Stranger than Fiction, Larger Than Life: the Finn Brothers song-by-song discussion thread

I Walk Away
Like the previous track, I like the chorus, but the verses seem kinda generic to me.
3/5

 

Yes, you're right of course. I'd forgotten that anomaly. My mistake.

 

Interesting you mention the artwork. It was partly the cause of my full immersion into CH being delayed by 5 years. As noted earlier, my first introduction to the band was via Don't Dream It's Over. I bought the 12" single and hated the B side (That's What I Call Love) - still do. I loved the next single - Something So Strong - on first listen and bought the 12". Of course, it featured I Walk Away. I loved three of the four songs but was slightly nervy of spending my extremely limited pocket money on the album in case they'd put their best three songs on these two singles. One day, I happened to be in my local record shop, and I thought to have a look at CH. I thought the artwork looked really amateurish (and not in a good way) and really rather unpleasant. It wasn't well done. I put the album back. A year or so later, I caught the video to Better Be Home Soon on a Saturday morning chart show. The lighting was dark and it was hard to make out what the devil was going on on a small portable telly (remember those?). Again, a little while later, I took a glance at the CH section and pulled out the two albums. I didn't like the artwork to the second album either - same issues. This one looked worse, if anything. I put them both back and sadly concluded that my relationship with CH was going to be limited to those two fabulous 12" singles I owned and still played the life out of...

 

To my (possibly unsubtle) ears I don't hear much difference between the Enz and CH versions of I Walk Away, either would do me. As well as it being largely unknown in the US, possibly another reason Neil chose this particular Enz track to rerecord for CH was that Paul already knew his part and/or really liked the track, having been the drummer on See Ya Round. Plus I think it fits well with the style/sound of the album, so that it definitely does not sound like a 'cover' version shoehorned into a CH album. 3/5

 

The first version of "I Walk Away" I heard was the one that is on "The Living Enz" which I bought (the Canadian edition on A&M, found by chance in a Paris record store) about six months before I got the debut Crowded House album. I didn't hear the Split Enz studio version until about a year later. I like all versions of this song, but I particularly like the Crowded House one. The re-arranged / re-written lyrics really add depth to the song. "Hurled from my home / into the unknown / as I walk away from you". It's the narrator who chooses to walk away but still feels hurled from his home and in the next verse describes it as a "black day" when he said "forget it, it's over / as a dark cloud covered up the sun". I think this really shows it was not a decision taken lightly and also an acknowledgment that he has many fond memories of his time with "you". Obviously the lyrics are inspired by Neil's decision to leave/end Split Enz (in Mike Chunn's book, it says that Tim left Split Enz on June 16, 1984 and that Neil announced his intention to leave too about three weeks later, which would have been "in the coldness of winter" from a Melbourne perspective), but this song has a theme that many can relate to, whether it is leaving a long-time relation, a long-time job or moving to a new city and so on. The memories of the good times remain, but change is happening anyway and something new and uncertain is awaiting. The narrator describes himself as both "a man on a mission / finally marching to a different tune" in the first verse and towards the end of the song says "I'm just a slave to ambition". This is sung with such passion and commitment, like he is both glad to have his ambitions but also feels anxiety that ambition makes him leave behind something that has been very good and risks losing the "you" (the other members of Split Enz and their long friendship, for instance) in the process.

Musically, it starts a bit cautious and low-key and keeps building in intensity throughout the song. It feels determined and defiant, but there's also a sense of being both excited and slightly scared of what the consequences of walking away might be. The song sounds "big" and I think Paul's excellent drumming contribute a lot to the energy of the song.

As for why the song was re-recorded, I agree with Lance that I think it was an artistic decision, a continuation of the Split Enz version, and also I think Neil felt the song deserved a wider audience. "See Ya 'Round" was only released in Australia, New Zealand and Canada. According to Wikipedia, the album and "I Walk Away" as a single charted well in New Zealand, but was (by Split Enz standards) only minor successes in Australia (the album peaked at #29, the second "worst" chart position of the Enz studio albums in Australia, the single reached #45 on the Australian singles chart) and didn't chart at all in Canada.

On a sidenote that might be a bit interesting… James Reyne from the group Australian Crawl, very popular in Australia in the early '80s and whose members were friends of Split Enz, also signed with Capitol Records in the US when he went solo, a year after the debut Crowded House album. Australian Crawl's final album was only released in Australia and New Zealand, the other main songwriter of that group was missing from that album and when Reyne went solo, he continued working with the drummer of the group who joined towards the end. On his debut Capitol album, he re-recorded two tracks from Australian Crawl's final album. So maybe Capitol Records encouraged their Aussie artists to re-record songs from Australia-only albums?

