KATE BUSH

Review #120!

My favorite Kate Bush album? Maybe. Even in her later years, Kate is still as capable as ever to produce great albums and songs. '50 Words for Snow' is a very soft record with a strong minimalist jazz feel. All of the songs here are primarily piano- driven in Kate Bush's natural style. While not a concept album, this record does have a pretty apparent theme: snow. Also, every song (apart from the title track) has a story to it. The album starts with 'Snowflake'. This track has interesting lyrics. The story is written from the view of a snowflake descending, waiting for a kind soul to catch it. The melody is repetitive, but Bush and her son's vocals are so powerful together no change is needed. Then is 'Lake Tahoe'. This track is close to perfect. Kate Bush tells a story of a woman who lost her dog named Snowflake with her voice and keeps the mood rolling with her mesmerizing piano skills. One of the best songs on this album. 'Misty', my favorite song on this album, has quite an odd premise: a lady builds a snowman and it arrives in her bed that night. They kiss and the snowman melts away before the morning. Steve Gadd's drums and Kate Bush's piano make a soothing, groovy melody that remains for all thirteen minutes of the song. Perfection. 'Wild Man' is a song about an elusive cryptid in a place called Garo Hills. A class of children on a field trip have an altercation with him and the wild man runs away. This song has a fun kind of energy to it. It is groovy, but it takes its time. Like a callback to Kate's earlier works. 'Snowed In At Wheeler Street' is my least favorite song on the album. Not bad (I love those Elton John vocals), but I feel it just doesn't feel as strong as all the other tracks on this record. The song is about a woman and a man who were caught in a snowstorm together. They had met and dated on many occasions and had wished to find each other again. It is a sweet song, but the music is nothing outstanding (although those vocals and lyrics are delicious). '50 Words for Snow' is a very fun song. It is a musical list of adjectives, verbs, and nouns to describe snow. Fun, groovy, and just amazing. Kate Bush's "Come on, you got __ more to go!" just gets me every time. Masterful. 'Among Angels', the last track on this album, has a theme that I really can't decode. The lyrics only reveal half the story and I don't know what the 'angels' even are. But I feel I don't even need an explanation, because the mystery pulls me back to want to listen to this album. Kate Bush's vocals are just as good as ever, and there's no more to say. This is a great album. I recommend this for anyone who has enough patience to get through each song (they're all mighty long, although if you're a prog fan which I know you are, you'll have no problem). Prog on.

No music videos for either of these songs, which is... not overly surprising, but going into this, I'll say this much: Interesting that either of these songs, while both excellent, would be selected for a single at all. Then again, we are talking The Dreaming. And we are talking Kate Bush. "Night of the Swallow" was that album's fifth and final single, backed with "Houdini".

Our A-side is the perfect, perfectly chilling track. In some ways glancing back only slightly at her piano balladry of her early career in the late-70s. But this is very characteristic of the eerie, Fusion-adjacent vibe of the time, starting with Never For Ever (songs we can look to there include "Blow Away", and "Egypt" with a fantastic Minimoog solo from Max Middleton). The thing that sets this song apart from most (though it has somewhat of a sister in the brighter "Jig of Life"), as it dips out of the dark ambience of the verses, it steps firmly into its Highlands-inspired chorus. The track that its verses bring to mind, though only somewhat, is that next track after "Jig of Life" on Hounds of Love, "Hello Earth".

"Houdini", our B-side, honestly feels fitting given her overall history with singles. And yet, in its immediate quietness, the track flows in and out of incredible pop-adjacent intensity. A track moreso of haunting (a form of dreaming), I think it's a great match. Beautiful Art Pop number with frisson-inducing orchestration and warm Soft Rock instrumentation. At times, Kate's vocals, in these most intense sections, are shredded, emotive, but also apparently heavily distorted; another chilling effect. Great single (off my favorite album by one of my all-time favorite artists).

