FEATURE: The Digital Mixtape: Thirty-Five Years of MTV Unplugged

FEATURE:

 

 

The Digital Mixtape

IN THIS PHOTO: Kurt Cobain of Nirvana during the band’s legendary MTV Unplugged gig in 1993

 

Thirty-Five Years of MTV Unplugged

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THIS may be an anniversary…

 IN THIS PHOTO: Courtney Love of Hole during their MTV Unplugged set in 1995

that people think is irrelevant or strange. We do not have MTV anymore. It ceased being a music channel many years ago. Going into reality T.V. and programmes like that, I guess it is still going be people do not talk about it. I used to watch MTV a lot in the 1990s. It was a real source of music videos and discovery. Whilst many associate MTV with groundbreaking videos and genres like Pop and Rock, one of its greatest achievements was the MTV Unplugged series. This is when big artists stripped things right back and performed acoustic sets. It took them outside of their comfort zone and brought new life to songs. It was first taped on 31st October, 1989. Its first episode aired on 26th November, 1989 and featured Squeeze. To mark thirty-five years of a classic series, I am going to assemble a playlist of the best MTV Unplugged performances/sets. Here is some more information about the incredible series:

“MTV Unplugged is an American television series on MTV. It showcases recorded live performances of popular music artists playing acoustic or "unplugged" variations of songs. The show aired regularly from 1989 to 1999. From 2000 to 2009, it aired less frequently and was usually billed as MTV Unplugged No. 2.0. Since 2009, MTV Unplugged specials have aired occasionally, sometimes through online or subscription only. Episodes and specials have tended to showcase one artist or group, playing a combination of their hit songs and covers.

Many of the artists who appeared on the show in the 1990s released their Unplugged session as an album, and some of these albums were commercial and critical hits. Eric Clapton's Unplugged (1992) sold 26 million copies worldwide and became the best-selling live album of all time[citation needed]. Albums such as Mariah Carey's MTV Unplugged (1992), Nirvana's MTV Unplugged in New York (1994) and Alice in Chains' Unplugged (1996) became notable hits of the program. Other Unplugged albums that went platinum include Rod Stewart's Unplugged...and Seated (1993), 10,000 Maniacs' MTV Unplugged (1993), Tony Bennett's MTV Unplugged (1994), Page and Plant's No Quarter (1994), Shakira's MTV Unplugged (1999), Lauryn Hill's MTV Unplugged No. 2.0 (2001), Alicia Keys' Unplugged (2005) and Ricky Martin's MTV Unplugged (2006). Some of these albums produced successful singles as well, including Mariah Carey's No. 1 hit cover of "I'll Be There".

In 2021, Rolling Stone ranked the best fifteen episodes of MTV Unplugged. Many will have their own opinions as to which was best. Whether it is Mariah Carey, The Cranberries or Nirvana. I will include the top three as chosen by Rolling Stone. Counting down from three:

“Jay-Z (2001)

A couple of months after dropping The Blueprint, Jay-Z staged an Unplugged special at MTV Studios in New York. Crucially, he invited the Roots to serve as his backing band for the entire show. They brought an incredible live energy to songs like “Big Pimpin’,” “Can I get A …” and “Hard Knock Life,” reinventing them from the ground up. Mary J. Blige came out for “Can’t Knock the Hustle” and Pharrell joined him for “I Just Wanna Love U (Give It Me.)” It’s an entirely new way to experience Jay’s catalog, and the ultimate example that any genre of music can work on the show given the right backing group and the right arrangements.

Pearl Jam (1992)

Pearl Jam were just beginning to gain a national profile when they taped their Unplugged special at Kaufman Astoria Studios in Queens on March 16th, 1992. They’d just wrapped a grueling European tour and had little time to prep. “We literally got off the plane from Europe, spent all day in a cavernous sound studio in New York, and did the show that night,” said bassist Jeff Ament. “It’s pretty powerful, and Ed’s singing great. Yet it’s kind of naive, which is awesome.” The group later said they wished they had more time to put together a whole set of newly arranged songs like Nirvana would do late the following year, but it’s still an amazing look at a band just starting to realize their own incredible power and range.

Nirvana (1993)

Unplugged wasn’t Nirvana’s last concert. Just one week after it wrapped they’d resume the American leg of the In Utero tour and then head to Europe early the following year for two months of additional shows. But in many ways, the show felt like their final statement to the world. The vibe was dark before they even walked on since Kurt Cobain insisted that the stage look like a funeral, complete with lilies and black candles. Joined by touring guitarist Pat Smear and cellist Lori Goldston, the group skipped over nearly all of their obvious hits in favor of covers like David Bowie’s “The Man Who Sold the World,” The Vaselines’ “Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam” and no less than three Meat Puppets songs, where they were joined by bandleaders Cris and Curt Kirkwood themselves. Near the beginning, Kurt delivered a chilling rendition of “Come as You Are,” repeating the line “no, I don’t have a gun” through gritted teeth, a moment that became very hard to watch in light of later events. The show wraps up with “All Apologies” and a cover of Lead Belly’s “In The Pines,” which they renamed “Where Did You Sleep Last Night.” It’s hard to think of a more powerful double shot from any live concert in the entire 1990s, or perhaps even the entire history of rock & roll”.

To mark thirty-five years of MTV Unplugged, I will end with a playlist combining some of the very best artists and episodes. It is a wonderful series that should still be going today. Hearing legendary artists take things back to basics and reveal hidden depths to their songs. Take a listen through this acoustic playlist and…

TURN the volume up.

FEATURE: All Right, AllBright: Highlights from the Last Four Months with The Trouble Club, And What Events Are Ahead

FEATURE:

 

 

All Right, AllBright

IN THIS PHOTO: Caitlin Moran is a Trouble Club guest in Manchester in February

 

Highlights from the Last Four Months with The Trouble Club, And What Events Are Ahead

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MY most recent…

PHOTO CREDIT: Alice Lubbock

feature regarding The Trouble Club was back in June. As I always say, you can become a member by applying here. Go and follow The Trouble Club on Instagram,  Twitter and TikTok. There is a lot to pack in from the past four months so I will not spotlight and discuss every event. You can check the schedule out here. One of the biggest developments in the past four months is the fact that The Trouble Club’s Director/CEO, Ellie Newton got married! As we head towards the end of the year, there are some exciting events planned and remaining for 2024. A tantalising one for next year. I have made Caitlin Moran the ‘cover star’ as she has been announced as a guest for February. She will be appearing in Manchester. I shall end with that. I want to highlight a few events that I have been to since July. On 18th July, the legendary Helen Lederer appeared at AllBright for a night of conversation and laughs. It was one of the most energetic and exciting events I have been to for The Trouble Club (“From the iconic Absolutely Fabulous, to Bottom, Happy Families, Naked Video, French and Saunders and Girls on Top, Helen will join us to talk about her phenomenal, rollercoaster of a career!”). She was discussing her book, Not That I'm Bitter: A Truly, Madly, Funny Memoir:

“What was it like as one of a handful of women at the heart of the right-on alternative comedy scene in the 1980s? Piece of cake? Bit of a laugh? Well, yes, and no. It had its ups - but also its downs. Helen Lederer was a regular on the stand-up circuit and new-wave sketch shows in the decade that launched the careers of today's comedy household names and national treasures.

She shared stages with comedy pioneers like Ben Elton and John Hegley, and TV screens with Dawn French, Jennifer Saunders, Harry Enfield, and many others. From the iconic Absolutely Fabulous, to Bottom, Happy Families, Naked Video, French and Saunders and Girls on Top, it is difficult to think of a comedy show that Helen wasn't a part of. From writing radio shows, to performing on the West End her wry, witty perspectives, and her face, are unforgettable. So, plain sailing then? Well, not really.

Not That I'm Bitter, her powerful, frank, moving and characteristically funny memoir, reveals exactly how choppy the waters could be. Even in those ground-breaking, anti-Thatcher days, there was only room at top for so many women. For the rest, it was as much a struggle to be seen and heard in the world of comedy as in any boardroom or workplace, and just as difficult to avoid the predators.

This is more than the story of one decade, however. The child of a Jewish-Czech wartime refugee, Helen Lederer was never part of the mainstream. How do you make humour from a lifelong battle against problems with weight and low-self-esteem? Where are the jokes in addictions to diet-pills and steroid injections? How can laughter defeat the darker moments, like a child's anorexia or PTSD? How do you cope with constant self-sabotage and when, despite enormous success, you still feel like a failure? Helen raises an important and open discussion around mental health alongside the evolved attitudes to women today. There's something in Helen Lederer's life-story that everyone, can relate to”.

IN THIS PHOTO: Ellie Newton with Rosie Holt/PHOTO CREDIT: Alice Lubbock

On 22nd July, the wonderful Rosie Holt (M.P.) appeared. Not that she is a real M.P. It was the wonderful comedic persona that was brought to The Groucho Club. This was another funny and hugely enjoyable event. Even though Holt was running slightly late, she more than made up for that with a whirlwind of comedy and reflection on politics in Britain (“Rosie is best known to her >300k followers for her viral internet ‘interviews’ on Twitter in character as a hapless, desperately loyal Conservative MP. Join us for a night of laughter and tears as we look back at many years of Tory leadership with their greatest troll”). Her must-read book, Why We Were Right is one I would recommend to everyone:

“Rosie Holt, the desperate and loyal Tory MP famous for her viral twitter ‘interviews’, is finally here in book form to celebrate the last 14 years of Conservative government and explain to you, the British public, why the so called “scandals” or “controversial” decisions derided by the left were completely right (and intentional) all along. She’ll make Tories of you all yet.

Having flourished as an MP during the reign of Boris and clung on through to Rishi Sunak’s government, via a short and turbulent detour through the brief fever dream of Liz Truss, Rosie – everyone’s favourite MP – will have you cheering and desperate to ensure the Tories rule for another 14 years. Let’s make Britain great again. (Again.)”.

I have not mentioned The Trouble Club’s Marketing & Events Coordinator, Francesca Edmondson. With Ellie Newton, they are an incredible powerful and inspiring partnership who create these events, book the speakers and venues and get the word out. The social media channels always updated and engaging! It is such a task ensuring that the business grows, stays fresh and reaches people. But they are growing! With events happening in Manchester, there is this new base for those who cannot get down to the London events. There is also a team who film the events and look after the sound. Ensuring that everything is as crisp and professional as possible. It is great to see The Trouble Club going from strength to strength! Back on 24th July at AllBright – my personal favourite venue that The Trouble Club hosts -, I was at The Power of Celebrity with Olivia Petter (“Join us as we meet Olivia to discuss her latest book, her phenomenal articles (which cover everything from Bridgerton sex scenes to Paul Mescal's shorts) and the celebrities that we love to loathe”). Gold Rush is a book I would urge people to buy:

“We give celebrities a power they don’t deserve. Power they haven’t earned. What happens when they exploit it?

Imagine you’ve just spent the night with the most famous man on the planet. Except you don’t quite remember it. That is what happens to Rose, a twenty-something woman who seemingly has everything going for her.

Working for one of the most powerful news outlets in the country, Rose spends her days doing PR for glossy magazines. There are tedious spreadsheets, fashion divas, and many A-list parties. It’s at one of those parties where she meets Milo Jax, the world-famous, globally adored, British pop sensation. An unlikely flirtation turns into an even more unlikely evening and then Rose wakes up, unable to piece it all together. What happens next changes everything.

Gold Rush is a story about consent, celebrity culture, and trying to figure out where women fit in a world that consistently devalues and disrespects their bodies”.

One of the biggest and most-attended events of this year was An Evening with OnlyFans CEO Keily Blair at the Century Club on 13th August. She was dispelling many of the myths around OnlyFans. Blair is a hugely influential and inspiring entrepreneur who was fascinating when she was in conversation earlier in the year. I want to bring in a bit of a recent interview from Financial Times:

“Keily Blair is the chief executive of OnlyFans, an online platform where sex workers, sports stars and celebrities sell subscriptions for access to images and personalised content. It was founded by Tim Stokely and his father Guy in 2016 but sold two years later to Leonid Radvinsky, a Ukrainian-American entrepreneur and owner of porn sites. Blair joined the London-based company in January 2022 as chief strategy and operations officer. She secured the top job in July 2023, taking over from Ami Gan, who had been in post for 18 months. Payments made on the platform, which was founded in 2016, reached $5.6bn in 2022, with more than 3.1mn creators on its books and 238.8mn fans. OnlyFans takes a fifth of payments generated on the site. The company has been scaling up its trust and safety measures, driven in part by the UK’s Online Safety Act, which forces adult sites to verify the age of its users through technologies like facial scanning or by cross-referencing with banks. Blair — who was previously a cyber, privacy and data specialist at law firm Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, where she had OnlyFans as a client — says that the platform has already done most of the work needed to comply with regulation. In this conversation with FT technology reporter Cristina Criddle, she discusses the negative perceptions of the site, the opportunities for creators who are not sex workers, and the reason OnlyFans will not be available in app stores. Cristina Criddle: Why did you decide to take this role? Keily Blair: I had the advantage of working for the business for a long time before taking on the role. I was its external counsel as well, so I know it quite well. [And] I think this is such a special company in terms of its place in the tech and social media ecosystem. We’re so unusual because we’re a UK tech success story. Whenever I talk about the business, everyone automatically assumes that we’re based in the US. We’re happy to say, actually, we founded it in the UK, we’re still solidly in the UK, that’s where the majority of our exec team lives. We’ve paid out over $15bn to creators since we started, and that’s increasing year on year. We continue to grow. We’ve done the FT’s Fastest-Growing Companies in Europe ranking two years in a row. I think everyone was worried we’d be a pandemic bubble. We’ve proven that’s not the case. The company is also capable of doing so much for creators. That’s what excites me about the job. Also, with my background in cyber and privacy and online safety, there’s a nerdy part of me that really enjoys the challenging landscape that tech companies face at the moment. I think I can help to reduce some of the risk that’s inherent in running a tech business, especially one that is open and honest about allowing adult content. Global reach: a user in Bangkok browses the OnlyFans website. The platform has about 240mn users.

CC: You mentioned that you’re UK-based. Is that your largest market?

KB: Our largest market is the US. We don’t give a breakdown on a country-by-country basis, because creators can be based anywhere and it’s typically not what we do. We pay our corporation tax in the UK. We’ve paid £250mn in tax since we started. In terms of the creator base, it’s a global one of 3mn creators, 2.2mn of whom have been active in the last six months — a good, active user base. Then, in terms of fans, it’s 220mn globally and, of that, 87mn have been active in the last six months. It’s continuing to grow, continuing to be an exciting business. But we were founded in the UK, and we’re not skipping off to Silicon Valley anytime soon.

CC: Is the US somewhere you might consider an IPO one day?

KB: We’re not looking to IPO at the moment. People ask us all the time if we’re on a path to going public. For us, the bigger question is: why would we be on a path to going public? When most people look at an IPO, they’re doing it to raise funds. That’s not so much of an issue for us.

CC: Ami Gan brought you into the business, and I’m sure you worked with her very closely. But now that she’s left to run [advisory firm] Hoxton Projects, is there anything that you’re hoping to do a bit differently?

KB: Differently is always hard in tech because it’s a question of consolidating what we’ve built and, then, thinking about what the future opportunities are. For us, obviously we’re very proud of our adult-content creators, but it’s making sure that we also open up to other creators, so we’re doing new verticals”.

Back at The Groucho Club, I was at The Trial of Ghislaine Maxwell with Lucia Osborne-Crowley (“In November 2021, Ghislaine Maxwell was convicted of five counts of sex-trafficking of minors, and now faces 55 years in prison for the role she played in Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse of four girls. Join us to hear her blistering critique of a criminal justice system ill-equipped to deliver justice for abuse survivors, no matter the outcome”). That was on 22nd August. She was talking about the book, The Lasting Harm: Witnessing the Trial of Ghislaine Maxwell. I was engrossed by everything she said. It was such a revelatory and occasionally shocking discussion:

'I understand – and sympathise with – the feeling you might have that you already know the Jeffrey Epstein story. But I am not here to tell you a story about Jeffrey Epstein, or even Ghislaine Maxwell. I am here to tell you the stories of ten women, many of whom have never spoken at length before, about the real impact of sexual trauma on their lives'

In November 2021, Ghislaine Maxwell was convicted of five counts of sex-trafficking of minors, and now faces twenty years in prison for the role she played in Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse of four girls. The trial was meticulously covered by journalist and legal reporter Lucia Osborne-Crowley, one of the only reporters allowed into the courtroom every day.

The Lasting Harm is her account of that trial, a gripping true crime drama and a blistering critique of a criminal justice system ill-equipped to deliver justice for abuse survivors, no matter the outcome.

Giving voice to four women and their testimonies, and supplemented by exclusive interviews, The Lasting Harm brings this incendiary trial to life, questions our age-old appetite for crime and punishment and offers a new blueprint for meaningful reparative justice”.

I want to skip to Women Who Made Me with Aindrea Emelife (“Our first guest is renowned art curator and historian, Aindrea Emelife. She is currently a Curator of Modern and Contemporary at MOWAA (Museum of West African Art,) and the curator of the Nigeria Pavilion at this years Venice Biennale”). At The London Edition, this was such a compelling evening. I am not an art fan or someone who knows much about it. However, I was interesting when the event was announced. I learned so much. I want to bring in segments from an interview published last year by Interview Magazine. This was the astonishing curator bringing Nigerian art to the Venice Biennale:

“Aindrea Emelife’s 2022’s exhibition Black Venus is a great entry point to the writer and historian’s curatorial philosophy. Black Venus featured the work of 19 international artists who traced the history of black women, exploring the art world, identity and history, while examining where each starts, ends, and converges. It is this type of thinking that flips what we know about art and history on its head, and which Emelife will bring to the 2024 Venice Biennale, where she will be hosting the prestigious festival’s second-ever Nigerian pavilion.

At age 20, Emelife wrote her first column for the Financial Times, in which she argued that “surrealism is so much a part of our visual vocabulary that it is almost overlooked.” She has hardly stopped since. With a degree in Art History from The Courtauld Institute of Art and nearly a decade’s worth of experience, she is part of a very small group of Black women curators in the UK who contextualize and spotlight Black art and Black history. Today, while writing and researching between Europe and Africa, she is the curator of modern and contemporary art at the recently-opened Edo Museum of West African Art (MOWAA) in Benin City, Nigeria, where the famed Benin bronzes now call home after their repatriation late last year.

Earlier this summer, Aindrea and I got together to talk about scouting talent, the origins of her interest in art and history, and how she’ll prepare for next summer’s Venice Biennale.

AINDREA EMELIFE: How are you doing?

DESMOND VINCENT: I’m pretty good. Congratulations on getting to host the Nigerian pavilion for the municipality. I can’t imagine how that feels.

EMELIFE: Yeah, it’s great. It’s a huge undertaking, so I’m trying to make sure that it’s as good as it can be. I’m putting all of my effort and energy and excitement and research into this because it’s extremely important. As you know, there’s not a great legacy of African pavilions at Venice [Biennale]. So there’s a great responsibility to make sure it’s executed at an incredible level and that people can really expand what they think about the continent and in particular, Nigeria. I’m really honored and thrilled and the artists are cooking up something amazing, I’m sure. 

PHOTO CREDIT: Jordan Tiberio

VINCENT: How did you select the artists for this particular exhibition?

EMELIFE: So the selection process was quite interesting. There’s a couple of different things that I tried to consider. Firstly, the perception of West African art or Nigerian art is quite singular in many people’s minds. I think they attach the idea of Black figuration and bright colors, which I guess has dominated the market scope. But there’s so much more, so I want to ensure that the list wasn’t a list that people may have predicted based on a singular monolithic idea of what Nigerian art is. So I set out to ensure that sculpture and installation is represented, but also new media and art that ebbs into the world of the technological or digital as well. And things like photography or video are important, because Nigeria’s such a young nation. Over 70% of Nigerians are under 30. Then I also started to think about the cross-generational approach. Obviously there are some younger artists, but there are artists like Ndidi Dike, who have been making work steadily for a long time and is receiving the deserved recognition now, and people like Yinka Shonibare, who has been making work that looks at Nigerian identity in a similar way that I do as a diaspora. Obviously I can’t represent every tribe that exists, but there is an artist from the north, like Fatimah Tuggar. There are obviously Igbo artists, there’s Yoruba artists. I’m both Igbo and Yoruba, so I can be unbiased hopefully, and make sure that there’s a balance. I thought it important for the Venice audience to understand the many different pockets of history and identity in Nigeria as well. And I hope through the writing and through some of the curation that the sort of multifaceted nature of what Nigeria is can be told. One other thing that’s important to notice is that some artists are Nigerian artists, some of them are diaspora artists that also work and interact with Nigeria. And I thought it would be a nice and important contribution to have a mixture of both to show how global we are.

VINCENT: You mentioned how people from the outside view African art as a sort of monolith, as a particular style. Why do you think that is?

EMELIFE: I think that it’s driven a little bit by the market. I think when there’s been many different watershed moments in the last couple of years in terms of the wider world waking up to West African art, and then that sort of knee-jerk reaction then sort of coincided with the rise of, I guess, Black figuration or figurative art. And when that happened, when there was this rise of great artists who were making work in this field, people’s limited knowledge of the artworks allowed them to just typify it by just this one practice. And a lot of people assume that we didn’t have a Modernist period or we weren’t making work in the 60s or the 40s or the 70s, and I think that disjointedness of understanding is one of the reasons. They used to make bronzes, they used to make masks, then, somehow, nothing happened, and then now they’re doing this, which is of course incredibly false. There was this moment when I think everyone thought, “Oh, it’s just pink backgrounds and Black women with Afros.” But there’s so much more.

VINCENT: True. As we were talking about selecting the artists for the Pavilion, I wondered how you scout talent.

EMELIFE: It kind of happens very naturally. I’ve got a lovely network of art historians and artists who are very passionate about this and we have lots of conversations about art we’ve seen, things that we’ve read. What I’m really interested in at the moment is trying to delve into the archives to  find the artists that have been lost throughout history, of which there are quite a few. But moving back to the contemporary, you actually don’t need to look that hard. There’s just so many West African artists doing such interesting work. I came across Fatimah Tuggar because she was working on a project in a museum in America, which sent me on a really incredible research journey with Chika Okeke-Agulu, who’s one of the advisors of the museum and who’s been mentoring me a little bit. I discovered how many Nigerian artists are working in different parts of the world, whether it’s France or Vienna or Canada. As a diaspora, I will always think of it as an advantage, not a disadvantage, and it’s an interesting lens to understand two places and see how they are different and how they fuse together. But that being said, it’s really interesting to understand the art scene in Lagos and Benin, which is flourishing at such a massive speed. A lot of people think that cultural infrastructure is state-funded in Nigeria, and it’s not. We just do it on our own backs, mostly. And the fact that everything is thriving, that there are residencies set up by artists, is such a great testament to our optimism, but also our self-sufficiency.

VINCENT: Let’s talk about you for a second. How did you get into art?

