By Helen Musa

When I catch up with Jim Moginie, founding member, guitarist, keyboardist and songwriter for Midnight Oil, and a musician with many faces, there is no dampening his enthusiasm for good old-fashioned rock ’n’ roll.

He and his band The Family Dog will be showcasing their fairly new THUNK album at The Baso in Belconnen later in February, and he is promising an enjoyable, danceable night, with a bit of politics thrown in.

THUNK, one of Canberra music shop Songland Record’s top three selling albums of 2025, brings together Moginie, Kent Steedman, of The Celibate Rifles, and Tim Kevin, of The Apartments, along with Moginie’s long-time alter ego Seamus, of whom more later.

Since January, Moginie has been selling only physical records, taking a stand against major music streaming platforms. He accuses them of destroying the music industry and argues that the tech giants behind streaming deny musicians a fair income.

“If you do stream, fine,” he says, “but then back-up musicians by doing something with real purpose. Buy a record.”

Moginie is always busy. His recent work includes the solo album Murmurations, inspired by the movement of starlings, released in 2023, followed by Everything’s Gonna Be Fine in 2024 on his own Reverberama label. He also published his memoir, The Silver River, in early 2024.

Hovering over our discussion is the awareness that Midnight Oil drummer Rob Hirst died very recently after a long battle with pancreatic cancer.

“It was shocking losing Rob. We were expecting it, but there’s nothing like it when it actually happens,” he says.

Yet there has been a silver lining.

“Rob and I made a lot of music after the band fell apart in 2002 and in the three years since his diagnosis,” he says. “It’s a beautiful thing for Rob to leave with.”

Following the final reunited Midnight Oil Resist tour in 2022, Moginie and Hirst had formed a trio with drummer Hamish Stuart, releasing two EPs, Red Continent in 2023 and A Hundred Years or More in 2025, both recorded at Moginie’s Oceanic Studio in Brookvale, which he describes as the industrial hub of the northern beaches.

They also performed as The Hillmans, a tribute to Midnight Oil bassist Bones Hillman, who died in 2020 and who provided the inspiration for the name The Family Dog.

“It was like back to the old days,” Moginie says. “We just got on with it.”

Moginie is known as a man of many masks. He has worked on and mixed music created in prisons and has even performed live with the Australian Chamber Orchestra’s ACO Underground, touring the world.

One of his more idiosyncratic personas is Shameless Seamus.

“When The Oils broke up in 2002,” he explains, “we were cast adrift, so I went into Irish music. It’s well known that I was adopted, but my original family were from Ireland.”

He speculates that he must have felt the Irish blood early on, because at the age of 11 he wrote a little jig, very Irish in character.

“I spent a lot of time getting back to that part of me. I’ve been to Ireland many times.”

He eventually found his birth family, plunged into the Irish music scene, attended sessions in Dingle, County Kerry, performed at St Patrick’s Day parades, and formed the folk project Shameless Seamus and The Tullamore Dews. He also wrote The Silver River while living in County Sligo.

These days Moginie lives in the bush hinterland behind Wollongong, where he says people “don’t have stress, where it’s laid-back, out of the hubbub and in great contrast to Sydney, where the rents are incredible.”

While he is adamant fans will be able to come along and have a good dance at The Baso, “think Masters Apprentices and Skyhooks, stuff we all grew up with,” there is no getting away from the fact that THUNK is full of political commentary. Subjects include the death of the pyramid-shaped Sunnyboy ice block, The First Amendment to the US Constitution and Gaza.

Given his avowed political stance, might he expect to get banned? He’d just be joining a long queue.

“Ban me, ban me,” he invites. “We’d love to be banned.”

Jim Moginie and The Family Dog, THUNK concert, The Baso, Belconnen, February 19.