True Rate: 4.75/5.00

Released for the US and Canadian markets, Kate Bush's self-titled 1983 EP is some variation of different singles that were released years prior, the one exception being the 1979 Hammersmith Odeon live version of "James and the Cold Gun" (released that year via the On Stage EP ).

It begins with the excellent "Sat In Your Lap", released a year prior on The Dreaming. I'm sure I said some variation of this, but this is a Kate Bush essential to me. "James and the Cold Gun", to reiterate, is a call-back to a different time entirely, released on her 1978 debut, The Kick Inside, this version being from a live performance in '79 (still 4 years before the release of this EP). I believe I said something of this sort when reviewing On Stage, but there's something slightly heavier in this version. It's nice to hear the backing vocals handled live. Organ sounds awesome and, as I noted then, the half-time slow at the end of the song is actually more impactful here than on the studio version. I got a real kick out of watching the actual video of this live performance, with a creeping Kate holding a pistol and then, even going so far as aiming at the audience, a rifle.

"Ne t'enfuis pas" is the French-sung post-progressive number, which B-sided "Suspended in Gaffa". Just an interesting use of sonics. I would think just a bit ahead of its time. Not a wild or crazy interesting song, but lovely. Then it's onto one of her signature classics, "Babooshka", a wild Art Pop track about infidelity and... trickery? Of course the chorus (and the music video) is iconic. Then the aforementioned "Suspended in Gaffa". I definitely had to be more honest with myself about rating for this track. It's a Baroque Pop song with a sort of harpsicord sound and a light, upbeat lilt. I love this song, and especially when it crescendos to a feral, untamed Kate, just waiting to be king, I do suppose haha. And finally, the French version of "The Infant Kiss", "Un Baiser D'Enfant". Interesting, indeed. This is a sort of eerie track off of Never for Ever. This is my first time hearing it in French. Nice song, but it was never anywhere near a favorite of mine.

A barely-rounded-up True Rate of 3.5/5.0

Wow! What a spread for the current individual ratings for this release! "Suspended in Gaffa" was the fourth and final single for Kate Bush's magnum opus, The Dreaming (1982). It was actually the first ever viewing of this song's music video, if I'm not mistaken, that put me on this back catalog journey into her work. This song is signature Baroque-Pop quirk, with light harpsicording, all played over an upbeat lilt. I love the chorus. I love her vocals. One I often think of, but perhaps not as thrilling to someone less familiar with her. Her vocals are wild, feral even, at the end of the song, with the final chorus. This music video shows a stableboy Kate dancing about in a somewhat sun-lit barn. Looks... smelly haha. Before the second chorus she is briefly shown floating through an outer space of stars.

Our B-side is one of the first non-album tracks that I had heard from Kate, "Ne t'enfuis pas". I just listened to the song she did with Peter Gabriel, "Don't Give Up", and honestly that puts this into a different perspective in my mind. As individuals like Gabriel, Japan's David Sylvian and Talking Heads' David Byrne were throwing out Post-Progressive ideations in its apparent infancy around this time (perhaps my perspective of timing is off), this feels like a fully realized post-Prog song. Beautiful track, sung of course in French (not the first time for Ms. Bush), with reverberating percussion and a beautiful, booming fretless bass. Lovely lovely stuff.

[Could have sworn I already rated this, but perhaps I'm just thinking of when I most recently listened through this and its B-side; again, I believe that being the reason I'm now going through her deeper back catalog.]

Definitely one of the more interesting tracks (especially as a single) is "The Dreaming", uncharacteristically un-English (despite the put-on accent) and sung for the most part in her lower register. I most love the refrain, for sure, but the song overall isn't one of her finest, despite being the title track of, in my opinion, her absolute strongest album. In the music video, uhhh.... reanimated [space?!] mummies(?) dance along with Kate, striding a beam of light, as though it were a horizontal metal pole in a dance studio. They dance in front of a rather creepy, beating sun. A dove leaves a cave (someone's soul departing?), and the dancers are found dead and dying therein, eventually being covered by sand and dust. Pretty cool video, to say the least, even if I have no clue what in the hell happened in it. The lyrics, which allude to some kind of future race-war (or governmental subjugation of "the other"), imply this may be space. Like a new Mars? And with that, too, it feels my suspicions about a possible visual homage to 2001: A Space Odyssey were warranted. Interesting.

Our B-side is the more-than-thematically-similar "Dreamtime", which actually picks up with the sound and tribal drumming of our A-side; effectively the backing track. Really very interesting choice. I certainly wasn't expecting this (like an anti-80s-Dance-version-B-side). It's basically the pre-chorus of "See the light ram through the gaps in the land" repeated over and over, as the rhythm shifts slightly and intensifies. I guess I haven't really thought about it before, but that's a didgeridoo, right?! [Oh, wow, and please believe me, I spelled that right on the first try?!]. Since it's basically the same song as the first, though simplified, I don't feel any which way about it, really.

A rounding up from a True Rate of 2.5/5.0

Another Kate essential, "There Goes a Tenner" was the third single for The Dreaming; an artsy, Baroque-lite pop song with a ton of quirk, character and spunk. In the video, Kate and a few others seem to be in a sort of mine, or... is it a grandfather clock? They bust open a metal door with explosives. It's not a safe? It is a safe?! haha. Interesting video, especially when compared to her earlier songs [this was a year into the advent of MTV specifically]. Anyways, this track is fantastic; love it.

One of the first of these B-sides that I perhaps moreso incidentally heard before was this'n, "Ne t'enfuis pas". And unlike many of her B-sides, it holds its own weight. It has its own character. As you might guess, this is sung in French. And it features the warm, jazzy bass that was pretty signature to this era in her career. Beautiful track. Easily could have fit in Never For Ever with others like "Egypt".

I'll be honest with myself and round down from a True Rate of 4.5/5.0.

And for me finally, I have entered into the singles for her magnum opus, The Dreaming (1982). "Sat in Your Lap" is the opener of that album, and a helluvan introduction to any work, I would say. As with these other singles, I was really looking forward to seeing the music video for this one. I'm surprised to say, somewhat, that I've never seen it before. This is the culmination of her more or less short-lived Art Pop era (beginning with Never For Ever, ending with The Sensual World). Always loved the compositional and lyrical progression of this song. The lyrics sort of whirlwind and change up from refrain to refrain. Super intense, from the vocals to the wordless percussion to the banging organ. From verse to verse, the video shows Kate rollerskating with two other dunces, and later with some bullheaded dancers and then some red-and-yellow jesters... I'm sure that's all poetically purposeful. ["Some say that knowledge is something sat in your lap / ...something that you never have."] Anyways, freaky-deak sh*t. One of her essentials, in my opinion.

The B-side is "Lord of the Reedy River", with quite the juxtaposition. A flutey Mellotron(?) softly accompanies Kate most eerily. Quieted, stylistically-consistent male backing vocals enter in in the second half. Haunting number. I like it. Worth a listen.

Christmas Kate?! Alright! Sorry I'm a month early to be celebrating Kate Bush's July Will Be Magic Again. I much appreciated in user Matti's review their contextualization of this single, as it was released just following Never For Ever (1980).

And indeed, she really captures that classic Christmas sound from the get-go on "December Will Be Magic Again". It's 1980 and she's of course still sporting her swelling dramatic soprano. With little trills of synthesizer, the main of the track is guitar (or is it mandolin) with piano. In a great compliment from me, the grand refrain, now with added drums and backing vocals (the latter of which continue on in the next verse), has a sort of oldschool Runescape feel to me. Generally speaking, the compositional style of that OST's (if that's what games also call them) Ian Taylor is relatively simplistic, but he is apt and well capable of capturing different moods. And so, as fans well know, does Bush. Great melody. Bit complex in the verses, but still lovely.

And "Warm and Soothing" is very much of her old mode, with soft and feeling vocals in piano balladry. A lot of beauty, but a less-than-memorable melody compared to some of the similar tracks of this sort. I mean, "In The Warm Room", for instance... Good God, can she write. Certainly B-side material here, to say the least.

First of all, a shoutout is most certainly due to user Finnforest, for the (to me here and now) twelve year old review of this EP. Really well written context for this can be found therein. I, for one, was utterly unaware of this. Despite what they say, it does appear this is a true-blue live recording, from May 1979 at the Hammersmith Odeon. But some have suggested that there was some kind of later (likely very purposeful) studio f*ckery on the finished tracks. Who's to say? Aside from Lionheart's "Don't Push Your Foot on the Heartbrake", the material on this album was originally released via her debut LP, The Kick Inside. [My personal experience with her live material is pretty much solely represented by her famed Christmas special, which premiered later that same year. If anyone is unfamiliar, there are some interesting commentaries written in recent about that performance, in all of its peculiarity. I'm sure they would make for a more than decent viewing guide, too.]

The EP begins with "Them Heavy People", one of her best Pop songs of her early works. For those somehow unfamiliar, this is one of a few tracks that is, as I've put it, faux-Reggae (successfully, I might add). Pretty great sound here, with much-necessary backing vocals. As if we didn't know it already, Kate is of course an insanely talented vocalist. The guitars at the end are soft and lovely. Next is the aforementioned Lionheart track, "Don't Push Your Foot on the Heartbrake". According to the credits for the EP, it is a full live band, as it sounds. This is the first time in her discography that I'm seeing the feature of one of her career go-tos, drummer Preston Heyman. For a live performance, pretty decent sound and offering a slightly different approach than what we get on the studio version. Specifically, it's slightly faster, slightly heavier and the backing vocals provide something pretty interesting that isn't on that original version. Even so, I'd take the original.

Onto our second side, we have the harder Rock of "James and the Cold Gun" and, really, the guitars here sound pretty awesome, either Brian Bath or Alan Murphy. Also a tad heavier than the original. But in that, I'll take the cleaner sound of the original. The even slower, super feeling approach of the final instrumental section is actually a lot more impactful than on The Kick Inside, so that's a mark in its favor, for sure! Honestly, super cool guitar solo here, too. The softest of the bunch by a landslide [did I use this analogy properly? haha] is our final track, "L'Amour Looks Something Like You". And this version, unlike the two tracks that precede it, is actually slower than the original studio recording. Kate sounds great, but there's really nothing that it offers that the original didn't already have.

True Rate: 3.5/5.0

Kate Bush's debut single, released January 20, 1978, was the iconic, eccentric "Wuthering Heights". This song was something else when it was released, I'm sure: an orchestral pop ballad, based off the Emily Bronte novel of the same name. As iconic as the song itself, if not more, is its accompanying music video, with a solo-dancing Kate in a red dress, swaying to and fro in an open field. Apparently, this was the second version of the video, from what I'm seeing. Like many others, this was definitely one of my legitimate introductions to Kate back when I was in college. In the first version, also iconic and much referenced in the age of internet memes, a slightly shorter version of the song than this single, instead features Kate (or numerous Kates) in a white dress on a lit stage. Supposedly somewhat closer to the novel, here she is slated to appear as the main character Catherine's ghost. The guitar solo at the end was performed by Alan Parsons' Project's Ian Bairnson. As with other material from this era and album specifically, it also most notably features Duncan Mackay, here on Hammond.

Our B-side is the very fun, very upbeat faux-Reggae of "Kite", [much] moreso a favorite of mine. Super free-flowing, this features pretty big Rock drumming and bright organ, which really makes its sound. Fantastic. Such a killer debut single, in my opinion.

A rounded up True Rate of 4.5/5.0.