire, I went back to assess the damage. Like an automaton, taking one heavy step at a time, I slowly picked through the rubble and the waterlogged timbers to see if anything could be salvaged. There wasn’t much left: a few blackened tins of letters and papers, seared and peeling from the heat, and that was it. It was painful, tedious work and often I’d find myself squatting, teary, staring at the debris, weighed down by a mass of sorrow pulling me towards the ground.
It took us a few months to clean up, sell the block of land and pay off the bank. Then I packed what was left of my belongings into a blue sailor’s bag. I had no more than a couple of pairs of T-shirts and black jeans, a handful of books, a mono cassette player for writing songs and flippers for body surfing.
Along with Andrew’s girlfriend, Lyndall, my brothers and I moved into the top floor of a house in Neutral Bay. Matt, six years younger than me, went back and redid his HSC while working part time in an old people’s home. Andrew was in his first year of uni, studying to be a surveyor. He picked up whatever odd jobs were going, including as a roadie for the occasional Oils gig.
We lay low, licking our wounds, watching telly, listening to music and, if the band didn’t have a gig, sharing cheap wine on the weekends. Eventually the dark lifted a bit and I started inching back into the bright light of day again.
…
The strategy from then on was simple. Play to the people where they lived, as often as was needed to get the music lodged inside their head. Never rip the audience off. Forget about pleasing the critics or pandering to the in crowd, who would sooner or later consign you to the outhouse. Find those who shared the vision: road crew, staff and music-industry people who were fans, and play, play, play, hoping like hell that you wouldn’t crash and burn.
After Gary’s arrival, other pieces of the puzzle started to fall into place. As the crowds kept building on the strength of word of mouth and some publicity from ABC radio station Double J, record companies came back for a second look.
After the obligatory ‘You guys are great!’, they wanted to talk money, singles and marketing. Like many young musicians, we simply wanted to talk music and impose our take on things—it had to be our way or not at all. The normal criteria of success weren’t the measuring stick, least of all for me, given what I’d just been through. We had our noses in the air, sniffing the wind, trying to figure out the best way to avoid diluting our precious work and insisting on having the final say. We had chosen to climb a very different-looking mountain compared to other bands that were courted by major record companies, and the dialogue was frustrating everyone. At the same time, the do-it-yourself ethic was energy-sapping and there were only so many 2 a.m. poster runs to let people know about the next gig, and only so many visits to the same suburban pub we could make. If we wanted to break out to a wider audience, we needed a machine that could enable the music to fly a little bit further.
Among the suitors was Channel 7, the television station that happened to own a pressing plant and had established a label to flog cheap compilations and cover records on TV. The manage
r of the plant, Ken Harding, was an old-school, down-to-earth businessman who, for some reason, liked what he saw and, importantly, was willing to chance his arm on the rogue outfit that had swung into his quiet village.
We were unlikely but ideal partners, as Ken’s knowledge of the music scene was scant at best. Channel 7 would give us our own label, subsequently named Powderworks, and promised no interference. We could record whatever we pleased, with the added incentive of television advertising if things went well.
We also found a fledgling agency called Nucleus, run by a gruff, grassroots operator, Chris Plimmer, who was prepared to place the band on its own terms and break the stranglehold of the mainstream agents. He was also willing to put up with Gary Morris and me badgering him at all hours of the day and night about some aspect of our touring schedule.
By now the Angels and Cold Chisel had built large followings and had set up their own booking agency, Dirty Pool. All of a sudden a raft of new venues opened up, as hotels and clubs across the country became the new stomping ground for the 1980s local music explosion.
Success on the charts was still likely to be elusive with a singer the industry hadn’t warmed to and with songs that didn’t fit radio formats, but the work plan was clear enough: play hundreds of gigs a year, following in the footsteps of troubadours and journeymen and -women since time immemorial.
