kimbofo

Another Finn to love

Don't let the beard fool you. This is Neil Finn's son, Liam.

The eyes are a dead give away, as are many of the mannerisms. I'm not sure the voice is very similar but there's definitely a common musicality.

Having watched this video and listened to this song quite a few times tonight (via Dooce), I am happy to discover that very special Finn musical gene has been handed down. But it does make me feel awfully old. I still remember Neil singing Our Day, a song about his unborn son, way back in 1983!

Crowded House perform Weather With You during their first encore at Wembley -- December 9, 2007

Crowded House in concert: the verdict on their Wembley gig (and their reunion)

So this time last week I was watching Crowded House perform live in front of 16,000-odd fans at Wembley Arena. From the opening Private Universe to the closing Better Be Home Soon it was an absolutely brilliant and breathtaking concert, one of the best ones I've been to, no less because I knew every lyric of every song and there's nothing like a good singalong to elevate a concert from OK to f**king brilliant.

And the banter between sets was as witty as ever. Neil, looking like Paul McCartney with a shaggy haircut (minus the bad dye job), was particularly chatty and Nick Seymour, whom I've always viewed as the dull, shy one, wouldn't shut up. It was his (49th) birthday, so that might have explained things. Or maybe, without the late Paul Hester -- the goofy, funny one -- behind the drums, he could suddenly get a word in edgewise.

Whatever the case, I hadn't expected to enjoy myself so much. Why? Because I had mixed feelings about the band getting back together, especially in light of  Paul's suicide two-and-a-bit years ago. I just felt that without Paul it would never feel right. And, to be honest, it didn't feel right, it just felt different.

As much as I enjoyed last Sunday's gig I felt the absence of Paul from the outset. I kept waiting for an acknowledgement by Neil -- and it finally came when he dedicated the lush, melancholic Four Seasons in One Day to him with the words "This one's for Paul. God we miss him!" It might just have been me, but I'm not sure that singing a song with the lines "And I will risk my neck again" was wholly appropriate given that Paul had hanged himself. But I digress...

A concert in your pocket

The wonders of technology never cease to amaze me.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s I went through an (expensive) phase of tracking down and buying bootleg cassettes. It was a labour of love trying to source particular concerts I'd been to -- mainly U2 and occasionally Crowded House or Midnight Oil -- just so that I could add them to the collection knowing I had been in the audience on that particular night. The quality was always slightly dubious. More often than not the actual live music would be drowned out by the voices of the audience members singing out of tune or talking to each other -- and everything always sounded muddy or fuzzy, as if the event had been recorded on a hand-held tape recorder shoved under someone's jacket to thwart security. Oh, that's right, that's exactly how they'd been recorded!

Fast forward almost 20 years and now some bands sell CDs of their concerts -- recorded at the mixing desk so that everything is crystal clear and minus all the annoying audience chatter -- within minutes of them finishing their final encore. I kid you not.

Last night a trio of us was fortunate enough to see the newly reformed Crowded House play Wembley Arena. It was a superb gig with an incredible song list and a genuinely fun and friendly vibe. It was so good even the band didn't want to leave. Their encore was almost longer than the actual set!  And after  some 2 hours and 15 minutes on stage we were sorry when it all ended...

...but the best bit was that after we'd filed out of the venue and queued up with about six trillion other people in the freezing winter air, we were able to buy a CD of the actual gig we'd just attended! There was a CD-pressing plant on the forecourt of the venue churning out a limited 1,500 souvenirs for die-hard fans. I think this is fantastic. The idea that you can go home with a concert in your pocket just astounds me. How I wish this had been commonplace every time I saw Crowded House throughout my teens and twenties, what a collection I'd have now!

Ho-hum. First impressions

A first, quick listen to the new Crowded House album, Time on Earth, and my initial impressions are disappointing. It's fairly middle-of-the-road stuff with some embarrassing throwbacks to 80s pop-rock, but I suspect it'll grow on me.

New Crowded House song

OK. I take it all back. Maybe Crowded House getting back together isn't such a bad thing after all. Especially if their new song -- due for release on June 18 -- is anything to go by.

You can listen to it via the offical website. Be warned. It's one of those tunes that gets stuck in your head and won't go away!

Crowded House's first major reunion gig turns out to be a "hit" of a different kind

Who was the bright spark who decided that Crowded House should be the "warm up" act for Rage Against the Machine at last weekend's Coachella 2007 festival in Palm Strings?

That's just asking for trouble. Hardcore rock and radio-friendly pop shouldn't really be on the same bill let alone on the same stage.

Predictably, Crowded House's reception -- only their second "official" gig since they announced their reunion -- wasn't as warm and fuzzy as the old days: poor Neil got pelted with a water bottle from an abusive Rage fan!

Judging by the messages left on the Frenz Forum, Crowdie fans ain't too happy about it either!

I do like this piss-take though (see below). Ironically, it was performed the night before the Coachella gig. I guess the guys knew what they were letting themselves in for...

Farewell to the world... or maybe not

I got all misty-eyed watching Crowded House's Farewell to the World DVD recently. I hadn't seen the concert -- the band's final one held in Sydney, Australia, in November 1996 -- for almost a decade, and it was wonderful to relive the highs and lows of that incredible night.

Long-time readers of this blog (and its predecessors) will know that I'm a lifetime-long fan of the Crowdies singer-songwriter Neil Finn. In fact, Neil was the first male "rock star" I developed a crush on: I was 10, he was 19 and it was love at first sight when I saw him in that purple suit singing the chart-topping hit I Got You with Split Enz way back in 1980!

Neil and I have been through a lot since then. I could not tell you how many times I've seen him live in concert -- with Split Enz, Crowded House, ENZSO, the Finn Brothers or solo -- and every occasion has been an absolute joy. But today's news that he is planning on reforming Crowded House for a world tour has me scratching my head in wonder...

An interview with Crowded House

I've never really paid much attention to You Tube before, mainly because I thought it just hosted stupid videos of people doing loud farts or other juvenile acts. But tonight I discovered it's jam-packed with Crowded House videos! Given I am a long time Neil Finn/Split Enz/Crowded House fan, I feel like a pig wallowing in lots of gloriously smelly poop right now.

The above video looks like it was taken from the late Paul Hester's Australian television show, Hessie's Shed. Paul, of course, was the drummer in Crowded House who infamously decided to quit the band while they were on tour in Atlanta, USA, in 1994. (I still remember hearing the announcement on the radio station Triple J; it felt like someone had cut my arm off!) In this 5-minute snippet he 'interviews' his former bandmates, Nick Seymour and Neil Finn, who have a few funny stories to tell about life on the road.

As much as I laughed at their tales, the biggest laugh comes at the end. But then any mention of Tonga always makes me smile. . .