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| "Minutes to Midnight" | |
|---|---|
| Song by Midnight Oil | |
| from the album Red Sails in the Sunset | |
| Released | 1984 |
| Recorded | June 1984 –August 1984 |
| Genre | Rock |
| Length | 3:07 |
| Label | Columbia |
| Songwriters | Peter Garrett, Jim Moginie |
| Producers | Nick Launay, Midnight Oil |
Minutes to Midnight is the fourth track on the 1984 album Red Sails in the Sunset by Australian music group Midnight Oil. The song was written by band members Peter Garrett and Jim Moginie.
The title and lyrics of the song allude to the Doomsday Clock, a symbolic timepiece published by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists , which represents the proximity of nuclear war (or more generally "catastrophic destruction"), designated as "midnight". Nuclear confrontation was pertinent at the time of this song, the clock having regressed to a mere "three minutes to midnight" in 1984 from some 12 minutes in the preceding decade. This was the closest to midnight the clock had reached since the overt testing of H-Bombs by the US and Soviet Union in 1953. [1] This setting was surpassed only recently, after the inauguration of American president Donald Trump in January 2017, when the clock was set at two-and-a-half minutes to midnight. [2]
On 27 January 2026 The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists made their annual announcement and the clock was moved from 89 seconds to "85 seconds to midnight", its closest ever to the metaphorical doomsday of midnight. [3]
The lyrics warn of escalation in the arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union (" ICBMs, SS-20s / they lie so dormant, they got so many"), and allude to both H.G. Wells and heralded Australian racehorse Phar Lap.
