FEATURE

JIM MOGINIE:

AFT ER  
MIDNIGHT
He’s one of the greatest songwriting talents and
performers this country has produced. Now, post
Midnight Oil, Jim Moginie has been turned onto life on
the other side of the glass.
Text: Andy Stewart

audio
ians in to continue our recent conversation about
Jim Moginie is one of the most iconic music
rock. For 25 years his production…
the history of Austr alian
cal consciousness
musical contribution to the globa l politi GOO D COP BAD COP
riter for the Production
as lead guita rist, keyboard playe r and songw Andy Stewart: Jim, we spoke recently on
place d him fair and squar e in the thick AT Worl d wher e you ment ioned Midn ight Oil
Midnight Oil has Panel at
s the globe has ever cers over the years .
of some of the gutsie st politi cal action had had a few run-ins with produ
on new Mr Nice Guy when produ cing
witnessed. The phrase ‘oils ain’t oils’ took Does that now mean you’r e
morn ing the band playe d a guerr illa-style gig other s?
meaning the
e the office s of Exxon
on the back of a flatbed truck outsid Jim Moginie: In the end it’s about honesty.
You can’t
sting the Alask an oil spill the g someone
in New York City, prote always be nice. There ’s a fine line betwe en tellin
any looke d for all the world to be gettin g away with. rting them,
comp
page and what you think and at the same time suppo
The gig put the disaster back on the front especially with younger artist s. It’s an ongo ing proce ss,
the comp any finall y admi tting liability, and an
contributed to and calling what I now do ‘recor d produ ction ’ is
ultimately chang ing its ways. interesting and perhaps slight ly inaccurate
term. To me a
Jim has done who book s the studi o, chooses
As a linchpin member of Midnight Oil, record producer is the guy
right s move ment , the environment and and basic ally gets the perfo rman ces out of
more for the land the songs
around Australia e very blurred
various other political and socia l causes people. That’s about it. That line’s becom
music ian outsid e the band. e to budd ing produ cers is, if you’re
than just about any other lately and my advic
and playe d on some of the most epic, to get invol ved in some one’s recor d and call yourself
He’s co-w ritten going
of rock ‘n’ roll avoid becoming
politically charged albums in the history ‘the producer’, you’d better be caref ul to
selves, but also the perso n who gets the blame
and his legac y is not only the songs them the meat in the sandw ich or
alian socia l get a produ cer so we
his contr ibutio n to the emer gence of an Austr if things go pear-shaped. “Hey, let’s
that sound s mad, but with some
conscience. can blame him!” I know
and a solo proje cts, it’s a bit like that.
These days Jim combines his love of music
He’s got more ion this
caree r with his other passi on – audio gear. People often forget it’s a high-pressure situat
o than most is unde r press ure, especially
stuff lying around on the floor of his studi recording business. The artist
in five lifetim es and his ambi tion – or is it e tryin g to follow up some thing that was
people acquire if they’r
renting out the music and you
a pipe dream? – is to start up a hire busin
ess successful, but I think once you get into
spect ing band s. all tends to disso lve pretty quick ly.
esoteric instru ments to unsu start playing, it
that pressure
The equipment list in his Sydney studio
is long and AS: So do you try and take advantage of
envy. The or do you prefer to make
class-A enough to turn most green(ie) with when you’re recording someone,
s are comp rised of a semi- an artist feel relax ed?
walls of the track ing room
tion of recyc led timbe rs, stone and glass –
random collec just enjoy
t timbe r up on the wall JM: I try and make them feel relaxed and
each with its own story to tell: “Tha themselves.
point ing up into the ceilin g “used to
there,” Jim recounts,
be the floor of the old Roya l Antle r Hote l.” PLAC E WITH OUT A POST CARD
doesn’t sound like
he preaches, but AS: Being relaxed and enjoy ing yourself
There’s no doubting Jim pract ices what ience you once had work ing with producer Glyn
the leg off a chair with political the exper
he’s not one to chew us a bit about that?
spoke n, empa thetic and one hell of Johns years ago. Can you tell
diatri be. He’s softly
o, Ocea nic, Place
a guita rist. I caught up with him at his studi JM: I was about 23 when Midnight Oil made