Anyway, back to "I Walk Away". I love this song in all its incarnations so I give this 5/5.

 

Our votes for "I Walk Away":

1-0
2-0
3-4
4-2
5-4
Average: 3.96

 

Today's song is "Tombstone" written by Neil Finn.

Spotify: Tombstone

A live version of "Tombstone" was released on the North American Tour Sampler, recorded in San Diego, California. In it, Neil briefly slips into "Wichita Lineman" for a couple of lines.

The song was originally called "Roll Back the Ocean" but Tim suggested changing it to "Tombstone" when they were on holiday in Italy in 1985. The song was completed and arranged in the pre-production phase with Mitchell Froom before recording proper started.

 

"Tombstone" has a pretty melody that I like, and it's optimistic message of rebirth and regeneration is a welcome bit of lightness after the darkness and gloom and anger of the last three songs. The lyrics are Neil at his most impressionistic: I don't so much as know what he means in some of the verses as feel that he's giving me an impression of his emotional state, which I think is true of much of the album. I get images of the endless gruel of travelling, the pressure of keeping your emotions in check, the fear of constantly meeting strangers, the urge to rejuvenate oneself from depressed stupor and feel like a hero again.
The opening lines are pretty arresting too.

Mitchell Froom's subtle moog work in the background lends the song a sense of depth and expanse and now that I think of it, that and the lush acoustic chords all does kind of recall those old Jimmy Webb/Glenn Campbell records from the late sixties; otherwise, I think this song shows early influences on Neil like James Taylor and Donovan.

I've always really liked the song. 4.2/5

 

I love "Tombstone". It seems to presage the sound the band would evolve toward on their next two albums. There are the acoustic guitars, and then the electric guitar jangle....and fewer of the overly 1980s touches that rear their not-so-pretty heads here and there on most of the rest of the album. I like the lyrics - they have strong imagery and provide a sense of jubilation and release. Too bad this one never really became a frequently played live song. 4.4/5

 

Some of the songs on this album feel a bit half-finished. With this one it kind of seems like Neil came up with a decent chorus and didn't waste too much time on the verses or the lyrics. Who knows, perhaps that's why it was performed so infrequently in concert.

One of the lesser songs on the debut, but not objectionable.

2.5/5.

 

I think Tombstone is full of hope and fresh starts. Full of imagery and very cinematic and features classic strumming. 4/5.

 

I like Tombstone, but it is one of the lesser songs here 4/5

 

In late 1986, through the whole of 1987 and for the first six months of 1988, I listened to "Crowded House" more or less every day and for a long while "Tombstone" was my #1 favourite track on the album. The blend of acoustic and electric guitars, the fairly discrete keyboards and the exquisite playing by Nick and Paul gives this track real cinematic atmosphere. And again, Neil sings the lyrics with real commitment, like every word is based on real feelings and experiences. When he sings "...run across the open plains / all the way and back again, back again" and this is followed by the guitar solo that really captures the heart and soul of the song, it gives me goosebumps every time I hear it.

The lyrics are a bit vague and mysterious but I interpret them as having been through some bad experience and being determined to not get stuck by that or dwell on that, being determined to try and make something positive from this - even though moving on to one's next, uncertain destination, perhaps having left friends and other important persons behind and now being among strangers, can be scary.

Wish this fabulous song had been played live more regularly.

5/5 from me.

 

As with most of the album, I really like it, but there's a few that I just like more.
4/5

 

I like Tombstone a lot and on most other artists' albums it would be a highlight. Here, it's just okay. 3/5

Something I want to say before we move on: Hessie's drumming on this album is utterly perfect. I came to it during the post-Woodface rush to gather up as much CH music as I could, so I heard it and learnt it at the same time as Temple, and while I was still soaking up the genius of Woodface. One thing that stood out to me was Hessie's playing.

He ALWAYS seemed to play exactly what was needed: a thump here, a smash there, all just perfectly judged and brilliantly played. He seemed to have a way of hitting his kit with just the slightest hint of being behind the beat and it gave everything a feel that I've heard nowhere else.

He made it seem as though everything played was obvious. There was nothing else that could be played at any given point in any given song. Of course, nothing is obvious: it needs finding and capturing. And yet Hessie seemed to make it seem effortless and natural. He had a way of making the drums sound hard and solid and yet languorous and laid-back at the same time.

For all the discussion about Mark Hart's departure and whether Neil and Nick "count" as being CH on their own, for me, none of the post-Hessie recordings CH has issued sound like the Hessie-era material. For me, he defined the sound of Crowded House.

 

I agree. He really rocked, and he played with a lot of personality and emotion too. More than almost most drummers of his time. I find him hypnotizing to watch when he is playing.
His drums are often a highlight for me.

