Ziggy Ramo’s Opera House Performance Of ‘Black Thoughts’ Is An Essential Watch
Every single step, tear and scream has intention.
On Saturday night, Ziggy Ramo performed his debut album Black Thoughts live for the first time, livestreamed from the Sydney Opera House.
The stirring performance saw Ramo and his bandmates perform to an empty Joan Sutherland Theatre, with the set opening with a smoking ceremony and songs of country from Brendan ‘Japangardi’ Keri, a representative from the Metropolitan Local Aboriginal Land Council.
Afterwards, Ramo entered wearing a single chain which wrapped around his wrists and neck — a simple and powerful image. The performance ran through Black Thoughts and featured accompanying visuals by Kamsani ‘Kambarni’ Bin-Salleh, as well as audio samples from Stan Grant’s Australian Dream speech and Australian politicians discussing and promoting harmful policies against First Nations people.
Ramo was also joined by a 10-piece band littered throughout the theatre, and was supported with backing vocals by Becca Hatch, with Sydney artist Milan Ring music directing the whole event.
In one particularly moving section, ‘The First Post’ led into ‘April 25th’, Ramo’s song about the hypocrisy of white Australians who don’t understand why January 26 is a day of mourning for Indigenous Australians. Halfway through the song, Ramo collapses and cries on the floor, saying “I can’t breathe” — a rally cry of the Black Lives Matter movement, echoing the last words of George Floyd.
Last month, Ramo was not allowed to perform ‘April 25th’ on Q&A over fears its lyrics, which feature the words “fuck those ANZACs”, weren’t appropriate — on the show, he called out the censorship.
“Me sitting on this panel ticks off a box for the ABC that is cultural diversity, but if I’m not able to express my perspective, is it performative or is it actual cultural diversity? The whole point of a song about April 25th is saying that I’ve seen this country recognise the sacrifices that have been made so that we could all sit here today,” he said.
“We can’t just pick parts of our history that we want to recognise, and bury the others. If in World War II, we fought against genocide, yet we don’t recognise the genocide in our own country, that’s a double standard.”
“So the whole reason why the song says, ‘I hate the Anzacs,’ is to demonstrate, that how outrageous is that? If we can recognise how outrageous that is, why can’t [we] recognise that on January 26?”
The performance is worth watching in full. Ramo wrote Black Thoughts five years ago, but worked on ‘rush releasing it’ after the surge of anti-racist and Black Lives Matter protests across the world in late May. It was released June 5.
Watch the performance below, part of the Opera House’s ongoing weekly live-stream series, which has also featured sets from Total Control and Gordi.
Photo Credit: Daniel Boud