EMELIFE: So my parents aren’t arty people. I was a little bit of a black sheep. I always loved art and history from a very young age. I would tell my mother to drag me to museums when I was younger and I found it an interesting way of understanding myself and history. One of the things I was most interested in looking at, ironically given the work I’m doing, was the Benin bronzes, because I was brought up in London. I’d always find it very strange obviously that they were there. I studied art history and was working as an independent curator, and a sort of inner precociousness allowed me to start pitching shows to different museums. And luckily, a few gave me a chance to stage shows, and that sort of allowed me to progress and learn more and build. Then I started doing museum shows at different places. I just finished a show that toured called Black Venus, which was on view at Fotografiska in New York. Then it went to the Museum of African Diaspora in San Francisco, and now it comes in London to Somerset House in July. And that show was looking at the history of the Black women throughout art. Again, I’m very interested in topics that relate to histories that have been underrepresented, so that was a really meaningful show to curate. And now I’m working on this Pavilion and I have joined MOWAA [Edo Museum of Western African Art], which is an incredible opportunity to build an institution from the beginning. I think what we want to do with MOWAA could essentially be a blueprint for museums on the continent. And it’s exciting to be able to transfer my curatorial experience and my art historical knowledge and really shift the needle in terms of how West African art is perceived globally.

VINCENT: I was really curious about the Black Venus project. That was really, really fun to look into. What was the light bulb moment for you?

EMELIFE: Black Venus was something that I’d been thinking about for a long time. It very directly obviously relates to my own identity as a Black woman. My mother told me the story about Hottentot Venus from quite a young age. I was maybe about eight. That story stuck with me for a long time and I became very interested in how Black women have moved throughout the world and been perceived. When I underwent the research for the exhibition, which is still very ongoing as I’m now working on a book about this topic, I came across so many different Black female figures in art history that have been lost. And in doing that, I found it interesting to understand how they were then portrayed either in the contemporary sense by new artists and in the historical sense, often by white male artists. One great example is an artist called Jeanne Duval, who was [Charles] Baudelaire’s mistress, but was painted by a few of the Impressionists. But now contemporary artists like Maud Sulter and Mickalene Thomas and Lorraine O’Grady create new artworks that allow them to reclaim Black female agency by restaging these images, but also painting or drawing or photographing her back into artistry, but by the Black woman gaze.

VINCENT: In your career, what were some early wins that made you feel more confident and realize, “Oh, this is a path I want to go down on?”

EMELIFE: I think a lot of things have been very serendipitous. I was very fixed on being in art history from a very early age. But carving a career as a curator is incredibly difficult. What I try to do is lean into some of my differences. I looked to people like Thelma Golden, Okwui Enwezor. Growing up, there wasn’t great visibility of people that were doing this role. So I think that the confidence to really go for it and sort of carve my own path comes from believing that there is always a different way to perceive things. And luckily, the art world is now very interested in new perspectives, so the timing is brilliant. So now, at this juncture, between trying to present this Black Venus project, and also working towards creating a new museum in Africa and doing a national pavilion, there’s something that runs through all those projects, which is the idea of trying to do something differently and show people that there’s more to art or about Africa than we’ve been told. And in order to find that, we need to prioritize different people telling those stories. Otherwise, we all just get the same history over and over and over again.

VINCENT: What’s been your experience navigating the art world as a Black woman?

EMELIFE: I think the difficulty or advantage is visibility. In the U.K., there’s not a large group of us. As a Black woman curator, I’m instantly identifiable. If I walk into a room and I’m talking to people and they’ve met me, they’ll know I’ve arrived, just by way of scanning. So that means that there’s a lot of pressure, because people will have that memory and will be looking more closely. I think that the interesting point when it comes to perception and trying to be taken seriously is proving that my youth or my womanhood or my Blackness, or all three of those things, is a positive rather than a negative. But at this point, having worked as a curator for quite some time, and because the art world is changing and because people want something different, it’s become much easier. I speak to other academics who have been doing the same work and a few decades ago people were more rigid and they didn’t want to listen. And so I feel very fortunate that the work that I’m looking to do, whether as an artist historian, writing books, or curating new shows, is at least landing on ears that are willing to contemplate and to listen, because that just makes the job more exciting. It’s never been just me, and it’s never been about me. It’s about ensuring that we really harness this as a transformative moment to really understand the world better. We need more artists. We need more writers. We need to sustain this on an infrastructure level, as well as the art that goes onto the walls. So I hope that I can use some of the teething and learning points throughout my career to help and develop the future as well”.

IN THIS PHOTO: Dawn O’Porter

Let’s move to Words, Wit, and Wonder: An Evening with Dawn O'Porter (“Get ready for an unforgettable night as we welcome the acclaimed author, director, and television presenter Dawn O'Porter for an exclusive evening of conversation, storytelling, and inspiration”). On 25th September, O’Porter was interviewed by Gabby Roslin at The Ministry. It was a very warm, sweet, uplifting, funny, frank and love-filled discussion. They were chatting about O’Porter’s new book, Honey Bee:

“From the Sunday Times bestselling author comes a brilliant new contemporary novel about womanhood, winging it, and the wonder of female friendship.

Old friends Renée and Flo couldn’t be more different. Flo wants to be invisible, Renée wants to be a somebody. But old friendships are magnetic. In their early twenties, and on the cusp of the rest of their lives, Renée and Flo both fly home to Guernsey: to the island where it all began.

Back in the place of their youth, yet spreading their wings into adulthood, will they flail and fall? Or will growing up be the making of them?

A coming-of-age story and a love letter to female friendship, Honeybee is about the gloriously messy days of early adulthood.

We’re all just winging it – but women stick together”.

I shall come to present and future events next. Before that, I want to highlight An Evening with Lena Alfi, CEO of Malala Fund (“Over 120 million girls globally are not in education. They are being robbed of the opportunity to become educated. Malala Fund is on a mission to break down the barriers that hold girls back and to champion every girl’s right to 12 years of free, safe, quality education”). The event was held over at 1 Warwick in Soho. I want to move to an interview from a couple of years ago, where Lena Alfi discussed her role with the Malala Fund and the challenges she has faced:

“Please tell us about yourself

My name is Lena Alfi and I am the Chief Development Officer at Malala Fund, where I oversee an amazing team of individuals who help fundraise for girls’ education. Together, we create partnerships with individuals, corporations and foundations who are passionate supporters of seeing all girls learn and lead. I am Syrian, a mother of two, and have a bachelor’s degree in art history and international relations from the University of Southern California and a masters degree in global human development from Georgetown University, I have been working on women and children’s causes for most of my career, something I am very passionate about.

Please tell us more about Malala Fund and the important work you do?

Ensuring every girl can learn for 12 years could unlock up to $30 trillion in global economic growth. Girls with secondary education become women who are more likely to participate on equal terms in the labor force, lead healthier and more productive lives and be decision-makers at home and in their communities. Malala Fund research shows that educating young women can also help prevent wars, improve public health and even help mitigate the effects of climate change. Despite the benefits, more than 130 million girls are out of school. And Malala Fund is working to break down the barriers that hold girls back. Whether it’s tackling child marriage, education funding, discrimination — our team works around the world to challenge systems, policies and practices to help more girls learn. We do this by investing in local education activists, advocating to hold leaders accountable and amplifying girls’ voices.

How does working for Malala Fund relate to you and your personal story?

I started working on education long before I came to Malala Fund. In my previous role with Middle East Children’s Institute, I was working on providing remedial education for Syrian refugees in Jordan. As a Syrian myself, it’s an issue I care about deeply, and I knew that Malala Fund was also working with Syrian refugees in Lebanon and Turkey. But when I learned about Malala Fund’s localized approach to grantmaking, I knew I wanted to work there. Malala Fund knows that there are already remarkable education leaders and activists out there who know their communities best are leading projects to help girls learn. To drive broader change, these individuals need more funding and a stronger network of support. Malala Fund offers just that.

What has been your proudest moment as a woman in your career?

Last week, my 3-year-old son had a few days off from school. While we are only going into the office sporadically, I needed to go in for a meeting. My husband and son were playing and while I was walking out of the house, my son said, “Thanks for going to work mama! I’ll see you later.” Juggling work and two small children can often feel overwhelming. Small moments like this bring me pride because I know that my sons will grow up believing that women can and should do anything they want with their lives. If they choose to work, stay-at-home, or anything in between, women can thrive. And in each instance, they can also be great moms, friends, co-workers, partners, leaders, sisters and daughters.

What has been the most challenging part of your role at Malala Fund?

The most difficult part of my job is changing the narrative on the solutions for girls’ education. There is an outdated idea that to get more girls learning, we need to build more schools and focus on enrolment. But we know that the barriers girls face are much more systemic. To solve the real problems keeping girls out of school, this requires global and national level advocacy. We need leaders around the world to develop and implement policies that better serve girls. We need communities to see the value in girls’ potential. And we need more leaders listening to the voices of the girls they serve”.

IN THIS PHOTO: Charlene Douglas

I will move to five future events. Before that, one tomorrow (16th October) is one I am excited about. Come Closer: An Evening with Intimacy Coach Charlene Douglas is happening at AllBright. There is going to be quite an atmosphere and energy in the air at AllBright. It is going to be a very open discussion that everyone in attendance will be engaged by:

“Let's talk about sex, Baby! Have you ever thought about seeing a therapist but felt hesitant due to concerns about awkwardness or cost? Meet Charlene Douglas: registered couples counsellor and an expert on the totally-bingeworthy series, Married at First Sight UK!

Join us as we sit down with renowned sex and relationship therapist, Charlene, for an intimate evening dedicated to helping you connect more, communicate better, and love more deeply. This event offers a safe, welcoming space to reflect on past experiences that have shaped your sexual world, explore what turns you on (and off), and address communication and sexual health challenges.

Don't miss this exclusive interview, where Charlene will guide you through interactive intimacy tasks designed to give you practical tools to work on at home. Whether you're looking to reignite an old spark or build newfound confidence in the bedroom, this event is your first step toward a fulfilling and healthy sex life”.

Charlene Douglas is going to be talking about her new book, Come Closer: Everything You Ever Wanted to Ask a Sex and Relationship Therapist. I am definitely going to check this book out. One I had not thought about before, the event on Wednesday will provide a lot of useful advice, insight and food for thought:

“Feeling a disconnect in your sex life?

Sex and relationship therapist Charlene Douglas invites you to connect more, communicate better, and love more deeply.

Perhaps you’ve considered seeing a therapist before but you worry it might be awkward or it’s too expensive... Come Closer provides the safe space you need to reflect on the past experiences that may have shaped your sexual world, explore what turns you on and what turns you off, and open up to issues in communication and sexual health.

Charlene draws on real-life case studies from her experience helping individuals and couples to navigate different relationship problems and combines this with interactive intimacy tasks at the end of each chapter to give you something practical to work on.

So whether you’re hoping to reignite an old spark or build a new sense of confidence in the bedroom, take the first step towards a happy and healthy sex life with Come Closer”.

On 31st October, AllBright are hosting Bittersweet Grief with Lotte Bowser exploring Healing Through Heartache. This is an event that you need to attend if you can. It is going to be so emotional and charged! Something personal yet relatable (to some). I am really looking forward to it. I had not heard of Lotte Bowser when the event was announced, though I was instantly compelled to book a ticket:

“When Lotte Bowser lost her partner Ben, miles away from home, she was left grappling with one haunting question: how do you envision a future without the person you love most? In this heartfelt and intimate event, Lotte shares her deeply personal journey through grief, offering insight into how loss and love intertwine.

Through her memoir, Lotte explores the delicate balance between heartache and healing, showing that even in the depths of grief, joy can still find a way. Join us for an evening of reflection, hope, and inspiration as Lotte reminds us that life after loss, while different, can still be beautiful. Join us as we explore the many facets of grief—how it changes us, shapes our relationships, and ultimately helps us find a new path forward.

Whether you're navigating your own journey of loss or supporting someone else through theirs, this event offers valuable insights, shared stories, and the comforting reminder that you are not alone in the experience”.

 IN THIS PHOTO: Lottie Bowser with her fiancé Ben at Glastonbury/PHOTO CREDIT: Lottie Bowser

This interview from September is heartbreaking. Lotte Bowser talks of the anger and fury that she felt when her fiancée died. How it has impacted her. Her book is one that you will need to read. She has had to rebuild her life from the ground up:

“Lotte Bowser was 30 when her fiancé, Ben, died. The year was 2020 and so the tragedy was furnished by a thousand others: treatment taken in isolation; last exchanges through layers of PPE; raw grief in lockdown.

In the months afterwards, forced into an alienating new reality, Lotte, now 34, began sharing fragments of her story online.

She typed lengthy Instagram captions to underscore images of herself and Ben bedecked in glitter at Glastonbury and of his proposal in front of Sydney's Harbour bridge on New Year's Eve 2019. Her words documented how it felt to pine, primally, for the person with whom she'd created a world.

It was on the platform, and via her revelations, that she found something she desperately needed – the support of others brutalised by partner loss at a cruel age.

In doing so, the former yoga teacher began to craft a new career as a writer. She's now preparing for the release of her debut book, Bittersweet: a Story of Love and Loss (Little A, £8.99), on 1 October. Within its pages you'll find the tale of Lotte and Ben's relationship, as well as how she radically re-imagined the architecture of her days after he died, including a move from London to Lisbon.

To mark the publication, Women's Health had a conversation with Lotte, which has been condensed for clarity, below. Scroll further down for an extract from the book.

Women's Health: Tell me about the book. Why did you feel compelled to write it; what is it about?

Lotte Bowser: The book is a tribute to my late partner, Ben, who I was with for six years in my twenties and who very tragically died, age 36, of soft tissue sarcoma and Covid 19 in November 2020.

It documents our meeting and the unfolding of our relationship over the course of the four and a half years before he was diagnosed, his subsequent illness and death, and the initial months and year of me trying to recalibrate and rebuild my life in in the wake of the loss. The themes are, I suppose, the enduring and boundless nature of love, grief and death and hope and resilience.

WH: You experienced the death of your partner at such a young age. How did that shape the experience?

LB: I was the first out of my friend group and wider community to experience partner loss, and so I felt incredibly isolated and lonely in my experience. I didn't know which way to turn and no resources spoke to my experience as a younger person. It was incredibly difficult, unexpected territory, and nobody really knew how to receive my grief or how to support me in it, because it was unprecedented. The isolation and the loneliness definitely compounded the pain of Ben's death.

I took to seeking out connections via Instagram, with others who had gone through partner loss and other kinds of losses, to find that shared sense of solidarity.

WH: Of course, it was also the pandemic...

LB: Yes. After Ben died, we went into another four month lockdown. So all of the usual customs and rituals surrounding death, like being in community and having a proper send-off for the person who died, weren't possible.

My friends did their best: we would speak on the phone and via WhatsApp and they'd send care packages, but I was still yearning for that connection with othrs who had been through the same loss.

I remember countless sleepless nights in those early days, gripped by grief and insomnia, scrolling through hashtags like ‘widowhood’ and ‘partner loss’ on Instagram and reaching out to people speaking about these things online.

I'd slide into their direct messages and tell them a little bit about what had happened to me and ask them if they were keen to chat at some at some point. I would go as far as to say that, in those four months in the wake of Ben's death, social media played a big hand in my survival”.

On 7th November, The Great US Election Breakdown with Claudia Williams takes place at Dartmouth House. This is a big night that many people are excited about or really scared. Depending on which way it goes! History could be made is Kamala Harris wins and becomes the first woman President of the United States:

“While a watch party wouldn't quite work given the time difference and the very very drawn out nature of US elections, we've got the next best thing!

Tortoise reporter Claudia Williams will be joining us to break down the campaigns, the results and potentially the winner (if one has been announced and the other candidate hasn't claimed the election was stolen - looking at no one in particular). Whatever happens, join us to unpack one of the biggest elections of 2024.

Claudia joined Tortoise as part of the Sensemaker team, and before that worked at the New York Times and The Week magazine”.

Three more events to go before I wrap up. On 19th November, Inheritocracy & The Bank of Mum and Dad with Dr Eliza Filby takes place at Kindred, Hammersmith. Please, if you have not booked a ticket yet, then make sure that you do. I think that everyone can benefit from the discussion. A subject that most of us can relate to in some form. I am particularly interested in it:

“Who among us freely admits to the levels of financial support they receive from their parents? It’s time we talk about the bank of Mum and Dad or Inheritocracy as Dr Eliza Filby terms it.

Coming to Trouble to discuss her insightful new book, Dr Eliza Filby will be enlightening our members to the >22 interviews she orchestrated with a diverse group of millennials, and just what she found out about today’s wealth and class!

Not only did Eliza discover that the act of ‘leaving a legacy’ is on the rise, with no signs of the inheritance economy abating, and an estimated £5.5 trillion of family wealth set to be transferred in the UK over the next three decades, but today’s millennials are actually poised to become the richest generation in history. And yet, this outcome cannot reach everyone. She will also be speaking to the deep and powerful divide emerging between those who can rely on family financial support and those who can’t.

Join us for an evening with this financial guru, as she talks us through the views of politicians, economists, authors and experts from David Willetts to Otegha Uwagba in order to decipher the most obvious but hidden privilege that defines life in the twenty-first century: inheritance”.

On 26th September, Inheritocracy: It's Time to Talk About the Bank of Mum and Dad was released. This is a book that I will also endeavour to get and read when I can. So many things to ponder and reconsider:

“Many of us grew up believing in a meritocracy, where hard work brings rewards. Go to university, get a job, put in the hours and things will be OK. That’s what we were told – but the reality is that life chances and opportunities are no longer shaped by what we learn or earn but by whether we have access to the Bank of Mum and Dad. We’re living in an inheritocracy, where parental support is what matters most – whether that’s covering the cost of university, stumping up for a house deposit or helping with childcare. And let’s be honest, this isn’t something we like to talk about with our friends, families or as a society. It’s a modern taboo.

In these pages, generational expert Eliza Filby explores the emergence of this inheritocracy through her own life story, revealing how her family’s financial circumstances shaped everything from her education to her dating life, from her career to her class identity. Inheritocracy is a thought-provoking and candid blend of memoir and cultural commentary, told through Eliza’s humorous and insightful voice.

With trillions of pounds set to be passed down the generations over the next two decades, a significant divide is emerging between those who can rely on family wealth and those who can’t. Inheritocracy offers a fresh, captivating and honest look at our recent past and a future that will be shaped – for better or worse – by family fortunes”.

IN THIS PHOTO: Carol Vorderman

Two big events from huge figures in popular culture. I am really looking ahead to seeing Now What? An Evening with Carol Vorderman at The Ministry. It is going to be such a packed event. Vorderman is beloved. An activist and essential voice, this is going to be one of the most popular and extraordinary events in The Trouble Club’s history. Such a fantastic booking:

“Presenting legend turned political heavyweight - the fabulous Carol Vorderman is coming to Trouble! For the last few years Carol's updates on Tory cronyism has been a much needed light in the shadowy darkness. Carol will join us to discuss the tumult of the last few years and her fixes for our broken nation, as laid out in her brilliant new book, Now What? On a Mission to Fix Broken Britain.

‘But what has politics got to do with me?’ I hear you ask. Well, quite a lot really. Whether you like it or not, it affects every single thing in your life from the moment you wake up in the morning until you crawl into bed at night. But some of our political elite make it feel like a club which we have not been invited to join. The privileged few who want to keep it all for the privileged few. I hope this book can explain much, make you laugh out loud and make you realise that together our voices are powerful. Buckle up and come on a political rollercoaster with me – ‘an old bird with an iPhone’.

Born in 1960, Carol Vorderman grew up in a single parent family in poverty in North Wales with her sister, brother and her beloved mum, Jean. After attending a comprehensive school, at 17 years old Carol became one of the first girls from the free school meals scheme in North Wales to study at the University of Cambridge. Since childhood, Carol has had a passion for everything mathematical and her skill with numbers secured her a role on Countdown in 1982, the show that cemented her position as one of the most successful and popular female presenters in British TV history.

Carol currently hosts a weekly radio show on LBC, the Pride of Britain Awards and is known for her political activism. She was awarded an MBE in 2000 for her services to broadcasting”.

If you have not bought her book, Now What?: On a Mission to Fix Broken Britain, then go and grab a copy. She is a fantastic writer. So important! Someone that we need to cherish. I cannot wait to dive inside of this book from someone I have admired since I was a child:

“'I'm just an old bird with an iPhone who's been on the telly for over forty years. Sixty-three and post-menopause, I hate bullies and charlatans, and I don't give a flying fig for what those people say about me.'

Amidst a landscape of economic turmoil, eroding freedoms and deepening societal fractures, one thing is clear: Britain is in a mess. Instead of serving the common good, our politicians seem fixated on personal gain, while certain segments of the media only seek to divide us further. But who is responsible for this descent into chaos? And how can we hold these people to account?

With her characteristic outspokenness and irrepressible sense of humour, Carol Vorderman here reveals the intricate web of influence responsible for our nation's unravelling. Part diary, part political manifesto, this is the story of how an old bird with an iPhone exposed the incompetence and lies of the Tory establishment, and inspired countless others to find their voice and stand up for what they believe in”.

The final event that I want to highlight happens next year. As soon as it was announced, there was a frenzy of interest and joy! Caitlin Moran! I think it was the previous feature or one before that I wrote about The Trouble Club where I mentioned how I would love to see Caitlin Moran booked. I literally had nothing to do with the booking, but it is great that my wish has come true. Caitlin Moran: For the Love of Women takes place on 15th February at Manchester Central Exchange Auditorium. Go and grab your ticket:

“CAITLIN MORAN PEOPLE, CAITLIN MORAN! Wow are we fans of this woman, can you tell? At Trouble we've been devouring her books and articles for years and it's about time she graced the Trouble stage.

Caitlin has hilariously documented the pot-holed road of womanhood from teenage sweat to midlife reinvention. She'll join us at The Trouble Club in Manchester to discuss how she's so brilliantly chronicled the journey and kept us laughing along the way.

We'll also dive into Caitlin's icons from the celebs she adored in her early years to the personal mentors who have shaped her incredible writing career. We'll discuss what kind of support we owe to the next generation and how her icons have changed as the years have progressed. There will also be lots of time for Q&A, so get your questions ready!

Caitlin Moran is an award-winning columnist for the Times and the author of multi-award-winning bestseller How to Be a Woman which has been published in 28 countries, and won the British Book Awards’ Book of the Year 2011. Her two volumes of collected journalism, Moranthology and Moranifesto, were Sunday Times bestsellers, and her novel, How to Build a Girl, debuted at Number One.

This will be our biggest event to date and it's taking place in Manchester, the home of our second Trouble location. Don't worry London members, the event will take place in the afternoon so that you can be back to London on the same day. Or stay, and enjoy the delights of the city”.

You can buy Caitlin Moran’s books here. I am watching the event virtually, as the train fare to and from London would have been too dear. I love Manchester, so I may well change my mind and go up there! In any case, those are some of the events I have attended a few coming up that I would recommend to people. As always, a big thank you to The Trouble Club for all they do. To Ellie, Francesca and everyone involved with bringing these terrific guests to a warm and loving crowd! The members are great. Even though I am one of the few men at the events, I always feel welcomed. I am pleased that the membership is growing and expanding. Who knows which other guests will be booked for next year?! Will there be a Christmas event or a late surprise?! Whatever comes, it is always pleasure to discuss…

THE Trouble Club.

