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

Today's song is "Are We One or Are We Two" was written by Tim Finn.

Spotify: Are We One Or Are We Two

 

Given some previous comments, my vote here may go against the general flow of things.

I think this is one of Tim's best-ever rockers, if not his best. I like the guitar, and the production isn't too bad without overdone guitars and quite a suitable guitar sound. And, real bass. (I like synth bass when the sound is appropriate for the song - on much of this album it isn't). Tim sings it well. Launay comes in a bit with the strings solo, but it isn't bad. Dropping the drumsticks at the end is good.

5/5

This one will get stuck in my head too.

 

"Are We One or Are We Two", like "Hole In My Heart" and "Carve You in Marble" show that Tim had not really lost his way lyric-wise. It

It's curious that the three songs that he did write without lyrical help from Brock were all love songs, and some of Tim's best, realest ones to date. -- that perhaps shows you where his head was at in 1985-1986. The lyric here is fine. And, unlike most of the lyrics he wrote for Escapade, seems largely genuine and heartfelt. The opening line is startlingly direct (for Tim.)

I think that his relationship Greta Scaachi would continue to inspire Tim for many more songs to come, even long after they'd broken up.

The melody is insanely catchy, it's yet another ear worm that will probably be buzzing through my head all day and the song is all the better for the relatively simple arrangement that chugs along. Except for the middle bit: when the orchestra comes in. But that's actually my favorite part of the song. It comes out of nowhere. It might be one of my favorite parts of the entire album! It's so unexpected and weird, yet it works for me and elevates the song from being rather pedestrian to something that I kind of like.

I also like the way the horns kind of chug a long with the McLougghlin's rather unoriginal Andy Taylor-like lead guitar in what I will call is the verse, if the chorus starts the song: perhaps it's better called the "B-section" of the song.

AS a rocker, I find it competent, in a "getting to middle aged" kind of 80s way. As a child of the 80s, I find it a bit old-fashioned sounding though compared to up-and-comers in the alternative world.

My memory of this song is worse than it is:, but I listened to it last night before and I quite enjoyed it. I'll give it a 3.0 (and I'd like to downgrade "Hole In My Heart" slightly to 2.8, too.). My feeling is that, with the bonus tracks, the CD/download version of Big Canoe is, frankly, too long and when I get to "Are We One or Are We Two" I am so tired of the whole aesthetic of Big Canoe that I feel a sense of relief when the (carefully miked) drum sticks are hurled to the floor.

Tomorrow we'll talk about the album as a whole but I want to say that I quite agree with @StefanWq that the inclusion of 'Hole In My Heart" here does the album no favors; and he makes some excellent points regarding the use of the bonus tracks a B-sides that complement their respective A-sides thematically; and especially about the problem they create with album flow.

I think that "Are We One or Are We Two" really suffers from the fact that it's back to back with "Hole In My Heart". It's just too much of same feel.

 

“Are We One Or Are We Two”.

Oh, dear.

It’s as if they got to the last song in the sessions and found they still had a hundred grand left in the account. Horns? Sure! Strings? Hell Yeah! Pile ‘em high!

I joke, but if any song is way overcooked on Big Canoe, it’s this one. The bones of the song aren’t bad - the lyrics are direct, if far less artful than some of the others on the album - and there’s a good rocking melody that propels the song forward. But those horns and strings....especially the latter....just take the song from the realm of serviceable into crazytown.

I suppose it makes sense to end the album with a song like this given that this is probably the most studio polished album that either Finn brother was ever involved in making.

3.1/5

 

1/5.

Ridiculously OTT production, horrible lyrics, unsubtle vocal inflections...

Unlistenable bilge.

 

A “1” and a “5”. I’m not surprised at the one, I am surprised at the five. I thought my 3.0 would be the highest,and that surprised even myself.

