The Power Of The Song

It's something of an odd time for Neil Finn. He's just put the finishing touches on his new album Dizzy Heights, though it's so fresh it doesn't actually have a name yet. “There's about 12 songs on it, it's all mixed and varied, there is quite a bit of strings… I kinda went to town on some of it,” he says. “It's hard to say more than that about it, because you haven't heard it. I'm not really in the mode of being able to describe it yet because I've only just finished it.”

What we do know now is that it sees Finn in more of an experimental place than many might imagine. The first single Flying In The Face Of Love is stock-standard Neil Finn genius – probably most like mid-'90s Crowded House – but the bizarre first taste we were offered, Divebomber, suggests there's genuine weirdness at play on this new record, perhaps thanks to the work of producer Dave Fridmann (Mercury Rev, Flaming Lips).

On his (brilliant) Twitter page, he posted that his forthcoming Falls Festival dates were to be “the beginning of a new me”.

“Well it's just wishful thinking, really,” he says of the comment. “We're trying to renew and remake ourselves all the time. [The new album has] got some new angles on it. I guess I'm not quite ready to say too much more about it because I'm still figuring out the nuts and bolts of it.

“I tweet all sorts of shit, to be honest,” he finally resigns. “Just whatever comes into my head on any given day. It's only fun for me if it's slightly obscure.”

It's also difficult to talk about the forthcoming Falls Festival; Finn has heard plenty of good reports from his brother Tim and son Liam, but never ventured to it himself so is unaware what is in store exactly. But he's comfortable in the festival setting. “There's an element of chance involved in the time of the day, the mood of the audience, how tired they are, how hot it is, whether it's raining – all of these random elements, [and] sometimes you can come unstuck because of that. Sometimes it really plays with you. But I think if you go out there and try and make it feel like you're in a lounge room still, it generally works and the music travels a long way. It can get to the back of the crowd better than big flamboyant gestures and jumping on top of PA stacks and stuff. For me anyway, I trust the song to do the job.”

But the utter genius of Finn's enduring pop songwriting will never be dulled, and just about anyone who has ever heard a Neil Finn-penned song from throughout his almost 40 years in the game will agree that he's among the finest pop craftsmen of our time. However, while he had monstrous pop success through the '70s, '80s and '90s, Neil Finn's latest material hasn't exactly been the kind of music that has sought commercial acclaim. The collaborative The Sun Came Out record from 2009, the 2011 Pajama Club LP with wife Sharon Finn, and even the first couple of snippets we've heard from Dizzy Heights have seen Finn stretching far beyond what might be your regular Crowded House fan's comfort zone.

So is it safe to say that, at this stage of his career, Neil Finn just does whatever the hell he wants? “It's kind of following your nose as best you can. I'm aware sometimes the chopping and changing between things confuses people – very few people would follow anything I'd do. But I'm like that with music; my favourite artists, I'm not necessarily going to tune into everything they do and sometimes I'm surprised years later to find they've done some obscure thing that I didn't know about that is really good.”

But he still loves the songs that have made him such a success and it sounds as if he would never think of turning his back on them. It's testament to the quality of the hits. “There are songs that I don't feel as strongly about as others. And amongst them some of them are probably popular songs. But generally speaking I really like the stuff that's connected with people, probably for the same reason that it connected with people, because it's got a good mixture of craft and magic, and I'm still really fond of them all. They've travelled a long way and taken me some good places so I'm happy to sing them. And every night there's the chance that they will be a little different.”