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Various ArtistsShe Will Have Her Way: The Songs Of Tim & Neil Finn Capitol/EMI Those of you who read your dB Magazines diligently will know of my immense fondness for the work of Tim & Neil Finn, whose work together and separately in Split Enz and Crowded House, not to mention their respective solo careers and various Finn Brothers records, has been a passion and an inspiration for me as long as I can remember. This promising collection of Finn material performed by female artists is, as you can imagine, a hit and miss affair. Firsly, the hits. Clare Bowditch's Fall At Your Feet: mesmerising, its minimal arrangement matched perfectly with Bowditch's dramatic articulation and occasional soft whisper. Renee Geyer's Into Temptation: her voice is stunning, although many marks need be deducted for the inane and punishing fake r'n'b drums. Little Birdy's big rock Six Months In A Leaky Boat: especially because it adopts many of Eddie Rayner's keyboard interludes (although what happened to the piano accordion?) Holly Throsby's Not The Girl You Think You Are, which has always been an amazing song. Lisa Miller's quiet waltz-time reinterpretation of the hyperactive Split Enz classic I Hope I Never; Sarah Blasko's drum and bass Don't Dream It's Over also deserve honours. But the award goes to New Buffalo - her haunting vocal sample and minimalist piano makes the Crowded House favourite Four Seasons In One Day truly frightening. Now, the misses: Missy Higgins removes all the piano from Tim Finn's beautiful Stuff And Nonsense - big mistake. Kasey Chambers and Brooke Fraser savagely murder Better Be Home Soon and Distant Sun respectively, and whoever's idea it was to get them involved should be shot. Amiel's dancefloor retake on Neil's Split Enz-era One Step Ahead is a small disgrace, and Natalie Imbruglia doing Pineapple Head: it's predictable, and it's crap. I also oppose all the women who decided that songs about girls should become songs about boys, although in the case of Little Birdy, I concede that 'girl' does rhyme much better with 'world' after all. It's still a very worthy collection, and I hope there's more of it in the future.  |
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