Mick Thomas' Roving Commission - GoComeBack [CD]

The new album GoComeBack by beloved Melbourne act Mick Thomas’ Roving Commission is a song cycle about the allure of home - “GoComeBack” is a pidgin Indonesian term for a return journey - penned by one of Australia’s finest ever songsmiths (as three ARIAs with his former outfit Weddings Parties Anything will attest).

Recorded in Auckland at Neil Finn’s Roundhead Studio with ARIA award-winning producer Steven Schram (Crowded House, Paul Kelly, Sans Cisco etc), GoComeBack is the follow-up to 2023’s Where Only Memory Can Find You which found its way to #1 on the AIR Independent Albums chart.

GoComeBack splits neatly into two halves:

‘Go' is side one - it takes you away, leaves you in a far off place. You catch a bus at dawn, by a submerged island you hear distant voices, you marvel at how mundane a supposedly exotic place can be, and how exotic a functional entity needs to be. You catch up with a band who went a-touring and never came back, you get your nails done by someone who wishes they were far away.

‘ComeBack’ is side two - it tries to see beauty in the everyday. A tram ride through a divided city, some wild birds in the airport food hall, a sculpture by the river and a small child in a Vietnamese restaurant. Mick sits on a pier in an obscure seaside town and wonders how he got there while some artists try their bohemian best to pretend their domicile is anywhere but a work-a-day Melbourne suburb.

Lead single ‘First Step In A Homeward Direction’ acts as a mission statement for the collection, and upon release earlier this year (as part of a 7-track EP featuring covers of songs by Aussie artists) it debuted at #1 on the AIR Independent Singles chart.