In Australia there had always been those who’d put in the miles: artists like Slim Dusty, whose biggest hit, ‘A Pub With No Beer’, we would subsequently record for a Slim tribute album. Slim Dusty, the King of Country, had played places Midnight Oil couldn’t get anywhere near, including a few remote Aboriginal communities in the far outback. I later got to know Slim and his wife, Joy McKean, an accomplished songwriter in her own right. It turned out the Oils and Slim had a bit in common: marching to the beat of our own drum, not afraid to talk politics and write music about the here and now. We were cultural patriots; singing nasal and local—touching base, not channelling a distant headline or, in Slim’s case, a Nashville by-line. The country crew never stopped touring and recording, and Slim, by dint of regularly showing up in just about every town on the map for as long as anyone could remember, ensured his relationship with the audience got deeper and deeper as he gigged into legend.
When Slim died in 2003 it was an honour to be asked by the family to speak at his funeral. I spent hours trying to craft a speech that did justice to his contribution. Slim had been on the road for nigh on fifty years and had over a hundred albums under his belt; he was the biggest Australian artist ever—there was a lot of ground to cover.
Ours was a full-frontal, revved up version of the practice pioneered by Slim, playing and returning in quick succession. The concentric circle spread out from Sydney and the inner city to the coastal suburbs. Next up were mid-week excursions to Newcastle and the Ambassador Night Club. Located in the main drag, Hunter Street, it was a scungy, forlorn dive that eventually came alive after repeated visits. Then to another steel city and Wollongong Workers’ the next night, then to far-flung suburbs we hadn’t known existed.
Necessity dictated that we continue to seek out new horizons. So off we went to Melbourne for our first southern tour, excited at the thought of being in funky town and pouring it out to fourteen people in a club in Carlton, most of whom we came to know well, in a circle that included Deb Conway, about to form Do-Ré-Mi, and Paul Hester, a great mate, who ended up drumming in Crowded House. And so it went, on to other capitals, Adelaide and the Arkaba Hotel, then Brisbane and, eventually, the west. In Perth the pattern repeated itself, except bands played on Sunday afternoons at ‘Sunday sessions’ after which everyone, but especially the bands, were definitely at a loose end. The solution? Regroup at one of the few pubs still open on a Sunday night, work the juke box over, ducking and weaving the wild-eyed looking for company before the town shut down. These pubs were our equivalent of the Kaiserkeller nightclub in Hamburg, where the Beatles honed their craft and learned to play all night, fuelled by beer and speed and fast food. As in Sydney, we kept coming back until the rooms were full and punters were turned away.
…
Unlike the rest of the band, who were in steady relationships, I was so focused on the task we’d set ourselves, still nursing my grief, that I had room for little else. Girls drifted in and out of my life, but I couldn’t hold things down for long enough and the sparks were intermittent. Friendships, for the most part, were suspended.
I lived around the Lower North Shore, occasionally sharing a house with Andrew and Matt, sometimes with other friends, including Richard Geeves from Rock Island days.
If there were earth-shattering events happening I didn’t much notice them. Wherever I happened to be sleeping, a routine of sorts emerged. I’d rise after twelve, slowly get the body back to a semblance of normal, then head down to Curl Curl Beach for a quick dip and a run. Then it was off to the gig, where I’d spill my guts for ninety minutes, drink gallons of water and Staminade, wind down with a beer or two, deconstruct the night, iron out the bugs in lighting and sound with the crew. And then do it again the next night, and month, and year. Winding down after the show was always the hardest part. It’s the time when lots of people in the entertainment industry come unstuck. In the very early days, I’d drive back into town when the others—quieter at this time—had headed for home. Martin would often come with me and we’d grab a pizza and play some pool or, mid-week, we’d hang out at Kings Cross, occasionally bumping into other bands having a late-night drink and telling war stories. Other nights we’d finish with a cup of tea at Martin’s flat overlooking Wedding Cake Island at Coogee as dawn broke. One early morning I was lamenting the dearth of surf songs in the set. A few weeks later he walked in with a guitar theme that would resonate for years. ‘Wedding Cake Island’ was our first big song; the fact that it was purely instrumental might have helped.