 

A bit of Power Station like feel to the riff on this one then feels like kitchen sink and never seems to make up it's mind about where it wants to go. 2/5

 

That “bang a gong” riff got a lot of action that year.

 

To me it sounds like someone who isn't a natural rocker trying too hard to do a rock song, which ends up sounding like a parody of itself - a bit like ABBA "Does Your Mother Know".

Or maybe he's just amusing himself and throwing something funny in at the end of the album. Either way, I always turn the album off when this track starts. 1/5

 

On the LP, which is how I listened to "Big Canoe" the first few years, the title track segues into "Are We One Or Are We Two?" without any silence between them and the way the electric guitar breaks off the percussion at the end of "Big Canoe" always makes me smile. I imagine the musicians in the studio, all having worked hard on "Big Canoe" and to get the arrangements right and Jon McLaughlin, the guitarist, getting fed up and just starting "Are We One Or Are We Two?" on his guitar, as if he was saying, "Yes yes, we've done all those complex story songs with strings and brass and whatnot, now let's just do some rocking and have some good old fun!", with everybody caught by surprise before they all join in. It's a fun rocker and the lyrics are perhaps more direct than poetic and at the end of the track, the final one on the album, Geoff Dugmore throws away his drum sticks. I think it's a good way to finish the album and for me that's how it should end, with the title track seguing into this track. To me it's really jarring how "Hole In My Heart" has been shoe-horned in between the two tracks on the CD edition.
The lyrics describe a feeling that I think many persons experience in the very early stages of a new relationship, that blend of feeling invincible one moment ("when I held you in my hands / the whole world moved at my command") but also insecure ("are we one or are we two / do you promise to be true") in another moment. In this song, Tim hasn't really attempted to be poetic a la "Hyacinth" and I think it fits the lyrics to "rock out" in the music.
I think Tim has written many songs that are better than this one, but as a fun, rocking album closer it works very well.
3,5/5

 

Our votes for "Are We One Or Are We Two":

1-2
2-1
3-2
4-1
5-1
Average: 2.65

 

Today we'll discuss Big Canoe as an album.

 

I have to admit that I appreciate Big Canoe a little more now than I ever did before. I was always put off, as I suspect many of us were, by the mid-80s production and overall sound of the album. It presented a barrier between my ears and the music that I couldn't easily surmount.

However, listening to a single song per day over the past 12 days has been a far more easily digestible method for me to be able to appreciate some things about almost every one of the songs. I think playing the album in one sitting is a sonically wearying experience; by the time I'm halfway through, I just want to hear something else -- something acoustic and simple. Taken one song at a time, however, I'm more able to find things I like about each track. Certainly a few of the songs are hard for me to love no matter how I listen to them. Several others, though, have musical hooks that I never remember appreciating in the past.

Big Canoe, in retrospect, seems like Tim's last real shot at solo worldwide stardom. I suppose perhaps he had a second shot about 7 years later with Before & After, but I don't know if Capitol was ever prepared to launch him in quite the manner that Virgin had been. We all know that the album was a commercial failure (particularly in light of what it apparently cost to make), but I think there is some quality material on offer here, and more than I had previously thought thanks to going one song at a time.

Overall, I'll give it a 3.3/5, which is just a tick higher than my rating for Escapade.

 

My main problem is that it's too long. The ten song album without the bonus tracks is a much better listening experience.

In general, 52 minute albums are bad ideas. Yes, the bonus tracks are all right, perhaps better than a few songs on the album like "Water Into Wine" or (fill in the blank.) Maybe "Searchin'the Streets" could have replaced "Water Into Wine".

I am glad that we got the bonus tracks on CD because otherwise, I'd be wishing that they were on CD, mind you. And now I can make my own satisfying playlists -- a ten song "Big Canoe" and put the rest on a collection of oddities.

I think what is most interesting to me is the narrative about what Tim was trying to achieve with the album. He had reinvented himself with Escapade as a light pop artist and he wanted to adjust that reinvention and make something weightier and more adult. I guess he was shooting for Phil Collins territory.

