by Dean McFarlaneThe career of this New Zealand singer/songwriter began in the '70s new wave explosion, where his group the Dudes had a series of hits in Australasia. A rocky path followed for Dobbyn in the '80s, and while his popularity of penning hits throughout the decade with his post-Dudes project D.D. Smash and occasional solo one-hit wonders surfaced, they failed to satisfy his creative urges, and the singer lived reclusively while his friends brother Neil Finn and Tim Finn saw great success post-Split Enz. Penning a soundtrack for an animated feature film in the mid-'80s, and being a scapegoat for causing a riot in his home city of Auckland, which broke-out during a free concert Dobbyn gave in a central square. A well respected songwriter, by the beginning of the '90s his music lived nowhere other than classic FM, until 1995 when a creative and experimental burst overcame him and old friend and producer Neil Finn. The result is this dark and complex collection of songs which explores a total inversion of commercial pop music values, in lyrics and production techniques alike. With many similarities to Elvis Costello's bleak Blood and Chocolate, Finn's production suggests some deep listening …  » Read more