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 Without a Postcard, and at that early stage I’d never even
been outside Australia. Suddenly we were invited by Glyn
to his farm in Sussex to make a record and every day
you’d be eating breakfast and looking up at all these gold
records from bands like The Small Faces, The Rolling
Stones, The Beatles, Joan Armatrading, The Eagles, The
Ozark Mountain Daredevils, you name it… gold records
everywhere… and you’d be sitting there having your
Crunchy Wheat thinking, “How the hell are we going to
get up there?”
But there was something about the band that Glyn
recognised – essentially it was our capacity for live
performance. Personally, I couldn’t see it at that time
but he thought we were a really great live band and just
wanted to capture that. I remember thinking maybe we
should make a record that was a bit more experimental
like the other records being released at the time – you
do get influenced by what’s successfully being released
around you… and I was a young pup you see. Anyway, we
went in there and made a very, very live-sounding album
and Place Without a Postcard was the result.
I remember Glyn was a very opinionated, very forceful
guy. He didn’t want you to play guitar in the room if he
wasn’t recording it, didn’t want anyone near the studio
if you weren’t recording, and loved the first take. He’d
have a red light that he’d switch on if a take wasn’t going
well, so when the light came on you’d have to just stop
and start again. No words were exchanged; you just had
to go from the top. It wasn’t much fun at the time, but
listening back to the record now I think it’s one of the best
things we ever did. It was simply the band playing at its
best, without any bullshit going on: no machines, no click
tracks… It’s got a real rawness to it, a raw honesty that
at the time just seemed a bit daggy to me… but Glyn was
like: “That’s good enough. That’s what you are. Go with
it. Trust it.”
AS: So you didn’t enjoy making that record at all?
JM: No, I personally didn’t enjoy making that record at
all.
AS: Not even when you were in the middle of a take?
JM: Well, obviously you enjoy that part of it, but Glyn
was quite an intimidating guy. He was constantly
saying things like, “When I recorded Let It Be, every
time Lennon walked into the room he’d make some
wisecrack… he was a funny guy you know.” We were
intimidated that’s for sure.
But he got some great vocal performances out of Peter.
There was one incident where things weren’t going very
well and he just said, “Right, okay, stop the machine. Peter
and I are going to have some time…” He went into the
overdub booth… and well… I don’t know what he said
to Peter but he came back after about an hour and a half
and said, “I’ve got it.” He pressed record and Pete nailed
the vocal in the first take. Lucky Country was the song. It
was all about Australia and I think he must have talked to
Peter about his family… and that came out in that take.
It’s an extraordinary vocal performance that Glyn drew
out of Peter, and he did it with psychology, and knowing
the difference between someone merely singing along – la,
la, la – and someone actually feeling it from the gut;
actually living it.
That’s why I think when you comp things up with DAWs
it doesn’t have the same effect at all. It might be ‘perfect’
and the singer might prefer it ’cause it makes them sound
like they can sing in tune, but it’s cannibalism. It’s much
better to have a verse that says it all, get focused and get
it on tape – preferably live while the band’s playing. That
will give it a sense of realism. It mightn’t be perfect but
the feeling will be there. It’s that feeling that’s all too often
AT 12
lost when you comp a vocal.
The problem with DAWs is that because they allow you
to fiddle with performance, you invariably do. To me
the crucial thing is to listen to what you’re doing as a
performer, and put down a heart-felt raw take. That’s
always going to be more happening, and a punter who
listens to a record – even though he or she won’t necessarily
know the difference – will go: “I prefer that one… don’t
know why. It just feels better.”
Everybody wants to be perfect these days and when
technology feeds that mania you’ve got problems. When
people are cool enough to leave things alone you usually
get a much better result. I wouldn’t say it’s the case across
the board but you’ll definitely get something that feels
more human, and people will relate to that because it is
human.
“
Discovering what they
don’t want to put on
their record is
sometimes more
important than what
they do want
”
THE LIBERATION OF LIMITATION
AS: Implicit in this observation is presumably the ability
to play instruments. But then again, the charm with some
albums is the ‘inability’ as it were of the players. Would
you agree?
JM: Yeah, and for me I’m just liking being around all of it.
It doesn’t matter to me whether it’s a punk band or a pop
thing with high production values, as long as I’m working
with musicians and around that energy. I love that feeling
of starting with a clean slate – where you don’t know what
you’re going to do, yet somehow it all falls into place – for
me, that’s what it’s all about.
I think the longer I do this, the more I’m convinced
you have to get as much down live as you can. In fact,
the more you can record things where people are being
