| Track: | Rating: | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Dirty Creature | | | | | |
| 2. Giant Heartbeat | | | | | |
| 3. Hello Sandy Allen | | | | | |
| 4. Never Ceases To Amaze Me | | | | ||
| 5. Lost For Words | | | | | |
| 6. Small World | | | | | |
| 7. Take A Walk | | | | | |
| 8. Pioneer | | | | | |
| 9. Six Months In A Leaky Boat | | | | | |
| 10.Haul Away | | | | | |
| 11.Log Cabin Fever | | | | | |
| 12.Make Sense Of It | | | | | |
Perhaps by virtue of their origins as a progressive rock band, Split Enz were able to straddle the gap between the New Wave and Art Rock genres without terribly many difficulties. Although their overt progressivisms may have departed with Phil Judd shortly after Mental Notes (take your pick...), the band still had enough sense to make intelligent music within the pop genre. It isn't every band that could play in shifting 9/8-4/4 rhythms in 1982 (see "Lost For Words") while still maintaining a working relationship with a sizeable fanbase -- but this is the situation which the Enz found themselves in at the time.
Time And Tide was the follow-up release to Waiata, a slightly uneven venture which saw the Finn brothers taking alternate leads on the mostly-pop-but-still-good material (see the Tentative Review for further comments). With T&T, the band produced a work generally considered to be their best of this particular era -- perhaps buoyed by a slightly less hectic recording schedule, SE managed to come up with a fair number of interesting pop gems, loosely based around a vague oceanic theme. Aside from containing their most recognizable "hit", the album also contains an enigmatic enough mix of tunes to make this recommended purchasing for fans of this sort of thing [note: this is not meant in an insulting sense].
That said, the album does take a bit of time developing its potential. The opening track is "Dirty Creature", a fairly cartoonish number about a foul beast emerging from the dark waters to torment our brave singer (Tim Finn, who sings lead on most of the album). The shuffle-esque rhythms play some role in precluding a "classic" status for the track, though they aren't terribly bad as such. Rayner's use of keyboard noises to represent the creature is somewhat clever (though didn't Genesis do that on "Dodo" a year earlier?), and the novelty aspects of the track aren't so annoying as to drag the track down entirely (the deadpan "I don't want to sail on the waters of the ocean tonight" in chorus is quite the nice touch). This doesn't quite match "Synchronicity II" as creature-emerging-from-the-ocean songs go, but it's good enough.
"Giant Heartbeat" is a bit better, though curiously similar to the previous track in some respects (not the least of which are the Banks-esque keyboard effects courtesy of Rayner). This is another decent art-pop number, with a dire warning of sorts regarding the heroic vessel in question at the very end. A guitar solo makes an appearance, for those worried that the pop world was making SE unduly concise in its musical economy. One might wonder why the vocals are mixed so low, though ...
Neil Finn's "Hello Sandy Allen" returns the Enz to semi-novelty status, the lyrics in question focusing on an encounter with the world's tallest woman. A nice enough tune in its own right, this doesn't exactly reinvigorate the meaning of the term, "essential". Highlights include some fairly good vocal harmonies, some art-wavish guitar lines, and more keyboard eccentricities at the song's introduction.
Tim Finn has had an unfortunate habit of producing overly naive pop material -- when left entirely to his own devices -- for some time now, and only one of the three tracks on T&T for which he receives the sole writing credit manages to fully escape this pitfall. "Never Ceases To Amaze Me" isn't the exception, however -- the basic Finn hook-writing skills are still in enough evidence to make the song work at a basic level, but this is still the least impressive track here. One images that populist-pop of this sort would have worked in concert fairly well; on its own terms, though, it doesn't make much of an impact.
After having loitered in "fairly good" territory for some time, the album finally makes its leap forward to better things with "Lost For Worlds", featuring the quirky rhythmic shifts mentioned in the intro. For that matter, the entire song seems premised in an ethos of quirkiness -- from the New Wave vocals, to the dominant-at-times keyboards, and even to Crombie's drum/percussion work. Perhaps Mr. Griggs was actually an underrated writing presence within the group. Or perhaps he simply focused his skills on producing a few notable tracks. One way or the other, though, the general improvement of the album begins here ...
