Power and the passion: Midnight Oil hit the capital on Reconciliation Day

For some fans, it meant coming only a few stops down the light rail, for others a road trip from Sydney, and for Malin Forsgren it meant a trip all the way from Sweden.

She first heard them in 1988 but it wasn't until 2017 that she saw them live in Stockholm.

"I only planned to see the Swedish gig," Ms Forsgren said.

But it was something about frontman Peter Garrett's performance style - the whole band's energy - that had her hooked.

She had never seen a band give 100 per cent and she swears she's never seen a bad Oils gig.

That same tour, she flew out from Stockholm to catch the Oils in Los Angeles over the weekend, flying back home with the same flight crew she had flown in with.

Even with the band's blatant commentary on Australian issues, Ms Forsgren said their music resonated internationally.

"It's good that they're being specific," Ms Forsgren said.

"They became big because they were so Australian".

She pointed to a song like Beds Are Burning, which not only spoke on Indigenous Australian issues but issues facing Sweden's indigenous Sami people, or Native Americans in the United States.

Across the Canberra Convention Centre, excited fans walked past posters with 2017's Statement from the Heart laid across the Australian Aboriginal flag, keeping true with the band's political messaging.

Early in the gig, Garrett told the crowd Monday night was all about recognising Reconciliation Day.

He then brought up Gooreng Gooreng and Wakka Wakka man Alwyn Doolan - who had walked 8000 kilometres from Queensland to Canberra for the recent federal election - to talk to the crowd. Then the band followed with a cover of Yothu Yindi's Treaty.

For some fans though, the power isn't in Garrett's message but his performance.

In fact Chris Harvey and Wayne Stein from Sydney didn't agree with the politics behind the Oils.

"I just came for the music," Mr Harvey said.

"He goes off."

"It's good music, no bullshit," Mr Stein said.

Mr Harvey said there was nothing like the Oils out there today.

"It's good music but it's not rock and roll," he said.

It was also the atmosphere the band created, especially when they played smaller venues, the pair agreed.

They had driven in from Sydney on the Monday evening and planned to drive back that same night.

Next for them was the Big Red Bash, a concert in the middle of the Simpson Desert, where the Oils are headlining.

"It's worth it," Mr Stein said.

Anthony Burgess and Liz Samra, on the other hand, loved the band's politics.

Mr Burgess first heard them when he was in Year 10, in 1984.

"He was talking to me," Mr Burgess said.

"My parents hated him so the first thing I did was I bought his record."

"The message is still as real and urgent," Ms Samra said.

"I don't think we have moved a great deal politically."

"For me, the Oils is their politics," Mr Burgess said.