FEATURE:
Inflections and Corrections
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1978/PHOTO CREDIT: Gered Mankowitz
Learning New Things About Kate Bush
_________
I guess…
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush performs The Wedding List at the Prince’s Trust Rock Gala, on 21st July, 1982/PHOTO CREDIT: Getty Images
no matter how much of a fan you are of an artist, you can never know everything! It is always amazing how there are these details and things that come to light all these years later. For me, Kate Bush is someone who I have think I have a pretty good handle on when it comes to her career. Certainty, when it comes to the basics, I know them for sure. When digging deeper, I always try not to assume that I know everything. When I post out features and thoughts, often I will find someone adds a detail or drops in a line that reveals something new about Kate Bush. A fact or piece of trivia that I was not aware of. Maybe it is something to do with The Tour of Life in 1979 and a particular set. Stuff that I did not pick up when researching for the numerous features about it. It is always edifying to get that new knowledge, but it also gives me respect for those Kate Bush fans who dig even deeper than I do. I wanted really to talk about how it is good to know more about your favourite artist, yet you can never know everything. Maybe tipping into obsessiveness, the beauty of finding out new sides makes that fandom richer and more nuanced. An artist who is an open book, yet has been read in full holds littler mystery and allure I feel. This all got started when I saw this article below. There is a lot of great detail and information there. One thing struck me that I thought I knew but had miscalculated. Maybe not the happiest Kate Bush memory, but I always thought that her relationship with Del Palmer – her engineer and long-term musician friend – ended around about 1992 or 1993. In fact, there are a few websites that state this. Around the time The Red Shoes was coming together – and her mother Hannah died (1992) -, it was another blow to her.
In fact, she married Danny McIntosh (who appeared on The Red Shoes and albums since) in 1992. A breakup then in the late-1980s/early-1990s. It is not a big thing, though that one small detail has this domino/butterfly effect. It makes me think differently about the album itself and how The Red Shoes resonates. I go back to 1989’s The Sensual World and the fact there were definitely strain there. How various songs are now cast in a fresh light. Bush and Palmer are on great terms - though it would have been devastating seeing a fifteen-year or so relationship end, even if it was not thew most fractious and bitter one. It goes to show that, even if I consider myself to be some sort of expert, there are areas and bits that she assume and then have corrected. It adds to my knowledge base. It also means I have new impetus to write about the period between 1988 and, say, 1993, and the fact that there are new angles and dynamics that influenced me thinking of Kate Bush and her songs. As I said, one can never know all there is about an artist. Something I thought was fact and was indisputable, actually, was not (and I was a few years out). I pick up new things about Kate Bush each week. It surprises me that there is this dedicated and passionate fanbase who knows so much! Perhaps not surprising given the power and importance of Kate Bush’s music. I study and write about Kate Bush, partly as I want to highlight a piece of work or side of her career that is worth putting out there. I also do it because I am researching and finding out more about the music queen.
Rather than me dwelling on my association with Kate Bush and, actually, how many people have different dates/details about the same event, all this makes me wonder whether the whole story can ever be known. Bush has always be very private, so something like a relationship breakup would not be made public and subject to tabloid scrutiny. Similarly, dates of single releases and even albums can vary depending on the type of source. I guess, until a definitive volume comes out that takes Kate Bush’s life from childhood to now – and expands on the biographies that are out already – then we can never really have that complete understanding. Even so, I still learn a tonne when I read books about her. I know Leah Kardos is currently working with the 33 1/3 book series and is covering Hounds of Love (1985). Making this accessible book about her masterpiece is going to be picked up by a whole new generation. I have just written a series of features about Hounds of Love, revolving around its approaching thirty-eighth anniversary on 16th September. I am pretty sure about that album, date, though there are a couple of her albums where the dates vary - depending on whether you go to her official website or Discogs etc. There needs to be a database where one can type any album in and get an exact date of its release (depending on the country you are in). It can be frustrating when you want to get down a fact – whether it is an album date, a detail about a photograph, something biographical or whatever – and there are all these different opinions (or none at all).
Having some mystery is good and should be commended, though an artist as beloved as Kate Bush has this fervent and dedicated fanbase. It is never wanting to know about things too intrusive. Merely, some of the things that are not in interviews or commonly known. That Del Palmer date correction threw me a bit – as I thought I had that figured! -, though, even as someone who writes about her extremely regularly, you can never be 100% about everything! Newer fans are teaching me things; I am giving some new insight to people who have been fans much longer than me. Whilst it may seem cool to be a know-all or the ultimate authority when it comes to an artist, there is much greater pleasure knowing that you do not know everything. Every time someone brings me a new Kate Bush nugget or I have to revise my thoughts and assumed facts, it makes me a better fan. It does renew that demand and real gap for an authoritative Kate Bush documentary. Maybe, in the same Mark Lewishon is dedicating a lot of his life to The Beatles and meticulously writing about their career from the start to the end, it would take less time to write about Kate Bush’s. I would definitely be fascinating owning a tome that goes that deep with details and dates! Regardless of possibilities and dreams, there is that lovely little joy (or embarrassment sometimes!) of realising something new about Kate Bush – or being put straight about something. The sort of interactions where we reveal new things and discuss Kate Bush makes us more enriched and connected. Hearing from someone who offers me a fresh take, gives me new information and creates this curiosity makes me truly appreciate the wonder of Kate Bush and…
THIS woman’s work.