Andrew Stafford

It's full of gossip and hearsay and innuendo.

And it relies on the memories of people who were completely addled.

So these are very unreliable memoirs, but it's like a lot of gonzo journalism.

The exaggerated version of the story serves to tell a bigger truth.

Okay, so now we're going to talk about Strict Rules by Andrew Macmillan.

We need to be careful here that we have his namesake, Andrew Macmillan, is now the music writer for The Australian.

We're talking about the late Andrew Macmillan, who was a great Australian writer from the late 70s onwards, who passed away about seven or eight years ago, I think now.

Strict Rules was his document of Midnight Oil's tour with the Warumpi band in 1986, and that led to the making of the Diesel and Dust album.

I'm a Midnight Oil tragic.

I ended up writing liner notes for them for one of their box sets a couple of years ago, which was a great career highlight for me.

I was attracted to Andrew Macmillan's book on that level initially, but it's a much bigger book than that.

It's an absolutely unflinching account of the relationship between white Australia and First Nations people, and it's a very sympathetic, stirring book, absolutely beautifully written.

I just think this is a book that's covered with red dust, and it sticks in your throat from the opening pages.

It's a great...

landscape writing.

I think one of the first paragraphs goes, the razorback ridges of the McDonnell Ranges split the plains like a wedge, splintering the earth with shards of granite and sedimentary deposits.

A glowing primeval spine from the air, they crease the desert like the ceremonial scars on an old man's chest.

And yes, I am reading that.

I brought my copy in.

It's a very, very special book to me.