... but not before we go through "Small World", a track more in line with the rest of Side One. This is another of TF's less-than-entirely- clever moments, promoting a general protest ethos about the state of global affairs, worrying about the legacy for the children, etc. The premise aside, this number does have its advantages -- not the least of which is the drum line offered by Crombie ... I'd hesitate to call it "sultry", but it certainly adds to a mood of restrained urgency. Not all of the actual lyrics are as awkward as the premise may suggest, and a band instrumental bit at the end works fairly well. Not an album highlight, but decent enough.
With the beginning of the second side, the album goes considerably further in fulfilling its potential. Neil's "Take A Walk" has the best habits of his songwriting: an immediately evident hook, a good vocal line, and even better musical accompaniment (including a vaguely Tippett-esque section from Rayner in the middle). It may be of the same pop ethos as most of the previous material, but it's nonetheless done a little better.
At this juncture, we reach the most obvious throwback to the progressive age on the entire album, as Eddie Rayner washes his way through "Pioneer". This extremely thick keyboard solo isn't quite good enough (or perhaps simply "enough") to really succeed on its own, and it exists primarily as an introduction to the next song. All the same, this is probably as close to "Alaska" as could reasonably by expected at this period of time.
And, of course, this prelude soon leads to "Six Months In A Leaky Boat", the [I apologize in advance] flagship piece of the Enz's catalogue, and the track most likely to be recognized by casual listeners today (though it never charted in America). This number is sometimes thought of as the closest thing to Gabriel-era Genesis in the early 1980s, and not without reason -- Tim's tale of a young and naive sailor-boy becoming dissoluted with life on the high seas is probably a better "pop translation" of said material than anything that the actual Genesis produced at the time [*]. Driven by Tim's high-range vocals and Rayner's synth treatments, this is possibly the most successful track on the album. The outro section, not always featured on airplay, is easily the most Genesis-esque element of the track, for those curious.
[*] Incidentally, I've heard from at a former Crowded House techie that Neil sung a bit of "I Know What I Like" backstage on a recent tour, when someone mentioned the Gabriel-era period in conversation.
The aquatic theme then continues with "Haul Away", the only solo Tim Finn composition on the album to transcend his frequent limitations. This sea-shanty/English-theatre-number tells the saga of a young man sent away (by ship, course) from his parents at a young age, grilled with rigorous Catholic education, and set adrift in the corporate world thereafter (eventually leading to a nervous breakdown). From a musical standpoint, there's the slightest hint of Gentle Giant lurking around the edges (though the level of composition complexity is obviously a bit reduced). The vocal mixing in mid-song, suggesting a complex swirl of activities around the protagonist, is rather effective as well.
Does the inclusion of "Log Cabin Fever" near the end of the album suggest an elliptical concept is at work? In some ways, this song can be considered the reverse of "Dirty Creature" -- unrelentingly depressive for most of the number (and far removed from novelty status), this number focus on a hermit's developing paranoia and desire to escape to the ocean to bring an end to his fears. At the very least, this track certainly indicates that Neil's darker lyrical motifs didn't suddenly appear out of nowhere with the formation of Crowded House (although the figure does possess the desire to rejoin society at the end). And it's one of the better tracks here, all else aside.
Finally, the work ends with "Make Sense Of It", a group-penned number about a man suddenly being called from his ordinary life to a primal force deep within the forest grounds. The music is somewhat intense, and vaguely akin to "Hard Act To Follow" (from Waiata). Completing the elliptical nature of release, this track too is not quite as good as "Synchronicity II", despite following similar themes. ;)
Time And Tide is a clear winner in the pop-era Enz albums that I've heard. As per most Finn-based releases, this is recommended for followers of intelligent music of this variety.
(review originally posted to alt.music.yes on 6 Jul 1998)