FEATURE: Grab My Soul Away: Ten Dark, Haunted, Ghostly or Scary Kate Bush Moments

FEATURE:

 

 

Grab My Soul Away

 IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in the video for Experiment IV (1986)

 

Ten Dark, Haunted, Ghostly or Scary Kate Bush Moments

_________

BECAUSE today is Hallowe’en…

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1980 for the single cover of Breathing (from Never for Ever)

I wanted to highlight ten moments where Kate Bush’s music or videos have got spooky. Whether it is about spirits, ghosts, ghouls, things that go bump in the night, or merely a brief or longer mention of a spirit or some possession, her catalogue is filled with it. I have covered it before. The spectral and otherworldly is right throughout her album. Think about her debut single, Wuthering Heights, and the ghostly Catherine Earnshaw. Hammer Horror, the first single from Lionheart, is another example. Hounds of Love has plenty of examples. In fact, on most of her studio albums, you can hear something that either provides a scare or talks about something not there. Bush always willing to open her mind to the unexplained. To honour Hallowe’en and the fact that tonight we will see people trick or treating and wearing costumes, I wanted to highlight ten of my favourite Kate Bush scary moments. Whether it is a brief nod in a video or a song dedicated to the paranormal or something else, one cannot deny that the spirits are present in Kate Bush’s world. Honourable mentions go to the performance of Them Heavy People (from The Kick Inside) for the De Efteling Special. This was a Dutch amusement park opened in 1978. Bush performed a few of her songs in this weird and wonderful T.V. special. In the chorus, Bush hugs and sings with these ghoulish puppets. Pretty cool and distinctly Kate Bush! I also love The Infant Kiss. A song from Never for Ever, it is inspired by the film, The Innocents. Kate Bush discussed the song (“This governess is supposed to look after these children, a little boy and a girl, and they are actually possessed by the spirits of the people who were in the house before. And they keep appearing to the children. It’s really scary – as scary on some levels as the idea of The Exorcist, and that terrified me”). There are more examples I could select. Instead, below are ten classic examples of, whether through lyrics or visuals, Kate Bush has given us some chills, scares. Summoning demons, ghosts, ghouls or anything that reminds of us of Hallowe’en…

___________

Wuthering Heights (1978) 

Kate Bush’s debut single, when it was released in 1978, it created huge intrigue. Reaching number one, it definitely has a haunted core. Inspired by a 1967 BBC series of the Emily Brontë novel (though Graeme Thomson, in his Kate Bush biography, Under the Ivy: The Life and Music, says it was a 1970 film starring Timothy Dalton) we feel the scene of Catherine Earnshaw appearing to Heathcliff in the night. This departed anti-heroine who is trying to grab his soul away. Be let in from the cold. It is this evocative and haunted love song. In the white dress version for the track – the second video shot; the original sees Bush in a red dress on Baden's Clump at Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire -, we get this sense of the ghostliness Bush is singing. Right from the off, Bush was putting sprits and scares in her music. Here Kate Bush discussed the writing of Wuthering Heights and its inspiration:

“I wrote in my flat, sitting at the upright piano one night in March at about midnight. There was a full moon and the curtains were open, and every time I looked up for ideas, I looked at the moon. Actually, it came quite easily. I couldn’t seem to get out of the chorus – it had a really circular feel to it, which is why it repeats. I had originally written something more complicated, but I couldn’t link it up, so I kept the first bit and repeated it. I was really pleased, because it was the first song I had written for a while, as I’d been busy rehearsing with the KT Band.

I felt a particular want to write it, and had wanted to write it for quite a while. I remember my brother John talking about the story, but I couldn’t relate to it enough. So I borrowed the book and read a few pages, picking out a few lines. So I actually wrote the song before I had read the book right through. The name Cathy helped, and made it easier to project my own feelings of want for someone so much that you hate them. I could understand how Cathy felt.

It’s funny, but I heard a radio programme about a woman who was writing a book in Old English, and she found she was using words she didn’t know, but when she looked them up she found they were correct. A similar thing happened with ‘Wuthering Heights’: I put lines in the song that I found in the book when I read it later.

PHOTO CREDIT: Gered Mankowitz

I’ve never been to Wuthering Heights, the place, though I would like to, and someone sent me a photo of where it’s supposed to be.

One thing that really pleases me is the amount of positive feedback I’ve had from the song, though I’ve heard that the Bronte Society think it’s a disgrace. A lot of people have read the book because of the song and liked it, which I think is the best thing about it for me. I didn’t know the book would be on the GCE syllabus in the year I had the hit, but lots of people have written to say how the song helped them. I’m really happy about that.

There are a couple of synchronicities involved with the song. When Emily Bronte wrote the book she was in the terminal stages of consumption, and I had a bad cold when I wrote the song. Also, when I was in Canada I found out that Lindsay Kemp, my dance teacher, was in town, only ten minutes away by car, so I went to see him. When I came back I had this urge to switch on the TV – it was about one in the morning – because I knew the film of Wuthering Heights would be on. I tuned in to a thirties gangster film, then flicked through the channels, playing channel roulette, until I found it. I came in at the moment Cathy was dying, so that’s all I saw of the film. It was an amazing coincidence.

Kate Bush Club Newsletter, January 1979”.

Hammer Horror (1978)

The lead single from her second studio album, Lionheart, this is a song less about ghouls and spirits. It is more to do with terror and scares. Inspired more by an actor playing the lead role in a film, rather then the classic Hammer Horror films that sort of faded away from the 1970s, this is Bush putting some personal fears and paranoia into the mix. An album where that was very much at the fore on a few numbers. One of her more underrated singles, it is definitely a wonderful song. Here is there Kate Bush explains how Hammer Horror came together:

“The song is not about, as many think, Hammer Horror films. It is about an actor and his friend. His friend is playing the lead in a production ofThe Hunchback of Notre Dame,a part he’s been reading all his life, waiting for the chance to play it. He’s finally got the big break he’s always wanted, and he is the star. After many rehearsals he dies accidentally, and the friend is asked to take the role over, which, because his own career is at stake, he does. The dead man comes back to haunt him because he doesn’t want him to have the part, believing he’s taken away the only chance he ever wanted in life. And the actor is saying, “Leave me alone, because it wasn’t my fault – I have to take this part, but I’m wondering if it’s the right thing to do because the ghost is not going to leave me alone and is really freaking me out. Every time I look round a corner he’s there, he never disappears.”

The song was inspired by seeing James Cagney playing the part of Lon Chaney playing the hunchback – he was an actor in an actor in an actor, rather like Chinese boxes, and that’s what I was trying to create.

Kate Bush Club Newsletter, November 1979”.

Blow Away (For Bill) (1980)

Some might not consider this song to be spooky or scary. It is more about spirits in the sky. The departed. It has this spiritual and otherworldly vibe. A song inspired by the untimely passing of Bill Duffield. He was a lighting technician who died after the warm-up gig in Poole for 1979’s The Tour of Life. It was an event that rocked and shocked Kate Bush. She put Duffield in the magnificent Blow Away (For Bill). In this article we hear what Bush had to say about a gem from 1980’s Never for Ever:

“So there’s comfort for the guy in my band, as when he dies, he’ll go “Hi, Jimi!” It’s very tongue-in-cheek, but it’s a great thought that if a musician dies, his soul will join all the other musicians and a poet will join all the Dylan Thomases and all that.

None of those people [who have had near-death experiences] are frightened by death anymore. It’s almost something they’re looking forward to. All of us have such a deep fear of death. It’s the ultimate unknown, at the same time it’s our ultimate purpose. That’s what we’re here for. So I thought this thing about the death-fear. I like to think I’m coming to terms with it, and other people are too. The song was really written after someone very special died.

Although the song had been formulating before and had to be written as a comfort to those people who are afraid of dying, there was also this idea of the music, energies in us that aren’t physical: art, the love in people. It can’t die, because where does it go? It seems really that music could carry on in radio form, radio waves… There are people who swear they can pick up symphonies from Chopin, Schubert. We’re really transient, everything to do with us is transient, except for these non-physical things that we don’t even control…

Kris Needs, ‘Lassie’. Zigzag (UK), November 1985”.

Get Out of My House (1982)

A propulsive and raw track from The Dreaming, this was a moment where Kate Bush truly lost any inhabitations and created a song as shocking and scary as anything she ever wrote. Inspired by Stephen King’s The Shining (rather than the film version of the book), Get Out of My House is a possessed home. Kate Bush seemingly this spirit that is trying to ward off intruders. A very bracing and intense song that chills the blood and thrills the senses. As we read here, we get some insight into Get Out of My House and what influenced Kate Bush:

“‘The Shining’ is the only book I’ve read that has frightened me. While reading it I swamped around in its snowy imagery and avoided visiting certain floors of the big, cold hotel, empty for the winter. As in ‘Alien’, the central characters are isolated, miles (or light years) away from anyone or anything, but there is something in the place with them. They’re not sure what, but it isn’t very nice.

The setting for this song continues the theme – the house which is really a human being, has been shut up – locked and bolted, to stop any outside forces from entering. The person has been hurt and has decided to keep everybody out. They plant a ‘concierge’ at the front door to stop any determined callers from passing, but the thing has got into the house upstairs. It’s descending in the lift, and now it approaches the door of the room that you’re hiding in. You’re cornered, there’s no way out, so you turn into a bird and fly away, but the thing changes shape, too. You change, it changes; you can’t escape, so you turn around and face it, scare it away.

Kate Bush Club newsletter, October 1982”.

 

Hounds of Love (1985)

There are a few different occasions on Hounds of Love where the ghostly or frightening can be heard. The title track has this mood of Kate Bush being pursued by hounds. This fleeing from something baying for blood. There is a certain horror and urgency through Hounds of Love. Always inspired by literature and film, the intro features a quote from a line spoken in the film Night of the Demon by Maurice Denham. I love the mood and vibe of Hounds of Love. It is a song with an intensity that is hard to shake off. Before moving on, it is worth getting some words from Kate Bush about the title track from her most acclaimed studio album:

“[‘Hounds Of Love’] is really about someone who is afraid of being caught by the hounds that are chasing him. I wonder if everyone is perhaps ruled by fear, and afraid of getting into relationships on some level or another. They can involve pain, confusion and responsibilities, and I think a lot of people are particularly scared of responsibility. Maybe the being involved isn’t as horrific as your imagination can build it up to being – perhaps these baying hounds are really friendly.

Kate Bush Club newsletter, 1985

The ideas for ‘Hounds Of Love’, the title track, are very much to do with love itself and people being afraid of it, the idea of wanting to run away from love, not to let love catch them, and trap them, in case th hounds might want to tear them to pieces and it’s very much using the imagery of love as something coming to get you and you’ve got to run away from it or you won’t survive.

Conversation Disc Series, ABCD012, 1985”.

Waking the Witch (1985)

The second of three Hounds of Love tracks that have a spooky or dark vibe is Waking the Witch. The title itself conjures up cackling and cauldrons. Something that projects this coven and smokiness. Fire and evil. Another song on The Ninth Wave,  I do love the lyrics of Waking the Witch. All these voices trying to wake the doomed heroine. I love what about the track. Some interesting perspectives on one of the most arresting and well-produced tracks on Hounds of Love:

“These sort of visitors come to wake them up, to bring them out of this dream so that they don’t drown. My mother’s in there, my father, my brothers Paddy and John, Brian Tench – the guy that mixed the album with us – is in there, Del is in there, Robbie Coltrane does one of the voices. It was just trying to get lots of different characters and all the ways that people wake you up, like you know, you sorta fall asleep at your desk at school and the teacher says “Wake up child, pay attention!”. (…) I couldn’t get a helicopter anywhere and in the end I asked permission to use the helicopter from The Wall from The Floyd, it was the best helicopter I’d heard for years for years [laughs].

I think it’s very interesting the whole concept of witch-hunting and the fear of women’s power. In a way it’s very sexist behavior, and I feel that female intuition and instincts are very strong, and are still put down, really. And in this song, this women is being persecuted by the witch-hunter and the whole jury, although she’s committed no crime, and they’re trying to push her under the water to see if she’ll sink or float.

Richard Skinner, ‘Classic Albums interview: Hounds Of Love. Radio 1 (UK), aired 26 January 1992”.

Watching You Without Me (1985) 

The third songs from Hounds of Love I want to bring in is Watching You Without Me. This song appears on The Ninth Wave at a time when the heroine is trying to stay afloat and awake but is struggling. You get the feeling of a family waiting for their daughter but her not being there. Instead, you feel her ghost standing alongside them. This vacuum or spirit that is lingering. The sheer horror of The Ninth Wave in general. It is this gothic and scary night of torment for someone trying to stay alive. No idea what is in the water beneath her. Here is Kate Bush discussing the brilliant Watching You Without Me:

“Now, this poor sod [laughs], has been in the water for hours and been witch-hunted and everything. Suddenly, they’re kind of at home, in spirit, seeing their loved one sitting there waiting for them to come home. And, you know, watching the clock, and obviously very worried about where they are, maybe making phone calls and things. But there’s no way that you can actually communicate, because they can’t see you, they can’t you. And I find this really horrific, [laughs] these are all like my own personal worst nightmares, I guess, put into song. And when we started putting the track together, I had the idea for these backing vocals, you know, [sings] “you can’t hear me”. And I thought that maybe to disguise them so that, you know, you couldn’t actually hear what the backing vocals were saying.

Richard Skinner, ‘Classic Albums interview: Hounds Of Love. Radio 1 (UK), aired 26 January 1992”.

Experiment IV (1986)

I wrote about this recently to mark its thirty-eight anniversary. Kate Bush released a greatest hits album, The Whole Story, in 1986. Experiment IV was a song especially written for the album. A single that accompanied songs that appeared of her studio albums prior to that point. There is so much scare and haunt through Experiment IV. The video is really frightening (Kate Bush directed it). Demons and ghostly chill. Darkness and horror. Its video was actually banned by Top of the Pops because it was deemed too scary. In 2019, Kate Bush discussed the brilliant and under-heard Experiment IV:

“This was written as an extra track for the compilation album The Whole Story and was released as the single. I was excited at the opportunity of directing the video and not having to appear in it other than in a minor role, especially as this song told a story that could be challenging to tell visually. I chose to film it in a very handsome old military hospital that was derelict at the time. It was a huge, labyrinthine hospital with incredibly long corridors, which was one reason for choosing it. Florence Nightingale had been involved in the design of the hospital. Not something she is well known for but she actually had a huge impact on hospital design that was pioneering and changed the way hospitals were designed from then on.

The video was an intense project and not a comfortable shoot, as you can imagine – a giant of a building, damp and full of shadows with no lighting or heating but it was like a dream to work with such a talented crew and cast with Dawn French, Hugh Laurie, Peter Vaughn and Richard Vernon in the starring roles. It was a strange and eerie feeling bringing parts of the hospital to life again. Not long after our work there it was converted into luxury apartments. I can imagine that some of those glamorous rooms have uninvited soldiers and nurses dropping by for a cup of tea and a Hobnob.

We had to create a recording studio for the video, so tape machines and outboard gear were recruited from my recording studio and the mixing console was very kindly lent to us by Abbey Road Studios. It was the desk the Beatles had used – me too, when we’d made the album Never For Ever in Studio Two. It was such a characterful desk that would’ve looked right at home in any vintage aircraft. Although it was a tough shoot it was a lot of fun and everyone worked so hard for such long hours. I was really pleased with the result. (KateBush.com, February 2019)”.

King of the Mountain (2005)

This might not sound like a scary song. I think there is a lot of wind and weather through King of the Mountain. This is Kate Bush looking for Elvis Presley. The King of Rock and Roll on a mountain somewhere living this new life. Unseen and tucked away. Almost like a mythical figure. It is the mood of the song that seems to summon something ghostly, rather than the lyrics. I really love the imagery that Bush casts: “Elvis are you out there somewhere/Looking like a happy man?/In the snow with Rosebud/And king of the mountain”. Written about a decade before most of the songs on Aerial, Bush wonders whether Presley might still be out there. In an interview from November with BBC Four's Front Row Bush said: "I don't think human beings are really built to withstand that kind of fame”. I always see this as a tormented and haunted song. Maybe the spirit of Elvis Presley out there. Or his physical self, hiding from the world. It is scary and quite sad in a way. I always feel like there is something quite ghostly and windswept about the song.

Lake Tahoe (2011)

2011’s 50 Words for Snow is awash with winter, cold and snow. It is an album that is so rich with textures and different characters. Perhaps the most ghostly and haunting tracks on the album is Lake Tahoe. It is about a spirit who resides in the lake and emerges. It is a typically Kate Bush source of inspiration. Few other songwriters making songs like this! You can feel this real chill and fright through Lake Tahoe. Kate Bush discussed the origin of Lake Tahoe in a 2011 interview:

“It was because a friend told me about the story that goes with Lake Tahoe so it had to be set there. Apparently people occasionally see a woman who fell into the lake in the Victorian era who rises up and then disappears again. It is an incredibly cold lake so the idea, as I understand it, is that she fell in and is still kind of preserved. Do you know what I mean?

John Doran, ‘A Demon In The Drift: Kate Bush Interviewed’. The Quietus, 2011”

Many people might suggest other Kate Bush songs that are representative of Hallowe’en. Tracks that have ghosts, monsters, scares, darkness, killers or creep throughout. She is an absolute master of conjuring scares and chills. I didn’t even mention a song like Mother Stands for Comfort (from 1985’s Hounds of Love). To mark Hallowe’en, the ten songs above seem appropriate for the day. Tracks that have something about them that creates fear and projects this definite scare. 50 Words for Snow found Bush still staying in that slightly mythical and strange world. Let’s hope that we hear more songs along these lines…

IN the future.

FEATURE: Kate Bush’s Aerial at Nineteen: A Glorious Return: Reaction and Reception

FEATURE:

 

 

Kate Bush’s Aerial at Nineteen

 

A Glorious Return: Reaction and Reception

_________

I am going to do more…

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 2005/PHOTO CREDIT: Trevor Leighton

than cover the praise and reaction for Kate Bush’s Aerial. Released on 7th November, 2005, this album was the first from Bush since 1993’s The Red Shoes. The same as I have done with other album anniversaries, I am going to explore some of the songs on Aerial. Regularly seen as one of Kate Bush’s best albums, it is her personal favourite. I guess, because she gave birth to Bertie in 1998, this album means a lot because of him. Everything sort of coming together. This double album is a masterpiece. I cannot go into all of the songs but, suffice to say, ahead of the nineteenth anniversary of this album, I wanted to cover as much as I could. Actually, I want to get to an interview and a couple of reviews to finish things off. Being a double album, everyone has their favourite Kate Bush songs on the majestic Aerial. I personally think that A Coral Room and Mrs. Bartolozzi are the best on the album. Many prefer the suite, A Sky of Honey. That is up there with Hounds of Love’s The Ninth Wave in terms of its impact and scope. The reviews for Aerial were largely ecstatic. People heralding this grand return. Of course, Kate Bush had not gone anywhere. Instead, she was raising a family and still out there. However, there was something about Aerial that seemed to be above what anyone could have hoped for. King of the Mountain was the one and only official single from Aerial. I have covered that recently. I want to spend a little time with a song that I felt should have been a single. The magnificent and entrancing Mrs. Bartolozzi is a distinctly Kate Bush song. Here, we discover more about the song:

“Is it about a washing machine? I think it’s a song about Mrs. Bartolozzi. She’s this lady in the song who…does a lot of washing (laughs). It’s not me, but I wouldn’t have written the song if I didn’t spend a lot of time doing washing. But, um, it’s fictitious. I suppose, as soon as you have a child, the washing suddenly increases. And uh, what I like too is that a lot of people think it’s funny. I think that’s great, because I think that actually, it’s one of the heaviest songs I’ve ever written! (laughs)
Clothes are…very interesting things, aren’t they? Because they say such an enormous amount about the person that wears them. They have a little bit of that person all over them, little bits of skin cells and…what you wear says a lot about who you are, and who you think you are…

So I think clothes, in themselves are very interesting. And then it was the idea of this woman, who’s kind of sitting there looking at all the washing going around, and she’s got this new washing machine, and the idea of these clothes, sort of tumbling around in the water, and then the water becomes the sea and the clothes…and the sea…and the washing machine and the kitchen… I just thought it was an interesting idea to play with.
What I wanted to get was the sense of this journey, where you’re sitting in front of this washing machine, and then almost as if in a daydream, you’re suddenly standing in the sea.

Ken Bruce show, BBC Radio 2, 1 November 2005”.

There is no denying that Aerial is one of Kate Bush’s most accomplished albums. That time away to concentrate on something very special. With the exception of Rolf Harris being featured on a couple of tracks, you cannot fault the album. Harris was removed from a future reissue of Aerial and replaced by her son Bertie. Nineteen years after its release, you cannot really compare Aerial to anything else. It is still very much a Kate Bush album. In my previous Aerial anniversary feature, I discussed the domesticity that influenced the album. How the seeds of Aerial were planted and what Bush’s life was like in the run-up to 2005. Before moving along, there is actually another song that I want to highlight that I mentioned in the previous feature. It is one that nods to her late mother, Hannah. Here is some details about the stunning and stirring A Coral Room:

“There was a little brown jug actually, yeah. The song is really about the passing of time. I like the idea of coming from this big expansive, outside world of sea and cities into, again, this very small space where, er, it’s talking about a memory of my mother and this little brown jug. I always remember hearing years ago this thing about a sort of Zen approach to life, where, you would hold something in your hand, knowing that, at some point, it would break, it would no longer be there.

Front Row, BBC4, 4 November 2005”.

I am going to move to an interview I have sourced previously for another feature. In 2005, there was a lot of interest in Kate Bush. With this new album being out, it is understandable there would be huge buzz and love for her. Bush was quite giving with her time. Among those who spoke with her was Greg Quill from The Toronto Star. It is interesting how he picked up on questions about her personal life. How Bush always has to answer that question as to whether she is a recluse. Someone painted as weird or hidden away:

"I don't hide from people. I go shopping, I go to restaurants and movies ... yet somehow I'm made out to be some mad hermit. It's too much.

"I think my cult following got grumpy waiting so long," she laughs.

That all sounds a bit disingenuous in light of the number of high-end European art and fashion photographers whose ubiquitous images of Bush created at least the impression of a showbiz diva between 1978 and 1990, when an eight-CD anthology appeared in the box set This Woman's Work complete with a colour booklet containing nothing but these extravagant portraits.

In lieu of personal appearances erroneous reports of stage fright that have apparently prevented her from touring after 1979 are another bone of contention with her fans have had nothing to fuel their addiction other than Bush's wild, rich and allusive music, and magnificent, stylized graphics.

"I never consciously gave up touring," she explains. "I only did just one, in 1979 and 1980, and I think other people gave up on me. I remember it as a fantastic experience, like being on the road with a circus. We're working on some ideas about doing some shows to promote this album, but it's early days."

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And she says she has no regrets about the image she helped create, though Aerial comes unadorned with large and ornate likenesses of her, and instead features realistic images of the ornaments of an ordinary village life washing on the line, a view from the kitchen window, a placid seashore, pigeons in the yard.

"Graphics are important," she adds, by way of explaining the effort that went into designing the honeyed landscape artwork for Aerial. "This may sound pompous, but I'm uncomfortable working with the CD format. I used to work in vinyl, when the artwork was big, and said something significant about an artist.

"And I loved double albums. They indicated that the music was conceptual, too important to be reduced, and you could open up the covers and get lost in the pictures and information inside.

"I liked it when an album was 20 minutes of music a side, with a breathing space in the middle. I think CDs are too long for people with short attention spans, people who are distracted by all the technological tools we have these days."

The Aerial format, she explains, is a respectful nod to the great days of vinyl. The package contains two discs, both around 40 minutes in length, the first a collection of single songs, the second a conceptual piece that unfolds as a musical panorama encompassing the span of a single day, with vast dreams and powerful reminiscences inspired by simple sounds of nature, the words of passers-by and routine chores.

