Photo by Daniel Boud
Midnight Oil today announced plans to release its new studio album — a 12-song collection titled Resist — next year and mount what it’s calling the band’s final tour, consisting of more than 20 headlining and festival dates in Australia and New Zealand in early 2022.
The Oils insist this does not mark the end of the band, just the end of touring — and the group says it is considering “a handful of international concerts,” subject to COVID restrictions.
As guitarist Jim Moginie put it in the band’s announcement:
“These will be sad and beautiful gigs, but luckily we’re still capable of blowing the roof off any stage and that’s what we intend to do. You could call this a farewell tour, but Midnight Oil will still continue in some form or other as we’re brothers, family. We stand as one, dependent on each other and grateful in all the important ways that make great bands great.”
The Oils’ statement says the band’s members “remain very open to recording new music together in (the) future and supporting causes in which they believe, but this will be their last tour.”
The new Warne Livesey-produced album, preceded by recently released first single and opening track “Rising Seas,” is reportedly due out in March, though the band did not specify a release date in its announcement. They say it will become available for pre-order beginning Tuesday, Nov. 30.
The Oils recorded Resist alongside 2020’s The Makarrata Project — a collaboration with First Nation musicians — pre-COVID, and prior to the death last year of bassist Bones Hillman, who appears on the new record. (Bassist Adam Ventoura is touring with the Oils.) The album, the band says, “engages with the issues of today and tomorrow,” as evidence already by the climate-change-themed “Rising Seas.”
Frontman Peter Garrett says:
“We all know time refuses to stand still for anyone but after many years together the band’s spirit is deep, the music and words are strong, and our ideas and actions as bold as we can make them. We’ve reached people in ways we never could have imagined. Our desire to create and speak out is undimmed. We hope everyone who hears this album and gets to one of the shows will come away charged up about the planet’s future, saying ‘why stop now?’ Having always tackled every tour like it’s the last — this time it actually will be.”
Below, check out the album’s tracklist and cover art — and those final tour dates.
See the band’s website for presale information.
Midnight Oil, Resist
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 Art Not Afraid”
12. “Last Frontier”
Midnight Oil tour dates
AUSTRALIA
Jan. 23: Mona Foma, Royal Park, Launceston, TAS
Jan. 25: Mona Foma, Royal Park, Launceston, TAS
Jan. 28: Mona Foma, Mona Lawns, Nipaluna/Hobart, TAS, Australia
Jan. 31: Mona Foma, Mona Lawns, Nipaluna/Hobart, TAS
Feb. 23: Newcastle Entertainment Centre, Newcastle, NSW
Feb. 26: Heifer Station, Orange, NSW
March 2: WIN Entertainment Centre, Wollongong, NSW
March 5: Mt Duneed Estate, Geelong, VIC
March 9: Rod Laver Arena, Melbourne, VIC
March 12: All Saints Estate, Rutherglen, VIC
March 26: ikola Estate, Swan Valley, WA
March 30: Adelaide Entertainment Centre, Adelaide, SA
April 2: Darwin Amphitheatre, Darwin, NT
April 6: Convention Centre Arena, Cairns, QLD
April 9: Sunshine Coast Stadium, Sunshine Coast, QLD
April 13: Riverstage, Brisbane, QLD
April 15: Bluesfest, Byron Bay, NSW
April 19: Stage 88, Canberra, ACT
April 21: Qudos Bank Arena, Sydney, NSW
NEW ZEALAND
May 7: Christchurch Arena, Christchurch
May 10: TSB Arena, Wellington
May 13: Spark Arena, Auckland
PREVIOUSLY ON SLICING UP EYEBALLS:
- Midnight Oil releases climate call to action ‘Rising Seas’ off upcoming studio album
- Listen: Midnight Oil returns with ‘Gadigal Land’ — first new song in 17 years
- Midnight Oil to release ‘Gadigal Land’ — first new song in 17 years — this week
- Midnight Oil to release 2 new albums this year, tour internationally into 2021
- Midnight Oil details huge new 12-disc box set: Demos, rarities, B-sides, hours of live video
- Midnight Oil announces massive 2017 reunion tour, 3 huge box sets with unreleased music
If you’ve never seen the Oils live and get the chance to on this last tour, I’d strongly recommend you take it. They are hands down one of the greatest live acts I’ve ever seen. And that’s coming from a grateful punter who’s been lucky enough to have caught The Stones, U2, Page & Plant, New Order, The Cure, Fleetwood Mac, Simple Minds, The Church and hundreds of other great artists. The power this band produces on stage really has to be seen to be believed.
Bummer if they do not do a proper farewell/final tour.