So Tim had three basic styles on this record: very heavily layered R&B, perhaps influenced by Michael Jackson and other R&B purveyors of the day; arty ballads; and songs that did their best to rock in a mature, tasteful adult "serious" way. I guess he was shooting for Phil Collins territory.

I think the arty ballads succeed and songs like "No Thunder, No Fire, No Rain", "Big Canoe", 'Hyacinth" and "Carve You in Marble" are all Tim Finn classics that stand tall . For those songs alone I'm glad this album exists.

I also quite like his forays into R&B, though, clearly many Finn fans here are not fans of that. I think the heavy arrangements there are well done and often sound good with the aesthetic of the record. They fit in with the times, even if they are a little more overdone than most synth-funk.

But the rock songs falter. I enjoy them all enough to give them low 3s (and I may have overrated a few of them on this thread, in retrospect); but they just don't work all that well. The cold production really doesn't suit rock like it did pop or R&B; it's just too precise and clinical. There's no real feel to it. It all sounds like a put on. And when rock sounds like a put on, it's no longer rock.

The prospect of listening to "Searchin; the Streets", "Water into Wine""Hole in My Heart" or "Are We One Or Are We Two" again anytime soon just fills me with dread. They are so drearily dull: not bad enough to hate, not good enough to really get behind. Again the length of the CD album is partially to blame. They go by quickly on the ten song album (and there are only two of them!)

Somehow the album is less than the sum of its parts. Some of the songs are fine but are obscured by the arrangements; Tim's voice is sometimes mixed too low. I can focus on individual instrumental lines or vocal melody or singing and think about how nice it sounds, but it just doesn't work that well together. Finn's extremely ambitious collaboration with Launay and Brock just doesn't add up: it's very ambition obscures the effect.

But you know, sometimes artists have to fall on their face. I don't blame Tim for going big, especially if he himself enjoyed that kind of thing, which seems likely. Sometimes an artist has to follow his muse even if it means falling on his face, which I think it's fair to say Tim did here, especially commercially. The melodic brilliant and arrangement talent he exhibits is clear, though.

With Time and Tide, after his marriage fell apart Tim had finally discarded the theatrical characters that he had written in the beginning of his career and really bared his soul. ON Escapade and Big Canoe, he had gone back to playing a variety of parts: here he is the serious pop artiste donning a number of artfully contrived masks. I think that this is the real Tim Finn: when things are going well for him, he is an artist who writes songs for characters, which is why he's focused on theatre in the past decade.
His coming problems with Scaachi would provide fodder for a more personal style of writing in the future.

In the context of his entire career, I think Big Canoe an interesting detour: one more interesting sound that Tim inhabited. He had done prog; he had done new wave; he had done lite pop and electro-dance stuff. Now he did cold 80s rockers and danceable, serious 80s R&B. His next big move (discounting Les Patterson Long Player) would see him trying to inhabit a more earthy singer-songwriter-cum-adult contemporary sound to better effect.

In the end, I give the ten-song album about 3.5.There are many highs for me, but the lows are pretty low. The 12 song album gets about a 2.9. It just readrags.

Note: there were apparently outtakes from this album, but as they were later re-produced by Ricky Fataar (with Nick Launay getting a "recorded by" credit) and released in 1987, I will hold off discussion about those and the other film songs he did at this time until we reach the period between Crowded House and Temple of Low Men.

 

'The Big Canoe' is for me an album where Tim did his bit well: He wrote quality melodies and sang them well. However, the album was sunk by other decisions. I don't know exactly who took which decisions and therefore who is 'at fault'. The two decisions being: having Nick Launay as producer, and for Jeremy Brock to write the lyrics.