The album lacks the frenetic pace and bluster of her last conceptual effort, 1985's Hounds Of Love, and achieves an almost elegiac, English pastoral grace. Several songs feature just vocals and piano, and expose matters closer to her heart than the turgid melodramas of her earlier work: the joy childhood brings in "Bertie," memories of her late mother in the eerie but strangely comforting waterscape "A Coral Room," the bucolic "Sky Of Honey" with its compelling echoes of Vaughan Williams. Orchestral charts were written by award-winning composer Michael Kamen, who died of a heart attack at age 55 in 2003. They were recorded just weeks before his death.

"He was a lovely person, very talented and brave," Bush recalls. "I'd worked with him on other albums, and he was never offended if I suggested changes he'd rewrite arrangements on the spot, even with the orchestra waiting in the studio. I admire his work for its visual qualities."

While it's debatable, as acolytes claim, that Kate Bush's impact on Western music and female artists in particular is as profound as Joni Mitchell's, it can't be denied that Bush has attracted more than a fair share of serious attention from new artists in the years since her so-called self-exile began. This includes R&B singer Maxwell, whose reworking of Bush's childbearing chronicle "This Woman's Work" was a hit in 2001, as well as male-dominated British rock acts Placebo and The Futureheads, who scored a hit last year with a version of her "Hounds of Love."

Her beginnings were more than auspicious. Bush was "discovered" at age 16 by Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour. He who paid for an orchestra to back her distinctive, hyperbolic soprano on demos of several elaborately theatrical, sexually loaded romantic fantasies that would become the core, three years later, of her hair-raising debut, The Kick Inside.

Though she had nothing in common with the post-punk, new wave acts with whom she shared the high end of the charts she was genteel, well educated, and possessed of aesthetic and artistic sensibilities that had less to do with rock than with the progressive side of opera, world music, jazz, musical theatre and epic cinema she became the darling of British prog-rock. Peter Gabriel gave her a nod by recording the moving duet, "Don't Give Up" with her in 1986. Procol Harum member Gary Brooker's organ and vocal contributions anchor Aerial, an exotic two-CD set.

Some pieces on Aerial will remind fans of the daring Kate Bush of old: "Pi" is little more than a series of numbers sung with dramatic extremes of emotion; "King Of The Mountain," the first single, is a contemplation on celebrity and its cost, with direct references to Elvis; in "Mrs. Bartolozzi," a washing machine becomes a sexual allegory in the romantic fantasies of a cleaning woman.

"After seven years with Bertie, I know a lot about washing machines," Bush chuckles. "He keeps me normal. I never wanted to be famous. I just want to create nice music, and I believe celebrity threatens creativity”.

I want to finish off with a couple of reviews for Aerial. When I explore it next year for its twentieth anniversary, I will be more forensic regarding the songs. Bigger ambitions and more features. Now, a year shy of that big anniversary, I wanted to give some overview. The Guardian saluted and heralded this masterpiece when they sat down to review Aerial in November 2005:

“Kate Bush means a lot to a lot of people. There are gay men who thrill to her rococo sensibilities, who repay her early endorsement of their sexuality with worship. There are straight men who fancied her in her 1980s leotard and found the songs fetching, too. For me, Kate Bush was always a trump card when the tiresome 'question' of female artistic genius came up.

There are many male music fans out there - and just a smattering of male music journalists - who believe quite matter of factly that Damon Albarn wrote Elastica's first album; that Kurt Cobain penned all Courtney Love's songs; that artistic production is self-evidently a guy thing. Before disgust stopped me getting dragged into these skirmishes, I had a ready arsenal of Girl Greats - Patti Smith, Bjork, Nina Simone, Delia Derbyshire, Polly Harvey, and so on. And yet, there would often be some caveat why genius eluded my candidates (ripped off Dylan etc). Until we would get to Kate. Female genius? Kate Bush. End of.

Aerial, the first Kate Bush album in a young lifetime (12 years), re-establishes the fact. It is extraordinary - jaw-dropping, no less. It's also tearjerking, laugh-out-loud funny, infuriating, elegiac, baffling, superb and not always all that great. Her beats are dated, for instance; unchanged since the Eighties. For a technological innovator with the freedom of her own studio, Bush's whole soundbed really could do with an airing. And there's a sudden penchant for heady Latin rhythms here that sits a little awkwardly, even for this enthusiastic borrower of world music.

More problematically, however, Bush's whimsies have never been quite so amplified. If you thought the young Bush prancing around to Bronte was a little de trop, this album is not for you. There's a song about a little brown jug and one about a washing machine (both, though, are really about other things). There are several passages where Bush sings along to birdsong, and one where she laughs like a lunatic. Rolf Harris - Rolf Harris! - has a big cameo.

But Aerial succeeds because it's all there for a reason. And because the good stuff is just so sublime. 'King of the Mountain', Bush's Elvis-inspired single, is both a fine opener and a total red herring. Bush's juices really get going on 'Pi', a sentimental ode to a mathematician, audacious in both subject matter and treatment. The chorus is the number sung to many, many decimal places. It's closely followed by a gushing ode to Bush's son, Bertie, that's stark and medieval-sounding. The rest of disc one (aka A Sea of Honey) sets a very high bar for disc two, with the Joan of Arc-themed 'Joanni' and the downright poppy 'How to Be Invisible' raising the hair on your arms into a Mexican wave.

Disc two, subtitled 'A Sky of Honey', is a suite of nine tracks which, among other things, charts the passage of light from afternoon ('Prologue') to evening ('An Architect's Dream', 'The Painter's Link') and through the night until dawn. Things get a little hairier here.

The theme of birdsong is soon wearing, and the extended metaphor of painting is laboured. But it's all worth it for the double-whammy to the solar plexus dealt by 'Nocturn' and the final, title track. In 'Nocturn', the air is pushed out of your lungs as you cower helplessly before the crescendo. 'Aerial', meanwhile, is a totally unexpected ecstatic disco meltdown that could teach both Madonna and Alison Goldfrapp lessons in dancefloor abandon. It leaves you elated, if not a little exhausted. After the damp squib that was The Red Shoes, it's clear Bush is still a force to be reckoned with.

The problem, though, with female genius - for many men at least - is that very frequently it is not like male genius. And with its songs about children, washing machines going 'slooshy sloshy', Joan of Arc, Bush's mother, not to mention the almost pagan sensuality that runs through here like a pulse, Aerial is, arguably, the most female album in the world, ever. There's an incantation to female self-effacement that rewrites Shakespeare's weird sisters: 'Eye of Braille/ Hem of anorak/ Stem of wallflower/ Hair of doormat'. Even the one about maths is touchy-feely. But the artistry here is so dizzying, the ambition and scope so vast, that even the deafest, most inveterate misogynist could not fail to acknowledge it. Genius. End of”.

It is interesting how Kitty Empire picked up on Aerial being the most female album ever. Perhaps so. I think that about The Kick Inside (Bush’s 1978 album). She has always been a feminist and someone who explores her womanhood. On The Kick Inside, there was this teenager exploring femininity, sexuality, menstruation, lust, heartache and her body. On 1989’s The Sensual World, we have this very womanly and sensual album that is so evocative, explorative and open. I do wonder if people discuss this when they consider Kate Bush. How she has released this incredible feminine album and how that is perceived. It is not a weakness at all. I think it gives her music more depth and beauty. Songs that stay in the mind. I will end with a review from the BBC:

“After 12 years of waiting Kate Bush fans finally get their hands on an album of new material. A double album-sized helping of new songs should keep most fans happy with 16 tracks to delve into.

Disc one is a varied set of numbers which mainly centre around her private life, with odes to her son and a moving song about the loss of her mother. But at times these songs feel too personal and are hard to decipher with dense and difficult melodies. They encompasse a range of musical styles - from folk ("Bertie") to new age ("Pi") and classic Kate Bush ("How to be Invisible"). However, some of these tracks never really achieve lift-off and could have been left on the recording studio floor.

The Kate Bush of "Cloudbusting" and "Wuthering Heights"-fame is in there but struggles to get out. After the flatness of disc one, the second disc is full of surprises. It's an old-fashioned concept album that takes the listener on a journey. And what a journey! Bush has written a lyric poem set to music, which has an epic quality, transporting the listener to a deeply lush and fertile landscape. Lyrically cryptic, but strangely seductive, side two is the album Pink Floyd might have made in 1979 if Bush had been their lead singer.

Concept albums are not everyone's cup of tea - but this is a masterpiece”.

Tomorrow (7th November), we remember Aerial at nineteen. It is a masterpiece. Perhaps not regarded as highly as Hounds of Love, the fact Kate Bush sees it as her favourite and best tells you all you need to know. A brilliant and truly captivating album, I would advise people to listen to this. You can play the album and get lost in it. Extraordinarily powerful and potent. The minute you press play and let the music start, Aerial draws you…

INTO its universe.

FEATURE: Moments of Pleasure and Pain: Kate Bush’s The Red Shoes at Thirty-One

FEATURE:

 

 

Moments of Pleasure and Pain

 IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1993 in a promotional photo for The Red Shoes

Kate Bush’s The Red Shoes at Thirty-One

_________

FOR this feature…

about The Red Shoes, I am going to explore a few of its songs and some reception to the album. An interview or two with Kate Bush from 1993. This is a bit of a round-up regarding this album and how it was perceived. How Kate Bush discussed it. I must confess that the tone of these anniversary features might appear negative. Certainly, many see The Red Shoes as the poorest Kate Bush album. Many critics rank it ninth or tenth when they do polls (she has released ten studio albums). We can focus on the strains and stresses she faced when making and releasing The Red Shoes. Instead, as it turns thirty-one today (1st November), I wanted to look at more positive aspects. Giving some light to a few of its key cuts. Some reaction from critics. Before I get there, I think it is best to get some words from Kate Bush regarding her seventh studio album. One that I really love. I am going to end with some ideas/feedback about The Red Shoes. How it would be great to see it on cassette (I covered this in a recent feature) and how the tracklisting could have been altered. Also, how Director’s Cut in 2011 has cast the album in a new light. The interviews in 1993 were a mixture. There were some kind and respectful. A few that lacked professionalism. This one from Chrissy Iley for The London Sunday Times is combative and frosty. I do want to, once more, sort of return to The Kate Bush Interview Archive. Nick Coleman, writing for Time Out, spoke to Bush around the release of the short film, The Line, the Cross and the Curve (in which Bush starred, wrote the script and directed):

“Where do your stories come from?

'Oh, all kinds of sources but generally they come down to people. People's ideas or works. Films, books, they all lead back to someone else's ideas, which in turn lead back to someone's else's ideas...'

I've always assumed you must be a bit of an Angela Carter fan.

'Um, no. I don't think I know her stuff.'

She wrote 'Company Of Wolves' and was big, I believe, on pomegranates, the predatory nature of nature, the heat of female sexuality; that sort of thing.

'Oh, yes.' Bush smiles, and her dimple disappears.

Other post addressed to Kate Bush arrived which went unopened. Then one day a letter came for the attention of Catherine Earnshaw. This being ambiguous, Catherine opened it just to make sure. Inside was a note from a Harley Street doctor indicating that Catherine was fit as a fiddle. This was good news. Unfortunately, Catherine had not been to see a Harley Street doctor. She hastily sent the letter on to Bush's record company, blushing at her daftness in not remembering immediately that Catherine Earnshaw is the name of the storm-tossed tragic heroine of 'Wuthering Heights '.

You're 35 and you've been doing this since you were a teenager. How have you changed?

'I think I've changed quite a lot. Essentially I'm still the same person but I suppose I've grown up a lot, and learned a lot.'

What's made you grow up the most?

'You get lots of disappointments. I'm not sure that they make you grow up but they make you question intentions.' She pauses. 'But life is what makes you grow up.'

That's a fantastically evasive answer.

'It is quite evasive but I think it's true.' Still no dimple. 'It's hard to say... when I was young I was very idealistic, and I don't really think I am any more. I think I'm more... realistic. I think it's good to change. I think I'd be unhappy if I didn't change. It would mean I hadn't learnt anything.'

Do you ever get curious about living another way?

'I do. But so far I'm extremely lucky to be doing what I'm doing. I feel extremely lucky to have the opportunity to do it.'

Mankowitz, who last worked with Kate in 1979, says he saw her being interviewed on TV by Michael Aspel recently. 'She struck me as being rather humourless, and I wasn't aware of that when I worked with her. She seemed uncomfortable, suspicious even, and was obviously tormented by the fact that if she doesn't promote then she can't expect any success.

‘Although I haven't had any contact with her for years, it's certainly true to say that she has her world and it's very important to her, and, to begin with, that held her feet on the ground. And of course as she began to have this huge success, and the money that goes with it, she found she was able to shape her world to her own design, and that must isolate you. In a general way, that has to be part of the madness of being a very successful artist. With so much control over life, the artist's reality becomes unreal to the rest of us.'

Kate, do you concern yourself with how you're perceived. Does it worry you that to a lot of people you seem quite potty?

'I'm not sure that it's something I've created. But potty is okay.'

What do you think it means?

'I presume it means people think I'm mad.'

Do you ever think you're mad?

'Yes.' This is a slow answer, not without humour. 'Yes, I do. But it could be worse ... I think everyone is mad in their own way. I mean, what is normal? I do think I have quite a lot of fun with my madness, though. It's nice that I can channel it into my work.'

Does work ever feel like it's not quite enough?

'Oh, now! She glares. My blood vessels turn into zip-fasteners. Now I've done it. 'Those last two questions seem like they're coming in on an angle ...'

The lecture follows about how she makes it quite clear that questions about her private life are out of bounds. I protest that I'm not trying to get her to betray facts about her private life but to talk about how she sees herself, and the world outside. After all, I bluster, there is a connection between her feelings and her work, is there not? She pours tea, clanking the lid of the teapot, doing stuff with her hands.

'Yes, well, I think my work is far more interesting than me, and nobody would be interested in me if it wasn't for my work ...'

It used to be said of Olivier that when he wasn't acting there didn't seem to be much of him left.

'Well, I'm only five foot three, so there's not so much of me here anywhere. I have so much time for actors. I mean, that really is putting yourself on the line. And acting is being so many different things, isn't it? I wonder how easy it is for very famous actors to hold on to a sense of who they are.'

Quite.

'But Olivier was awfully good at what he did, wasn't he? So if there wasn't much of him left, who cares, really? What he did was great.'

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush napping whilst in the makeup chair for 1993’s The Line, the Cross and the Curve/PHOTO CREDIT: Guido Harari

What do you make of children?

'I suppose I think in a way that we're all children. And the older I get I think there isn't any difference between children and grown-ups. It's just that grown-ups are the ones trying to pretend that they're not children, while all the time they're the most sensitive children of all.' Another long pause. 'There's a sense of preciousness, don't you think, about children? Especially when the child is young enough. Such a pure spirit, so uncorrupted. A child is so symbolic of purity and tremendous potential. And people who have childlike qualities ... well, it's a lovely thing. It's tough for people to hang on to things like that ...'

Supposing someone were to point their finger at you and say, 'J'accuse Kate Bush of...'

'I confess.'

... of trying to occlude the nasty, real world so that you can live in a protected fantasy world of ballet shoes, over-ripe fruit and warm feelings. How would you respond to that?”.

Prior to getting to some insight and background to a few big songs from The Red Shoes, I want to take a snippet from an interview from the Hamilton, Ontario Spectator. Even though there is a lightness to the interview, the final words from Kate Bush are quite telling. How she was very tired at the end of 1993 and was very much looking ahead to a break and some time away for herself. Little did we know how long that gap would be:

“Bush says that by the time she got past a long phase where she lost all desire to perform, she grew nervous about returning to the stage. "Now I've come back to the idea of doing it - especially over the last couple of years. If we did do something, I'd like to do something personal. The idea of standing here and just singing my songs more simply now appeals to me." If she decides to tour, she won't likely have to worry about filling seats. Every Kate Bush album released in Canada has gone past platinum (100,000 copies sold), and after just a month, The Red Shoes is already gold (50,000).

The album, her seventh, is loosely based on the Hans Christian Andersen fairytale about a young girl who receives a pair of red shoes which allows her to fulfil her dream of becoming a great dancer. She can't stop dancing, though and the shoes won't allow themselves to be removed. Eventually, the girl orders her own feet to be amputated, and dies.

Mutilation aside, Bush says she identifies with the character. "The imagery of possessed by an artform - which in this case is dance - so it has a life of its own, is something I can relate to.", she says. "I look at my albums as probably the same kind of thing. I am very obsessed by my work when I'm in the middle of it. I'm quite tenacious, and don't like to let go of it until I'm sure I've finished it."

The Red Shoes also shows a lighter side to Bush in such songs as Rubberband Girl and Eat The Music. She admits it was a conscious move to contrast her last project, The Sensual World. " With every album, I like starting from a fresh point," she says, "It's almost a rebellion. I need to do something totally opposite." "I wanted to put more emphasis on the songs this time out, and less emphasis on production. I tried to make the songs more direct, simple, and honest."

Bush sees the recording experience as a chance to work with friends and people she admires. Some of the special guests on the album include violinist Nigel Kennedy, Procol Harum founder Gary Brooker, and guitarists Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton. But the tops for her was collaborating with Prince on Why Should I Love You? "I'm so glad he agreed to work with me," says Bush. "I've been a big fan of his for a long time." Bush has also ventured into film, directing a 50 min. short called The Lion, The Cross and The Curve, which co-stars Miranda Richardson and is based around six of the album's songs. It should be out on video some time next year.

Right now, it's time for a break. "I'm feeling very tired," admits Bush. "I'm going on a holiday. I'm really looking forward to not pleasing anyone but myself”

I am keen to frame The Red Shoes in a more positive light than it has been afforded. It is thirty-one today. Not many people will discuss it. I will end with some positive words about it. Before that, I want to highlight three songs that I feel are especially strong. I want to get inside Eat the Music, Moments of Pleasure and the sublime title track. I am going to end with some words about the production and tracklisting. What I love about The Red Shoes is the change of moods and sounds. The fact that Bush was writing in a personal way and creating some tender and evocative songs. There are so many upbeat and rousing tracks that provide this levity and balance. It is a shame it does not get more credit. Maybe not quite what people were expecting from her one and only album of the 1990s. Anyway. Released as a single in the U.S. in September 1993, I actually want to start with Del Palmer speaking about the variegated and succulent spice of Eat the Music. So much sweetness, life, colour and sway to the song. One that gets under the skin:

“It uses a small guitar called a ‘caboss‘ which is one of the instruments Paddy (Bush, Kate’s brother) discovered and brought back with him. He’s very into ethnic music of all kinds and has always contributed a lot of ideas to the albums – he helped bring in some authentic players and the track started off with bass guitar which was then replaced by an acoustic bass – but that sounded a bit too Latin. The horn section’s real, of course.

Future Music, November 1993”.

I think I will move to one of the most emotive and heartbreaking songs on The Red Shoes. I think of Kate Bush’s mother when I hear the song. Without that many reviews written about it, I think listeners should explore this remarkable song. One of the jewels from The Red Shoes, it is a gem that I never tire of. The chorus words “to those we love, to those who will survive” was written about her mother, Hannah, who was sick at the time of recording. She died a short time later (on 14th February, 1992). I think there is a lot of strength and beauty in the song. Even though Bush reapproached the song for 2011’s Director’s Cut, I still think that the original is best. I love this article that has some words from Kate Bush about the track. How her mother laughed when a particular line from the song was said to her. A phrase that Hannah Bush once said which stuck in her daughter’s mind:

“I think the problem is that during [the recording of] that album there were a lot of unhappy things going on in my life, but when the songs were written none of that had really happened yet. I think a lot of people presume that particularly that song was written after my mother had died for instance, which wasn’t so at all. There’s a line in there that mentions a phrase that she used to say, ‘every old sock meets an old shoe’, and when I recorded it and played it to her she just thought it was hilarious! She couldn’t stop laughing, she just thought it was so funny that I’d put it into this song. So I don’t see it as a sad song. I think there’s a sort of reflective quality, but I guess I think of it more as a celebration of life.

Interview with Ken Bruce, BBC Radio 2, 9 May 2011”.

I cannot find too much written about The Red Shoes’ title track. It is such a shame! Maybe someone tying it to the 1948 film. How Bush would have been influenced by a character in the Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger classic. Bush spoke to Melody Maker in 1993 where she revealed the following: "It's just taking the idea of these shoes that have a life of their own. If you're unfortunate enough to put them on, you're going to dance and dance. It's almost like the idea that you're possessed by dance. Before I had any lyrics, the rhythm of the music led me to the image of, oh, horses, something that was running forward, and that led me to the image of the dancing shoes. Musically, I was trying to get a sense of delirium, of something very circular and hypnotic, but building and building". One of my favourite Kate Bush songs, I love the frenzy and spirit of The Red Shoes. Maybe sharing some DNA with Eat the Music and Hounds of Love’s Jig of Life, it is a shame that there was not enough love out there for a brilliant cut! Even so, as Wikipedia has collated some evidence; there was some appreciation for the song:

“Chris Roberts from Melody Maker said, "The Red Shoes' meets its jigging ambition and sticks a flag on top, making her dance till her legs fall off." Another editor, Peter Paphides, commented, "Only as a grown-up will I be able to fully apprehend the texture and allegorical resonance of the themes dealt with in 'The Red Shoes'. Until then, I'll content myself with Tori Amos and Edie Brickell." Parry Gettelman from Orlando Sentinel wrote, "The mandola, the whistles and various curious instruments on the driving title track really recall the fever-dream quality of the 1948 ballet film The Red Shoes, the album's namesake." Mark Sutherland from Smash Hits gave it two out of five, adding that "loads of spooky 'ethnic' noises and tribal beats make for a very weird single, but not a very good one”.

I am going to end up with some thoughts and feedback regarding The Red Shoes ahead of its thirty-first anniversary on 1st November. Before I get there, in 2018, The Quietus marked twenty-five years of the album. With virtually no other deep dives or features around an album that warrants so much more discussion and appreciation, they did at least highlight some of its strengths. A lot to digest for those who feel the album has only a couple of good moments but is spoiled by the production sound and some less-than-inspired moments from Bush. Maybe lapsing into cliché or boredom at times. Songs that are flat or routine. On the contrary: this is an album that has so much depth and nuance:

“Hearing her equate emotional intimacy with scoffing mangoes and plums might suggest that The Red Shoes still has plenty of idiosyncrasies. There’s certainly something quintessentially Bushian about some of its songs, including the title cut, which soundtracks the fate of a girl who puts on a pair of red leather ballet shoes and dances a frantic Irish jig: it combines her fondness for Celtic sounds, old stories and classic film (The Red Shoes was written by Hans Christian Andersen and later adapted into a 1948 film directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, the former of whom Bush salutes on ‘Moments Of Pleasure’), and her shrill, possessed vocal makes it sound like a feverish fairytale. The steamy ‘The Song Of Solomon’, meanwhile, mixes a literary text and desire in the same way that ‘The Sensual World’ let Ulysses’ Molly Boom step off the page and experience physical pleasure. This time, there was no-one stopping Bush lifting lines from her chosen book, the Hebrew Bible, although the erotic charge of the chorus is all hers: “Don’t want your bullshit, yeah/ Just want your sexuality.”