captured almost without them even knowing it, the better
it is. And part of the charm of my new recording space is
that when people walk in here they pick up some strange
instrument and before they know it they’re playing music.
To me that’s how production begins. From there you can
easily embark on a conversation with the artist, where
they might then say: “Oh well, I don’t really like electric
guitar but I really like nylon string guitar” or “I really like
upright pianos but not grand pianos.” Being surrounded
by instruments naturally provokes those conversations –
that’s how I like to start to formulate an idea of what the
artist likes – discovering what they don’t want to put on
their record is sometimes more important than what they
do want.
Making some rules – and sure, rules are made to be
broken – can make your life a lot easier. As a record
develops, having a palette of predetermined colours that
you’ve chosen beforehand rather than being open to
literally everything makes things move forward quickly.
There’s nothing like a well-chosen limitation.
GUITARIST BECOMES PRODUCER
AS: Can you tell me how you made the transition from Midnight Oil
guitarist to producer? Was it any more complicated than Midnight Oil
simply breaking up?
JM: I fell into it somewhat after I did a bit of work with Silverchair… some
B-sides that we recorded in only a few hours. They sounded fantastic and
it all snowballed from there. Silverchair was doing some music with Nick
Launay – Nick and I are great friends and go way back. Nick’s a brilliant
producer: part mad Spaniard, part analytical Englishman. Anyway, he
actually said something like – and Daniel Johns was quite ill at that stage
– “Oh I just thought Daniel might like to meet someone like you...” and I
said, “Someone like me? What does that mean?”
“Someone who likes to fiddle around with gear and quite enjoys getting
weird sounds out of it!” And he’s right of course – I do.
I played keyboards on a couple of Silverchair’s albums after that, and
then just started working with other people – Neil Murray, The Fauves,
Neil Finn, Sarah Blasko – and played on their albums too. That’s really
how it is with all the albums I ‘produce’ these days – I’m usually playing
on them somewhere. I can’t help myself. I get enthusiastic and think,
‘Oh, what about this?’ and ‘What about that?’ to which the band either
responds: ‘Yeah, yeah!’ or ‘No, no. Please don’t!’
I must admit, I do get carried away sometimes – I want to be out there with
the band.
AS: But you don’t want to literally be in the band, I assume?
JM: No, I certainly don’t want to be in the Tarago with them fighting about
the tambourine overdub we did 18 months ago.
Sometimes I have to back off ’cause I know what it’s like to experience
producer interference from a band perspective. We made an album once
with Malcolm Burn – who’s done some work with Daniel Lanois – where
Malcolm ended up playing a lot of the instruments on the record, and
even though it was kind of interesting, it did make me think, ‘What if he’s
wrong? What if we could have played them better?’ I mean, it’s our record
after all.
AS: I think it’s kind of weird when a producer starts to live vicariously
through another band like that – impinge on the band’s right to perform
their own music…
JM: Yeah you’ve got to be respectful. You’ve got to understand the
chemistry of the band and sometimes you’ve got to get right out of the
way. Other times it’s necessary. A band might need another musical
colour: somebody to pick up an acoustic guitar, even somebody to just hit
something to get them in the mood. With a great band, like The Living
End for instance, who were in here at Oceanic a few weeks ago, you don’t
need to do anything much. I’d never dream, for instance, of jumping
in and grabbing the guitar off Chris Cheney and playing it. In that
circumstance my philosophy is simple: it’s the band’s record and they have
to live with it. They’re going to be the ones out there on the road after all,
and they’ve got to know it’s them playing it. You don’t want a Milli Vanilli
situation arising…
The worst kind of producer is the one that goes: “To get a hit record you’ve
got to a) make sure it’s less than three minutes so it gets played on the
radio; b) make sure the guitar solos are no more than 10 seconds long; c)
get this guy to mix it; and d) that guy to master it.”
My attitude is more like, “You know what guys? Radio isn’t going to play
you anyway, so you’re free to do whatever you like.” And they go, “Oh, okay
then. We’re free to be who we are?” “Yes, you’re free to be who you are.
That’s fine with me.”
People come in here sometimes thinking ‘Jim’s going to give us a good
record because he’s had so many hits himself’ blah, blah, blah… but really,
I’ve got about as much clue as the next bloke. If it’s exciting to listen to,
that’s great. If the band feels like they’re excited then that comes through
in the performance. If there are some interesting sonic ingredients in there
then that’s great too. But the most important thing is the song. First and
foremost, the song must be there.
SELF-DISCOVERY
AS: Is it important for an artist to ‘discover themselves’ do you think –
have the guts to be themselves, as it were?
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JM: Psychologically that’s sometimes very hard because when
people do that and find there’s nothing there, it’s terrifying for

