Barbecue conversation at my place inevitably turns to the question of what bands or artists people have seen. Rare gigs or guilty pleasures are named: Prince, Cold Chisel, The Baycity Rollers ... Mick Jagger at The Corner Hotel. And dead artists are popular: Jeff Buckley, Michael Jackson.
But I come into my own when we start talking about who we've seen the most. My band? Midnight Oil. Seven times. I chanted Oils with the best of them through many a sorry support band's set.
Peter Garrett was my boyhood hero. He turned me on to caring about the environment, Aboriginal people, workers' rights, nuclear disarmament and even politics itself. He couldn't sing to save himself, but Garrett had something that few rock stars had: straight up and down gutsy passion. And it was catching.
That's why what Labor has done to him makes me madder than a Garrett dance across a slippery beer barn.
They got themselves an '80s rock star for cabinet — nice move. Attracted the notoriously disaffected Gen X voter. But they didn't get the lead singer of Pseudo Echo: they got Peter Garrett, the lead singer of a band that once stood on a truck in Wall Street, wailing about financial inequality and environmental abuse. The same singer that travelled Australia getting to know Aboriginal people before releasing one of the best reconciliation documents this country has seen, the album Diesel and Dust.
He's a man who made speeches off the cuff at gigs that Julia Gillard couldn't write in a year.
And what jobs has Labor given him? Ah, Pete, put down the megaphone and Marshall amp, we need you to have a look at this insulation scheme thingy. Guess what Labor? He didn't sing 'How can we keep the recession out of our beds/stick pink batts in all our roofs.' And now he's the man for schools, education and youth, which would have been perfect for him 20 years ago.
Labor has used its rock star politician, who almost made it to Canberra on his own, to push paper around.
A little stage whisper of advice, Labor: Peter Garrett was a rock star and a hero to a lot of us. Use him at the top of his voice!