This interview continues from Interview with Tim Finn: Part One.
Suite101: Did you always think you’d be a songwriter, when you were really young?
Tim Finn: No, I didn’t actually. It sort of snuck up on me, because no one in our family had ever been any kind of artist, as far as we can tell. It wasn’t something that was in the blood and in the genes. So it was quite a leap of faith and I didn’t know that that was what I was really going to do until I was about nineteen or twenty, even though I’d been doing it since I was about thirteen. Then it just sort of took over my life. I didn’t see it coming. I went with it. I had no choice at that point. It was just calling me on. It was a great feeling, to find that. I’d always loved words and loved writing. I used to write poems and prose, but I didn’t really start writing songs until I was about thirteen or fourteen, and that was because I was with this other guy at school who was more confident than I was. He started it drawing it out of me. I think that often happens with people. They need someone to help them get over the hump.
Suite101: Now, how do you deal with things like creative doubt? Do you have days when you still feel unsure about your writing or have slumps? Or is it more of a smooth ride, now that you’ve been doing it for so long?
Tim Finn: I think I’m much better at recognising what’s a good idea and finishing it off to my satisfaction, especially lyrically. I used to be a bit lazy in the old days and, if I had a good chorus, I might leave the verse half-written. But I’m much more thorough now, in my work, and therefore, in the end, it’s more pleasing for me. My wife’s a really good editor of my work. It’s not like any formal arrangement, but she definitely lets me know, even by words or by silence. If she likes something, she’ll tell me, and if she doesn’t, there might be a kind of a silence (laughs). I can trust her, really, a lot.
Suite101: How long does the silence go on for?
Tim Finn: (laughs) Days. No. It’s hard to take sometimes, because I want to impress her, but she’s got great musical taste. When I married her, I married a record collection. She’s quite rigorous and very staunch about it all. It’s amazing for me to live with somebody like that. It’s never happened before. I’ve never been with somebody who’s a great sounding board like that and somebody who I look up to in that way. When we first got together, she was playing me stuff from the ‘60s, which was supposed to my era, which I’d never heard, and I thought, wow, this is someone that I’d like to be around.
Suite101: Someone who’s going to push you into a few different places.
Tim Finn: Absolutely, that’s right, and just be thorough, and finish things well. It’s good.
Suite101: Which artists are on your CD player at the moment?
Tim Finn: We listen to a whole lot of stuff. A lot of the time, it’s kind of old stuff – old soul, or ‘60s stuff. We really like Nick Lowe and always find his albums very rewarding. There’s just so much. There’s plenty of good music out there.
Suite101: Were there any artists you listened to growing up who were influential in you becoming a song writer?
Tim Finn: It’s difficult. I’m loath to say The Beatles, because it’s such a loaded word. Everything then becomes Beatlesque or sub-Beatles, but I do think that their body of work is unparalleled. They completely changed my world when I was growing up and made me want to write songs. So it’s pointless to not mention it. They were the fundamental influence in my life, John Lennon particularly, and other English bands – ‘60s bands, like The Kinks, The Small Faces; they were the primary influence.
Suite101: The Beatles still stand as pretty amazing songwriters when it comes down to it.
Tim Finn: Hundreds of years from now that’ll still be true. I think the music you fall in love with when you’re thirteen or fourteen is probably always going to remain the primary influence in your life. I think that’s true for just about everybody. You’re never going to fall deeply in love with a song again. You’ll still enjoy music a lot, but there’s something about being that age and connecting with music. It lights up your world.
Suite101: Did you have formal training as a musician?
Tim Finn: I had a little bit. I learnt the piano for about three years. There was a nun, called Sister Raymond. She was pretty cool. She taught me a few little jazz pieces and things that loosened me up a bit. My dad suggested that I go to this other guy. We were living in a very small town in New Zealand. There was this teacher there who made me do pie charts of all the chords and, as soon as I started learning what chords were, I forgot about this left hand-right hand kind of reading stuff and I just began playing by ear. It was a real liberation for me, so I have my dad to thank for that.
Suite101: Were your parents always really encouraging of you doing music?
Tim Finn: Yeah, definitely. They loved music. There was a piano in the house. They’d have get-togethers all the time, with their friends, and there’d be somebody sitting in the corner, playing every song that they loved, with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth and a glass of gin, and off they’d go. I grew up with that live music in the house. Mum and dad were delighted when I developed my talent, though they also didn’t see it coming that it would become my whole life.
Suite101: It must have been quite a big thing for them when your music took off.
Tim Finn: It was, especially when you think about early Split Enz, and the way we looked; it was pretty challenging to their idea of who I was (laughs). It was pretty deranged, but it was a great career.
Tim Finn is currently touring The View is Worth the Climb nationally. He plays the Shoalhaven Entertainment Centre on November 18th; Belmont 16s on November 19th; Joe's Waterhole, Eumundi on November 24th; Twin Towns, Tweed Heads, on November 25th and Tanks Arts Centre, Cairns on November 26th.
Jasmine Crittenden - Jasmine Crittenden (B.A.)(Hons.)(First Class) is a writer and editor specialising in music, literature and travel.
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