Review: Place Without A Postcard by Midnight Oil (1981)

I am supposed to be packing for a week away but I promised I would do this, so I have to get it done now while I have internet. For fairness I will again pick apart the songs and try to ignore the overall deep attachment I have to this record. I sing this album right through to myself sometimes, on a long walk or during a long wait for a train etc. I once had a mildly hellish ride back to Cuzco from Machu Picchu on a crowded train, riding in the toilet cubicle the whole way; and my memory of this album got me through it. 

Don’t Wanna Be The One Jim Moginie on the organ is the spine of this track. Kind of dull 4/4 from Rob Hirst until the big finish. 6/10

Brave Faces This is the real start of the album for me. When I sing it my recitation always starts with “I’ve seen faces in the window”. The bridge has another great walking bassline that returns in the coda paired with a great guitar solo, tied in a bow at the end. 8½/10

Armistice Day Very unusual song to release as a single. Slow and menacing. I have never been a huge fan of it - it is almost too spare. Full instrumentation kicks in after nearly 2 minutes. Lyrically and in tempo a cousin of Short Memory on 10 9 8. 6/10

Someone Else To Blame Short sharp and perceptive song. “See me suffer see me pain - must be someone else to blame”. Busy bass, great solo. 8/10

Basement Flat Hell is other people - a song about the rental market. First chorus seems to come from somewhere else entirely, but the second one fits better somehow. About 1:50 someone starts playing a stapler. Good but not great song. “What can I do - there must be some solution” - not one of their most rousing calls to action. 5/10

Written In The Heart The chorus suffers a little from the words-don’t fit music thing, but the music is terrific although the dreaded harmonica appears near the end. 7/10

Burnie This is about my hometown, so I have always pricked my ears up to the lyrics. Burnie is an industrial port town - in 1981 especially it would have been pretty ugly. This song is unflattering but has empathy - it says you don’t have to accept it or leave it - you can stay and change it. I have a feeling the “surfing priest” was Fr Jim Souley, who took over our parish shortly before I stopped attending mass. Musically its a bit slow and has an unconvincing chord change going into the chorus. 6/10

Quinella Holiday A cracker - a Paul Kelly-like short story in a song. And the beginning of a wonderful Abbey Road-style medley 9/10

 as it rolls into … Loves On Sale Catchy uptempo powerpop number about conspicuous consumption. Some Reg Mombassa-sounding whammy in there 8/10

If Ned Kelly Was King A really mature and complex song. 17-year-old me thought Ned Kelly as king was a fine idea. Summary justice for Christopher Skase, Alan Bond, politicians who tee up legislation for miners then retire as paid consultants. Quinella Holiday sneaks in again at the end. 9/10

Lucky Country Really taut and balanced rock song up to 2:40 when the “helicopter” keyboard pulse comes in (Koala Sprint/Outside World style) .Garrett goes into an extraordinary spoken word rant over acoustic guitar before the electrics return. Garrett chants “small talk, small talk” as the boys sing “lucky country” behind him. 8/10

Average mark 7.3 = ★★★★

Review: Head Injuries by Midnight Oil (1979)

I am going to review a couple of old Midnight Oil albums in order to measure them against each other and justify my preference for one over the other. In fairness, I have only ever had this album Head Injuries as a muddy-sounding home pirated cassette. Clearly I am not an audiophile - and I would never criticise music for it's production values so it's not going to influence me I don't think.

I don't really get into anything Midnight Oil recorded after Red Sails In The Sunset (1984). They made some good and rightfully popular music but it didn't grab me the way the early stuff did. I was at Joe Crawford's house, one day in grade 10 I think, and he was playing some albums his cool young Uncle Max had sent them from Sydney, including Place Without A Postcard. I was hooked immediately. One of my formative experiences as a 17 year old was taking off to Launceston with a gang of schoolmates to see them play at the Velodrome (not an especially charismatic venue) and about ten of us staying that night in a holiday cabin nearby that accommodated 4.

Cold Cold Change opens the album with what I think of as a dumb riff, like Feeling Kinda Sporty by Dave Graney is. The best part of the song is the chord at the end. It was released as a single. It's common to start an album with what you think is the strongest track; but I think they were wrong. 5/10

Section 5 (Bus to Bondi) On this record quite often the lyrics don't scan very well, just ill-suited to the musical space provided. Here is an example "Push start this car tomorrow, I'll take it to the tip yaaaaaaaard, and I'll leave it as a memory for cats.to.sleep" 5/10

Naked Flame - This works. Like a lot of their songs at this stage I have no idea what this about. It's got a nice Sherberty harmonic chorus near the end. 7/10

Back on the Borderline opens with great drum solo and settles into a good tempo. Very catchy 4 word chorus. "The only place is Laminex" - nup no idea what this is about either. Much more straighforward rock without tempo changes etc of first few tracks. 8/10

Koala Sprint opens with a spoken word bit over a choppy keyboard something like a distant helicopter (which returns on Outside World on a later album). Part 2 is a quiet instrumental prelude then Garret screams and it turns into road song, about a surf trip going north. A bit like Houndog by Cold Chisel. Then for the outro the helicopter comes back. End of side 1. I can hear the needle lift on my home taped cassette. 6/10

No Reaction is back to four on the floor rock, nice spidery guitar solo in the middle. "You're almost but not quite more than we deserve" was a bit complex for me as a teenager and I still don't think I have nailed it. 7/10

Stand in Line  The standout track. No Reaction sets it up well. Deals with unfairness of mining riches, unevenness of wealth distribution. Killer bassline, one of their best. Appealed to my teen sense of the world being unfair and the first step on the ladder being deliberately put out of my reach. Well, I was relatively well off and had nothing to whinge about really but out of *many people's* reach. Good guitar solo then some vocal gymnastics for a big angry finish. Must have been a roof-raiser live. 9/10

I was actually in Sydney when this concert on Goat Island happened, simulcast on Triple J and ABC TV.

Profiteers does some tricky time signature things, starts waltz, then goes 4/4, it's lost me if I'm honest. Vocals sound like they were done via a pay phone; a bit of a singsong nursery rhyme thing about recruiting boys to be soldiers. Back to waltz at the end and some military drums to help the thickies like me who haven't worked out it's about war. 6/10

Is it Now. I am feeling a sense of relief when a new track starts and it's simple rock. They were such a good tight rock band. The riff reminds me of Mental As Anything’s Possible Theme for a Future TV Drama Series. 7/10

Average mark: 6.667 which you could say equates to ★★★.

EDIT!!! 

I have come up with a new system for converting marks out of ten to star ratings. 2.5 or below is one star. 9 or above is 5 stars. On that basis Head Injuries is worth ★★★½

The Rees Marks-to-Stars System

Khaki ice-cream

My new experience for today was green tea ice cream. Possibly getting it from a suburban pizza joint was not the best choice. It tasted like, hmmm, well imagine picking a bunch of any random plant in your garden, and blending it with vanilla ice cream. That.

And it was almost exactly the colour of our house. That paint was called Tree Of Heaven, but it is basically khaki.

I give the khaki plant-flavoured ice cream 2 stars. ★★☆☆☆