Midnight Oil are reaching back to the beginning of their triumphant 2017 comeback for a new live album, Head Injuries (Live At Selina’s), arriving November 27th.
Recorded at the legendary Selina’s at Coogee Bay Hotel on April 13th, 2017, the album captures The Oils at the very start of their ‘Great Circle’ world tour, when they returned to full-scale touring after a 15-year hiatus.
For the roughly 2,000 fans crammed into the Sydney pub that night, it was an unusually intimate chance to see one of Australia’s most iconic live bands back and better than ever before they headed off around the globe.
“Seeing Midnight Oil in full flight left you inspired to live life more passionately and to get involved,” the band wrote while announcing the album on social media. “It was like getting smashed by a breaking wave.”
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The show was particularly significant for longtime fans, with Midnight Oil marking their return by digging deep into their early catalogue and delivering a one-off run of songs from their 1979 second album, Head Injuries.
That record, released on the band’s independent Powderworks label, helped establish the ferocious pub-rock sound that would become central to Midnight Oil’s identity. The new live album fittingly arrives through Powderworks as well.
The Selina’s performance included Head Injuries tracks such as “Cold Cold Change”, “Section 5 (Bus to Bondi)”, “Back on the Borderline”, “Koala Spirit”, “No Reaction”, “Stand in Line” and “Is It Now?”.
The set also produced a rare live performance of surf instrumental “Wedding Cake Island:, named for the rocky outcrop sitting offshore from Coogee Beach, just beyond the venue.
The recordings were captured by Colin Ellis, Midnight Oils’ longtime front-of-house mix engineer, and mixed by veteran Australian live sound engineer Greg Wales.
The album was completed last year, with the full participation of founding drummer Rob Hirst, and is dedicated to the memory of Hirst and long time bassist Bones Hillman, both of whom feature on the recordings.
Head Injuries (Live At Selina’s) follows Midnight Oil’s most recent studio album, Resist, released in 2022. That album accompanied what the band declared would be their final concert tour, though they stressed at the time it did not necessarily mean the end of Midnight Oil.
Four years later, the Selina’s recordings offer another glimpse of what made the band such a powerhouse in the first place — a packed pub, songs built to be played loud and live, and Midnight Oil sounding as though a decade and a half away had never happened.
Head Injuries (Live At Selina’s) will be released digitally, on vinyl and CD on November 27th through Powderworks and distributed by Sony Music Australia. Pre-orders are available now.
