See Ya’ Round (1984)

This is the end of the road, and the best news I can give you is that they didn’t limp across the finish line. See Ya’ Round is the final Split Enz LP, a record that steps away from their signature sound while keeping just enough of the old quirk, and it doubles as a showcase for Neil Finn right on the cusp of everything he was about to do next. After two records that felt like a slow fade, this one rebounds. It’s a charming, properly strong farewell.

It opens with Breakin’ My Back, pure fun built on great synth accents, and then drops a curveball: I Walk Away, which you may recognize as a soon-to-be Crowded House song, here in a more electric, rock-leaning form. I still can’t decide which version I prefer, and that’s the whole arc of these last two albums in a nutshell. The future is already in the room.

From there it just keeps delivering. Doctor Love, another all time great, is dynamic, serious and catchy at once. One Mouth Is Fed is rich and melodic with sharp percussive accents. Years Go By is unnecessarily good, balancing introspective ballad energy against electrifying rock. And Voices closes the first half on something simply gorgeous.

Side two takes the expected eccentric turn. The Lost Cat is a haunting instrumental that plays like a mid-80s answer to The Alan Parsons Project’s Tales of Mystery and Imagination, and it’d slot perfectly onto a Halloween playlist, which, if you’ve been with me since Mental Notes, you know is high praise around here. Adz is the one I’ll wear out, a driving bassline under great guitar and keyboard work and a five-star finale, easily one of my favorites here. This Is Massive swings back to the energy of the first half, an upbeat rocker with a cheeky innuendo running under it. All good fun. Kia Kaha is atmospheric and pleasant even if the chorus stays close to home.

The one stumble is Ninnie Knees Up, a polarizing Noel Crombie oddity that reaches back to the band’s early weird-experimental days. You can skip it without guilt, completist or not.

It’s a shame See Ya’ Round never got a global release, because it deserved a much bigger audience than three countries. Fans of Split Enz and Neil Finn will find a lot to love in this last chapter. It deviates from the established sound and makes up for it with charm, and as endings go, it’s a great one. From the eccentric art-rock weirdos of Mental Notes to this, Split Enz went out about as strange and as good as they came in.

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Highlight Songs:

• Breakin’ My Back

• Adz

• One Mouth is Fed

• Doctor Love

Own it, Stream it, Forget about it?

You can’t stream it, and even if you could, I’d tell you to buy it blind. It’s that good. If you can track down a copy in a shop or online, it’s well worth owning.

Overall Rating:

4.5 Stars