Midnight Oil’s Jim Moginie celebrates his Irishness, music in new memoir
Jim Moginie didn’t know about his Irish heritage until he was in his late 40s and managed to track down his birth parents in suburban Australia. The Midnight Oil guitarist and chief songwriter, who was adopted soon after birth, must have been one of the last people on the planet to wise up.
In his new memoir, Moginie, now aged 68, relates that a Dublin chambermaid was convinced he was of Irish descent as was the New Zealand musician Neil Finn who is 50% Irish. And I — absolutely 0% Irish — just assumed he was Irish. So that makes three of us, at least.
Jim’s quest to trace his roots and fill in the troubling gaps in his life makes up a serious chunk of The Silver River: A Memoir of Family — Lost, Made and Found, and it’s a thrilling read. Most rock star bios fade fast in the last few chapters because their careers have run their course and there’s nothing else to write about except money and women problems.
But Silver River, named after an Irish waterway that nourished Jim’s ancestors, is like two books for the price of one. Much of it lifts the lid on the Oils, a fanatically private band despite its hard-won global success with such socio-political hits as “Beds are Burning” and “U.S. Forces.”
And just as their career hits a plateau at the turn of the century — too P.C., too mainstream, singer gets a new job — Jim is happily distracted by his family found (with his adoptive family’s blessing). He connects with his his birth parents in the nick of time, along with five full brothers and sisters and an ecstatic brother-in-law who blasts Midnight Oil’s high-octane “Kosciusko” (link to YT live clip) while doing donuts around the car park.
Jim submerges himself in shamrock, meets up with extended kin on the Emerald Isle and makes it his second home. While wary of romanticizing his Irishness, he jams with the locals at every opportunity and attends countless riotous weddings, even singing “Beds are Burning” at one of them. It’s more emotional than a drunken singalong of “Danny Boy” at closing time.
But one has to wonder: What if Jim’s DNA had been Polish or Finnish, or — gasp! — Scottish? Could he have embraced his heritage quite so enthusiastically? Would the old country have warmed to him? From personal experience, I can’t see the dour Scots giving him the time of day. I guess the book would be much shorter.
There’s plenty more treasure in Silver River. Jim’s a deliberately low-key chap, definitely the least recognizable member in Midnight Oil, lurking in the shadows at stage right, obscured by a hat, guitar and/or keyboard. Even one of his newfound brothers recalled seeing the band back in the ‘80s but not noticing him. And that’s OK with Jim. At heart he is an electronics nerd who worships the Dutch prog-rock band Focus and their guitarist Jan Akkermann, and puts the music first. His first tour, as a teen, was evidently a chaste affair. “Drugs, girls and adulation weren’t important,” he claims.
That pretty much sums up the band that would become Midnight Oil, and the word “monastic” pops up a few times. We do learn, though, that lead singer Peter Garrett — their future “father figure and taskmaster” — and their bonkers manager Gary Morris were initially bonded by, among other things “weed [and] women.” It’s a jarring observation when you remember that they eventually became born-again Christians. Late bassist Bones Hillman preferred to hang out with the roadies because his bandmates were so boring, Jim sighs. The Osmonds probably got up to more hijinks.
What’s not boring are Midnight Oil’s live shows, and Jim is not short of tales from the road, even if the travel became a drag in later years. He couldn’t wait to get out of America a few years ago, in part because of the shocking decay in, uh, left-wing sanctuary cities. I have an uncredited role in one anecdote: I spotted him in Leipzig during Midnight Oil’s farewell trek in 2022 and stole away from a walking tour to go fanboy on him. Jim recounts his trip to Leipzig (but leaves me out of it) as well as the great Berlin show a few nights before where a Theremin player added some psychedelic magic to “Short Memory.”
The musical highlights of the book are arguably the songwriting and recording sessions. Garrett’s verbose memoir, which mentioned everyone in the Australian telephone book, largely glossed over his band’s catalog. But Jim provides all the detail you need to know about the hits – and even the misses like the forgotten 1996 album Breathe, which he considers a personal favorite. Silver River, ahem, flows very easily. I read it in a day. The tone is appropriately understated, and the writing style is elegantly self-effacing. Amid the honest recount of personal insecurities, marital woes, career struggles, and worst of all — being “a bad father,” one wonders whether Jim should try to develop a bit of an ego. He is most definitely worthy.
NOTE: If you liked this week review, try my gossipy rock bio Strange Days: The Adventures of a Grumpy Rock ‘n’ Roll Journalist in Los Angeles, available here
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