Later on, I’d often stay at the venue for hours decompressing, just hanging round, deconstructing the show with the crew, letting the after-burn of the night fade until the dreams of ordinary men took over again.
Our musical spirits now unleashed, we’d happily play on after the show with whatever instruments were at hand. At the Ritz in Manly, previously a picture theatre, a small crowd would gather around the piano still sitting in the mezzanine and hit us with requests as we sang the night away, Jim massaging the ivories through old radio classics, the Doors, Elvis Costello, anything that was singable into the early hours.
If we finished early it was important to find something to do or the night would spoil with our body clocks set to peak after midnight. After playing to a bewildered first-time crowd at a pub in the South Coast town of Tathra, we were done by ten and so retired to the roof of the motel in the main street. It was flat and made of concrete, an ideal place to pull out the guitars and sing and drink and smoke until dawn.
The after-show jams were by no means routine, and over the years they happened less and less, and then usually in a hotel room—the second home of the touring musician—but they were pure outings and I fed off these moments; they were solid preparations for the marathon haul we’d embarked on.
At this time there wasn’t anything like the travelling one-day rock extravaganza of Aussie pub rock anywhere else in the world. Bands would bring all their musical equipment, as well as sound and lights, into an empty room comprising four walls, beer-sodden carpet and a couple of power points behind a basic stage. A desolate drinking trough would be turned into a ‘you’ve got to be there’ rock cauldron in the space of six hours, as road crew lugged in box after box of gear: mixing desk, lighting rig, speaker boxes and drapes, completely transforming the empty space.
Along with our new-guard peers, the Angels and Cold Chisel, we pioneered the door deal, a basic form of capitalism that meant you got paid on the basis of how many people showed up. It was an honest model but needed proactive management who were skilled in promotion to make sure fans knew you were playing at a particular venue on a
particular date. It also required someone with the instincts of a bloodhound to be simultaneously checking off the numbers as the audience came in the front door and making sure no one was sneaking in through the back.
On a good night, a thousand people or more would pour into the pub, share the songs, then pour out again, leaving the same handful of crew to pull it all down. This involved packing up in super-quick time then carrying tons of equipment outside to be loaded into waiting trucks that would set off into the night, sometimes across the city, sometimes interstate.
And on it went, night after night. It was grinding, exacting work—an extreme version of the musician’s life on the road, when most time is spent travelling or waiting, with the high point that is the performance over in a flash. The crews were as determined as any technician in any opera house to honour the entertainment industry’s first commandment—the show must go on—but under far more difficult conditions. It was a small miracle that more road crew weren’t seriously injured by the inevitable mishaps that happen in a pressure-cooker environment. There was no shortage of electrocutions, rollovers, clashes with authority figures and wilful fans, scrapes and near misses.
The early Midnight Oil road crew was fiercely proud, with a staggering work ethic but few communication skills. Most interaction with others was short and brutal, along the lines of, ‘Fuck off and get out of my way, I’ve got a job to do.’
At rougher venues there was some risk in this approach, as we discovered when playing the Comb and Cutter Hotel in Blacktown—where, surprisingly, the publican took offence at this phrase being uttered within earshot of his wife at the end of the night. He came up onto the stage—hallowed ground for road crew—to complain, only to be met with the automatic response.
In the ensuing discussion he was flattened by a sudden right-hand jab from the roadie in question and a nasty brawl followed. We struggled to separate the warring parties and, in the face of increasing numbers on the publican’s side, grabbed our bags and retreated to the hotel car park. Attempts to negotiate a ceasefire with the hotel security staff were abandoned. The finer details of who said what to whom no longer mattered and they were clearly in no mood for making up. At last it was agreed that if the roadie in question—known to all and sundry as the Pig—was kept out of sight (by now I fervently wished to see the last of him as well), they would allow us to finish loading out the equipment.
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