“
them – no-one wants to discover that! When there is something
there and they can unlock it, it’s wonderful. But of course not
everyone is a songwriter and there’s no harm in singing someone
else’s song. A song recorded with hundreds of
I did a recording in here with Sarah Blasko last year – a bonus indecisive overdubs... that’s my
disc of songs for a record she’d done in Sweden with Bjorn
Yttling. We were playing songs from musicals like The Sound version of an unholy nightmare from
of Music, Fame… we even did a version of Xanadu! I know it Danté’s Inferno

”
sounds daggy but it was just beautiful. Those songs could be
played in a rainstorm busking in a tube station and they’d still
work! There’s something completely bulletproof about those
songs.
She was in that corner over there singing [Jim points to where
the drumkit is currently set up] and I was playing piano over
here, and I swear there were moments where the hairs stood up
on the back of my neck, and I thought: ‘This is why I’m in this
business. This is so beautiful’.
So whether it’s your song or someone else’s, if the person in the
spotlight is at all doubtful about what they’re doing, it’s going
to be obvious to the audience. A vocal performance has to be
sincere and compelling – it’s gotta be intense. It can’t just be
half-arsed and you definitely can’t go into a recording session
thinking: ‘We’ll put it together in ProTools and make it sound
nice later’. That’s folly.
In the old days – and I do hate talking about the old days – in
the ’50s the singer had one shot at a take… and then more
recently one or two tracks of a 24-track tape machine. You
had to step up at that moment and find something in yourself.
What annoys me now is that things can take so long – people,
musicians can be terribly indecisive. I mean I’m a musician
and I can be indecisive – more than most other people – but
I know musicians can prevaricate and the technology allows
them to. It’s a sin! You’ve gotta control it! A song recorded with
hundreds of indecisive overdubs? That’s my version of an unholy
nightmare from Danté’s Inferno.

GEAR LUST
AS: How did you end up becoming a ‘gear guy’ Jim?
JM: I’ve always loved gear and I guess in some ways it’s an
addiction. But as you of all people must know, it’s also a
fascination. When I was in Midnight Oil we’d always be in
studios in England or The States where there would invariably
be an instrument lying around and we’d be like: ‘What’s that?
That’s great! Gotta use that’.
When we did 10 to 1 with Nick Launay I got the number of
this guy called Maurice Plaquet, who had a gear hire company CSIRO TESTS OILS
in London. We were always getting marimbas and Hammond
JM: I actually came from a science background.
organs off Maurice, and the day I walked into his warehouse Believe it or not, I was doing a degree in
was when it all started. There were all kinds of instruments: architectural acoustics when the band first took
harpsichords, theremins… some quite esoteric stuff. It looked off. Needless to say I didn’t quite finish it, but that’s
incredible. When The Oils split I started to hoard instruments where I was heading. I worked at the CSIRO for a
and hire a bit of the gear out, which was actually a lot of fun. It’s while working with building materials: testing their
transmission loss etc. A guy would bring in two
still in the back of my mind somewhere to take it a bit further sheets of glass or something and we’d test them
and develop a warehouse collection of hire gear like Maurice, and give them a rating. I remember we designed the
but I think with the state of studios and budgets in Australia windows for the High Court building in Canberra
being the way they are, I’m not sure it would work out! There are – the judges wanted to sit in silence but they also
a lot of people recording but they don’t have the budgets to hire wanted to look through glass at the lake.
instruments. Budgets have just been killed. AS: Did you enjoy the job?
JM: Yeah, I really enjoyed it, but I enjoyed the band
REIGNING IN A MIX more! So I guess you could say there are two sides
AS: Now that you’re a producer of bands like The Fauves and to my brain: a science-based side, which is quite
The Break, I assume you take the mixing reins sometimes? nerdy and obsessed about gear, and the other side
which is just my wild artist persona that’s a bit of a
JM: I do and I’d say I’m okay at it. I can get everything balanced nut. (laughs)
quickly, but mixing is something best left to other people
sometimes. I like to get the performances right, and get some
exotic sounds hopefully – I’m always learning. But you can’t do
everything: produce the song, be the engineer, be the mixer – it

AT 14 AT 15
turns you into a control freak I reckon. You’ve got to look
around and think to yourself: ‘I should be doing this, he should
be doing that’. If you can achieve that as a producer it helps

“
you avoid that awful sense of dragging the album around like
a ball and chain. Any company boss knows about delegating –
producers should too.

