True Colours (Split Enz album)

Infobox Album | Name = True Colours
Type = Album
Artist = Split Enz


Released = 21 January 1980
Recorded = Armstrongs Studios, Melbourne 1979
Genre = New Wave
Length = 39:48
Label = Mushroom Records (AUS), (NZL)
A&M Records (Rest of world)
Producer = David Tickle
Reviews =
*Allmusic Rating|4|5 [http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:fxfyxqqdldte link]
Last album = "Frenzy"
(1979)
This album = "True Colours"
(1980)
Next album = "Waiata/Corroboree"
(1981)

"True Colours", the fifth album released by New Zealand band Split Enz, was their first major commercial success. Released in 1980, the album featured more mature songwriting from Neil Finn. Credited to him is the album's New Zealand and Australian #1 single, "I Got You," which also broke them internationally. The U.S. release of the album featured "Shark Attack" and "I Got You" in reversed positions due to the latter's success on the single charts.

Originally, the band thought "Missing Person" to be the album's standout track, not realizing "I Got You" would become the hit. "I Hope I Never" was mixed differently for the Australian single release, with strengthened percussion. "Nobody Takes Me Seriously," "What's the Matter With You?" and more notably "Poor Boy" were released as singles outside of Australia.

The album was initially released in four colour combinations — red and green, purple and yellow, and blue and orange — but would ultimately be given another four makeovers with releases in lime green and pink, hot purple and burnt orange, gold and platinum (to mark its sales milestones), and finally yellow, blue and red.

When it was later released on the A&M label, wild, imaginative shapes and patterns covered the vinyl using a technique known as "laser-etching". When light hit the record, these designs would protrude and spin about the room. The album was the first to ever use this technique, originally designed to discourage the creation of counterfeit copies.

A synthesizer melody played in "I Wouldn't Dream of It" was first introduced in an early Split Enz recording, aptly titled "The Instrumental".

True Colours was remastered by Eddie Rayner and re-released on 2 occasions. Firstly in 2003, and yet again with the rest of the Split Enz catalogue on the 20th of May 2006 with the bonus tracks: "Things" and "Two Of a Kind"

Track listing

* Songs written by Tim Finn, except where noted.

# "Shark Attack"
# "I Got You" (N. Finn)
# "What's the Matter with You?" (N. Finn)
# "Double Happy" [Instrumental] (Rayner)
# "I Wouldn't Dream of It"
# "I Hope I Never"
# "Nobody Takes Me Seriously"
# "Missing Person" (N. Finn)
# "Poor Boy"
# "How Can I Resist Her?"
# "The Choral Sea" [Instrumental] (Split Enz)NOTE: On the A&M version, tracks 1 & 2 are inverted. The listing above is the original Mushroom (AUS/NZ) listing.

2006 Re-release

* Songs written by Tim Finn, except where noted.

# "Shark Attack" - 3:00
# "I Got You" (N. Finn) - 3:29
# "What's the Matter with You?" (N. Finn) - 3:09
# "Double Happy" [Instrumental] (Rayner) - 3:27
# "I Wouldn't Dream of It" - 3:22
# "I Hope I Never" - 4:34
# "Nobody Takes Me Seriously" - 3:30
# "Missing Person" (N. Finn) - 3:39
# "Poor Boy" - 3:28
# "How Can I Resist Her?" - 3:33
# "The Choral Sea" [Instrumental] (Split Enz) - 4:51
# "Things" (N.Finn) (Single, released October 1979) - 2:48
# "Two of a Kind" (Recorded at Harlequin Studios, Auckland, June 1979) - 3:41

Chart positions

Personnel

plit Enz

*Tim Finn: vocals, acoustic guitar
*Neil Finn: vocals, guitar
*Noel Crombie: vocals, percussion
*Malcolm Green: drums
*Nigel Griggs: bass guitar
*Eddie Rayner: keyboards

Technical

* Produced and engineered by David Tickle
* Assistant Engineer: Scott Hemmings
* Recorded at Armstrongs, Melbourne 1979
* "Two Of A Kind" Produced by Tim Finn and engineered by Doug Rogers
* Recorded at Harlequin Studios, Auckland 1979
* Cover Art: Noel Crombie
* Design and layout: Traffic Design Studios
* Project Coordinators: Dean McLachlan, Peter Green

External links

* [http://www.radionz.co.nz/nr/programmes/enzology/ep06 Enzology]

succession box
before = "Off the Wall" by Michael Jackson
title = Australian Kent Music Report number-one album
years = April 14 - June 22 1980
after = "Can't Stop the Music" by Village People