Midnight Oil’s 1987 hit “Beds Are Burning” might be one of the most authentically Australian songs to become a worldwide hit. The song is up there with “Land Down Under” by Men At Work. But while the band never expected it to become such a massive hit, they always intended it to be unapologetically Australian.
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But that also meant making it Australian from more than a colonialist perspective. The band, comprised of Peter Garrett (vocals, harmonica), Rob Hirst (drums), Jim Moginie (guitar, keyboard), and Martin Rotsey (guitar), wrote the song at the request of several Aboriginal Australians to commemorate a triumph for Australia’s native peoples. It would become one of the most forceful rallying cries for native rights in the history of Australian music.
It also became Midnight Oil’s most significant success and legacy. Diesel And Dust, the album on which it appeared, was voted No. 1 on the 2010 list of The 100 Best Australian Albums. It was also voted No. 3 on the list of Top 30 Australian Songs of The Past 75 Years by the Australasian Performing Right Association.
The members of Midnight Oil took the legacy of “Beds Are Burning” seriously. It has remained the soundtrack of their extensive advocacy and protesting activities, including further campaigning for the rights of indigenous Australians.
Although the song was an international hit, not many people know the meaning of “Beds Are Burning.” Moreover, most don’t know the story behind how a band of four white men from the city became the singers of this influential song. Read on to learn the fascinating history behind Midnight Oil’s “Beds Are Burning.”
Meaning Of The Song
In 1985, Midnight Oil was becoming widely known throughout Australia. That year, the Australian Government returned ownership of Uluru, formerly known as Ayers Rock, to the Pitjantjatjara people; it had been forcibly claimed by European settlers more than a hundred years earlier. The region later became a spot of native settlements, where Australian Aboriginal tribes were forced to live under colonial rule.
However, the members of Midnight Oil were surprised when several people approached them to ask if they would write a song about the event. Rob Hirst told Songwriting Magazine that they initially hesitated, thinking it would be more appropriate for a First Nations band to write the track.
“They came back and said, ‘We want the message of the hand back to go to the big cities, and that’s where Midnight Oil is from, so could you have a crack at it?’” said Hirst. “So Jim Moginie and I got to work.”
For the title, Hirst reflected on an art exhibition about the battle between Italian fascists and partisans in the Second World War.
“The guy who put the exhibition on explained to me that there was an expression from Italy about the fightback from those partisans, ‘How could you sleep when beds are burning?’” Hirst said. “I thought we could write a song about the same idea of an ancient Australian community who had so much thrown at it but was still joyfully dancing in the desert.”
The phrase fueled the concept as the band members worked on the song. To research further, they spent several months traveling through the Australian bush with a local guide. This helped them become familiar with the area and the aboriginal peoples about whom the song was written.
“We got to see the best and the worst of the Australian desert in the 80s,” Hirst said. “There were a lot of negatives, but those were also some of the most marvelous times we had together as a band, alongside the Warumpi Band, playing music under the stars to people whose ancestors had been there for up to 80,000 years.”
Local Descriptions Become a Worldwide Hit
Peter Garrett later said it was strange to think that a song written about unknown regions of Australia was now being played worldwide. The lyrics detail places and people hardly known outside the country, one of many reasons that “Beds Are Burning” became known as a uniquely Australian song.
This was intentional for the band, who were determined to keep their “Australianness” in their music. It was another goal behind their long desert tour, crafting lyrics uniquely about the people and the region.
Four wheels scare the cockatoos
From Kintore east to Yuendemu
The Western Desert lives and breathes
In forty-five degrees
Kintore is a region in Australia’s Northern Territory; it is known for being where large communities of the Pintupi relocated after being displaced. Yuendemu is another region that also has a large native population. The mentioning of these places — one with a European name, the other with an Aboriginal name — ties into the repeated chorus of It belongs to them, let’s give it back.
The song also references other unique features of the Australian Outback, including bloodwood, desert oak trees, and the Broken River.
The Legacy Of “Beds Are Burning”
“In retrospect, ‘Beds’ was the song we were born to record,” Vocalist Pete Garrett told News. “It’s got all the bits to make it work: strong rhythms, good melody, and the lyrics had some punch while being very Aussie. It took a while to stick. It’s incredible how much it still gets played around the place. Who would have thought an Aboriginal land rights song would travel that far?”
Midnight Oil continued to use the song to protest issues around Australia for many years. “Beds Are Burning” peaked at No. 17 on the Billboard Hot 100 and topped charts worldwide. The Rock n’ Roll Hall of Fame included it on its list of 500 Songs That Shaped Rock And Roll. It is an unexpected legacy — but one that the members of Midnight Oil seem honored to have.
Photo by Steve Eichner/WireImage
