I hardly know which way is up
Or which way down…
“Lose yourself when you linger long,” passes a refrain in the insidious five-minute-plus brood-over about infidelity, “Into Temptation.” Almost completely contained within the seemingly effortless entrancement of Finn’s mellifluously understated vocal nuance is an anticipatory, subtly-building musical dread and sense of emotional overload and mental discombobulation as the Sirens pull him in closer and closer:
- A muddle of nervous words
Could never amount to betrayal
The sentence is all my own
The price is to watch it fail
As I turn to go
You looked at me for half a second
With an open invitation for me to go
Into temptation
Knowing full well the earth will rebel
Into temptation
Safe in the wide open arms of hell...
As if to make up for all of the angst, anxiety, and alienation scattered or helicopter-dropped over the course of the previous nine tracks, Temple of Low Men’s closer, the gorgeous “Better Be Home Soon,” ends the album on a comparatively positive note, or at least a more stoic one, as Crowded House finds a silver lining of resilience, of finding something so strong within: “It would cause me pain / If we were to end it / But I could start again / You can depend on it.”
In other words, dream on - it’s over.
Article comments
1 - JC Mosquito
This band was SOOOOOOOOO good........ why they never reached the Beatles/U3 level of success is a mystery. And their last album since they got back together was even good, too!
2 - Rob
What a great album from a great band! Neil Finn has one of the sweetest voices in pop music and is a very skilled songwriter. I agree with you JC, I don't understand why they never reached a higher level of popularity in their heyday?
3 - Tom Johnson
I enjoy the Beatles, but I LOVE Crowded House. This is more important music to me, personally, than the Beatles. They'd be in my suitcase for that desert island before the Beatles, is all I'm saying . . . (Please note, Beatles freaks, that I'm not putting down the Beatles.)
4 - Gordon Hauptfleisch
You all have me on a Crowded House kick, digging out the albums I have (which is most), and tracking down the ones I don't (including the last release).