THE ART SCHOOL APPROACH

Adding countless overdubs or
AS: I know you’re a great musician with a powerful layered sounds quickly erodes
imagination. How do you manage to produce albums with
people and avoid racking up hundreds of experimental
intimacy and the ability to draw
overdubs? the listener in

”
JM: I’m like everyone else: I like to discover new things on an
album after repeated listens, but ironically this is one of the
things that leads some people to recording 300 tracks on one
song. Going down all the possible roads to make sure nothing’s
been left out is a distraction, and recording 10 versions of every
part is just plain criminal. Then of course some poor bastard
has to mix it all! Personally, I think musicians that work like
that should be taken out and shot! There’s a certain momentum
in a session, a certain energy, and you’ve got to know when
that’s run out. You just can’t keep texturalising a song forever.
I like to take the art school approach. With sculpture, for
example, as with music, there are tools at your disposal: you’ve
got chisels to carve with, hammers to beat things into shape
with and saws to cut with. Instruments are like that too. Things
can be made rough, things can be made smooth, and there’s a
perception of depth and negative space where shapes are created
by a hole. This enterprise utilises the same part of the brain that
perceives three-dimensional space and it’s exactly the same in
music: taking away things can be so much more powerful than
piling more stuff on. Adding countless overdubs or layered
sounds quickly erodes intimacy and the ability to draw the
listener in. It’s like going to a party where there’s a thousand
people yelling their heads off: you tend to just switch off, turn
around and go home – or at least I do! If it’s smaller and there’s
not as much noise going on you feel like you’ve been invited in.
It’s more meaningful.
AS: Although, you must have wanted to put lots of layers on top
of a performance to physically create that sort of scale before,
surely?
JM: To me, overdubbing the same thing several times just
smoothes things off too much, like sanding something back
– you end up with a very shiny surface. It may be pleasing to
some to create that mirror finish, but it’s not an aesthetic I like.
I particularly dislike hearing a double-tracked vocal where the
singer is using the word “I”. I take the attitude that when you’re
recording vocals and someone says “I”, you don’t double-track
it. If it’s “we” then okay you can have as many voices as you LIVE RECORDING IN CANS
want. But if the lyric is: “I like the sound of surf crashing on the JM: Recording with headphones can sometimes
really cripple a recording. They can make musicians
beach” then I want there to be only one person saying it.
become very critical of their own performance and
Again, to me it’s like sculpting – I’m hearing things much then they start to collapse. The air comes out of the
more in those terms than I used to. Having embarked on a song like a balloon and they fall on the floor. They
become nit-picky and a pain in the arse. Sometimes
bit of a career as a sculptor recently I actually really like that
it’s much better to record with everyone playing
idea of it just being pretty bony – not too slicked up. I think live at the same time.
sometimes when you overdub a couple of backing vocals, those Music is about energy, not just clarity. When I
can sound good. But once you get three on there it’s a whole record in here with The Break [A surf band Jim plays
other world and now we’re starting to smooth it. Record four guitar in with Rob Hirst, Martin Rotsey and Brian
or five and suddenly all bets are off – it becomes too polished, Ritchie] I just put up a few perspex screens to get
or conversely, turns to mush. I prefer sounds being sharp and a modicum of separation and then we just go for it.
Bass blasts straight into the kick, and guitars are in
rough. Having said all that I’ll probably triple-track the next the room. It’s just a quicker way to get to the heart
thing I do! (laughs). of it. And really good surf music is all about the
energy anyway. Put the reverb up really high… that
big moving sound is much bigger than the thought
of the song. The sound of the song is what gives
birth to the song
!
Go to: www.jimmoginie.com for more info on Jim Moginie’s solo
albums and extra curricular activities.

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