The production is over the top, and the style doesn't suit the songs. If there was a standalone single, that wouldn't be too bad, but this is an entire album. And, it goes on too long. Before this thread, I had rarely listened to the whole album; listening to songs as standalone songs, particularly the highlights, is fine. And, I wouldn't want these songs and album to disappear from Tim's history - but I'm pleased that his next album was done properly.

Jeremy Brock's lyrics, for me, are often clumsy and don't suit the songs. It is possible to 'turn off' and not listen to them. It seems that Brock didn't do much songwriting after this - so unless I've missed something perhaps he too realises that this didn't really work. If Tim was feeling uninspired then perhaps if someone hadn't been bought in to do the lyrics then maybe there would have been no album at all. And, I can guess that after the success of 'Escapade' they wanted to strike while the iron was hot, and therefore waiting was not an option.

But, there are some really good melodies in there. Sometimes perhaps stretched to fit the lyrics.

My overall rating for the album is 3/5. While there are quite a few 2/5 songs, there are also some that I rate much higher. Including, it seems controversially higher than others. What can I say? I like what I like and don't like what I don't like.

 

I read about this album before I ever actually heard it. From memory, the album was described as ambitious, epic and overreaching. Those words combined with the title Big Canoe had me expecting an entire album that sounded a little like the ending to Together Alone. Was I ever in for a surprise?

I would say that the Escapade album was a success at the time,but that its standing has fallen in subsequent years. I would say this album was not a success, but that its standing has still fallen in subsequent years.

The production, even by 80s standards, hasn't aged well and it doesn't suit the material. The lyrics can also be clumsy and mawkish. The phrase more cheese than Wensleydale springs to mind.

We all have our own way of rating these things and I guess I would say that 3=good, 4=excellent and 5=great. As I never ever listen to this album in its entirety, I can only rate it 2/5.

 

Can't edit my previous post.

I would also say that the opening song Spiritual Hunger, being my least favourite song on the album doesn't help. At all. Phil's 'Intro Composition' is interesting, but doesn't really fit the song nor the album. Getting off on the wrong foot is not good.

I'm giving the album a start to finish play now.

 

I'm very fond of "Big Canoe" as an album, despite its many flaws, and many happy memories from the time it was released. (For the rest of this post, I should stress that the album for me is the 10 track LP version which is how I've mainly listened to it over the years) By early 1986, Split Enz was firmly my #1 favourite group but I knew I didn't have all their albums yet. My collection at the time consisted of "Dizrythmia", the A&M version of "Frenzy", "True Colours", "Waiata", "Time and Tide", "Conflicting Emotions", the Chrysalis compilation "Beginning of the Enz" plus Tim's "Escapade" and "Counting The Beat" by Phil Judd's post-Enz group The Swingers. I was looking for "Mental Notes" and "Second Thoughts" (I was unaware of the existance of "See Ya 'Round" and the Mushroom "The Beginning of the Enz" at the time), so I decided to phone every record store there was in Stockholm. I picked up the phone book and spent some weeks after school calling them, in alphabetical order, asking "I was wondering, do you have any records by a group called Split Enz?". By the time I reached a record shop called Sterling Sound, the phone calls had yielded nothing. When this record store answered, I was expecting the usual "What is Split Enz?", "No" or "Yes, we have one, called 'Time and Tide'", and nearly fell off my chair when the woman answering the phone said "Not here at the shop unfortunately, but I've got plenty of them at home. I'm a big Split Enz fan". She was as surprised as me, nobody had ever asked about Split Enz before and I had never spoken to or met anyone else who also liked Split Enz. We had a long chat about the Enz that day. In early May 1986 she contacted me and said, "I have some interesting news for you. A second solo album by Tim Finn has just been released titled 'Big Canoe'. Shall I order it in for you?" I said "Yes, please!" and picked up the album a couple of weeks later. While a second solo album suggested to me that Split Enz was indeed over, I wasn't sad about that - it was positive that there was new music by Tim and it also triggered the thought that if one of the singers and songwriters of Split Enz, Tim, was releasing a solo album, there might be hope that the other singer and songwriter, Neil, might also release new music soon.

