Midnight Oil
Resist - Sony 2022
Tracks: 1. Rising Seas / 2. The Barka Darling River / 3. Tarkine / 4. At the Time of Writing / 5. Nobody's Child / 6. To the Ends of the Earth / 7. Reef / 8. We Resist / 9. Lost at Sea / 10. Undercover / 11. We Are Not Afraid / 12. Last Frontier
Comments:
This album came as a big unexpected surprise to me. Especially because the group's recently deceased bassplayer Bones Hillman, the bassist with the beautiful voice,
participates. The previous album "The Makarrata Project" was released a few days before Hillman's death in November 2020. I thus did not expect new Midnight Oil music with Hillman featured on bass.
Now it turns out that many other new songs were recorded during "The Makarrata Sessions" and most of these have now been released on this 2022 album, "Resist".
In terms of sound, we are back to the sound that brought the group their big breakthrough with albums such as "Diesel and Dust", "Blue Sky Mining" and "Earth and Sun and Moon".
Guitarist Jim Moginie has written the majority of these predominantly melodic rock songs; in most cases with clear political views. This has been a hallmark of the group throughout its long career.
The album opens strong with four strong classic Midnight Oil tracks. "Rising Seas" is airy rocker with classic harmony vocals on the chorus. A clear comment on the climate crisis. "The Banka Darling River" is a two-part song with the first part as a rather hard rocker, while the second part is subdued with piano in the foreground.
"Tarkine" is a more folkish thing with acoustic guitar; melodic and released as a single as early as 2021. “At the Time of Writing” is another single; a catchy upbeat rocker.
From here things become more uneven with numbers of more varying impact. The best are the ones where the acoustic guitars are allowed to play a significant role, such as "To the Ends of the World", "Reef", "Lost at Sea" and "Last Frontier".
Great to have a new album from these great guys who always have important things on their minds. If more will come only time will know.
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