After the thunder, Colin Hay returns to tour Down Under

Booked to perform his Men at Work ‘party piece’ before the Melbourne Cup race, Hay gave it everything he had.

Singer-songwriter Colin Hay backstage, brand-new Maton guitar in hand, before performing at the 2022 Melbourne Cup on Tuesday, November 1. Picture: Arsineh Houspian

When Colin Hay took the microphone to begin performing the world-famous song he fondly describes as his “party piece” at Flemington Racecourse on Tuesday, it marked the first time Australian audiences had seen him in the flesh in years.

Down Under, his 1981 hit with his band Men at Work, was what he was booked to sing before the Melbourne Cup was run – and sing it he did, mightily. “That power in his voice is like the wind,” wrote one fan on YouTube, accurately.

As ever, Hay put his whole heart into it, bringing a sense of delight to all who heard his signature song.

“It’s my job to enjoy myself up there, isn’t it?” he said with a laugh. “I thought it was pretty joyous: all those people there, taking a punt, and I had the energy of all those young, delightful musicians who were there, and full of youthful exuberance.”

As he walked to the stage and shouldered a brand-new Maton acoustic guitar he’d recently picked up from the company’s Melbourne factory, there was little thought given to the minor stir created two months earlier, when he appeared on the front page of The Australian.

In September, ahead of his return to tour the east coast of Australia — which the Scottish-born songwriter called home from the age of 14 — Hay said that Down Under was written as a pro-environmental song whose lyrics reflected his concerns for the plundering of the landscape.

“I think it’s pretty obvious,” he told The Australian on Wednesday. “If you have a chorus which says, ‘Living in a land Down Under / Where women glow and men plunder’, it’s not that obtuse. ‘Can’t you hear the thunder? / You better run, you better take cover’ – it’s not that difficult to grasp.”

Asked how he responds to suggestions that he is attempting revisionist history, the self-described “tree-hugger” gave a shrug.

“I can’t, at this point in my life, pay attention to any comments that people make,” said Hay, 69. “Because people are still saying stupid things like ‘stay in your lane’; it’s the ‘shut up and play’ brigade, who are so f..king tedious, it’s mind-numbing. There’s a lot of people that expect that you’re just like a performing seal.”

In support of his 15th solo album, titled Now and the Evermore, Hay’s tour begins in Bendigo on Thursday, followed by concerts in Melbourne on Friday and Saturday; the run will end in Thirroul on November 20.

Of Australian audiences, Hay said, “I feel very connected to them, in a very deep way, because I spent my formative years here. I feel the same way when I go back to play in Scotland: I get claimed when I’m there, and I get claimed when I’m here. I’m very lucky.”

Colin Hay performs before the Melbourne Cup race at Flemington Racecourse on Tuesday. Picture: Jay Town