Published in the March issue of
Rolling Stone (February 2014)
Neil Finn Reaches Dizzy Heights
“I want to sink
into the atmosphere,” sings Neil Finn, the near desperation in his delivery
heightened by the eerie swell of strings, guitar stabs, harmony backing vocals
creating a bed from which the lyrics leap. The track in question is ‘Impressions’,
the opener to Finn’s newest release, Dizzy
Heights, his first solo outing since One
Nil in 2001. It’s a record which sees the man in ebullient form,
investigating different avenues, looking for something new.
It’s also a record
which explores the theme of height, or ascension, a fascination with the
aforementioned atmosphere. Songs with titles like ‘Flying In The Face Of Love’,
‘Divebomber’, the title of the record itself, all suggest an affinity with
moving up, with being above things, soaring high on velvet wings.
“It’s not a
concept record at all, but there is more of a thread running through it than
I’ve had on previous records,” Finn confesses on a theme that came about almost
accidentally, something he quickly latched onto: “I decided to acknowledge it
rather than just keep it as a sub-agenda that nobody knew about.
“And I’m not the
sort of writer that has a clear narrative running through my songs… I like to
leave a few doors open, let people find things in their own way and interpret
things in their own way. But on the other hand, it’s quite good to give people
a bit of a leg up, so I’ve done that a bit more this time.”
Dizzy Heights is a record which has, understandably, been a long
time coming for Finn. Since One Nil,
he’s been involved in a myriad projects, from a second Finn Brothers record (Everyone Is Here in 2004, with brother
Tim), to Pajama Club with wife Sharon, releasing an eponymous record in 2011,
not to mention the reformation and subsequent release of two records with the iconic
Crowded House. And yet the idea of another solo record wasn’t something which
consumed Finn during this almost decade and a half.
“I [didn’t] want
to underplay it, or overplay it in my mind, because I don’t really think about it that much,” he concurs.
“There’s impetus for making music always, and people say it’s been 14 years
since the last solo release, and that surprises me too, it doesn’t feel that
long. But it also doesn’t feel that making other records is in any way less of
an intense experience, from a writing point of view, from seeing it through.
“There are
collaborators at every stage, and there are collaborators with a solo record as
well, so in some ways it’s just a different condition but the process is very
similar, the name on the record just ends up being different. So I don’t dwell
on that one too much.”
Something he had thought about was how the record
would come together. As he writes in the press material which accompanies Dizzy Heights, he didn’t want it to be a
stripped back, “singer-songwriter” record. “I was aware that that was something
that I could do, and would almost be
expected of me… [but] that was less interesting to me, at the moment,” he
explains.
“I love pop music,
first and foremost, and I love it when it’s got an element about it that’s
mysterious, you’re not quite sure how they put that together… and it carried
with it a challenge to myself; it would be easy to settle into being extremely
tasteful and sensitive, and I’m resistant to that. I’m trying to make sure I
don’t get too cosy.”
He goes on to say,
with a hint of a smile, that he’s also entertaining the idea of doing, for his
next album, a collection of songs revolving around just him and a piano. “I’ve
reserved the right to completely contradict myself, from album to album,” he
laughs.
While Dizzy Heights may not be cosy for Finn,
in a sonic sense it’s the epitome of, wreathed as it is in layers of warm,
atmospheric sound. Working with wife Sharon (bass), and sons Liam (guitar) and
Elroy (drums), along with string arrangements by Victoria Kelly and production
from Dave Fridmann, (Mercury Rev, The Flaming Lips), Finn has crafted something
different – given his experience and the relative freedom that comes with that,
it’s not really a surprise.
“You have a bunch
of songs that you’ve attached yourself to, you want to see them expand and
become more, well, everything really,” he says on how he wanted the album to
come together, what his MO was. “You know, give them more weight, more feeling,
more flair, more colour. Mainly, making them step out, not having them sound
too much like ‘shut away in your bedroom’ type of thing.”
“And Dave is
really good at recognising sonic fuel, and allowing it to exist and making it
fit,” Finn expands, referencing producer Fridmann’s contribution to the warm,
cosy sounds that permeate the record. “And he was a good editor too, you can
make a lot of good, spontaneous noises and sounds for a long period of time,
but Dave is fantastic at wading in there and going, ‘Like that, like that,
don’t like that, don’t like that’, and just building something, and he’ll play
it back to you, and you go, ‘You’ve picked about all the best things I could
have imagined’. He’s got a very well organised mind.”
“We’re ascending
higher and higher each day / There’s no turning back,” Finn falsettos on
‘Divebomber’, a line that basically describes the making of the album, his
career as a whole, and his want and need to continually move on, still learning
after all these years. “I’m trying to take control over the whole process,
understand the whole process of music making and record making,” he says
thoughtfully. “It’s a really great mystery, and it’ll always be a mystery, but
I feel now I’m on the verge of being able to direct my attention in a very
focused way.”
Samuel J. Fell