I didn't have any preconception of what it was going to sound like. One thing that appealed to me about Split Enz was how every album sounded different to the other ones, so I was expecting to hear something different yet again with this new Tim Finn solo album. I can well understand that if someone discovered Crowded House in the early '90s via "Woodface", and then picked up Tim's solo albums out of curiosity, expecting or hoping that they would have a Crowded House-ish sound, then "Big Canoe" must come across as a huge shock to the ears and sound very dated. But when I heard it in May 1986 it sounded contemporary and fresh and not out of place among popular records by, say, Eurythmics, Tears for Fears, Arcadia / The Power Station and so on. The most recent new album I had got before "Big Canoe" was Squeeze's 1985 album "Cosi Fan Tutti Frutti" which I liked even though it is uncharacteristically keyboard-dominated and features a lot of synth drums and synth bass. Nick Launay had fairly recently at that time produced INXS's "The Swing" album and INXS's funky, dance-oriented rock was played quite a bit on the radio here. I imagine Tim was familiar with their music and I've also read that he liked the British group ABC (I'm not particularly familiar with their music though).
In that context, "Big Canoe" didn't seem out of place. I thought it had a strong collection of songs, but that many of the songs were over-produced with too many instruments and backing singers. One thing that also bugged me then, and still do, is that there doesn't seem to be all that much musical chemistry or empathy between Tim and the musicians. The Split Enz albums that I had listened to hundreds of times were totally different in that respect - without knowing anything about the group other than what I could get from each album's credits, I think you can hear in those records that they have spent many years together, been through a lot a bad times together, shared a lot of success together, probably have had disagreements about song ideas at rehearsals and so on. There is a cameraderie, a shared bond, that is obvious to me when I hear Split Enz's music and when I listen to "Big Canoe" I hear Tim and a number of session players who slickly play what they have been told but doesn't quite get to the core of the songs' souls. I think Tim's singing is top notch on this album, most of the songs are fine but not executed as well as they could be. To get the deal with Virgin, Tim must have presented a demo of some kind with the songs. What songs were on that demo and what instruments did he use on it?

I'm also wondering what Virgin Records had in mind for this album. It must have been very expensive with a "name" producer, well-renowned session players and the "hot shot" recording engineer and so on. Presumably both Virgin and Tim were aiming for mainstream chart success in the UK and in other European countries. Having spent all that money on the album, they then chose "No Thunder, No Fire, No Rain" as the first single. I think that's a great album track but a very strange choice as a single. I mean, if Tim had been an established superstar in the UK when "Big Canoe" was released, it could have been positive to go with a risky choice for a first single. In May 1986, it had been two years since "Escapade" had achieved some success in several European countries though it wasn't that successful in the UK (it didn't chart there, did it)? In essence, Tim Finn, solo artist, was starting from scratch in terms of recognition in the UK in 1986, so why choose that song as the first single? A first single, in my opinion, should be the most "immediate" song, a song that can be picked up by radio (and in 1986, MTV Europe was a year away, so any TV exposure that Tim and Virgin was hoping to get would have to be done country by country) and can get Tim on Top of the Pops and The Tube. I don't think "No Thunder, No Fire, No Rain" was ever gonna be that song, great though it is, and thus a very poor and strange choice for a single.
Yes, "Big Canoe" is over-produced and sounds very dated now, but to me it's also an album featuring many great songs, especially "Hyacinth", "Big Canoe", "Carve You In Marble" and "No Thunder, No Fire, No Rain", and superb singing by Tim. Despite its many flaws, it's an album that intrigues and fascinates me, perhaps because I don't totally get it, and keep returning to it surprisingly often. When I think about, I believe I actually listen to this Tim album more often than "Tim Finn" or "Before and After" and that's surprising to me.
I give "Big Canoe", the 10 track LP version of the album, 4/5 and the 12 track CD version 3/5.