And if Bush has dabbled with the gothic and supernatural ever since ‘Wuthering Heights’, there’s more magick on the moody, witch-rock of ‘Lily’, a tribute to her friend and spiritual healer, Lily Cornford. “I said ‘Lily, oh Lily, I’m so afraid,’” trembles Bush. “I fear I am walking in the vale of darkness.” She banishes the evil spirits with fire and the help of four angels, although Gabriel, Raphael, Michael and Uriel couldn’t save The Line, The Cross And The Curve, the Bush-directed film-meets-visual-album which included videos for ‘Lily’ and five of the LP’s other songs. Inspired by Powell’s original movie, the singer is tricked by Miranda Richardson into wearing the cursed ballet slippers, and must free herself from the curse under the tutelage of Lindsay Kemp. It was, Bush later claimed, a “load of old bollocks”.

It’s easy enough to find the common thread running through The Red Shoes: time and time again she returns to being brave, to being strong, to being open, to having to decide between holding on or letting go, and still trusting you’ll come out OK on the other side. There is, admittedly, less of a sonic coherence, especially in its latter stages. ‘Constellation Of The Heart’ is a colourful swirl of funky guitars, organs and saxophone, while ‘Big Stripey Lie’ is built upon Nigel Kennedy’s gorgeous violin but is undercut by bitty guitars and discordant squiggles of noise, its scorched beauty hinting at violent chaos as Bush frets: “Oh my god, it’s a jungle in here.”

That’s then followed by the absurdity of ‘Why Should I Love You?’ Bush had originally asked Prince to record backing vocals for the track, but he decided to take it apart and add guitars, keyboards and brass, too. Conventional wisdom is that great collaborations are the result of a shared vision, but ‘Why Should I Love You?’ is great even though there’s absolutely no shared vision whatsoever: for the first 60-odd seconds it’s built around Bush’s hushed vocal, until Prince’s huge rush of ecstatic, kaleidoscopic sound steamrolls everything in its path. It’s less the meeting of two minds and more the smashing together of two completely different styles, the most special of cut-and-shunt hybrids. (And somewhere, among all the hullabaloo, you’ll also hear backing vocals from Lenny Henry).

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1993/PHOTO CREDIT: John Stoddardt

There’s another cameo on the closing song, the fantastically histrionic breakup ballad ‘You’re The One’, on which Jeff Beck’s dizzying, drawn-out guitar solo pushes Bush to an exhausting catharsis. Like so much of The Red Shoes, it finds her preparing to leave a lover to save herself, although this time she’s less bullish, more prone to tying herself in knots. “I’m going to stay with my friend/ Mmm, yes, he’s very good-looking,” she admits. “The only trouble is, he’s not you.” By the song’s end, she’s so frazzled by frustration and anguish that she lets rip a larynx-tearing shriek: “Just forget it, alright!” Bush, who had spoken of feeling emotionally burnt-out years before the album was released, was ready to withdraw, too: she vanished for 12 years until Aerial, and then went on hiatus for another six before returning with Director’s Cut. “I think there’s always a long, lingering dissatisfaction with everything I’ve done,” she said in 2011, glad to have the chance to right some of the wrongs that had been bothering her for 20-odd years. For me, though, the original album has always been enough: it might have its flaws, and there might be a handsome alternative, but just like Bush on ‘You’re The One’, I still want to keep going back”.

You can buy The Red Shoes on vinyl. You can read some other reviews for the album. I don’t think it deserves its reputation as the runt of Bush’s output. In fact, I have recently written as to how it would be great to have Kate Bush’s albums on cassette. More attention needs to be paid to the album. It would be really interesting having The Red Shoes on cassette. It was available on that format at one point. I would love a red cassette that I can put into a portable player and walk around listening to it. Bush did re-record and redo some tracks from The Red Shoes for 2011’s Director’s Cut. The Song of Solomon, Lily, The Red Shoes, Moments of Pleasure, Top of the City, And So Is Love and Rubberband Girl. Pretty much redoing the singles. Songs considered strong in 1993. In fact, more than half the album was re-recorded. I don’t think it is a sign of how Bush sees The Red Shoes. Instead, maybe the production sound. In the 1990s, a lot of music was over-compressed or had this rather tinny and artificial sound. Artists going digital. Trying to cram a lot onto a C.D., it often meant albums could be pretty flabby and over-long. I would love to hear The Red Shoes, with its original songs, stripped back. Think about the sound of the demo of Why Should I Love You? A stronger album could be born if some of the layers of the production were removed.

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in a promotional photo for The Red Shoes

However, I still have a lot of love for the 1993 original. I have said how the tracklist is disordered. How it is a top-heavy album. A much weaker second half to the first. I keep thinking about the tracklisting and order. I have put a rejigged version of the album below. Look at the songs and how the stronger numbers are more evenly distributed. How there is a stronger finish. A great middle section. Also, I do think that the album warrants new inspection. It has so many high points. Many associate Bush’s 1993 album with tragedy, loss and fatigue. An artist who, in her own words, needed a break. They see it as far less inspired and consistent than any album before. Rubberband Girl, the album’s first U.K. single, is about Bush bouncing back to life and being this elastic and flexible fighter. However, many see that as ironic considering how many reviews piled on and dismissed The Red Shoes. I hold love for the album. Besides, the wonderful and unstoppable Kate Bush…

WOULD bounce back eventually.

FEATURE: “Ah. You’re a Fine Woman, Kate!” Kate Bush’s Aerial at Nineteen

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“Ah. You’re a Fine Woman, Kate!”

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 2005/PHOTO CREDIT: Trevor Leighton

 

Kate Bush’s Aerial at Nineteen

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NOVEMBER is a busy month…

for Kate Bush albums and anniversaries. Aerial is one of her finest and most celebrated albums. It was released on 7th November, 2005. This is the first of two anniversary features around its release. Celebrating nineteen years of a masterpiece. Kate Bush fans will be aware this was her first studio albums after 1993’s The Red Shoes. Many had given up hope we would ever get another Kate Bush album. Even though there was talk and tease much earlier than 2005, you never know for sure until the announcement is made. Bush had her son Bertie in 1998. She was writing earlier than that for Aerial, though having a son and looking after him definitely took priority. However, him coming into her life pretty much established the mood and drive behind the album I think. Whether you get a song like Bertie dedicated to him or others that are inspired and influenced by family, new joy and horizons, Bertie is very much at the heart. In the second feature around Aerial, I will go more into the songs and the reception the album received. I want to explain the origins of the album and the domestic. Family and hospitality. Bertie was born in July 1998. Creative endeavours were very much on the backfoot. Bush and her partner Dan McIntosh were consumed by their love for Bertie. Motherhood is so integral to Aerial and so entwined within the songs. Bush, in some less meaningful sense, always considered her songs to be like her children. At least something that she could nurture, protect and grow in her own image. Not wanting them to be rushed or harmed. When Bertie came along, I think that her work ethic and drive turned from the studio to the home. However, Bertie’s existence opened her mind and heart to an album very different to anything she had ever created. Her mind and imagination exploring new vistas. The same revelation we got with Hounds of Love in 1985. Because Bush was more rested in 1983 and 1984, surrounded by home and the country, she could write in a far less anxious and supressed way. Think about Aerial and the years before it came out. I can picture Bush writing songs in 2003 or 2004. Bertie, five or six, running around or in the garden. Bush thinking about him and his joy! Maybe A Sky of Honey, the conceptual suite that makes up the second part of the album, Bush thinking about the idyllic family situation and setting. People forget Aerial is a double album.

Kate Bush is not someone who made a big deal of her son’s birth. In terms of being a celebrity and contacting the press. She was this normal mum who talked to mums of Bertie’s friends, but there was not this sense that she was this superstar. Living quite a normal life. Rather than focus on the music, I wanted to look more at the press, importance of home and family and the seeds of Aerial. Her relationship with the press had changed by 2005. The fact she was still being seen as recluse. That annoying word that does not apply to Kate Bush! However, you do get the sense that family and home definitely motivated Aerial and gave it this real energy, magic and beauty. Speaking with Canada’s National Post in promotion of the album, there are some interesting observations:

“Interviews with the famously reclusive singer are about as common as five-leaf clovers, but on the phone she comes across as warm, enthusiastic, even effusive. The woman who has been responsible for some of the past three decades' most downright scary pop music is clearly in a very good mood. Releasing Aerial has removed an albatross from her shoulders; the fact that it has received almost uniform praise has particularly pleased her.

According to Bush, she was concerned that the public "might feel it was a bit anticlimactic when the actual record appeared, after such a build-up ... It feels like people have responded on a really direct level with the work."

While Aerial's first disc, subtitled A Sea of Honey, has moments of darkness, its companion, A Sky of Honey, is an almost unambiguously upbeat suite of songs about artistic creation, nature, the sublime and freedom. "I'm actually very happy," she says. "It's not that I particularly set out to write something positive; I think it's just the way it came out."

Becoming a mother may have slowed the album's progress, but it has certainly buoyed Bush's spirits; in the Renaissance-flavoured Bertie, she sings about how her son brings her "so much joy." Perhaps the most arresting moment on the two discs is a moment of unrestrained happiness in the epic title track. Bush performs a laughing duo with a bird: It twitters in melodic bursts, and the singer titters expansively, as if to imitate or outdo it. The effect resembles jazz players trading solos. Bush laughs at the suggestion.

"I suppose it was a bit like a duel," she says.

"I was also trying to draw a comparison between the two languages -- it struck me that laughter has got this sort of connection [with] the shapes and patterns and songs of birdsong."

Bush is not often renowned for her sense of humour, although the occasionally campy sensibility of her earlier videos offset her perceived seriousness. The promo for King of the Mountain, Aerial's first single and a powerfully moody song, is overtly humorous: It shows the journey of Elvis's animated white body suit from Graceland to the Arctic, to reunite the King, who has been living there in tabloid-fantasy seclusion. On a musical level, new song Pi finds her singing about a character who is obsessed with the number's calculation; in the refrain, she sings it to over 100 decimal places, with a gentle sensuality. The result is impressive, but also undoubtedly barmy.

"Sometimes, early on," Bush recalls, "when I was playing that to friends, they really liked it, but when they got to the end, they'd laugh. I thought that was really nice. I think that there's always room for humour in music. It's something that always takes itself so seriously, which I think is a bit of a shame."

As much as Bush is keen to speak about certain aspects of her life, she's also quick to distance herself from strictly autobiographical readings of her work, especially when she's almost always singing from the point of view of imaginary characters or historical figures. In conversation, she will occasionally, but subtly, leave certain topics under wraps.

"My life and my work are very interlocked," she says. "That's partly why I like to keep my private life private. I don't really see myself as a celebrity, but more as a sort of mitre." Not a bishop's hat, that is, but a joint, which forms a corner in a building; Bush sees herself as joining people together, including her family and her recurring cast of musicians, who appear from album to album. Mitres tend to be unobtrusive, and Aerial's stealthily rhythmic song How to Be Invisible, has often been read in terms of Bush's own desire for privacy. It features a recipe for invisibility, which involves "hem of anorak," "stem of wallflower" and "hair of doormat" -- all references, as Bush notes, to "geeks," who are "literally absorbed into the wallpaper”.

Unfortunately, it was her long-term friend and collaborator Peter Gabriel who revealed Kate Bush had a son. In a 2000 interview, he revealed she was a mother. The press went into overdrive! Rather than respect her privacy and mind their own business, there were headlines around this secret son. This big mystery. Bush described in insulting tones as isolated, reclusive, weird, hiding or shunning showbusiness! In fact, Bush was making music but was prioritising motherhood. She was never ‘in showbusiness’. Someone who never wanted fame, she was keeping private and did not want to welcome in headlines or the tabloids. As Graeme Thomson explains in his biography of Kate Bush, Under the Ivy: The Life and Music of Kate Bush, it is noted how the tabloids had this vision of Kate Bush and the music was irrelevant. She was incorrectly labelled as a recluse or weirdo. This has not changed radically today! Bush was growing more tired of the press. By 1993’s The Red Shoes you could see how it was getting to her. Think about the last T.V. interview she gave, with Michael Aspel, and how insulting and lurid that is. A car-crash! You can understand, with a new album out, how she was at best wary of the press. At worst she saw them as a poisonous and hugely negative force. Aerial changed the way she promoted albums. You kind of think of The Red Shoes about being concerned with loss and separation. Bush losing her mother and breaking up with Del Palmer. Losing friends and going through a very hard time. Aerial is the opposite: about new life, purpose and new family. Perhaps in a more giving headspace in terms of her time, she was doing things on her own terms.

In 1991, she famously kicked a tabloid snapper when she was photographed coming out of a play. In 1993, there was a challenging and combative interview with Chrissey Illy. The articles about Bush’s son were particularly intrusive and violated any sense of privacy and decency. Speculation and scandal. Bush came out and made a statement to her fan club addressing these inaccurate articles. She explained how she was having fun being a mum and was working on a new album. It is important to consider why she retreated from music shortly after 1993. Part of it was the media and that pressure and intrusion into her private life. As she was working on a new album and preparing to come back to the fore, she was facing the same sort of violation and horror she got in the 1990s. Truly, Kate Bush could never get respect or peace! Regardless, stories from the people who worked with Kate Bush on Aerial tell of the mood and warm environment at her home. I love the informality and family vibe. The same sort that her mother used to provide at East Wickham Farm when Bush was younger. Musicians and those who worked with Bush were struck by her hospitality, cheerfulness and true attentiveness. I think about Aerial as this album informed by domesticity and the mood at home. This warm, wonderful and really welcoming environment. Bush was not only producer and the artist. She was also the host. Tea was always on hand! Ensuring her musicians were fuelled with tea, Peter Erskine – who played percussion on several tracks – recalls that there was always a brew on the go. Bush making sure that everyone was seen to! There was this joke between Del Palmer – the engineer and player on the album (and Bush’s former boyfriend and long-term friend) - and John Giblin (who played bass). They adopted this accent of a British actor and would say “Ah. You’re a fine woman, Kate”. It was almost this mantra. Even though EMI’s Tony Wadsworth kept in contact, she did not play him any of the album. There is this false story (that she was asked about by Tom Doyle in 2005) that she made a cake for him and saying she was going to play him some music. Privacy and secrecy about the album was paramount.

Even so, that idea of there being this warm vibe and new spirt around her home was noticed by musicians and the press. Bush always on hand with tea. This very nice environment. I think that there was new trust with the record label. I am going to address this in a future feature. About how Bush pushed away from EMI eventually. However, in 2005, she was in this space where she was more open to their updates and queries. Again, in another feature, I will address how promotion changed from 2005. Bush was not seen in public or a T.V. studio. Her interviews were conducted at her home or via phone. She was very much open to people coming to her but, because of continued press nonsense and insult, something has been broken. She no longer would do things how she used to or was expected to do. Regardless, I think this new approach worked wonders. Being in this stable and familiar environment, she could talk about her album in a much more relaxed way. Some very long interviews from 2005. Tom Doyle enjoying four hours with Bush. Mark Radcliffe getting this long interview. I feel Bush, as mother and creator of one of her best albums, was in a new phase. In her forties, her priorities had changed. Not enduring the same sort of brutal promotional circuit, she was instead creating this balance between music and family. I am going to go into the album and how Aerial resonated with critics in the second anniversary feature. However, on 7th November, 2005, we got this album from Kate Bush. Her first in twelve years. It was a monumental moment. People not sure how good it would be or whether it would be worth the wait. It was very much worth the wait! Whether truly driven by her son, family and home, you cannot deny that Bush was much happier. Spotlighting growth and new joy rather than loss (even though there are moments on Aerial that are slightly heartbroken). Up there with her best work, the majestic Aerial still sounds amazing nineteen years later. If you have never heard Bush’s eighth studio album then you must…

HEAR it now.

FEATURE: The Digital Mixtape: Black History Month: The Best 2024 Albums by Black Artists

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The Digital Mixtape

PHOTO CREDIT: Orione Conceição/Pexels

 

Black History Month: The Best 2024 Albums by Black Artists

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AS October…

PHOTO CREDIT: RDNE Stock project/Pexels

is Black History Month in the U.K., I thought I was long overdue a feature about it. In fact, I will do another before the month is through. It is important that we mark it. I am going to end with a playlist. Celebrating great Black artists who have released year-defining and best albums in 2024. I am going to spread it beyond the U.K. Recognising the amazing Black talent across the music world. A salute to the kings and queens that have put out some truly world-class releases. Prior to that, this website explains and explores the origins of Black History Month:

“Origins in the United States

Black History Month predates the UK’s celebration however, and originated in the United States. The first official Black History Month took place from 2nd January to 28th February 1970, but it has an even earlier history than this. In 1926, academic and historian Dr Carter G. Woodson and the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (which Dr Woodson founded) created ‘Negro History Week’. Many consider this the first version of Black History Month- it created a ripple effect leading to the official Black History Month as we know it today.

You’ll also notice that while Black History Month is celebrated in October in the UK, it’s celebrated in February in the United States. In America, they chose February because Dr Woodson and ASAALH wanted to mark the birthdays of former President Abraham Lincoln, and incredible abolitionist and writer Frederick Douglass who both made huge contributions to Black liberation and equality during their lifetimes.

Dr. Woodson explained the importance of celebrating Black history, and said that “if race has no history, if it has no worthwhile tradition, it becomes a negligible factor in the thought of the world, and it stands in danger of being exterminated.”

Dr. Woodson felt that at least one week would help raise awareness and help for the movement to become an annual celebration. After the first celebration, Woodson and the ASALH wanted to focus on encourage teaching about Black Americans in public schools. They created a curriculum with lots of resources and shared them around schools. The departments of education in North Carolina, Delaware, and West Virginia and the city school administrations in Baltimore and Washington D.C. took part in the yearly celebrations. Dr. Woodson noted that predominantly white schools who had adopted their curriculum had better race relations than those who hadn’t.

Dr. Woodson worked tirelessly to share the campaign and educate people on Black history and its importance. In the 1940s, he frequently worked at universities in West Virginia which led to the state’s residents celebrating ‘Negro History Month’, and the ASALH forming branches across the states.

The first Black History Month

Following Dr. Woodson’s death in 1950, people continued to celebrate and learn about Black history and people fought for better rights for Black people. Black college students pushed for further education on Black History, with one university in particular leading the charge.

Black History Month in the more modern sense of what we know now was first proposed in February 1969 by Black academics and the Black United Students, a student organisation at Kent State University. Over the following six years, Black History Month spread across the United States and was being celebrated in universities, community centres, and centres of Black culture.

In 1976, then President Gerald Ford officially recognised Black History Month during the United States Bicentennial celebration, which observed and paid tribute to the historical events that led to the United States becoming an independent republic. In his speech, President Ford encouraged Americans to “seize the opportunity to honour the too-often neglected accomplishments of Black Americans in every area of the endeavour throughout our history.”

Celebrations in the UK

Black History Month in the UK was first officially celebrated 11 years later in 1987, which coincided with the 150th anniversary of Caribbean emancipation of slavery and the 25th anniversary of the Organisation of African Unity. Ghanian analyst and activist Akyaaba Addai-Sebo played a huge role in organising the UK’s first Black History Month. Addai-Sebo came to the UK in 1984 when he sought refuge from political persecution during the regime of Jerry John Rawlings. He said leaving Ghana during that time meant he was “therefore absorbed in community activism right on my arrival.”

In an interview with the UK Black History Month organisation in 2017, Addai-Sebo said: “I was stirred up in the mid 1980s by the identity crisis that Black children faced. A crisis of identity faced us squarely despite the Race Awareness campaigns of the Greater London Council and the Inner London Education Authority. More had to be done and so I conceived an annual celebration of the contributions of Africa, Africans, and people of African descent to world civilisation.”

Addai-Sebo said that they settled on October rather than February for the UK Black History Month so that “children were fresh after the long summer vacation and had less to worry about exams and tests, and the camaraderie was stronger as they shared experiences. […] Self-pride is the catalyst for achievement and there is no greater ‘truth’ than knowing yourself.”

Black History Month has been celebrated across the UK ever since, with more and more people celebrating each year. It is an important time of the year where we can spend time learning more about the contributions of Black, African, and Caribbean people so we can better appreciate and understand each other. Celebrating Black History Month doesn’t only have to be in October either- taking the opportunity to learn more about Black history throughout the year and listening to our Black colleagues, service users, friends, and family is so important and will go some way to making society a more equal and appreciative place”.

I am going to wrap up soon. I will publish another feature celebrating and marking Black History Month. It has taken me too long to put out the first one this month. Recognising the best albums of this year from Black artists, there are some terrific and must-hear works of brilliance. Make sure that you give this Digital Mixtape…

A listen.

FEATURE: Basket Case or Welcome to Paradise? Why Green Day’s ‘Demastering’ of Dookie Is More Than a Novelty

FEATURE:

 

 

Basket Case or Welcome to Paradise?

  

Why Green Day’s ‘Demastering’ of Dookie Is More Than a Novelty

_________

IN an age where albums…

are mostly streamed and vinyl can be quite expensive, I am always looking around for something different. Many reissues and anniversary editions of albums are mastered and made to sound as crisp and clean as possible. This idea of remastering tracks. Making it sounds better or more professional. This feeling that people want something that is as polished as possible. Improving on the original album. That is commendable. I guess we are looking for remastered versions, though the original can be better. It is hard to offer a unique or different take on an album reissue. You can offer demos and additional songs. Apart from that, the releases are pretty standard. However, to mark thirty years of their masterful album, Dookie, Green Day have come up with a retro, random, ridiculous and perhaps revolutionary was of ‘demastering’ their album. Rather than making it all shiny and modern, they have planted and imbedded a different track from the album in a range of items that you can keep around the home. Billboard explains more:

“Ever wondered what Green Day‘s ode to soul-sucking boredom “Longview” would sound like if it was re-recorded on a doorbell? How about the hard-charging Dookie classic “Welcome to Paradise” rendered in 8-bit glory on a Game Boy cartridge?

Well, then you’re in luck, because on Wednesday (Oct. 9) the band announced that as part of the ongoing 30th anniversary celebration of their breakthrough 1994 major label debut the punk-pop trio has added to the already super-stuffed deluxe edition box that dropped last September with an innovated Dookie Demastered edition featuring all 15 songs recorded on what a press release described as “obscure, obsolete and otherwise inconvenient limited-edition formats.”

The collaboration with BRAIN features purposely lo-res, glitchy versions of the songs rendered on everything from the long-dead 8-track format (“Sassafras Roots”), to floppy disc (“Having a Blast”), wax cylinder (“When I Come Around”) and, of course, a toothbrush (“Pulling Teeth”).

“Instead of smoothing out its edges and tweaking its dynamic ranges, this version of Dookie has been met­icu­lously mangled to fit on formats with uncom­promis­ing­ly low fidelity, from wax cylinders to answering machines to toothbrushes,” reads a press release. “The listening experience is unparalleled, sacrificing not only sonic quality, but also convenience, and occasionally entire verses. It’s Dookie, the way it was never meant to be heard.

All 15 formats can be played here, with fans encouraged to enter a drawing for a chance to buy one of the one-of-a-kind recordings in a drawing that ends on Friday (Oct. 11) at 11 a.m. ET. Green day have been celebrating the Dookie anniversary, as well as the 20th anniversary of American Idiot, on their massive Saviors stadium tour, which will hit Corona Capital stadium in Mexico City on Nov. 15.

