New Release from Forenzics ‘Shades and Echoes’

For the first time in many years, former Split Enz members Tim Finn and Eddie Rayner have collaborated on a fresh new original music project, aptly titled Forenzics. The 14 songs that comprise the duo’s debut album titled Shades and Echoes is officially out now.

The new feature song from the album is the delightful duet Unlikely Friend, the song beckoned a strong harmony vocal which then morphed into the guest vocal appearance from Megan Washington.

“I’d worked with Megan before” says Tim. “We’d written a song together on my album The View Is Worth The Climb and she’s toured with me as well. We just get on. She’s really talented, a great singer. I knew it had to be her. She’d already heard the album and loved it, so she crafted the harmony part and Eddie mixed it into the track. Of course it works beautifully!”

The Forenzics project sees two artistic endeavours meet in the middle. Over the years, Tim and Eddie had been revisiting some of their favourite sections from lesser-known Split Enz works, using them as inspiration and the basis for new songs. This idea had been percolating in Tim’s mind for many years, since 1976, in fact, when Brian Eno visited a recording session of Split Enz’s Second Thoughts album at Basing Street Studios in London, where Eno’s Roxy Music bandmate Phil Manzanera was in the producer’s chair. Listening to a section of the Enz song Walking Down A Road, Eno declared “that was the best bit and [you] should just develop that”. His mild provocation led more than 40 years later to Tim suggesting to Eddie they try it.

The Forenzics project is works of inspirational ingenuity from Tim and Eddie. Adding in signature musical contributions from Enz’s Noel Crombie and Roxy Music guitarist Phil Manzanera– who dialled their parts in during Covid lockdown conditions.

The Forenzics repertoire, like pictures at an exhibition, is an album of individual works that together form an immersive and cohesive whole. It is a genuine sabbatical journey into the artistic unknown, mapped out by two artists at the height of their creative powers.