 

One thing that becomes very obvious when discussing "Big Canoe", and the soon-to-be discussed first Crowded House album, is how important it is for artists to find the right producers and record company people to collaborate with. I was re-reading the 1985/1986 parts in Chris Bourke's book and on page 45 it says that when Neil and Paul were in London around February 1985, they had some interest from Simon Potts, A&R for Elektra-Asylum, "who had signed Thompson Twins" and suggested Alex Sadkin as producer. Just imagine the following "what if" scenario: Neil and Paul strikes a deal with Elektra-Asylum and work with that producer, who upon hearing the Mullanes demos suggest that they should enhance the funkier, more dance-oriented hints that are there and also suggests adding trumpets and saxophones and that they should use a top notch 1985-spec synthesizer for the solo in "Don't Dream It's Over". Tim, and Greta Scacchi, meanwhile have moved to Hollywood (to further her career opportunities while Tim thinks the US market would be good to crack). Tim, taking the songs he's written for "Big Canoe" with him, meets Mitchell Froom and signs with Capitol Records. In this "what if" scenario, our views of the first Crowded House album and "Big Canoe" would probably be very different. I think many of the Mullanes demos on the Deluxe Edition are pretty crude and it's a credit to Capitol Records and Mitchell Froom that they could hear the potential in the songs and that the first Crowded House turned out as fabulous as it is. I can't help but wonder what Tim's album might have been if he had found the right producer, the right musicians and the right record company at this point in time.

 

Our votes for Our votes for Big Canoe:

1-0
2-1
3-3
4-2
5-0
Average: 3.16

 

Collated Scores for Big Canoe:

Spiritual Hunger 2.5571
Don't Bury My Heart 2.4429
Timmy 2.48
So Deep 2.9
No Thunder No Fire No Rain 3.8143
Searching The Streets 2.64
Carve You In Marble: 3.7111
Water Into Wine: 2.2167
Hyacinth: 4.46
Big Canoe: 3.75
Hole In My Heart: 2.55
Are We One Or Are WE Two? 2.65


Big canoe album: 3.16

Average by song: 12 song version: 3.0143
10 song version: 3.0982

 

Today we'll begin discussing the songs on Crowded House's debut album, Crowded House.

Some history leading up to the album, which is one of the best-selling if not the best-selling album of either Finn's career. The chronology goes something like this:

• After the Mullanes were signed to Capitol/EMI Australia, Neil Finn had a holiday in Europe with Tim Finn and their respective SOs: "Tombstone" was worked on at this time.

• Neil Finn did a New Zealand pub tour with New Zealand singer/songwriter Dave Dobbyn in a cover band called the Party Boys, which was sponsored by Coruba Rum. Neil hated the experience and seems to have nearly had a nervous breakdown during the tour, but earned $5000 from it and got a couple of good songs from the tour. "Mean To Me" and "Can't Carry On" came out of this period.

• Finn then flew to LA to find a producer for their album. Few producers were willing to work on the new album; eventually it came down to David Tickle andMitchell Froom - Wikipedia ; under Tim's advice, Neil chose Mitchell Froom.

• Finn and Froom spent a month in pre-production with Froom, arranging the Mullanes demos, sometimes radically changing them.
• The band moved to LA settling in a two-bedroom bungalow.

• The band spent some time rehearsing in LA before recording basic tracks.

While the basic tracks seem to have been recorded very quickly, overdubs (mostly, reading between the lines of the redacted Bourke book, done by Finn) seem to have taken a great deal of time. A few LA session players played on the album, notably guitarist Tim Pierce and George Bermudez on percussion. (Jim Keltner and Jerry Scheff played on "Now WE're Getting Somewhere.) Most of Tim Pierce's contribution were erased, but he's pretty prominent on some songs (especially "Don't Dream It's Over").