Green Day Dookie Demastered track list:

  1. “Burnout” – Player Piano Roll

  2. “Having A Blast” – Floppy Disk

  3. “Chump” – Teddy Ruxpin

  4. “Longview” – Doorbell

  5. “Welcome To Paradise” – Game Boy Cartridge

  6. “Pulling Teeth” – Toothbrush

  7. “Basket Case” – Big Mouth Billy Bass

  8. “She” – HitClip

  9. “Sassafras Roots” – 8-track

  10. “When I Come Around” – Wax Cylinder

  11. “Coming Clean” – X-Ray Record

  12. “Emenius Sleepus” – Answering Machine

  13. “In The End” – MiniDisc

  14. “F.O.D.” – Fisher Price Record

  15. “All By Myself” – Music Box”.

Some might comment how this reissue is quite expensive and random. Each item costing quite a bit. I think it is more than novelty. Maybe a rebellion against all the gloss and sameness of reissues, this back-to-basics approach sort of transports us back to 1994. When Dookie was released. Artists reissue albums in all kinds of formats. Few have thought about items like a toy or a toothbrush! I don’t think it only a novelty. Sure, artists might not want to put individual tracks into a wax cylinder or Big Mouth Billy Bass! That feeling of the retro and oldskool. That feeling or tangibility. You may have the original album, so the reissue might not hold any worth. You can get remastered albums on Spotify or streaming services if you like. If you want to keep something special and different, why would you not invest in this?! Green Day already put out the standard reissue. Expanded tracks and all of that. This is important. However, to add a twist, this somewhat charming and inconvenient formatting should not end with the band and this album. I do think there are seeds that are beyond gimmick. The fun that would get hearing an album track through a toy, appliance or something like a MiniDisc. More and more, we are looking for the physical. Having music in that form. I do like the idea from Green Day. It would be great if it wasn’t a limited run. Where you could order these items weeks and months from now.

I personally like Welcome to Paradise on the Game Boy Cartridge! One might say that this is a lot of money and waste for a single song. Not environmentally friendly or quite a lot to hear a song that is going to be tinnier and less pleasing than the richness of vinyl. That is true. However, think about how we love vinyl because of its feel and durability. Something we can keep. I do feel that there is this real value, novelty or not, to what Green Day have introduced. We can get so familiar with the album and its tracks. Standard reissues might not offer too much to tantalise. I like how you can get a track from Dookie or any other album in this form. You can introduce the album to new people through this. It is a great way of opening up the music or that song. I don’t think that Green Day did this simply as novelty or a way of cashing-in. It is a really cool way of reapproaching and repackaging an album. Again, that move away from the digital. Big artists reissue albums in all formats and put out bundles. Merchandise too. There is no reason why this Dookie demastering should stop here. Giving fans choice and something different is really important today. I would not have bought the reissued version of Dookie but, when it comes to the fifteen different items with individual tracks in, I am tempted to buy one! For those who feel that this is a bit of a novelty, as I say, there is potential. I feel other artists might follow Green Day and strip things right down and take them back to basics. I feel that fans and other artists should…

LOOK at the long view.

FEATURE: The Greatest So Far…. Kate Bush’s The Whole Story at Thirty-Eight

FEATURE:

 

 

The Greatest So Far….

  

Kate Bush’s The Whole Story at Thirty-Eight

_________

I could not pass this anniversary…

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1985/PHOTO CREDIT: Guido Harari

without marking it. Kate Bush’s The Whole Story has a very special space in my heart and life. It was the first Kate Bush album/collection I came to. When I was about four of five, I experienced the music video for Wuthering Heights. The Whole Story is the only true greatest hits collection from Kate Bush. I shall come to some information about it. On 10th November, 1986, this amazing compilation was released. I always assumed that the VHS version of The Whole Story came out in 1987. It would have been 1986. In any case, it was the VHS that I first experienced. The visual brilliance of Wuthering Heights. My eyes were opened to something truly spectacular and original. Up until this point in my life, I don’t think I had really seen or heard an artist like this. More theatre than music! Something that will stay with me. In 1985, Kate Bush released Hounds of Love. The popularity of it meant that EMI were in a position to release a greatest hits album. Bush was reluctant at first and felt that it was a bad idea. She wanted to do original material and would have thought a greatest hits was cashing in or would not sell. When shown some research and logic, she was more on board. The fact that it went on to become her best-selling album to date (being certified four-times platinum in the United Kingdom) definitely meant she was right to allow it! I am also going to tie in the anniversary of Experiment IV, which was released as a single on 27th October, 1986. That was the same date as Don’t Give Up was released. Peter Gabriel and Kate Bush together. Two very different songs on the same day. Kate Bush’s doubts were put aside when The Whole Story reached number one. There are a couple of notable aspects of The Whole Story. Rather than Wuthering Heights being the original, it was a re-recorded vocal. It has divided opinion. Bush wanted a more updated and adult vocal. She recorded the original in 1977. Nearly a decade later, Bush could approach the song from a new angle and perspective. I will always prefer the original, though this was one of the first times when Bush reapproached and re-recorded her music. A unique treat for fans at that point.

There are some notable omissions on The Whole Story. Of course, Bush and EMI would have focused on the singles. Under the Ivy is missing. The B-side for Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) is one of Bush’s very best songs. One of the limitations of a greatest hits is that there is something missing. I shall come to that point more. Also on The Whole Story is the album mix of The Man with the Child in His Eyes rather than the single version. The home video version of the compilation was nominated for the Best Concept Music Video at the 1988 GRAMMY awards. Maybe people do not know about this album. However, in 2014, when Bush was performing during the residency, Before the Dawn, The Whole Story reached number eight in the U.K. Before coming to Experiment IV and more about The Whole Story, here is some critical reaction and words from Kate Bush about her greatest hits:

“The compilation album was received well and had several critics write down their positive reviews.

Over the last nine years and five albums, Kate Bush (…) has matured into quite the most sensual, expressive, and creative artist this country can now boast.

Roger Holland, Sounds (UK), 1986

This glorious retrospective collection… she’s playing a high-risk game, and more often than not her irrepressible flair, her instinct for a hook, and her gift for unusual and gripping arrangements carry her through.

Colin Irwin, Melody Maker (UK), 1986

More useful and more enjoyable than the constipated jangling of a hundred and one little lads with big mouths and even bigger clothes allowances. Such people are not worth a carrot. Meat or no meat, Kate Bush is streets ahead.

John McReady, NME (UK), 1986

A monumental tribute to this craziest, coziest girl-next-door. (…) One of the most refreshing compilation LPs it would be possible to put together.

Andy Strickland, Record Mirror (UK), 1986

The video version was also reviewed, but they were a bit more mixed.

The earlier clips, dating back to her breakthrough hit ‘Wuthering Heights’, show off her considerable dance skills, yet they aren’t particularly good videos. Nevertheless the material is engrossing in its disturbing portrayal of the ethereally beautiful songstress as a tormented darker Stevie Nicks type.

Jim Bessman, Billboard (USA), 4 JUly 1987

With her mime and dance talent, and her narrative songwriting style, you’d think Kate Bush would be a natural for music videos. So why then is this collection so spotty in quality? Maybe because Kate Bush is so enamoured of Kate Bush. At times she’s more interested in her hair, face and lips, than in the meanings of her lyrics or the purity of her voice. Kate Bush is an affected artist most likely stuck with her cult following.

Phil Anderson, Buzz, July 1987

Kate about ‘The Whole Story’

(…) I was asked to put out a greatest hits album by the guy at the record company. I thought it was such a crap idea and I said, “No, no way”. He came back with all this research he’d done and just completely won me over. And of course it ended up being my biggest-selling record.

Tom Doyle, ‘Kate Bush: National treasure’. Q (UK), November 2006

Yes, I was [against the release of a compilation album] at first. I was concerned that it would be like a “K-tel” record, a cheapo-compo with little thought behind it. It was the record company’s decision, and I didn’t mind as long as it was well put together. We put a lot of work into the packaging, trying to make it look tasteful, and carefully thought out the running order. And the response has been phenomenal – I’m amazed!

Kate Bush Club newsletter, Issue 22, December 1987

It wasn’t chronological because we wanted to have a running time that was equal on both sides, otherwise you get a bad pressing. In America, where I’m not very well known, they didn’t realise it was a compilation!

‘Love, Trust and Hitler’. Tracks (UK), November 1989”.

I want to spend a bit of time with Experiment IV. This was the only original song from The Whole Story. A song that could have easily sounded right on Hounds of Love. It reached number twenty-three in the U.K. One of the most notable aspects of Experiment IV is that Bush directed the video. It features cameos from  Dawn French, Hugh Laurie, Richard Vernon, Peter Vaughan, Paddy Bush and Del Palmer. It is one of her most striking and memorable videos. Before the editing of the full video could be completed, a minute-long segment was made for Top of the Pops. They refused to play it as they considered it to be too violent. Like with The Whole Story, here is some critical reception of Experiment IV and words from Kate Bush:

“The first lady of progressive rock warbles out another chilling fantasy. Kate crams more into seven inches of plastic than most science fiction writers could fit into a trilogy of novels. An epic to curl up with on some storm torn winters evening.

Edwin Pouncy, Sounds, 1 November 1986

Initially conventional, she hides inside the slight shapes, sticking the needle into our eyeballs with customary delicacy… it grows.

Mick Mercer, Melody Maker, 1 November 1986

Chilling, moody, beautiful… An essential purchase.

Mark Putterford, Kerrang!, 5 November 1986

Behind ethereal dreamy swirls of sound, a story line worthy of Stephen King.

Nancy Erlich, BillBoard (USA), 6 December 1986

Kate about ‘Experiment IV’

This was written as an extra track for the compilation album The Whole Story and was released as the single. I was excited at the opportunity of directing the video and not having to appear in it other than in a minor role, especially as this song told a story that could be challenging to tell visually. I chose to film it in a very handsome old military hospital that was derelict at the time. It was a huge, labyrinthine hospital with incredibly long corridors, which was one reason for choosing it. Florence Nightingale had been involved in the design of the hospital. Not something she is well known for but she actually had a huge impact on hospital design that was pioneering and changed the way hospitals were designed from then on.
The video was an intense project and not a comfortable shoot, as you can imagine – a giant of a building, damp and full of shadows with no lighting or heating but it was like a dream to work with such a talented crew and cast with Dawn French, Hugh Laurie, Peter Vaughn and Richard Vernon in the starring roles. It was a strange and eerie feeling bringing parts of the hospital to life again. Not long after our work there it was converted into luxury apartments. I can imagine that some of those glamorous rooms have uninvited soldiers and nurses dropping by for a cup of tea and a Hobnob.
We had to create a recording studio for the video, so tape machines and outboard gear were recruited from my recording studio and the mixing console was very kindly lent to us by Abbey Road Studios. It was the desk the Beatles had used – me too, when we’d made the album Never For Ever in Studio Two. It was such a characterful desk that would’ve looked right at home in any vintage aircraft. Although it was a tough shoot it was a lot of fun and everyone worked so hard for such long hours. I was really pleased with the result. (KateBush.com, February 2019)”.

I have written about The Whole Story a few times before. Apologies for repeating any words! There have been compilations of Kate Bush’s music since 1986. Nothing really like The Whole Story. I think that there is a demand and desire for something new now. Maybe people would think it would be repeating things. Given the new popularity of Kate Bush, it would be great to compile a new greatest hits. One that carries on from 1986 and takes us up to date. I do think that there should be a re-evaluation. The original is worth celebrating as it comes up to its thirty-eighth anniversary. In 1988, it was released to Minidisc.  A video-C.D. version was released a few years later called The Whole Story ’94. 1986 was a busy year for Kate Bush. One might think there was comedown after Hounds of Love the year before. Bush was still promoting and releasing singles. Here is what she got up to in a year when she turned twenty-eight:

“January 11, 1986

In the annual Sounds poll Kate is voted Best Female Vocalist of 1985.

February 10, 1986

Kate performs Hounds of Love live at the British Phonographic Industry Awards presentation. She is nominated for (but does not win) three awards: Best Album, Best Single and Best Female Singer.

February 17, 1986

The third single, Hounds of Love, is released in seven- and twelve-inch formats.

Kate records a duet with Peter Gabriel for his fifth solo album. The track is called Don't Give Up.

Kate abandons the plan to make a film version of The Ninth Wave side of the new album.

March 6, 1986

Kate appears on Top of the Pops to perform Hounds of Love.

March 19, 1986

For the making of the video for The Big Sky Kate assembles over one hundred fans on the sound stage of Elstree Studios.

Kate records a live performance of Under the Ivy at Abbey Road Studios for the 100th edition of the Tyne Tees TV programme The Tube.

April 4, 1986

Kate participates in the first of three Comic Relief shows at the Shaftesbury Theatre. She performs Breathing live and performs a duet of Do Bears Sh... in the Woods? with Rowan Atkinson.

April 5, 1986

The second Comic Relief show.

April 6, 1986

The third Comic Relief show.

May 25, 1986

Kate joins in the Sport Aid mini-marathon at Blackheath, South London, along with many other celebrities.

May 1986

The fourth single, The Big Sky, is released.

Kate does some session work for Big Country on the title track of their album The Seer.

June 16, 1986

The videos for the four Hounds of Love singles are released as a video EP under the title Hair of the Hound. It goes straight to the number 1 spot on the music video chart.

Hounds of Love passes the double platinum mark in the U.K.

October 20, 1986

Don't Give Up, the duet with Peter Gabriel of his song, is released as a single.

October 23, 1986

Kate participates in a personal appearance of the Comic Relief stars at the Claude Gill Book Shop, Oxford Street for the launch of the publication of the Comic Relief Book.

October 27, 1986

A new single, Experiment IV, is released in seven- and twelve-inch formats.

October 31, 1986

Kate appears on the BBC TV programme Wogan for the second time, giving a lip-synch performance of Experiment IV [with violinist Nigel Kennedy].

November 1986

Kate directs the video for Experiment IV, which is made on location at a disused military hospital in South East London and a street in the East End. The film features the Comic Strip regulars Dawn French and Hugh Laurie.

November 9, 1986

Kate interrupts the shooting of the Experiment IV video to attend a party at the Video Cafe organised by the Kate Bush Club and Homeground.

November 10, 1986

The Whole Story, the first Kate Bush compilation album, is released. It is promoted by the most expensive TV advertising campaign EMI has ever mounted. Sales are massive”.

On 10th November, it will be thirty-eight years since The Whole Story was released. A magnificent greatest hits album that has iconic hits throughout, one might say there is a need for an update and refresh. However, I would direct people to the original. But, yes, a new chapter would certainly not be a cash-in. It is long overdue! The album is officially on Spotify, but you cannot hear Wuthering Heights with the new vocal, as that was never released on any of her studio albums. Also, Experiment IV is not available (as it is a single that only appeared on The Whole Story, and it is mainly studio album tracks we have on Spotify). It has also not been reissued and remastered on vinyl and C.D. You can find the album on vinyl though, when Bush reissued her albums recently for independent record stores, she only did the studio albums. I think that The Whole Story should have got its own version and moment in the spotlight. Something that I think is Kate Bush cannon. Even if The Whole Story is only part of the tale of Kate Bush, it is a wonderful compilation. In fact, when you think about the greatest hits albums through time, Kate Bush’s 1986 release is up there. I think that there are…

FEW better in music history.

FEATURE: Company in Blue: Amazing Artists and Actors Going Deep with Kate Bush

FEATURE:

 

 

Company in Blue

IN THIS PHOTO: Halsey replicating a 1981 photo of Kate Bush shot by Clive Arrowsmith

 

Amazing Artists and Actors Going Deep with Kate Bush

_________

THIS is a bonus Kate Bush feature…

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1981/PHOTO CREDIT: Clive Arrowsmith

and one that has been inspired by some very cool and amazing artists and actors who have not only mentioned Kate Bush. They have done so in a way that goes beyond Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God), Hounds of Love, Wuthering Heights or anything obvious. One of my gripes is how little Kate Bush has resonated with younger generations. Maybe one or two songs. There does not to be the same sort of penetration and acknowledgment as one would hope. Maybe it depends on the groups of people you hang around. Those who I know in their twenties and thirties might vaguely know who she is - or maybe not at all. I hope that this improves and there is more in the way of awareness! If radio stations are singular and Bush’s music is not heard on ‘younger’ stations, then it can mean that it is hard to spread her incredible legacy. Maybe people know Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) but do not venture beyond it. I can’t assume that is what everyone does, though I get the feeling there is not the curiosity of Kate Bush you would want. Perhaps a lack of new music means that she is going to struggle to pick up new fans. However, in the public eye, there are some amazing people who are going deeper with Kate Bush and talking about her music. I got a nice surprise on Wednesday (9th October) when I saw a photo of U.S. artist Halsey posing and copying a photo of Kate Bush from 1981. She is replicating a series of photos that feature amazing artists. She also has posed as PJ Harvey. This post is tied to Halsey’s new single, I Never Loved You. Taken from the forthcoming The Great Impersonator this is an album you will want to check out:

“Step right up, ladies and gentlemen! Behold the marvel of a century! Witness the uncanny ability of a woman who can become anyone, anything your heart desires. Friend, lover, foe. She transforms before your very eyes, her voice and visage a reflection of your deepest dreams and darkest fears but beware, for she is not just a master of disguise but a spirit of transformation, slipping between the cracks of reality. One moment a beloved friend, the next a shadowy nightmare. She is the queen of the uncanny, the mistress of metamorphosis. Beware of the great impersonator!"

— Halsey, The Great Impersonator synopsis”.

The single, I Never Loved You, is inspired by the unique and brilliant Kate Bush. I was not aware Halsey was a fan. I think there are so many other artists of Halsey’s generation who are fans of Bush. Not only her more obvious work. Those that have explored her catalogue. It is wonderful Halsey has this tribute to Kate Bush in musical form. Also, that photo that she recreated. One could forgive her for casting herself in the Hounds of Love cover shot. Maybe even something from 1978 or 1979. Most people do not really know what Kate Bush was up to in 1981. A year after her third studio album, Never for Ever, Bush was working on The Dreaming and there was this period of exploration, evolution and change. Her music about to become more experimental, denser and stranger. Also more accomplished and ambitious. There are not a great deal of photos of Kate Bush from 1981. Two of her most iconic shots were taken by Clive Arrowsmith. This photo of Bush wrapped in ivy and looking amazing is one of the best shots ever taken off her. The one Halsey recreated where she is bathed in this blue backdrop and her hair looks incredible is one of my favourite photos. Before moving on, here is Arrowsmith discussing working with Kate Bush:

“Hearst Magazines had asked me to take a cover photograph for their new magazine Company. Kate was very definitely the woman of the moment at that time and her career was going from strength to strength all over the world. I had been very excited to meet her and had been listening to her music the evening before. Kate was very easy to work with and a calm silence pervaded her while we all worked. When you are shooting portraits you have to take people as you find them in that moment, so I did try and reflect the wistful and ethereal feeling I got from her. I sent the stylist out to get strong theatrical gauze, in different colours, while Kate’s make-up was being done, and I asked for some strands of ivy. After hair and make-up, the stylist helped me by arranging the shape of the blue gauze which I wanted to surround her face.  I set up a blue light behind her, to surround her in blue and to enhance the blue gauze, which contrasted with the red of her lips and her hazel eyes. After the blue image my team and I hung the ivy from a boom over her head. I directed the hairdresser from my camera viewfinder to refine the ivy strand arrangement. I asked Kate to hold the pose and we got the shot. Kate is a totally genuine musical artist and these images also capture that very serious aspect of her talent”.

A great deep dive from Halsey. Knowing that the photo existed and choosing to pay tribute to her for a promotional shot. Bringing Kate Bush to life through a new song. I think it will not only introduce her music to new people and widen the discussion about this international treasure. It is also nice that an artist like Halsey is opening people’s eyes to Kate Bush’s amazing photography. Photos of her. From periods they might not know about. I think American artists and those in the public eye there have especially responded to this new wave of affection for Kate Bush. We can look back to Stranger Things catapulting Bush into the consciousness again when Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) was featured and subsequently reached number one. Now, hopefully, artists like Halsey are keeping that momentum going. Recognising the incredible genius of Bush! Nod to artists in the U.K. and Ireland like CMAT and The Last Dinner Party who have recently covered Kate Bush songs – Wuthering Heights (from 1978’s The Kick Inside) and Army Dreamers (from 1980’s Never for Ever) respectively. An actor you might recognise from the hit show, The Bear, has also been extolling the virtues of Kate Bush’s lesser-known work. The phenomenal Ayo Edebiri plays Sydney Adamu. The Boston-born actor has also appeared in films like Bottoms and Inside Out 2. She is a major talent and someone who loves Kate Bush. Edebiri has just turned twenty-nine. Halsey recently turned thirty. Those who were born after The Red Shoes came out in 1993. Their first exposure to Kate Bush might have been close to the release of 2005’s Aerial. Compared to fans like me who were born in the 1980s, their path is different.

 PHOTO CREDIT: Getty Images

I am interested especially in an interview from April where Ayo Edebiri was in conversation with artist Mosey Sumney. Among other topics, Kate Bush entered the fray. Someone shouting out an icon when she can, full respect to Ayo Edebiri! This exchange is what caught the eye:

“SUMNEY: But I’m curious to know if you have the desire to do music stuff.

EDEBIRI: I don’t not have the desire. If there’s something where it felt right, that’d be cool. I’ve always had a little slight dream of—do you know the Kate Bush song, “Why Should I Love You?”

SUMNEY: I don’t know that one.

EDEBIRI: Okay. It’s a song that Prince and her made together. I’ll send you the demo. It’s my favorite thing ever”.

I love how obscure and rare that song choice is. One of the lesser cuts from The Red Shoes, this is someone else nodding to a period in Kate Bush’s career that does not get a lot of attention. Why Should I Love You? The demo sort of suggests what the song could have been. Something more sparse and beautiful. The album version is overloaded. Here is a bit of information and background to an underrated cut from The Red Shoes:

“Bush asked Prince to contribute background vocals to ‘Why Should I Love You’ in 1991. She sent him the track, which she had recorded at Abbey Road Studios (Studio Number One), London, England, and Prince added vocals, but also added many instrumental parts to the song, at his Paisley Park Studios. When Kate Bush and Del Palmer listened to Prince’s returned track, they weren’t sure what to do with it. They worked on it on and off for two years to try to “turn it back into a Kate Bush song”. The track also features background vocals by British comedian Lenny Henry, a good friend of Kate’s”

This is not the only Kate Bush song that Ayo Edebiri has mentioned. She is a true fan. In fact, when she and the cast of The Bear were interviewed for Vanity Fair, Edebiri raised an interesting question for the cast to answer. Her answer was in fact pretty fascinating. As this article explains, a Kate Bush classic is a karaoke go-to for Edebiri:

“The cast of The Bear — Jeremy Allen White (Carmy), Ayo Edebiri (Syd), Ebon Moss-Bachrach (Richie), Abby Elliot (Natalie), Lionel Boyce (Marcus), Liza Colon-Zayas (Tina), Matty Matheson (Fak #1), and Ricky Staffieri (Fak #2) — sat down with Vanity Fair for a video to see how well they know each other.

One question Ayo posed to her co-stars was: what’s my go-to karaoke song? After Moss-Bachrach jokingly suggested it was either the overture of Oscar-winning masterpiece Drive My Car or the theme from Dune: Part Two, both of which would bring the house down, Staffieri guessed “Believe” by Cher. Nope. It also wasn’t anything by Celine Dion, though Edebiri has been known to belt out “It’s All Coming Back To Me Now.” The actual answer: “Wuthering Heights” by Kate Bush or “Don’t Speak” by No Doubt”.

