FEATURE:
Kate Bush’s Hounds of Love at Thirty-Nine
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush during The Ninth Wave photo session/PHOTO CREDIT: John Carder Bush
The Ninth Wave: The Unseen and the Unknown
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I am looking ahead…
to 16th September and the thirty-ninth anniversary of Kate Bush’s Hounds of Love. It is worth getting to some background about the album before coming to its incredible suite, The Ninth Wave. There was this period of recovery and rest following The Dreaming. That album came out in 1982. Clearly, Bush was exhausted and needed to stop. Her father, a doctor, diagnosed nervous exhaustion and prescribed bedrest. If she had ploughed on and worked to the same extent she did through The Dreaming, it could have meant an early end to her career. It was a crucial moment where she had to heed advice. She did. Spending time with family and friend, 1983 especially was a fruitful period of rare relaxation. She bought a VW Golf and drover herself around. She went to films and spent time at home. Together with her boyfriend Del Palmer (who was in her band and engineer), Bush hung out and enjoyed downtime. She listened to music (mainly Classical) and went for walks. Gardening came into her life and provided this calm and focus. Buying fresh fruit and vegetables, she prepared one good and healthy meal a day. Instead of the takeaways and unhealthy life she had before – I can picture late night recording, smoking a lot, lousy T.V. shows, very little sleep, together with a lot of stressful and tense moments -, this was a new chapter. I am engrossed in Graeme Thomson’s Under the Ivy: The Life and Music of Kate Bush and what he writes on this period. How there was a lot of press speculation around Bush ‘disappearing’. That she had a drug habit or was vastly overweight. I have written on this before, though it is worth reiterating. How she was viewed and pictured by the press, compared to the actual reality. This very busy and hardworking human was not an addict or majorly depressed. Instead, she was being a normal human and not out and about at parties and being in the public eye!
Kate Bush and Del Palmer moved into the Kent countryside in a seventeenth-century farmhouse that was close to the family home of East Wickham Farm. Bush, taking dance back up and in a healthier space, was living in this very romantic and idyllic house. There was a sense of darkness and doom from 1981 and 1982. Days and days of recording The Dreaming. A period which took a toll. I mention all this because, to over-analyse or over-simply, that trajectory from 1981 to 1983 sort of is mirrored through The Ninth Wave. That initial stress and fear that ends with relief and sanctuary. Whereas some of the tenser, anxious and frightening moments of The Dreaming reflected a very present and personal significance, I do think there was more in the way of fiction and detachment with the fears of Hounds of Love. One could say that the title track is Bush exposing her fear, cowardice and worries about love and herself. I always think the song has positivity and strength. The same goes with nearly everything on the first side of the album. Much more in the way of the positive and optimistic mindset she would have found from 1983 onwards. How much of The Ninth Wave is genuine fear coming to the surface? I think that that idea of a woman being lost at sea and at the mercy of what is underneath was a genuine one. Kate Bush has said she imagined nothing more frightening. Some could say that this, psychologically, was Bush feeling vulnerable about her career and security. Metaphors for the industry and the capricious nature of her career. How she was maybe adrift and could be lost at any moment. It is a whole different thread to examine. I think there is much more in the way of fiction and fantasy than any hangovers from The Dreaming.
That said, one could say that there was lingering depression or anxiety from that time. If there was, it was channelled in a very ambitious and positive way. Perhaps her greatest achievement is that song-cycle from the second side of Hounds of Love. It is a masterpiece. If you want to analyse things, you could see this as a nod to Kate Bush’s life for the previous couple or few years. The fatigue and being lost. That need to stay awake and alive. Family and friends waiting for this woman who might never return to them. The sense of a spirit watching over them and, finally, rescue and a return to land – though the woman who returns is a shadow of her former self. Each song could very much be attached to a particular career moment or time in her recent life. I think there is more warmth and different sound on The Ninth Wave. If percussion and a heavy and grittier sound was used in The Dreaming and the Fairlight CMI was very much used to project a lot of dirt, smoke, guttural and grime at times, I feel there are different emotions and textures on The Ninth Wave. Beautiful and tender moments then sweeping and grand symphonies almost. Heady and intoxicating sound collages and spirited, rousing songs. Think about the joy and energy of Jig of Life. The simplicity and heartbreak through And Dream of Sheep. The atmospheric and affecting The Morning Fog. The choral and huge Hello Earth. I think this work was from the mind of someone happy and content enough to think in a more abstract way. Perhaps putting less of her own emotions and strains through machinery. Of course, there as some of that, though her mind and body was healthier. Awake and alive to opening up her palette and imagination, there is this mystery and sense of the unknown about The Ninth Wave.
There is so much to uncover and explore when it comes to The Ninth Wave. Think about a real lack of podcasts or documentaries about it. There has been a literary adaptation of the suite, though very little in the way of articles and new examinations. Maybe there will be more of it next year for Hounds of Love’s fortieth anniversary. Apart from the relatively overlooked Mother Stands for Comfort on the first side of Hounds of Love, every other track has got quite a bit of write-up and focus. Maybe The Big Sky should have more. I think that The Ninth Wave has this mystique. We do not really know much about it beyond the interviews Kate Bush has given where she has discussed it. Nearly thirty-nine years after the world first heard The Ninth Wave, there are questions and gaps. One of the most obvious things to note is how none of the songs on that second side were released as singles. The only video representation of any of the songs is when Kate Bush filmed And Dream of Sheep for 2014’s Before the Dawn. The only time where she performed The Ninth Wave in its entirety. Across twenty-two dates, it was an undertaking pulling it off every night! We have no filmed documentation of those performances. There is the live album audio. So, really, the only people who sort of know what Kate Bush had in her imagination are those who were in Hammersmith ten years ago. I have pitched how there should be a filmed version of The Ninth Wave. Something Kate Bush was keen to do once Hounds of Love was released. It just never came together. As someone desperate to see The Ninth Wave in all its glory, you wonder if it will ever come to pass. I guess that everyone who hears the suite has their own interpretation and vision.
