Neil Finn
QPAC 08.02.2014

There’s no doubting Neil Finn’s credentials as the best adult pop song writer this side of Paul McCartney. Every time Finn takes the stage the kilos of expectation are immense. He more that punched his weight last year with Paul Kelly and he has a back catalogue of shows that feature not only solo gigs but also magic nights with Split Enz, Crowded House and brother Tim.

With a new band behind him, and his wife Sharon on Hofner bass, the troupe took the stage fighting off a tropical storm. Umberallas were replaced by instruments and Neil quickly dipped into a sterling back catalogue that included the Enz’s One Step Ahead and Crowded House’s Distant Sun. Fall At Your Feet had the capacity house in good voice and then one wag called out for ‘I See Red’. Great song; but  Tim wrote it. Not to be deterred Neil grabbed the tune by the scruff of the neck and delivered it as a piece of country swing before heading to the piano and cranking out the eccentric motif on the keys.

Now here’s where Finn and McCartney veer away from each other. McCartney delivers the same set pretty much night-after-night and stacks it with songwriting gold. Neil takes the road less travelled and plays a lot of new material from his latest album Dizzy Heights. Flying In the Face of Love and Better Than TV are standouts, but the show, for this reviewer at least, lost momentum. Anytime gave it a lift, as did Suffer Never. A piano led Don’t Dream It’s Over felt like we were offered a morsel of genius for sitting through the not so ‘god-like’ material. The band, all fine musicians, never felt like a cohesive unit: but, as it’s the second proper night of the tour, that’s understandable.

Locked Out led to a lot of guitar shredding while She Will Her Way just reminded me of how many great tunes weren’t played.

History Never Rpeats was a car crash with something weird emanating from the bass rig, while I Got  You never fails. Dizzy Heights, with its neat synth line was great, and the knock-down ‘moment’ of the night was a solo, acoustic guitar reading, of, Private Universe. All in all, it was mixed bag of almost glorious heights and new material.

Mitchell Peters