He could play in the pocket, Ricky Fataar style, as we saw from See ya Round and the Mullane demos, but this slightly laid-back but intensely passionate style of Crowded House sounds like the real Paul. Not to mention his backing vocals brought really quite a lot to the group:when he was on he sounded great behind Neil.

 

I also heard the Enz version of “I Walk Away” before the CH was released. The Enz version will always be my favorite.

As for “Tombstone”... I feel it’s a “by the numbers” Neil song. It just doesn’t do much for me. It’s a pleasant tune, but I don’t find it particularly memorable.

2/5.

 

I'm personally surprised at the low scores some people have given Tombstone. (I'm not disagreeing or saying that anyone is 'wrong' - how good a track is is a highly subjective question. Tombstone to me an album track, 'filler' perhaps. But to me it is a quality Neil/CH song, and shows how consistent this album is.

I repeat my pre-travel 3.8/5.

 

"Tombstone" is a good, but not great, Neil Finn song. 3/5

 

I feel the same as most people about "Tombstone" and the same as I feel about the whole triplet of "Can't Carry On", "I Walk Away", "Tombstone". They are good quality songs that I enjoy very much, and I would never skip over them, but the problem is they come all together after the better songs have gone, and are only followed by the worst song on the album (which I do skip). Maybe a better sequencing would be to split them up throughout the rest of the album, so that the album 'quality graph' would ebb and flow rather than lots of high points at the start & middle then tailing off towards the end. It will be interesting to see if this is the case when our votes for every track are analysed at the end of the album.

3/5 for Tombstone

 

Tombstone gets a hurried 3!!

 

Catching up a bit on this thread, as I last posted about "Don't Dream It's Over." My feeling about the album as a whole is that most of the songs are at the same relatively high level, but two stand out for their more deeply engaging melodicism and and more touching lyrics: "Don't Dream It's Over" and "Hole in the River."

"Love You 'Till the Day I Die" is probably the weakest to me--a fairly generic rocker with Neil arguably overdoing the raw, shouty vocal thing, yet with some of the clever arrangements that keep the album from getting too by-the-numbers.

"Something So Strong" is a great song, yet I probably don't love it as much as many seem to. In some ways, it probably delayed my buying the debut album, as I was afraid that the kind of country-ish atmosphere on this track would be more prominent overall. I also agree that the video may have given the group an unfair reputation of being a near-novelty act in the States, from which they struggled to recover in the subsequent grunge era.

"Hole In the River" really stands out to me. As was the case for me with DDIO, the music brings the album some much needed atmosphere and mystery, balancing out the jangly, upbeat nature of almost everything else. Even so, its subject is so dark, personal, and powerful that the music almost seems to play on the edge of being too light for its context. Yet, I think it manages to avoid that fate by conveying a kind of mystical, out-of-time-and-body experience--this is not a funereal expression of grief, but more a kind of hallucinatory seance. For that reason, the contrasting instrumental breaks end up fitting in spite of how jarring they initially may seem. And even in the midst of all the mysticism and musical adventurousness, I still end with a powerful sense of both loss and deep human connection. A lot of songs on this album might have been made by other "Beatlesque" pop groups, but this track seems like something only CH could really have done, and is an example of what I love most about the group.

"Can't Carry On"--One of the most overtly catchy pop songs on the album, but also one that sounds so different from the rest that it feels added on after the fact. Like some of the other posters, I really like the song on its own, but also feel like it takes away somewhat from the holistic album experience.

"I Walk Away"--A finely crafted song, but doesn't really stand out among the more memorable album tracks.

"Tombstone"--A very nice song that I usually forget is even on the album, but then enjoy more than I expect whenever I hear it. I think Therunner makes a good point above about the album sequencing not doing many favors to the three songs following "Hole In the River."

 

Our votes for "Tombstone":
1-0
2-1
3-5
5-6
5-1
Average: 3.5308

 

Today's song is "That's What I Call Love", written by Paul Hester and Neil Finn, lead vocals by Neil Finn with Paul Hester.

Spotify: That's What I Call Love

"That's What I Call Love" was released as a B-side to various singles in different territories.

A demo "Mullanes" version was released in 2016 on the Crowded House deluxe set. This demo version features different lyrics than the album version, as does various versions from live performances. A link to the Mullanes demo will be below, as well as a link to a live version from the ABC New Year's Special recorded on 12-12-86 concert Crowded House played, recorded on 12-12-86 (a great performance.)

This song is historical: this is the demo which Nick Seymour played bass on as an audition, doing a variation of a Chic bass-line; his performance on the demo won him a spot in the band.