Whether you think the woman does get rescued – Bush said she did in interviews around the album and years after, but those who were at Before the Dawn think she never made it out alive - or not, one cannot deny how eclectic and extraordinary The Ninth Wave is. Many talk about the singles from Hounds of Love. I don’t think The Ninth Wave gets enough attention. With few videos or much audio dedicated to this collection of songs, there is that need and desire for more. The Ninth Wave was part inspired by Idylls of the King: The Coming of Arthur by Alfred, Lord Tennyson. Also, by Aivazovsky's iconic 1850 painting, The Ninth Wave. This great article goes more into that. Once more, Bush influenced by literature and art. With that mix of personal and fictional in the main character and the story arc, The Ninth Wave is truly fascinating and mysterious! Everyone will have their own interpretations and theories of what happens and how things end. The Kate Bush Encyclopedia have transcribed part of a 1992 interview where Bush talks about this incredible suite:
“The Ninth Wave was a film, that’s how I thought of it. It’s the idea of this person being in the water, how they’ve got there, we don’t know. But the idea is that they’ve been on a ship and they’ve been washed over the side so they’re alone in this water. And I find that horrific imagery, the thought of being completely alone in all this water. And they’ve got a life jacket with a little light so that if anyone should be traveling at night they’ll see the light and know they’re there. And they’re absolutely terrified, and they’re completely alone at the mercy of their imagination, which again I personally find such a terrifying thing, the power of ones own imagination being let loose on something like that. And the idea that they’ve got it in their head that they mustn’t fall asleep, because if you fall asleep when you’re in the water, I’ve heard that you roll over and so you drown, so they’re trying to keep themselves awake.
Richard Skinner, ‘Classic Albums interview: Hounds Of Love’. BBC Radio 1, 26 January 1992”.
There have been fan theories and messages about The Ninth Wave. Not a lot in the way of column inches or minutes of audio. I hope The Ninth Wave is given more love and light by next year. I am going to end with this article from 2021. An examination and nod to wonderful and rich musical storytelling. Even if there is no beginning and end – where we see how the woman got into the ocean and we never know what happened when she got back to land -, it is that period where we are with her at sea that is so evocative and tense. Never really knowing which direction things would go and if she would be safe. Never knowing for sure how things worked out:
“So in which direction did Kate Bush take her ocean story? Well, many. The tracks do play out like the film which was in Kate’s imagination, beginning with the wonderfully lonely “And Dream of Sheep,” in which the narrator floats alone in their life jacket, drifting in and out of consciousness. As the character falls into the “warmth” of a hallucinatory state, the scene is set for Kate to experiment with their mental state and the dreams they experience.
Beginning with “Under Ice,” the music becomes much darker and more intense. The lyrics of the track give a warped impression of the cold and hypothermia that the narrator is likely experiencing. We transition to the sudden direction to “wake up,” the theme of the track “Waking the Witch” (my personal favourite,) where things start to get more chaotic, the calm voices of the introduction being replaced by broken, fragmented jitters of speech — “Help me, listen to me, listen to me, tell them baby!”
IN THIS IMAGE: Ivan Aivazovsky The Ninth Wave
With the most intense section of the suite over, Kate continues her experimentation into mental states, where in “Watching You Without Me” she describes an out of body experience — as a ghost in her own home, watching her loved ones worry. A third hallucination appears with “Jig of Life,” and we are suddenly enveloped in the sounds of Irish folk music — violin, fiddle, pipes, and drums. Confronted by her future self, the narrator is persuaded to fight for their life — the relentless, powerful instrumental driving the story forward.
The final tracks of the suite lead to and take us through the serenity and relief of the narrator’s ambiguous rescue. “Hello Earth” is Kate floating away further and further from the life she knows. We hear samples of NASA communications, conveying the feeling of being so far from human contact.
The iconic “The Morning Fog” is the final track of the album, in which Kate is rescued. The joyful tone highlights the journey we have been through, loss, mental states, hope, and finally the serene, joyous feeling of being safe. Kate stated in interviews that the suite was always intended to end in rescue, but it could be argued that “The Morning Fog” is instead the narrator succumbing to the water, experiencing the final moments of life”.
On 16th September, it is the thirty-ninth anniversary of Hounds of Love. I know that there will be talk of the album and iconic singles like Hound of Love and Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God). I still feel that The Ninth Wave has been left aside. Google results for it and there is not a lot in the way of videos, articles or anything recent. You do feel there is so much to navigate and explore. Go deep with the songwriting, the sounds, the psychological and the imagery. The fact a relatively small number of people have and will ever see the only visual representation we have of The Ninth Wave. The way Bush talked about the suite in 1985 or 1992. How she altered that when mounting it for Before the Dawn. So much to discuss. Maybe we will next year. Such an accomplished cycle of songs. Almost like a Classical symphony! Something with moving parts and this narrative that takes us through a dark and tense night. The different moments, moods and emotions that switch between songs. Rooting for this woman on her own at sea. The salvation and possible safety of the final song. Kate Bush’s stunning production vision and talent present in every note and line. It is her masterpiece! I think it subsumes and overpowers the rest of the album. Rather than Hounds of Love being defined by its singles, its true heart and core is The Ninth Wave. People should cover the songs. We need to remix the tracks. Separate them and rank them. Dissect each one and do more. Or maybe a relative sense of mystery is what makes it so intriguing and powerful. This piece of work swims in the imagination, gets inside the heart and…
OVERWHELMS the senses.