Redgum were an essential Australian band for some fifteen years performing from 1975 to 1990. Their unique sound, which often has a strong strain of Irish-Australian folk, was matched with a direct assessment of Australian politics with the richness of the Australian working class in mind with its influences from many cultures. Achieving a number one hit with their first-person Vietnam war account “I Was Only 19”, they are also remembered for the satirical “I’ve Been to Bali Too”, the monkey-wrenching of “Caught in the Act”, and the safe-sex advocacy “Roll it On Robbie”.
For the past fifteen years former Redgum lead singer John Schumann has been performing with John Schumann & The Vagabond Crew, the latter part of the name taken from a Henry Lawson poem, with a collection of Lawson put to music on their first album (“Lawson”, 2005), with a second album thematically orientated to poetry of Australians war (“Behind the Lines”, 2008), and with a third (“Ghosts & Memories”, 2018) that looks at the life of John McDouall Stuart, Anzac history, and more.
It is Redgum however where the popular memories lie and it is not surprising when a tour occurs that this is highlighted, such as an open-air performance at the Darwin Ski Club on August 25 for the Darwin Festival. Well-attended it is quite clear that the name Redgum can still pull quite a crowd and from a surprising variety of ages for a band that hasn’t been around for 35 years, albeit with a definite bias to an older folk-orientated crowd; Redgum was never a band that had much of a following among the supposedly sophisticated black-clad inner-city beret-wearers, and more loss to them for their elitism (your author is perhaps an exception in this regard).
It was a long set, well over two hours, with an excellent focus of Redgum’s early albums. The show opened with “One More Boring Thursday Night In Adelaide”, a haunting assessment of that city’s parochialism and updated for contemporary experiences. Wealth and privilege are mocked in “Beaumont Rag”, with the other side of life remembered with “Peter The Cabby”, “Working Girls”, historical tracks with “Poor Ned”, “The Diamantina Drover”and the ugly side of people with “It Doesn’t Matter To Me” or experiences in “The Gladstone Pier”. As could be expected, “I Was Only 19” and “I’ve Been to Bali Too”, along with their less well-known Vietnam protest song “Long Run” as part of the encore.
A couple of things were very notable about the show. The first was the level of positive engagement led by Schumann with the audience and the degree of interaction that was encouraged. This was not a performance to an adoring crowd, it was a performance with them. Secondly, the competence of the Vagabond Crew must be mentioned. They are a group of incredibly skilled multi-instrumentalists and one gets the impression that even for a front-man John Schumann is humbled to be in their presence.
Although this concert was in August, John Schumann & The Vagabond Crew are continuing their tour of “The Redgum Years” throughout Australia. They are well-worth seeing; for the sake of nostalgia for some, to see an engaging performance for others, and for all, to be impressed by a thoroughly great event.
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