Nick Seymour painted the album cover, as he would on all of the band's album.

The recording of the album was fraught with a lot of tension; the band went through five different engineers before eventually settling on Tchad Blake, who would form a partnership with Froom; the band had some fights: the record company wanted the band to call themselves "Neil Finn and the Tearaways"and Neil, who was doing most of the work after the basic tracks were done was not totally against it; the others were.

Eventually, he decided against it, though, and the new name Crowded House was settled on, to reflect the band's living situation in LA.

The album eventually was a huge success, perhaps the biggest selling album of either Finn's career, especially in the USA where it went platinum. A lot of hard work and promotion was involved in a saga that includes sushi bar tours, live showcases for record industry insiders, Neil Finn solo acoustic gigs at parties,house party gigs in Australia and the States and an FBI crackdown on the independent sellers that had created a payola system in the industry.

The albums credits read:
Neil Finn: vocals, guitar, piano
Nick Seymour: bass guitar
Paul Hester: Drums and backing vocals

Is it true that Nick Seymour didn't do any singing on this album? That seems odd to me.

The album had two different track listings originally: In Australia, the track listing on vinyl and cassette was:


1. "Mean to Me" (Neil Finn)
2."World Where You Live" (N.Finn)
3."Now We're Getting Somewhere"(N. Finn)
4."Don't Dream It's Over"(N. Finn)
5."Love You 'Til the Day I Die"(N. Finn)
6."Something So Strong" (N. Finn-Mitchell Froom)
7."Hole in the River" (N. Finn-Eddie Rayner)
8. "Can't Carry On"(N. Finn)
9."Tombstone"(N. Finn)
10."That's What I Call Love" (N. Finn-Paul Hester)

The American release replaced "Can't Carry On" with a cover of Split Enz's "I Walk Away."

ON CD, "Can't Carry On" and "I Walk Away" was included as a bonus track in all teritorries, making an 11 song CD album.

We will discuss the CD album track list, for simplicity's sake and as it is likely the version most of us know best (though, I think that "Can't Carry On" sticks out like a sore thumb and I include it on my Mullane's playlist.)

I suggest we talk about the following bonus tracks:

• Lester (N. Finn)
• Whispers and Moans [home demo] (N. Finn)
• Think I'm Gonna Change (N. Finn)
• Throw Your Arms Around Me [live at the Roxy version]

And the following Tim Finn tracks, taken from The Les Patterson Long Player sountrack, released in 1987.

• Desert Chord/With You I'm Alive (Tim Finn/Tim Finn-Jeremy Brock)
• Everybody's Jumpy(T. Finn)
• Strange WEather(T. Finn)
• Hacia El Sol (T. Finn)
• You Saved the World (T. Finn)

There are other songs from The Les Patterson Long Player credited to Tim Finn, but I haven't heard them and they don't stream. I'm not sure if they are worth discussing.

If anybody thinks any other song or music bit from the soundtrack is worth talking about, I will include it! Please give your opinion! I will quite happily do the entire soundtrack, as long as you have heard it!

Also this would be a good time to discuss the following Tim Finn rarities from that era:

• The Night of the Moon (streams a little on Youtube)
• The Flavour of Forever(does not stream, I have not heard it -- has anyone heard it?)
• White Mischief (available on Itunes White Mischief soundtrack, which is on iTunes -- you must buy the entire soundtrack to own the song!)

What think you? As always corrections, or new information is welcome

 

This.

 

Today's song is "Mean To Me", written by Neil Finn.

The song was also released on the live album Farewell to the World and numerous live albums from the 2007 and 2010 tours, not to mention many fan club only live albums. It was included on collections Recurring Dream, and The Very Very Best of Crowded House.

It was also released as a single (in Australia only, if I'm not mistaken: which I may be) with "Hole In the River" as the B-side.

 

Here's the live "Farewell to the World" version: