Who's Gonna Save Me?4 Out of 5 Stars
Spanning from 1978 to 1998, "20,000 Watts RSL" makes for a decent Midnight Oil primer. These aggressive Aussies with the overpowering lead singer put the politics of rock onto the airwaves, achieving their biggest US success when "Beds Are Burning" cracked the top 20 in 1988. It makes this a broad base to try and capture a band that has some 14 studio albums to their name, while Americans know them through one song. While Diesel and Dust (recently reissued) may be their best - and best known - album, there's a lot more to hear.
Midnight Oil started out as a loud and angry band, fighting their way out of the bar circuit with a gritty debut (not represented here) and soon gathering their stand with Peter Garret's politics and the band putting their money where their mouth is. By the time they got to 10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1, the band's relentless guitar attack and Garret's sermonizing songs gelled into a power not unlike that of The Clash, but with a more musical bent. Songs like "Power and The Passion" and "US Forces" held nothing back lyrically and guitarists Jim Moginie and Martin Rotsey brought the muscle. The even more strident Red Sails in the Sunset was a tougher sell; with a cover depicted Sydney after a nuclear attack and a droning snarl about Three Mile Island titled "Harrisburg," this was the album made before Garret decided to run for a seat on Australia's government. (An American parallel would have been Henry Rollins running for Senate, or maybe David Byrne.)
When he reconvened the band for "Diesel and Dust," he was ready to make the message count. That meant smoothing down the rougher edges and polishing up the melodies. "Beds are Burning," "The Dead Heart" and "Dream World" are all here and are incredible when you hear them in the knowledge that something this ferocious came from a band that was toning itself down. How many groups in the 80's can say they made dancers shake it to a song about Aboriginal rights? The follow-up, Blue Sky Mining, maintained the force but lost the momentum. Still, songs like the title track, "Forgotten Years," "One Country" and "King of The Mountain" are terrific by any band's standard.
After that, "20,000 Watts RSL" goes slim on the pickens, with one song each from Earth and Sun and Moon and Breathe, and a pair from Redneck Wonderland. While that's a shame ("Earth and Sun and Moon" is a vastly underrated effort), it does show that band still had fire after the International audience began to slip away. But to me, "20,000 Watts RSL" is hardly a waste of CD. Rarely has a band been able to drive their politics to worldwide chart dominance and still keep their integrity. Midnight Oil remain a band of the ages.
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