@vanityfair Don't you dare forget #AyoEdebiri's go-to karaoake song. Watch the cast of #TheBear test how well they know each other. #jeremyallenwhite #dune ♬ original sound  - Vanity Fair

I have used Halsey and Ayo Edebiri as two examples as a fair few artists, actors, authors and those in the public sphere who are talking about Kate Bush. It is a slow and promising movement, though I think it will lead to a few things. We will see more younger listeners investigating Kate Bush and going beyond the obvious. Broadening their mind and imagination. I think word will come back to Kate Bush. Indications that her brilliance is being recognised by a new generation. Maybe the realisation that there is such love and respect for her music. I also think this will continue. More and more people covering Kate Bush. Saluting great photos, mentioning her in interviews or merely saying how awesome she is! All of this will combine and, let’s hope, lead Kate Bush to engage with fans in 2025. Maybe give us a taste of something new. Even if it is not original music. I love Halsey recording a song inspired by Kate Bush. Her doing her version of an iconic Clive Arrowsmith photo. Ayo Edebiri vibing from a deep cut from The Red Shoes. One that asks why should I love you? When it comes to the divine Kate Bush, that answer is…

PRETTY obvious!

FEATURE: Turning the Tables: Inside the Incredible New Book, How Women Made Music: A Revolutionary History from NPR Music

FEATURE:

 

 

Turning the Tables

 

Inside the Incredible New Book, How Women Made Music: A Revolutionary History from NPR Music

_________

I am always looking out…

IN THIS PHOTO: Odetta/PHOTO CREDIT: Michael Ochs Archive/Getty Images via The New Yorker

for books, documentaries and podcasts that celebrate women in music. Shining a light on their invaluable role and incredible history. Sometimes facts and history that is forgotten or overlooked. Think about the modern music scene and how it shaped and defined by women. Nobody can objectively argue against that. The modern scene is as rich as it is because of women. Look through history and around the globe and that is definitely the case. Many might consider how vital and important women are to the development of music. They have had to fight for generations for respect and equality. Often, people consider music to be owned by men. That their contributions are the only ones. That is definitely not the case. This brings me to a brilliant new book that is out on 24th October I would recommend everyone seeks out. Titled How Women Made Music: A Revolutionary History from NPR Music it is from Inc National Public Radio (author), Alison Fensterstock (author) and Ann Powers (author of introduction), it will reframe and redefine women’s role in music history. From innovators to we know to pioneers from around the globe that people might not be familiar with. A fascinating insight into the brilliant women who we need to salute. Here are some more details:

“Drawn from NPR Music’s acclaimed, groundbreaking series Turning the Tables, the definitive book on the vital role of Women in Music—from Beyoncé to Odetta, Taylor Swift to Joan Baez, Joan Jett to Dolly Parton—featuring archival interviews, essays, photographs, and illustrations.

Turning the Tables, launched in 2017, has revolutionized recognition of female artists, whether it be in best album lists or in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

How Women Made Music: A Revolutionary History from NPR Music brings this impressive reshaping to the page and includes material from more than fifty years of NPR’s coverage plus newly commissioned work. A must-have for music fans, songwriters, feminist historians, and those interested in how artists think and work, including:

•          Joan Baez talking about nonviolence as a musical principle in 1971

•  Dolly Parton’s favorite song and the story behind it

•  Patti Smith describing art as her “jealous mistress” in 1974

•          Nina Simone, in 2001, explaining how she developed the edge in her voice as a tool against racism.

•          Taylor Swift talking about when she had no idea if her musical career might work

•          Odetta on how shifting from classical music to folk allowed her to express her fury over Jim Crow

This incomparable hardcover volume is a vital record of history destined to become a classic and a great gift for any music fan or creative thinker”

“Spanning from Joan Baez to Rihanna, the collection captures the varied ways women have innovated the American musical landscape, in the process powerfully giving due to music as a cultural artifact, a public artistic expression, and a site of personal meaning. It’s a buoyant, welcome ode to some of the most influential songstresses of the 20th and 21st centuries.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review) "Almost every reader is likely to find a host of new names to check out... An indispensable survey of the too-often neglected role of women in creating the music we all listen to." — Kirkus Reviews (starred review) "The project endeavors to correct the persistent marginalization of women and nonbinary artists in the music world... Full of photographs and other visuals, this is not a book on women in music; it is the book on women in music." — Booklist (starred review) "Essential, definitive reading for anyone who listens to music or cares about women -- which is, in short, everyone. Simply put, I wanted this book not to end." — Sheila Weller, bestselling author of Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon and the Journey of a Generation. “If what neuroscientists tell us is true, that music is a social/emotion-delivery device…truly a woman's voice, words, rhythms, and melodies are best adapted to express what it feels like to be a human. This welcome book taps us on the back to remind us of the many underappreciated musicians whose work found its way into our own self images.” — Susan Rogers, legendary producer, neuroscientist, and author of This Is What It Sounds Like: What the Music You Love Says About You "HOW WOMEN MADE MUSIC: A REVOLUTIONARY HISTORY is a rich harmony of different writers paying homage to some of the greatest musicians of our time....It will change the way you experience their music forever." — Liz Garbus, documentary film director and producer of What Happened, Miss Simone? and Harry & Meghan”.

I only recently found out about this book. If you want to know more about this book, then check out the mix above. I have dropped in a five-minute sample (from the introduction of the book). How Women Made Music is a phenomenal and essential book that, one hopes, will help open up the conversation regarding women in music and how they have shaped it. The question of how music would be different if women were at the centre. This feature from NPR includes an episode that takes us deeper into the book:

“NPR Music has just put out its first book: How Women Made Music. It collects more than 50 years of essays and interviews from the network, inspired by our series Turning The Tables. Launched in 2017, Turning The Tables considers how the canon of popular music would change if we centered women instead of men. What albums and songs would dominate conversations if women and other marginalized voices were the ones having them?

On this episode, NPR Music's Ann Powers and contributor Marissa Lorusso talk with host Robin Hilton about the new book and share some of the music that inspired it, from Joni Mitchell's Blue to Beyoncé's Lemonade, Big Mama Thornton's "Hound Dog" and more, including Kate Bush, Tracy Chapman, Against Me!”.

Before finishing up, I want to bring in a review from Kirkus Reviews. This is not only a book for those who are unaware of the pivotal role and worth of women in music. If they shape and are at the forefront today, that has not always been the case. How there has been this struggle when it comes to proper credit. I think it is the names in the book that many might not know about that are going to be most illuminating. Those new discoveries that will compel you to check out music from amazing women who are truly inspirational:

“A wide-ranging exploration of the role of women in popular music over the last century.

The book draws on the NPR project “Turning the Tables,” created by Ann Powers, Jill Sternheimer, and Alison Fensterstock, to document how women have been “musical pathfinders, innovators, and standard-bearers.” The text of the book consists mainly of segments from that show, along with bits from other NPR shows like “All Things Considered,” some only a few sentences long. They cover female artists from 1920s pioneers like Bessie Smith and Mother Maybelle Carter to midcentury icons including Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, and Barbra Streisand, rock stars Janis Joplin and Diana Ross, right up to modern-day chartbusters Beyonce and Taylor Swift, with lots of others from every school of music.

And there is a fair bit of attention paid to non-U.S. performers such as South Africa’s Miriam Makeba, Iceland’s Björk, and Brazil’s Gal Costa. Of the longer essays, some are largely biographical, while others record the artist’s impact on the writer’s own life. The shorter ones vary between interview snippets and comments on specific records, the latter drawn from two lists created for the radio show (and included in the book) of “greatest albums” by women—one covering the whole history of recording, the other from the 21st century. Omissions are inevitable in such an ambitious project, but almost every reader is likely to find a host of new names to check out. Recommended for anyone who takes music—especially women’s music—seriously.

An indispensable survey of the too-often neglected role of women in creating the music we all listen to”.

Out through HarperCollins Publishers Inc on 24th October, you can pre-order this book. I think this should sit on every music lover’s book! For me and so many others who are compelled by women in music and their stories and phenomenal gifts, it is a wonderful read that will educate, illuminate and drive conversations and debates. I also hope it leads to other books being published around women in music. Whether modern-day icons or those from history who have helped defined the present, we need to continue to talk about these vital voices. I am really excited about getting the book and reading and seeing archival interviews, essays, photographs, and illustrations. I think that How Women Made Music: A Revolutionary History from NPR Music can easily stand alongside the best…

BOOKS of the year.

FEATURE: To Be a Threat to the Men in Power: Kate Bush’s Cloudbusting at Thirty-Nine

FEATURE:

 

 

To Be a Threat to the Men in Power

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush on the set of the video for Cloudbusting/PHOTO CREDIT: John Carder Bush 

 

Kate Bush’s Cloudbusting at Thirty-Nine

_________

ONE of Kate Bush’s…

biggest and most celebrated singles turns thirty-nine on 14th October. The second single from Hounds of Love, Cloudbusting reached twenty in the U.K. It is an instantly noticeable and noteworthy song. One that has such a fascinating sound. A brilliant video and a truly remarkable vocal from Kate Bush. Her production on the song is phenomenal! With Stuart Elliott and Charlie Morgan on drums, strings by The Medicci Sextet and backing vocals from Brian Bath, Paddy Bush, John Carder Bush and Del Palmer, it is a track that is still played widely to this day. I want to explore this iconic song prior to its thirty-ninth anniversary. I am going to end by quoting a few articles that rank Kate Bush’s singles/songs and where they place Cloudbusting. Kate actually contacted Peter Reich to explain her motives for writing Cloudbusting. She hoped that he would approve of the song. She received his response a while later, saying that he loved what she was doing. If that sounds unfamiliar or you are not sure who Peter Reich is and how he connected with the song, then the Kate Bush Encyclopedia collates some words from Kate Bush where she explains the story behind one of her biggest and most important tracks:

“This was inspired by a book that I first found on a shelf nearly nine years ago. It was just calling me from the shelf, and when I read it I was very moved by the magic of it. It’s about a special relationship between a young son and his father. The book was written from a child’s point of view. His father is everything to him; he is the magic in his life, and he teaches him everything, teaching him to be open-minded and not to build up barriers. His father has built a machine that can make it rain, a ‘cloudbuster’; and the son and his father go out together cloudbusting. They point big pipes up into the sky, and they make it rain. The song is very much taking a comparison with a yo-yo that glowed in the dark and which was given to the boy by a best friend.

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1985/PHOTO CREDIT: John Carder Bush

It was really special to him; he loved it. But his father believed in things having positive and negative energy, and that fluorescent light was a very negative energy – as was the material they used to make glow-in-the-dark toys then – and his father told him he had to get rid of it, he wasn’t allowed to keep it. But the boy, rather than throwing it away, buried it in the garden, so that he would placate his father but could also go and dig it up occasionally and play with it. It’s a parallel in some ways between how much he loved the yo-yo – how special it was – and yet how dangerous it was considered to be. He loved his father (who was perhaps considered dangerous by some people); and he loved how he could bury his yo-yo and retrieve it whenever he wanted to play with it. But there’s nothing he can do about his father being taken away, he is completely helpless. But it’s very much more to do with how the son does begin to cope with the whole loneliness and pain of being without his father. It is the magic moments of a relationship through a child’s eyes, but told by a sad adult.

Kate Bush Club newsletter, 1985

If I’ve got this right,he believed that sexual energy was positive, usable energy that he tied in with his concept of orgone energy. He upset a lot of people selling orgone boxes, saying they could cure cancer and stuff. He ended up being arrested and put in prison. I knew nothing about Wilhelm when I read the book,which was his son’s experience of all this, written from a child’s point of view with a tremendous innocence and sadness. Years ago, I just went into a shop and picked it off the shelf, and really liked the title and the picture on the front. I’d never bought a book before which I hadn’t known anything about;I just felt I’d found something really special. And nine, 10 years later, I re-read it and it turned into a song. When it was finished, I wrote a letter to Peter Reich saying what I’d done. It was important to me in some way to have a sense of his blessing because his book really moved me. He sent me back such a lovely letter. It was an incredible feeling of returning something he’d given to me.

Mat Snow, ‘Follow That!’. Q/HMV special magazine, 1990”.

There is quite a bit written about Cloudbusting. Last year, Wine Travel and Song deciphered this remarkable song. It is such a compelling and emotional song. Made so much more atmospheric and brilliant by its video. I shall come to that soon. I hope that this song gets a lot more words written about it:

“I still dream of Orgonon,” sings Kate Bush at the opening of “Cloudbusting” from her 1985 album, ‘The Hounds of Love.’ I’ve cherished this song since its release, yet I’ve always wondered about its subject matter. Was it simply about ‘cloud busting,’ or did it hold a deeper meaning? Like any Kate Bush song, the answer is both profound and captivating.

The song references the ‘Book of Dreams’ by Peter Reich, written about his father Wilhelm Reich and his unconventional theories, particularly his concept of “orgone,” a pseudo-scientific life energy he claimed to have discovered. The Orgonon mentioned at the start of the song is Wilhelm’s ‘Orgonon’ ranch in Maine, USA, where he conducted his experiments. You can actually visit the ranch and the William Reich museum today.

Wilhelm believed that his devices, called “cloudbusters,” could manipulate this energy to produce rain and influence the weather, which explains the cloud busting aspect of the song.

However, when you combine the song with its music video, a deeper subtext emerges. The song reflects the emotional bond between Peter and his father and their experiences with the cloudbuster. The video, featuring Donald Sutherland as Wilhelm Reich and Bush as his son, further illustrates this relationship and the concept of cloudbusting.

The line, “I can’t hide you from the Government,” alludes to the son’s desire and inability to protect his father from the consequences of his actions. Reich’s conflicts with government authorities in both Europe and the United States were multifaceted, including legal actions, investigations, and his unconventional therapeutic practices.

In the U.S., the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) pursued legal actions against him, eventually leading to his arrest in 1956. Reich was charged with contempt of court and later sentenced to two years in federal prison, where he passed away in 1957”.

I will wrap up soon enough. I wanted to move to this DAZED feature from 2015. A look inside the cinematic and epic video for Cloudbusting. They gathered words from contributors including its director Julian Doyle and star Donald Sutherland (almost a literal father figure, he chided Kate Bush for smoking weed before filming the video saying it would mess her up and affect her concentration - to which he replied she hadn’t been straight for nine years!). The stunning video was conceived by Terry Gilliam and Kate Bush as a short film. The video features the much-missed Donald Sutherland playing the role of Wilhelm Reich, and Bush in the role of his young son, Peter:

“​Sometime in 1985, a package arrived with a video cassette and an autographed album,” says Peter Reich. “My wife and children, who were five and two at the time, listened, watched and were entranced. Quite magically, this British musician had tapped precisely into ​a unique and magical fulfilment of father-son devotion, emotion and understanding. They had captured it all.”

Everyone knows that “Wuthering Heights”, Kate Bush’s debut single of 1978, was inspired by Emily Brontë’s gothic tale of unfulfilled passion and madness on the moors. But how many people know how one boy’s relationship with his father, a disciple of Freud who fled Nazi-occupied Austria to pursue his studies on the orgasm in America, came to inspire another, similarly cherished piece of pop-culture history?

If you’ve seen the video for “Cloudbusting”, released 30 years ago this month, you’ll know that it’s a cinematic, oddly moving tale of a young boy, played by Kate Bush in a ragamuffin wig, and his idyllic adventures with his dad, played by Donald Sutherland, who is working on a giant ray-gun contraption that can shoot at clouds to make it rain. At some point in the video, a group of men in suits arrive to snatch the boy’s father away, but not before the boy can reach into his dad’s jacket pocket and pull out a slim volume called “A Book of Dreams”.

It sounds like fiction of the most fanciful kind, but in fact, the video – and book – are drawn entirely from life. Written by Peter Reich and published in 1973, A Book of Dreams is an extraordinarily touching account of a father, one Wilhelm Reich, as seen through the eyes of his doting son. Reich senior was a controversial figure in the field of psychoanalysis. On the one hand, his pioneering work laid the blueprint for the sexual revolution of the 1960s, attracting interest from Albert Einstein and Norman Mailer, among others. On the other, his ‘orgone accumulator’ invention – a metal box which Reich claimed harnessed the sexual energy of his patients for alleged benefits to their health – brought an injunction from the US authorities that would eventually land him in prison, where he died at the age of 60 in 1957. It’s the moment of his arrest that provides the book and the video with its heartbreaking focal point, as a child’s love for his father bumps up against the impassive forces of McCarthy-era moral panic.

“(My dad) was the father of body therapy and the sexual revolution,” says Reich of his father. “In Germany in the 1930s, he led a political movement that called for, among other things, the abolition of laws against abortion and homosexuality, free birth-control advice and contraceptives, health protection of mothers and children, nurseries in factories and in other large employment centres, the abolition of laws prohibiting sex education and home leave for prisoners.”

Another of Reich’s inventions, of course, was the Cloudbuster, the fantastical rainmaking machine that features in Kate Bush’s video. We pick up the story of the shoot, speaking to key contributors including Donald Sutherland, director Julian Doyle and editor Terry Gilliam, with additional insights from Peter Reich. Watch the video and get the story below.

Terry Gilliam: “Kate called me to direct the video and I said, ‘No, how about Julian (Doyle)?’ They had a great time shooting, but somewhere in the editing a conflict developed and I became the mediator. Kate knows exactly what she’s doing, she knows what she wants. She’s the sweetest person on the planet but she’s absolute steel inside!”

Julian Doyle: “Kate came to me with a storyboard, which I remember had the sun coming up with a face on it. She was a lovely lady, with a great smile that she gave generously. I understood her influences – like, I knew immediately where ‘It’s coming through the trees’ (film sample on ‘The Hounds of Love’) came from and things like that. I also knew about Wilhelm Reich, because there was interest in him among the new women’s movement which was exploring the female orgasm and I was close to the women involved.

Donald Sutherland: “Barry Richardson, who was the hairdresser on Nic Roeg’s Don’t Look Now, asked me if I’d do a music video with Kate Bush. I told him no and we went on to other conversations. A couple of days later there was a knock on my door. I lived in the Savoy Hotel (in London). On the river. Suite 312. I loved it there. So cosseted. So private. Only the floor butler rang the door. I opened it. There was no one there. I heard a voice saying hello and I looked down. Standing down there was a very small Kate Bush. Barry had told her where I lived. What can you do? She wanted to explain what her video was about. I let her in. She sat down, said some stuff. All I heard was ‘Wilhelm Reich’. I’d taken an underground copy of his The Mass Psychology of Fascism with me when I went to film (Bernardo) Bertolucci’s Novecento in Parma. Reich’s work informed the psychological foundations of Attila Mellanchini, the character Bernardo had cast me to play. Everything about Reich echoed through me. He was there then and now he was here. Sitting across from me in the person of the very eloquent Kate Bush. Synchronicity. Perfect. She talked some more. I said OK and we made ‘Cloudbusting’. She’s wonderful, Kate Bush. Wonderful. I love that I did it. (What do I remember) about doing it? I remember being in the car and the hill and them taking me, taking Reich, away and looking back through the back window of the car and seeing her, seeing Reich’s son Peter, standing there. And I remember the first morning on set seeing her coming out of her trailer smoking a joint and I cautioned her, saying she shouldn’t smoke that, it’d affect her work, and she looked at me for a second and said she hadn’t been straight for nine years and I loved her.”

Peter Reich: “At one point in the video, the federal agents in black suits pull from a file cabinet a newspaper article about a rainmaker. In fact, during a drought​ in 1953, blueberry growers hired Dr Reich to make it rain in blueberry country along the Maine coast. I was along for that rain-making operation in the summer of 1953 and helped crank the levers. No rain was forecast. A most vivid memory: being aroused in the early morning hours just before dawn and led to an open door to observe a steady rain.​ The incident with federal agents coming on our property occurred a couple of years later, that day in August 1956 when I ran up that hill.  That was the summer the government burned several tonnes of Wilhelm Reich’s books and equipment.”

Julian Doyle: “I thought it should look like a real story – like a film, not a pop video. I wanted to point out the story was real, which is why I had Kate take out the book. I also wanted more time so I doubled up a section of the music. Kate lengthened it even more, then she wanted to change the edit.  I thought they were mistakes – so in bringing in Terry (Gilliam) it stopped her making bad changes to the edit as she accepted what Terry said. The editing process is very difficult – as it goes on for some time you have to be quite stubborn in character, keeping a balance in being open but not changing (things) because you are bored with them. Someone like Eric Idle, who is extremely smart and quick-witted, is a disaster in the cutting room, because he gets bored quickly and soon wants to cut out every joke.

“I was pleased we got up early to get the (shot with the) sun rising behind Kate falling down. I was also pleased with the track to close-up (on Donald Sutherland) where he changes from smiling to worried and then I pan into light flare. (When Donald had finished shooting his scenes) I said to him, ‘We have finished with you, thanks – but I just want you to walk away down the hill towards the sun.’ He looked great taking off his jacket. The very last shot of the shoot was the very last shot of Kate punching the air. There are only seven frames before I cut.”

Peter Reich:  ​“Watching it for the first time, and ever since, not infrequently, the video’s emotional power is overwhelming and enduring, even after 30 years – or 60 years, for me. I did meet Kate once or twice.  She gave me a very British umbrella, how very appropriate, one rainmaker to another”.

The final feature I am going to reference is VICE. In 2018, they wrote and argued why Cloudbusting is the song of every summer party. I had never really considered it as a summer song. I think it has quite an autumnal vibe. I think of the countryside and the open. However, it is an ultimate cloud-buster, so why should we not crown it as a summer anthem?! The multiple sides and strengths of Kate Bush’s songs! I hope that people who have not yet heard Cloudbusting and Hounds of Love investigate them:

“In that way, there’s a sensuality about “Cloudbusting” that makes it feel like it belongs firmly within summer, the most tactile season. Bush’s voice, which tangibly sighs and pleads across the track, feels like it’s trying to grab onto something, like fingers in sand, or feet climbing a hill under beating sun. Her lyrics are largely centred on the Reichs (singing from Peter’s point of view, Bush is concerned with Wilhelm Reich’s arrest in 1941: “I can’t hide you from the government / Oh, God, Daddy, I won’t forget”), and yet the hope at its core, paired with the rousing, lilting musicianship that could mean anything at all, allows the song to maintain a universality that is bigger than their story. In fact, “Cloudbusting” is just one of many examples of Bush’s gift for taking a narrative (think, even, of her most famous song “Wuthering Heights”) and reinventing it for her own purposes, to make more all-encompassing points.

That broadness can be observed at all levels of the song, and I think I like best about “Cloudbusting”. It’s rare that you hear pop music that feels so simply big. It is an island of a song, existing in and of itself, and it lies outside of trends, expressing itself entirely without need for them. It is not the Song of the Summer, but the Song of Every Summer, because it can mean something different every time. It tells a story that is small – the tale of a son and his father – but inside that specificity there are pockets of enormity: there’s a whole sky just in its soaring chorus.

It’s here, in the chorus, where the summer in “Cloudbusting” seeps out. Bush’s voice, pretty but somehow beseeching, conjures sun after rain, light after dark, summer after a long, punishing winter. It’s a perfect image of possibility, made more powerful by the surge of the cello. And then there are the words themselves, like an incantation opening up the sweeping vistas of life that summer promises in a way that other times of year just cannot: I just know that something good is going to happen. And I don’t know when. But just saying it could even make it happen.

