Rob Hurst

And then amazingly, when I called Pete, he was into it.

He said, when do we start playing?

So I organised a series of shows with a lighting guy called Craig Alexander up and down the New South Wales coast because we knew we wouldn't get any gigs from an agent.

So we decided we'd put on our own shows.

So in the September school holidays, I went down and plastered the South Coast, New South Wales and North Coast with posters with Farm, Top Sydney Rock Band, you know, $2.50, Tarthra Hall or wherever, you know.

So that was how we got some experience and some gigs.

Well, Farm was a dodgy title, and so we had a short-lived keyboard player who suggested that we each put a name in a hat, and I think there were other names in the hat.

I think one was Sparta.

I think I might have put that in, which actually turned out to be another band later on.

And I think Southern Cross was another alternative.

And the keyboard player fellow put Midnight Oil in it, and that was the one that we drew out.

And so we became Midnight Oil.

And Martin, by then, from Gunja, had joined, initially on bass and then back on guitar, and then the band was complete.

So I built a little Midnight Oil because we were a professional band.

LAUGHTER

Built a little light, blue light, which said Midnight Oil, which plugged in, you know, with our gear, and we started doing gigs.

Pretty bad gigs, I've got to tell you, but we started playing.

I have no idea what we sounded like.

I know that it would have been kind of frantic, a lot of it.

Pretty aggressive environments too, I'm guessing.