Album Review: Crowded House - Gravity Stairs

Everyone who admires a well-crafted melody and a flawless pop song was delighted when Neil Finn reconvened Crowded House for 2021’s Dreamers Are Waiting. The rejigged ‘House incorporated Finn’s gifted sons Liam and Elroy as well as the talents of Mitchell Froom, who worked the faders on the first three albums including 1991’s solid gold classic Woodface. They delivered a fine album, including many highlights such as ‘To The Island’ and the bouncing ‘Playing With Fire’, but they’ve surpassed it here.

There’s a dreamlike, swirling quality to the sound on this record but that’s not to imply any lack of focus. The joyous ‘Oh Hi’ was an obvious choice for the first single, blessed as it is with a chorus forged for whistling but its “scaling the darkness with a lightbulb” which will, to paraphrase its refrain, be forever “in your head” is merely one of the delights to be found here. Second single ‘Teenage Summer’ floats through like a July breeze when you’ve all the windows open and you’re feeling good about yourself. Its original title, ‘Life’s Imitation’, was ditched when Finn’s grandson told the song writer over the phone that he really liked the ‘Teenage Summer’ song. Finn wisely paid attention, adding in a recent interview with this reviewer that, “It seemed obvious and we won’t have people in record stores asking for the wrong song like they did with ‘Don’t Dream It’s Over’. “Have you got ‘Hey Now’?’”

“Words matter but they get in the way when you’ve got some stories to tell, let the melody reign,” Finn sings, laying out his stall on opener ‘Magic Piano’, before the voices combine - something to do with that shared DNA, probably – over Nick ‘Sligo’ Seymour’s subtle and inventive bass, and so it continues across a lovely record that wraps itself around the listener like a mother’s embrace although it’s Finn’s father’s wartime romance story that inspired the beautiful ‘Some Greater Plan’.

‘Thirsty’ is so gorgeous in its simplicity, it’s natural to assume it must have been written before, and who else would it be by? Third single, ‘The Howl’ opens with the kind of circular guitar figure they excel at with Finn’s voice soaring around the melody, and ‘All That I Can Ever Own’ – a great song about telling the missus she’s the greatest in the car on the way home – could pass for some long buried Beatles ‘66 outtake or a piece of sunshine.

And, just so that and the Revolvery cover aren’t the only thing to remind us of The Fab Four - “It’s a homage!”, the designer told me. “I’ve been pulled up on it through chatter online already. ‘Has Nick Seymour never seen the Revolver sleeve?’ Well, I have, yes.” - ambitious closer ‘Night Song’ has distinct movements – a lilting beginning, a change to a jazz bar tempo, then a choral segue to four-four. A voice at the end says, ‘Beautiful, I love it!” You will too. Bet The ‘House. You can’t lose.