FEATURE:
The Kate Bush Interview Archive
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in a promotional photo for 2011’s Director’s Cut
2011: Sinéad Gleeson (The Irish Times)
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I am going to spend some time…
PHOTO CREDIT: Sinéad Gleeson
with Kate Bush’s 2005 album, Aerial, as I am celebrating album anniversaries of hers. That album was released in November of that year. I am considering it, as Bush returned after twelve years. Recently, ABBA announced their first album in forty years, Voyage! Not that Bush leaves that sort of gap between albums - though we were relieved when Aerial was announced! It has been ten years (almost) since Bush released her latest studio album, 50 Words for Snow. Earlier in 2011, Bush surprised everyone with Director’s Cut. Almost six years after Aerial’s release, it was wonderful having new Kate Bush material. Re-working tracks from her albums, The Sensual World (1989) and The Red Shoes (1993) – songs she felt dissatisfied with –, it is an album that we wouldn’t have expected from her. It is interesting hearing her reversion these songs all these years after they first appeared. Before that, Bush had not really engaged in retrospection like this. Therefore, interviews from that time are really interesting. In this part of my interview feature, I want to bring in Sinéad Gleeson’s interview for The Irish Times. I wanted to highlight this interview, as there are some great questions and answers. We get a sense of how motherhood (her son was born in 1998) has affected her work. Bush also talked about why she wanted to take on Director’s Cut:
“When we finally speak, Bush is late, and profusely apologetic. Her day has been taken up with a short film she has directed for Deeper Understanding. It’s the first single to be taken from Director’s Cut, a new album of reworked songs culled from The Sensual World and The Red Shoes. Six years after the release of her last album, Aerial, Bush had multiple motivations in going back to these songs. Technological and production limitations were a factor, but artistic doubt also lingered in the back of her mind.
“I’ve wanted to do this for a while, and I think some of my more interesting songs are on those two albums. You look back on your work and often feel there’s something wrong with all of it, but that’s just part of being a human being as much as an artist. I tried to make some of those songs sound like I’d want them to sound now, but this time I wanted it to be more about the songs than the production. I also approached them in a lower key, because my voice is lower now.”
Bush’s voice was just one of the unique things about her. Female singers who wrote their own songs were in a minority, as were ones who played piano, never mind ones who wrote about Brontë novels. Stylistic experiments have pushed her in various vocal directions, but age has added new textures and angles to her voice. It’s noticeably lower on songs such as Song of Solomon and Rubberband Girl. Elsewhere, she sounds as distinctive as she always has, and is comfortable with these changes.
“I really like other people’s voices as they age. I think singers’ voices get more interesting as they age. People like Frank Sinatra and Billie Holiday had wonderful voices when they were younger, but they sounded even better as they aged.”
Bush grew up in a musical family, and played piano from an early age. She absorbed all kinds of music, and she says that many of her early influences – not just her piano-playing father and musical brothers – were men. Like women in 1970s music, from Joan Jett and Ari-Up to Poly Styrene, Bush’s musical image is self-made, because of a dearth of role models. No one was doing what she was doing.
“There was Joni Mitchell and Carole King, but the people I was drawn to in my teens tended to be male. My greatest hero was Elton John, and part of that was because of what he does, but that he was also a singer who played piano. A lot of songwriting at the time was very guitar-based, but Elton stood out. He’s a brilliant pianist and I still love his work.”
On Director’s Cut, This Woman’s Work has been completely re-recorded. The song (and original video) deal with the idea of womanhood, especially in relation to being a mother. Bush wrote it long before she gave birth to Bertie, but on 2005’s Aerial, the sense of the domestic seeped in again, from the track named for her son, to Mrs Bartolozzi. Cyril Connolly warned of the dangers of the “the pram in hallway” for great art, but Bush thinks she has the balance, and her priorities, right.
“It’s quite an intense life when you’re trying to be a mother and work, but you have to get on with it.”
Has motherhood influenced her work? “Oh yes, I think so. I’ve had to learn to work differently, because I have a lot of commitments as a mother, and there are things I don’t want to bypass. I love spending time with my son. The way I set out to be a mother was that he came first and my work would fit around that. It means I don’t always get a lot of sleep , but I feel really privileged that I can do a lot of my work at home.”
When she’s not recording or writing, she admits she loves to watch films and read – no Kindles, mind – she believes in “the energy of a physical book, the smell of it”. She admits to being “immensely flattered” when people cover her work, and is indefatigably modest when asked about being an influence on artists such as Joanna Newsom, PJ Harvey and Alison Goldfrapp. At the moment she is working on new material, but is guarded about it.
“ Director’s Cut took a long time. It’s funny, every time I start a new album I say to myself ‘this one’s going to be really quick’, and of course it ends up going on and on. But it was great to go straight into the new songs, while I was still in focused, studio mentality. With Aerial and this new album I feel there’s a greater space. They’re a bit different to my other work, but then I feel that about everything when I start it, and I don’t want to keep making the same album all the time. It’s hard to talk about work when it’s in progress, because it’s always an evolving process.”
While there is no definite release date yet for the forthcoming album of brand new material, the singer’s return via Director’s Cut was bound to cause the issue of touring to resurface. Bush has famously toured just once – in 1979 – and legions of devotees would love to see her live. Few artists command the kind of fan loyalty she does, but then Bush is a one-off. A consummate artist and an original – the ne plus ultra of female musicians”.
I am fascinated by Bush in 2011. She released Director’s Cut in May, then followed it with 50 Words for Snow in November. She herself wouldn’t have felt she’d put out two albums in a year! No wonder she needed a break! Let’s hope that we do not have to wait too long before we here from her again. I love a lot of Kate Bush interviews. The one with Sinéad Gleeson of The Irish Times is especially compelling. It is great reading a legendary songwriter discuss…
SUCH a wonderful album.