Category: Kate Bush

A guest posting by The Robster

I’m not sure there’s much I can write about Kate Bush that could ever do her justice. Quite frankly, she’s one of the greatest musical talents that walked the earth. I’m not going to qualify that statement. There’s no need. Those who disagree are nothing to me.

I do accept, however, that there are many people who are not overly familiar with her work. I mean, everyone knows a few of Kate’s biggest and best known songs, but in terms of her albums, they remain something of a mystery to most.

To put right a clear (and I’m sure unintentional) wrong – that there is a glaring lack of Kate Bush posts on this otherwise wonderful site – I’ve compiled an ICA of deep cuts (no singles) from Kate’s studio albums (plus a b-side) in chronological order. Hopefully, those of you who think you love Kate but can’t profess to knowing a whole lot of her stuff other than the big hits will gain a Deeper Understanding of her work and investigate further. For everyone else, those of us who adore her, well we can just revel in her genius for 45 glorious minutes and argue over what tracks should have been included over those that actually were.

Deeper Understanding : A Kate Bush ICA for the (new) vinyl villain

SIDE ONE

1. Them Heavy People (1978, from ‘The Kick Inside’)

My no-singles rule could face a challenge right from the off. Them Heavy People was a standout from Kate’s astonishing debut album, but though it wasn’t actually released as a single in the UK, it was in Japan. It was also the lead track on the live EP ‘On Stage’ the following year, but the album version counts for the purposes of this article, and it’s long been a fan fave, so there!

2. Don’t Push Your Foot On The Heartbrake (1978, from ‘Lionheart’)

A live version of this one also featured on the ‘On Stage’ EP. Kate’s second album came out the same year as her debut, and perhaps suffers because of it. It has some excellent stuff on it, but it isn’t considered in the same league as what came before it. Or after it, for that matter. Heartbrake perhaps should have been the single instead of Hammer Horror.

3. Violin (1980, from ‘Never For Ever’)

Kate had been writing songs for years before her first single, and aged just 15, she recorded a number of them on a simple tape recorder while at the piano. Two of those earliest songs, Babooshka and Violin, weren’t recorded properly until her third album. The latter of these is a highlight from ‘Never For Ever’, an album that begun some of the experimentation she furthered on her next couple of releases.

4. Get Out Of My House (1982, from ‘The Dreaming’)

Kate refers to ‘The Dreaming’ as her “I’ve gone mad album”. It was her first entirely self-produced record, and it’s fair to say it baffled critics and much of her audience with its far-from-conventional instrumentation and arrangements. Over time, though, it has become an essential part of her discography. It’s my favourite of all her albums, probably because of its weirdness. It does get rather intense in places, none more so than on Get Out Of My House, the album’s closing track, in which Kate drew inspiration from Stephen King’s novel ‘The Shining’.

5. Under Ice (1985, from ‘Hounds Of Love’)

Basically, if you’ve never heard ‘Hounds Of Love’, then why are you even here? It’s Kate’s ‘Rumours’, her ‘Automatic For The People’, her ‘Nevermind’. It’s the one everyone knows, or at the very least, the one everyone claims they know. Aside from THAT song – which is fast becoming the latest in a long line of great songs we’re becoming completely sick of hearing (thanks, social media) – it’s one of her finest sets, and is perhaps a more focussed follow-up to ‘The Dreaming’ in that it continues the experimental approach (Side 2 in particular), but doesn’t jump from style to style like its predecessor. Under Ice forms part of ‘The Ninth Wave’, essentially the suite of songs about the fear of drowning that make up side 2.

6. Rocket’s Tail (1989, from ‘The Sensual World’)

Compared to her previous couple of albums, ‘The Sensual World’ was in many ways a more conventional record. That’s not to say it was any less interesting. Many of the songs are influenced by the James Joyce novel ‘Ulysses’. Rocket’s Tail totally blows me away whenever I hear it. It features Bulgarian vocal group Trio Bulgarka, and sounds absolutely incredible.

SIDE TWO

7. Ken (1990, b-side of Love And Anger; from the Comic Strip Film ‘GLC: The Carnage Continues’)

There are those who think musicians like Kate take themselves far too seriously. As if to completely disprove that theory, Kate teamed up with the comedy outfit The Comic Strip. She appeared as The Bride in Les Dogs and while she didn’t have many lines, she had plenty of screen time. I’m sure I’m not the only straight bloke who saw Les Dogs and melted at the sight of her… Kate also provided two brand-new songs to the soundtrack of another episode entitled GLC: The Carnage Continues. Ken is about the show’s anti-hero Ken Livingstone (played by Robbie Coltrane playing Charles Bronson playing Livingstone…) and his rise to leader of the Greater London Council. She portrays him in the song as he is in the show – the one man who can ultimately overthrow and kill the evil Ice Maiden, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher (Jennifer Saunders as Brigitte Nielsen…)! It’s a lot of fun, though sadly only fiction…

8. Why Should I Love You? (1993, from ‘The Red Shoes’)

The three years following ‘The Sensual World’ were traumatic for Kate. First her guitarist Alan Murphy passed away, then her mother. She also split from her long-term partner. You’d have forgiven her for taking a break, or if her next record was going to be a more downbeat affair. But instead, ‘The Red Shoes’ was a triumph and was lauded by the critics. There were guest appearances a-plenty, including Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton and Nigel Kennedy. Why Should I Love You? features Trio Bulgarka again, plus Prince, whose presence is most definitely felt in the chorus. Apparently, comedian Lenny Henry is in there too…

9. ∏ (2005, from ‘Aerial’)
Kate did take that break after ‘The Red Shoes’ and wouldn’t emerge again for 12 years. When she did, it was with something incredible and unexpected – a double album. Even more unexpected was her homage to ∏ (pi) in which she recites the number to its first 78 decimal places (then, oddly, from its 101st to its 137th). Look, I’m not going to question her obvious genius, I’m just so pleased she did it because, let’s face it, who else would?

10. 50 Words For Snow (2011, from ’50 Words For Snow’; featuring Stephen Fry)

It was another 6 years before Kate followed up ‘Aerial’, and it was with not one, but TWO albums. Firstly, ‘Director’s Cut’ featured analogue re-recordings of tracks from ‘The Sensual World’ and ‘The Red Shoes’, which were both digitally recorded to Kate’s regret. The second record of 2011 was particularly audacious though – seven songs sprawling across a double-album set lasting more than 65 minutes, “set against a background of falling snow”. It was nothing less than we expected from her, and once again it wowed the critics. The title track features the great Stephen Fry in character as Professor Joseph Yupik, rising to Kate’s challenge of citing 50 snow-related words and phrases. What’s not to love?

And that’s the last we’ve heard from Kate, at least in terms of new material. It’s been more than 14 years, yet somehow she remains remarkably relevant. A new record would be nice, a thing of wonder and joy I’m sure, at a time when the world desperately needs it. But until then, here’s a couple of things you may not have heard before to tide you over…

SPECIAL LIMITED EDITION BONUS 7”

Remember I mentioned Kate’s home demo recordings when I was talking about Violin? She was just 15/16 when she sat at her piano and recorded 23 songs to a cassette tape. This tape found its way to family friend David Gilmour who secured a studio session to professionally record the demo that ended up getting Kate signed. Only a handful of those original 23 songs were eventually done over and put out on her albums, the rest of them have never been officially released. They have been bootlegged though, and I’m lucky enough to have them in that form. So, as a special sign off from me, here’s a couple of practically unheard Kate songs performed by the precocious teenager at home in 1974.

1. Never The Less
2. Coming Up

The Robster

JC adds…..

By coincidence, a Kate Bush song appeared on the blog yesterday, courtesy of FFF’s guest offering.   Chaval asked if this had been Kate’s first appearance on the blog…not quite, as each of Wuthering Heights, the On-Stage EP and Wow have featured (November 2019, January 2017 and May 2016 respectively).

Yesterday’s posting involved a lot of research and work. Today’s is a straight lift from wiki, albeit in edited form:-

Wuthering Heights is a song by Kate Bush released as her debut single in November 1977 and re-released in January 1978. It appears on her 1978 debut album The Kick Inside. It stayed at number one on the UK Singles Chart for four weeks, and remains Bush’s most successful single. The song received widespread critical acclaim, with Pitchfork naming it the fifth greatest song of the 1970s.

Bush wrote the song aged 18, within a few hours late at night on 5 March 1977. She was inspired after seeing the 1967 BBC adaptation of the 1847 novel Wuthering Heights. She then read the book and discovered that she shared her birthday with author Emily Brontë.

Wuthering Heights is sung from the perspective of the character Catherine Earnshaw, pleading at Heathcliff’s window to be allowed in. It quotes Catherine’s dialogue, including the chorus lyric “Let me in! I’m so cold!” and “bad dreams in the night”. Critic Simon Reynolds described it as “Gothic romance distilled into four-and-a-half minutes of gaseous rhapsody”. The vocal was recorded in a single take.

Bush’s record company, EMI, originally chose another track, James and the Cold Gun, as the lead single, but Bush was determined that it should be Wuthering Heights, which in due course was scheduled for release at the beginning of November 1977. However, the singer was unhappy with the images chosen for sleeve and demanded that it replaced. Although some copies of the single had already been sent out to radio stations, the label did relent and rescheduled the release for mid-January 1978, a move that actually was of immense and unforeseen benefit as a November release would have seen it clash with Mull of Kintyre, the new single by Wings that subsequently became the then biggest-selling single in UK history.

Wuthering Heights proved to be something of a slow burner, with most of its early plays being restricted to the London-based Capital Radio. It took a full month to reach the charts, but after a debut appearance on Top of The Pops, it went on an upwards spiral, hitting the top spot in mid-March, where it stayed for four weeks. It wouldn’t drop out of the Top 40 until May 1978, and come the end of the year was certified as the tenth highest-selling single of 1978, with sales of well over half a million.

mp3 : Kate Bush – Wuthering Heights
mp3 : Kate Bush – Kite

Little known fact….and one which is a damning indictment on the pop industry.

Wuthering Heights was the first UK # 1 to be written and performed by a female artist.

JC

AS POSTED OVER ON THE OLD BLOG IN AUGUST 2010.

I was never completely convinced by Kate Bush when she first emerged in January 1978. The early singles sold in their millions but as a mid-teens boy with a love for post-punk bands with all their loud guitars and even louder shouty lyrics, the talents of the singer-songwriter at the piano with her squeaky voice just didn’t register.

Oh and she was ancient as well at 18 and a bit years of age……..

But as I got older and realised that there was a wee bit more to music than spotty oiks in sweaty venues, I fell for the charms of Ms Bush and started to listen to her much more closely. Oh and some brilliant promotional photos on giant billboards also had something about grabbing my hormonally-charged attention…..

I’ve a few Kate Bush LPs sitting in the vinyl cupboard, but its been years since I played them. The only tracks that ever come up on the i-pod shuffle are those that formed part of a Greatest Hits CD that was released in 1986 that I picked up cheap a few years later. I didn’t pay any attention to the comeback record in 2005 although a few folk have said I’m missing out on something quite decent.

The thing is, while browsing in a second hand vinyl emporium a wee while back, I came across a copy of a 1979 EP, and given it was going for £2, I thought it worth giving a listen again all these years later.

It has four live tracks, all recorded at a London gig in May 1979. This turned out to be the only time that Kate Bush ever toured in her entire career*, although over the years there would be sporadic live appearances, either solo or as alongside a whole range of other performers, suggesting that it wasn’t a fear of playing live that she suffered from.

The four songs all originally featured on The Kick Inside or Lionheart, her first two LPs:-

mp3 : Kate Bush – Them Heavy People (live)
mp3 : Kate Bush – Don’t Push Your Foot On The Heartbrake (live)
mp3 : Kate Bush – James And The Cold Gun (live)
mp3 : Kate Bush – L’Amour Looks Something Like You (live)

So as its spinning round the USB Turntable and doing whatever thing it is gadgetry wise to turn the tracks into instant mp3s, I’m thinking to myself…….this is shite.

It just feels as if it is music played by top-notch session players incapable of hitting a bum note but who are just as incapable of adding any meaning or feeling to a song. It’s got wanky solos all the way through as well and the sort of music that punk/new wave/post-punk was determined to banish forever (not that they ever had a chance of succeeding).

I’ve recently read reviews of that six-week tour that Kate Bush undertook in 1979 and by just about every account, it seems to have been an event that was ahead of its time with its use of theatre and dance and multi-median innovations including the use of a head-mic. But tucked away in the middle of such reviews you cotton-on to the fact that the musicians were drilled to the Nth degree with no room at all for improvisation. It sounds as if it was more akin to going along to a musical than a gig…….and I reckon that’s what comes across on the tracks on the EP. They lack any real depth or soul……but I bet they were astonishing if witnessed in the flesh.

Oh well. I’ve said it.

Bring on the brickbats.

* written and published years before the London residency of 2015 which so many got really excited about.

Is there any bloke out there, born in the first half of the early 60s, who didn’t fall in love or lust immediately with Kate Bush?

In 1978, her single Wuthering Heights, topped the singles charts for four weeks. This meant Kate became the first woman to reach #1 with a self-written song. What made the feat truly astonishing was that it was her debut, and she was just 19 years of age.

This was a singer who was quite unlike any other in the late 70s. Very few women were involved in punk or new wave, although that was to change quite quickly. If you heard a woman singing on the radio, is was usually on a disco track or some sort of sugary ballad. OK , I’m generalising as there were also some reggae-style singles that had female vocals, but like punk/new wave, these were few and far between.

Kate Bush had a vocal style all of her own – and it was one that divided the nation. I loved the fact that you couldn’t always make out the lyrics unless you really listened closely (or bought the albums in which case you got a lyric sheet). I loved how the records sounded – it was, thinking back, the first time that I appreciated how records had to be produced and arranged rather than just someone shouting into a microphone while strumming a guitar.

And most of all, for these things were important to a hormonally-charged teenager, I loved the way she looked. But I’m not that shallow folks…..if the music had been awful, I wouldnt have given her any attention. Honest.

Its hard to imagine nowadays when so many artists seems to take ages from one album to the next, but Kate Bush released two LPs in 1978. The Kick Inside was her debut, and it hit the shops in February. By late-October, Lionheart had been issued. This was all down to the fact that her label, EMI Records, knowing that Kate had already written over 50 songs that were in demo form, put pressure on her to quickly follow up the initial success.

The first single from the LP also came out in 1978, but Hammer Horror was a flop, failing to reach the Top 40. In a rare show of sense, EMI waited a few months and allowed Kate herself to have a big say in what would be the follow-up, and in March 1979, this began to be heard regularly on daytime radio:-

mp3 : Kate Bush – Wow

It was quite a daring single for its time. In an era when ‘pain in the ass’ was a lyric that wasn’t allowed on radio, Kate got away with ‘he’s too busy hitting the vaseline’ as part of a song that was sympathetic to homosexual actors unable to get the lead roles as they weren’t macho enough. There wasn’t much made of the subject matter at the time, but I’m guessing that if a 21st century female singer-songwriters was to do something similar, you can bet that one of her myriad of publicists would have the fact running in every tabloid in the land in the hope of creating a hype….

Here’s yer b-side too:-

mp3 : Kate Bush – Fullhouse

Enjoy.