Like many of the other victims of hard drive damage I joined the Diaspora of Burgers who have fled from the demise of JS here. Long may the adventure continue.
For my first post I wish to report a most excellent concert.
7 Worlds Collide is a project of Neil Finn (ex Crowed House, ex Split Enz) started in 2001. He has collected an eclectic group of musicians to put together an album to benefit Oxfam. The show my reason for living (copyright BarnesM) and I saw lat night was excellent.
Firstly the players
Neil Finn and his two sons Liam and Ellroy.
Don McGlashan and Bic Runga – two stalwarts of the NZ music scene
KT Tunstall, four members of US band Wilco
Radiohead’s Ed Obrien and Phil Selway and
Johnny Marr and his son Niall and daughter Sunny
All these players drifted on and off stage in a seemingly random fashion that not only worked but coalesced like a well boiled egg.
We were treated to 28 songs over a three hour period (a small break in the middle to refresh our mineral waters). Opening with Distant Sun from Crowed House the show was a delight that ran through individual works by all of the above. Highlights for me were;
Ø Johnny Marr – that man and guitar are one
Ø Neil Finn singing Radiohead’s Bodysnatchers with Ed Obrien using the guitar like a weapon of violence
Ø Jeff Tweedy doing Radiohead’s Fake Plastic Trees
Ø Niall Marr doing a Stirling if somewhat adolescent version of the Hunters and Collectors classic Throw your arms around me.
Ø Phil Selway giving us the first live version of a self-penned song the title of which I didn’t catch
Ø Tunstall and Runga bought down the mood for a little while with a murder ballad of gothic darkness
Ø Finn, Marr and Obrien delivered a version of the Smiths’ There is a Light that Never Goes Out that had the crowd singing along
Ø Finished with the strangely appropriate version of Thunderclap Newman’s Something in the Air in the night’s encores.
If there were any tickets left for the two remaining shows in Auckland I bet there aren’t anymore!
Tags: Word on Music
