The Sun Came Out

The Sun Came Out, the second release by the nebulous entity called 7 Worlds Collide, is the musical equivalent of vacation snapshots. Crowded House resident Neil Finn invited a supergroup's worth of artists from the UK and America to convene over the Christmas holidays at his New Zealand studio and record an album for charity. Members of Wilco and Radiohead made the trip, along with KT Tunstall, Lisa Germano, Johnny Marr, and a handful of Australian and New Zealand artists. They had three weeks to complete as much as possible, and while that may seem like a long sojourn, it's a fast turn-around when there are 20 musicians coming in and out, some of them bringing finished songs to record but most of them writing as they go. Finn, however, kept it low-key by promising proceeds to Oxfam and by inviting the artists' families along. He even included his own musical brood: his wife Sharon, sons Liam and Elroy, and brother Tim all played on the album. Even Spencer Tweedy, Jeff's teenage son, gets a credit.

The phrase “7 worlds collide” comes, within Neil Finn’s vocabulary at least, from the song “Distant Sun”. On it, Finn sings “seven worlds collide / whenever I am by your side”. But the real payoff is a less prominent but just as heartfelt “I offer love”. It’s with the same largesse that the Crowded House singer-songwriter has curated his 7 Worlds Collide project. The first time around, it was a series of concerts in New Zealand, with the resultant CD/DVD benefitting Medecins Sans Frontieres. That was seven years ago, but many of the artists previously involved have returned, family reunion-style, for the collaboration’s follow-up, The Sun Came Out.