I am quite sure that there are no words that feel truer on a summer evening, which is as close as nature gets to real magic – the cloudless heavens turning purple, your body warm and light like the air – than those words of Kate Bush’s from “Cloudbusting”’s chorus. Close your eyes and say them for yourself. I just know that something good is going to happen. And I don’t know when. But just saying it could even make it happen. Perhaps it really could”.

I know I have brought in various rankings features when speaking of other Kate Bush tracks. As Cloudbusting is one of the standouts from Hounds of Love, I think it is worth reintroducing them. In 2021, Dig! ranked Cloudbusting seventh in their lowdown of the twenty best Kate Bush songs. (“The first half of Hounds Of Love saw Kate take the sonic daring of The Dreaming and apply it to universal, skyscraping songs that found a huge audience. Cloudbusting was a case in point – a stunning song propelled by a stately marching beat, an insistent, choppy string arrangement and, for the most part, little else. By the end it has become something utterly triumphant, and yet the lyrics are based on Peter Reich’s 1973 memoir, A Book Of Dreams, which dealt with his painful relationship with his father, the controversial psychoanalyst Wilhelm. It deals with memories of childhood on their family farm, called Orgonon, where the two attempted to cause rainfall by pointing a machine (a cloudbuster) designed and built by Reich at the sky to break up clouds. The song goes on to describe the effect of Wilhelm’s arrest and imprisonment on Peter, and his helplessness at being unable to protect his father. It takes a rare genius to turn all of that into a hit single”).

Smooth also ranked it seventh in their feature from last year. In 2022, GQ named Cloudbusting among the best ten Kate Bush songs that are not Wuthering Heights or Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God). Earlier this year,. Classic Pop listed Kate Bush’s best forty songs. Cloudbusting was ranked eighth. Last year, Prog named Cloudbusting among the greatest forty Kate Bush songs. In 2022, Stereogum ranked the song second in their feature listing Bush’s ten strongest songs (“The aching, string-swept “Cloudbusting” contains some of Bush’s best lyrics. At one point she compares someone to a glow-in-the-dark yo-yo (“What made it special/ Made it dangerous”); on the other side is a sweetly optimistic chorus: “I just know that something good is gonna happen/ I don’t know when/ But just saying it could even make it happen.” Make no mistake, however: “Cloudbusting” is introspective and aching, searching for something — or someone — to make life a bit more manageable after some heavy loss. “All of us tend to live in our heads,” she told the Associated Press in 1989. “In ‘Cloudbusting,’ the idea was of starting this song with a person waking up from this dream: ‘I wake up crying.’ It’s like setting a scene that immediately suggests to you that this person is no longer with someone they dearly love”). In 2018, The Guardian ranked Kate Bush’s singles. They placed Cloudbusting ninth. Finally, when MOJO published a feature spotlighting Kate Bush’s best fifty songs earlier this year, they put Cloudbusting at ten. You can see the sort of respect and love this song has received. The second single from the mighty Hounds of Love, we mark its thirty-ninth anniversary on 14th October. Even if it only did just get into the top twenty in the U.K., its legacy and importance outstrips chart positions. I feel that more people are seeking out the song and its video follow Donald Sutherland’s passing (he died in June at the age of eighty-nine). How important he was. It was the final song (second song of the encore) Bush played for her Before the Dawn residency dates in 2014. Such an epic finale! This will be the last time I mention Hounds of Love in a fulsome capacity this year – though I have said that before! -, so it is a great way to salute the album one more time. Showcasing her songwriting and production genius, the stirring Cloudbusting is…

A timeless masterpiece.

FEATURE: Inside the Christmas Classic: Can You Revise or Reinvent a Seasonal Standard?

FEATURE:

 

 

Inside the Christmas Classic

PHOTO CREDIT: Peter Fazekas/Pexels

 

Can You Revise or Reinvent a Seasonal Standard?

_________

IT may sound a bit early…

but I have been thinking about Christmas music and what makes a classic. You can’t really get away from the season. We already are being inundated with Christmas food in supermarkets and shops! I struggle to think why we need a three-month run-up when it comes to Christmas food! There will be presents and other bits filtering in soon enough. Maybe we will wait until December but, very soon, artists will be announcing Christmas singles. We will be preparing ourselves for multi-generation classics that never seem to get old. I am very interested in the new crop of songs. The artists tackling the standards. How everything from a Mariah Carey anthem through to classics from Slade and Paul McCartney seems to be fresh. New generations discovering them. I have been inspired by a book from journalist and writer Annie Zaleski. This Is Christmas, Song by Song: The Stories Behind 100 Holiday Hits is fascinating. Published last year, I would recommend people check it out:

“Celebrate the merriest season of the year with award-winning author and music journalist Annie Zaleski's collection of the 100 most popular and beloved holiday songs of all time.

'Tis the season! Break out the eggnog, hang the mistletoe, blast those Christmas songs, and settle down in your favorite armchair with this beautifully illustrated volume exploring well-known and lesser-known behind-the-scenes stories of the 100 most cherished holiday songs of all time and their everlasting impact. From artists such as Bing Crosby and Ella Fitzgerald all the way up to Mariah Carey and Ariana Grande, this all-encompassing collection of holiday favorites (called one of "the 25 best Christmas books of all time" by Book Riot) is sure to warm your heart during the merriest season of the year. 

What song was listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the best-selling single of all time? Which popular Christmas tune was reportedly written to commemorate Thanksgiving? What holiday song led to a special meet-and-greet between the song's 10-year-old singer and a 700-pound hippopotamus? 

Spanning musical genres and decades of classics and modern hits, some of the featured songs include:

  • “White Christmas” by Bing Crosby

  • "All I Want for Christmas Is You" by Mariah Carey

  • "Deck the Halls" by Mannheim Steamroller

  • “Christmas Tree Farm” by Taylor Swift

  • “Christmas Time (Is Here Again)" by The Beatles

  • “Feliz Navidad” by José Feliciano

  • "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" by Gene Autry

  • "You Make It Feel Like Christmas" by Gwen Stefani

  • “Santa Baby” by Eartha Kitt

  • “Rockin’ around the Christmas Tree” by Brenda Lee

  • “Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays” by NSYNC

  • “Run Rudolph Run” by Chuck Berry

And many more!

Including full-color illustrations throughout, this gorgeously packaged compendium is the perfect gift for you and your loved ones to experience the holiday magic year after year”.

PHOTO CREDIT: Lucie Liz/Pexels

It is fascinating reading stories behind Christmas classics. Songs spanning back decades. Ones that our parents would have listened to. More modern examples that have the potential to be heard for decades more. Every Christmas, we get this run-in where you hear that blend of the older songs from the 1950s and 1960s. Then you get a mixture from the 1970s and through to the 1990s. It is always satisfying having that instant and familiar connection. Maybe it is because we hear them from such a young age that they stick in our heads. They soundtrack a magical and peaceful point of the year. When we are all together and there is this mood of happiness and giving. A time to swap gifts and be around family. I am really interested in the stories behind Christmas standards. The songs that are synonymous with that time of year. Of course, now is a moment when we think what Christmas songs will come from modern artists. If you prefer the established songs that have been embedded into our minds for years or like more contemporary songs from Taylor Swift or Gregory Porter, there is this growing and expanding playlist that will resonate with all generations. Pretty much something for everyone. I don’t agree that Christmas songs or cheesy or saccharine. I mean, some can be, though think of the richness and quality the very best of the best. Choruses that can match the absolute best. So catchy and infectious. The mood you get on White Christmas or Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.

I am excited already to hear that first taste of Christmas music! It provides a sense of comfort and something to look forward to. Seeing what new Christmas songs will come around. There are quite a few articles out there that debate the merit of newer Christmas songs and whether they can compete with the all-time best. Can anything match All I Want For Christmas Is You by Mariah Carey?! That giddiness! The warmth and tenderness you get from Winter Wonderland. It is hard to compete with those songs we are all familiar with. I do wonder whether there is any way that new Christmas songs can have the same sort of impact and legacy as older ones. Although there have been some great ones from the past few years, do they have the necessary ingredients and potent blend that gets inside the head and lasts for years?! I do think books like Annie Zaleski’s are useful guides and invaluable resources. It is not only nostalgia and familiarity that means we keep coming back to the same Christmas songs. That they get the most play on radio and in stores. There is a more cynical and commercial reason. That recognition makes people want to buy and remain in a shop. Something new and unfamiliar might not make them linger as much. It is that trigger inside us where we remember back to Christmases past and these wonderful songs that scored some amazing moments. I don’t think that new Christmas tracks are completely out of the race.

It is good that modern artists cover Christmas standards and classics, though it is always interesting to hear a new take on the holiday. Maybe few could equal Mariah Carey or Wham!, though I do think that there are potential future-classics waiting to be released. Incredible voices and phenomenal talents that can craft something timeless. I think we get more diversity now. Not beholden to a particular sound or theme. Artists are faced with the choice or either sticking with cliches and over-familiar images and words one associates with Christmas or to take a modern approach. There is something romantic and innocent in classic Christmas songs. Sending our a less joyful or familiar message might put people off. Also, because of the world we live in, should artists reflect something more realistic? The commercialism of Christmas. Religion not really playing into it. There are articles like this that ask whether there is a magic formula when it comes to writing a Christmas hit. There are always like this and this that ask why there are very few new Christmas songs:

“Studies have shown that our general taste in music has become sadder, slower and generally more miserable than it was 50 years ago. 2017 in particular was one of the bleakest years in pop music history, with more minor key number ones and songs in downbeat tempos than normal.

With all that doom and gloom in our ears all year, it makes sense that we’d gravitate towards major key music during the season of goodwill. And if the music we’re making these days is less upbeat, it’s no wonder that we’re continually drawn back to the songs of yesteryear.

Let The Bells Ring

From the tubular chimes of Band Aid, to the sleigh bells of Winter Wonderland, to the jingling of Jingle Bell Rock, we have conclusively proved that we are total suckers when it comes to bell-based percussion.

You can barely move in the Christmas discography without bumping into a clanger of some sort. Bells are absolutely everywhere, refusing to let a quaver go by unmarked. For the most part they’re supposed to be evocative of Santa’s sleigh (with the occasional bit of church campanology) and their hypnotising effect on us is so profound that the simple addition of bells into a regular pop song can trick us into mistaking it for a full-blown festive classic.

For example, there was a conscious decision taken by the record label to add bells into the mix of East 17’s “Stay Another Day”—a song that’s actually about the heartbreak of suicide—to make it fare better in the competitive Christmas charts.

It worked a treat. The song has very little in the way of seasonal flair otherwise yet it managed to beat Mariah Carey’s undisputed classic “All I Want For Christmas Is You” to number one, and became one of the final songs to make it into the official Christmas canon (since we apparently stopped taking applications in 1994).

The Most Wonderful Time

Most pop music we know and love is written in a basic 4/4 count. Naturally then, it follows that the vast majority of Christmas songs are written in 4/4 too—but there’s an interesting exception.

A handful of our well-loved Christmas classics are written in 12/8. “Happy Xmas (War Is Over),” “Lonely This Christmas,” “Christmas Time (Don’t Let The Bells End)” and everyone’s problematic fave “Fairytale Of New York” all work to that relatively rare time signature.

Not only that, but there are a couple of non-festive songs that were Christmas No.1s which are also in 12/8 too. “Too Much” by The Spice Girls. Alexandra Burke’s cover of “Hallelujah.” Last year’s Christmas No.1, “Perfect” by Ed Sheeran. All 12/8.

What is it about 12/8 that feels so seasonal? Western pop music might be in 4/4, but a lot of our most cherished Christmas traditions stretch back to 19th century Central Europe, an area famous for its 3/4 waltzes
12/8 effectively acts as a compromise between these two time signatures, and therefore these two traditions. With four sets of three quavers in each bar of 12/8, you get your regular, radio-friendly 4/4 pop beat as well as the sort of triple-count found in both a classic Viennese waltz and in a lot of carols (“Away In A Manger,” “Silent Night,” “We Three Kings”).

It’s the perfect blend of old and new. A nod to tradition while keeping things modern.

Christmas Future

All of this raises an interesting question. If the hallmarks of a successful Christmas song are so obvious, why hasn’t there been one that’s really gripped the public imagination in the past 25 years?

It’s not as if Christmas albums aren’t still big business. Every major artist worth their salt has done a cover of “Santa Baby”, or released a non-specific holiday album in late November—and they continue to do so. Sia, one of the world’s most successful and well-respected songwriters, put out a whole album’s worth of original Christmas material last year, but you can safely bet that Chris Rea is going to see more season-specific airplay than she will.

We’ve never been so granular about the production of music than we are in 2018, so why doesn’t this sort of theoretical nuts-and-bolts approach produce any massive modern hits?”.

Even if we are less beholden to new Christmas songs and there is perhaps less excitement and impetus for artists, I do still believe that there is room for new interpretation and stories. It is hard to break that familiarity of the classic and same songs we keep coming back to. Even if the new breed might not be able to match the spirit and joy of Slade or the sway and strange beauty of Fairytale of New York (featuring the late Shane MacGowan and Kirsty MacColl), I do feel there is potential. Modern Christmas classics waiting. We are yet to see what 2024 has to offer for new Christmas songs. We need to instilling artists the importance and value of a Christmas song. How, unlike normal songs, they can last and be passed through the generations. The fact they are attached to a very powerful and joyful time of years creates a bigger rush than a song that is about or released at any other time of the year. For those bah-humbugs who say only older Christmas tracks are valid and we will never get any modern-day gems, I would urge people to keep their eyes and ears open for gifts we may receive…

IN years to come.

FEATURE: Kate Bush’s The Red Shoes at Thirty-One: And So Is Love: Inside One of Her Most Personal Albums

FEATURE:

 

 

Kate Bush’s The Red Shoes at Thirty-One


And So Is Love: Inside One of Her Most Personal Albums

_________

ON 1st November…

it is the thirty-first anniversary of Kate Bush’s seventh studio album, The Red Shoes. Although some felt a note of disappointment, I wanted to stand up and shine a light on the brilliance of this album. A look at the lyrics and personal openness throughout. I think 1989’s The Sensual World was quite a personal album, though it is clear that The Red Shoes existed at a time of personal change and loss. Not to start with something downbeat, there were things weighing on Kate Bush’s mind through 1992 and 1993. On 14th February, 1992, Kate Bush’s mother Hannah died of cancer aged seventy-three. It was a devastating moment where Bush felt like the world had ended. Working at East Wickham Farm was changed. There was this vacuum. The ever-present and hospitable Mrs. Bush was now not there. Someone who had been omnipresent for decades was now gone. Kate Bush being Kate Bush, she was still focused on work. Maybe as a coping mechanism, Bush could not let herself succumb to the weight and impact of that loss. It would have completely taken her. I will explore this a bit more for a feature where I look at Kate Bush’s 1994. How that was a year where there was a real black dog at the door. I wanted to give some background to the album and how there was a lot going on. Even if Bush wrote many of The Red Shoes’ songs before her mother died, there was still this atmosphere of illness and loss that makes the album this very personal and emotional album. Even though Bush went on, the impact of her mother’s death meant that she could not do sessions for a while. Things had to stop at a point. Bush couldn’t write at times and the pain and trauma was too great.

Even so, things did go on. Even if some feel that there is an unfocused aspect to the album, I do feel that we are seeing some fascinating sides to Kate Bush. The production on the album is not her best. She did address this a bit with 2011’s Director’s Cut. It was the age of the C.D. Maybe compacted and a little too long, you have this very different sound compared to her earlier work. Some very busy and layered songs alongside some raw and emotional moments. I do think that there is plenty of joy and meditations on love. Eat the Music is so joyful and vivid. Bursting with flavour and colour, the metaphors for love and food work really well. The Red Shoes has that energy and dance. I will not talk about the short film, The Line, the Cross and the Curve for this feature. Regardless, Bush was keen to turn to film and create something bigger and more ambitious than a music video. One can trace a line back to that when we think of visual albums and long-form videos of today. Rubberband Girl is about defiance and bouncing back. Bush writing it in the studio; perhaps an attempt to convince herself she could come back and was dealing with this sense of grief or impending loss. However, I don’t agree that The Red Shoes is aimless or lacks punch. I think Bush ponders loss and love a lot. Lily is her consulting a real-life healer, Lily Cornfield. Bush perhaps turning to people to process what was happening. Her relationship with Del Palmer was fractured and changed. It was instable at various points since they met many years earlier, though she did not more stability at a tough time. Her mother was ill and died in 1992. That turning to the spiritual. The way Bush talks about life. On Moments of Pleasure, there is this heartbreaking line: “Just being alive it can really hurt”. Kate Bush had lost a lot of friends. Alan Murphy (Smurf) and John Barrett (who, as Graeme Thomson writes in his Kate Bush biography, was nicknamed Teddy (from the children’s show, Andy Pandy); Bush was Loopy Lou and Jon Kelly Andy).

All of this might sound like The Red Shoes was a disaster. An album where loss and depression leads to poor songs and choices. That is not the case. In the second anniversary feature, I am going to go more into the songs. Even if the move from analogue to digital perhaps washed some of the emotion and purity to songs, I think that The Red Shoes is among her most fascinating and open albums. Many felt Bush hid behind characters. She was not as interested in putting herself out there. Her debut single, of course, saw her take the form of Wuthering Heights’ Catherine Earnshaw. Bush fascinated by T.V. and literate and bringing those worlds into her songs. The Red Shoes was released when Bush was thirty-five. She was at a stage in life where she lost a long-term relationship, her mother and friends. It was a challenging time and she definitely was looking to spend time away from the spotlight. As such, I think we get this glimpse of a woman opening her heart and putting herself more into the music.

If joyful and uplifting songs is Bush showing strength at a difficult time, I think a few standout songs get to the heart of things. Moments of Pleasure, And So Is Love and You’re the One are devastating in their own way. Away from the passionate flair of Eat the Music, here we see Kate Bush processing and handling a loss of companionship and some heartbreak. Her relationship with Del Palmer was coming to and end around the time of The Red Shoes and The Line, the Cross and the Curve. We can focus on the exhaustion and negativity around The Red Shoes and the release of The Line, the Cross and the Curve. In 1994, accompanied by Del Palmer, Bush flew to New York to promote it. She arrived for a signing session at Tower Records in a white limousine. Wearing brown shades and looking drained, that was a moment when she was wanting to be anywhere but there. I don’t think that The Red Shoes is a failure or album where Bush lost her way.

She got together with Dan McIntosh. Father to her son, Bertie, there was this new beginning and stability. Her break-up with Del Palmer was not publicly shared. It was quite amicable. The fact they remained close friends is wonderful. I think, in a sense, Palmer accompanied Bush and was good friends because she suffered loss and bereavement. He was a rock and remained her engineer up to 2011’s 50 Words for Snow. We sadly lost him earlier this year. I think we get a rare opportunity to hear Kate Bush exposed and letting us into her heart. She did that in a different way when she released Aerial on 7th November, 2005. Her mother still very much in her heart for A Coral Room. Her young son Bertie at the core of everything. I love The Red Shoes. Sure, the final few tracks are not her best and there is an issue with the tracklisting. A slight rearrange could have given the album more strength and consistency. I would love to hear the entire album stripped back in terms of its production. Maybe an analogue version of the album. This thing about it being the runt and worst album. Think about the joy you get. The beauty and heart-stopping Moments of Pleasure. How vulnerable Bush is at times. Something we might not have heard when she was in her teens and twenties. How, when you lose your mother, you are not a little girl/boy anymore. It instantly takes away this sense of childhood and innocence. This protective field has gone. Because of that, I think we feel this heartbeat and heartache. This pondering of life and lost love. Also, some truly tender and soul-baring moments.

I am going to into more depth regarding the songs of The Red Shoes for the second anniversary feature. I wanted to discuss Bush’s personal life and what was happening around the time of recording and release. Even if some critics were cold on the album, it did reach number two in the U.K. Selling well and charting high in the U.S. too (at twenty-eight), there is also a wonderful and varied list of personnel through The Red Shoes – including Prince, Nigel Kennedy, Jeff Beck and the Trio Bulgarka. I know The Red Shoes was reissued in 2023 as a Dracula colour vinyl two-L.P. The original came out on cassette and MiniDisc. I would love to own a cassette version! I am going to end with some reviews of The Red Shoes. Thanks to the Kate Bush Encyclopedia for their great work:

“How many of us could stand the self-imposed exile that has been the adult life of Kate Bush. She’s elevated privacy to an art-form… it’s her most personal album to date, yet it is her most accessible, in which the listener can identify directly with the pain she’s trying to pull herself through… A truly exceptional album.

Terry Staunton, NME, 6 November 1993

As a whole, The Red Shoes is more musically varied than thematically, as Bush’s constant returning to the links between love, spirituality and creativity becomes wearing. In compensation, there’s a rich pan-global tapestry woven here in which the textures and designs from distant cultures are being used not for effect, but for the way they express an emotional truth beyond mere words.

Andy Gill, Q, November 1993

There is nothing here that quite compares with her most splendid songs – 1980’s Breating and 1986’s The Big Sky… but The Red Shoes is a triumph nonetheless…

Tom Hibbert, The Independent on Sunday, 14 November 1993

Bush’s most pensive album yet… its mood of wistful mystery maintained by elaborate arrangements… the occasional number is overwrought, but the best confirm Bush as an artist of substance.

Neil Spencer, The Observer, 7 November 1993

This plunge into Bush’s sensual world sometimes leaves the listener gasping in awe at the lush musical landscapes spawned by her unfettered romanticism, but also sometimes gasping for breath in the rarefied despair of a troubled heart… Bush keeps her balance by composing music that’s never complacent, always exmploring fresh dimensions of her wideranging vision and musical interests.

Rick Mason, Minneapolis Star Tribune, 31 October 1993”.

On 1st November, the wonderful The Red Shoes turns thirty-one. Not a lot of people have written about it. Not in passionate or deep tones. Not in a really positive and kind nature. I hope I have conveyed some love and respect for the album! People need to hear it. It is such an important moment in Kate Bush’s career. In the second and final anniversary feature, I will go inside different songs and dig up some interviews from 1993 where Bush spoke about the album. I think that the brilliant and revealing The Red Shoes is…

A gem that deserves more love.

FEATURE: TiK ToK, Time’s Up: Kesha’s Plans to “Dismantle” the Music Industry and the Impact It Could Have

FEATURE:

 

 

TiK ToK, Time’s Up

 IN THIS PHOTO: Kesha/PHOTO CREDIT: Vincent Haycock via The Guardian

 

Kesha’s Plans to “Dismantle” the Music Industry and the Impact It Could Have

_________

A music news story…

 PHOTO CREDIT: Blaz Erzetic/Pexels

last week that caught my eye. It involves U.S. superstar Kesha. Perhaps best known for her huge hit, TiK ToK (when she was known then as Ke$ha), of 2010, she has this plan and mandate that could mean big shockwaves through the music industry. At the moment, women in music face so many obstacles and issues. When it comes to working in studios, with particular producers. The way they are exploited and abuse. The harassment and misogyny they still face. For anyone who thinks these issues have gone away or are less evident now, you only need to speak to pretty much any woman in the industry. They would have faced these things or know someone that has. I think there is a long way to go until things are better for women. There does need to be this bolt or revolution. Something that gets those in charge to change things. I have said how a #MeToo movement never happened. Not in any unified or huge way. Consider the sheer proliferation and rise in sexual abuse and it is clear that things are truly rotten to the core. I want to start off with this NME article.

“Kesha has announced that she’s devising a 10-year plan to “dismantle” the music industry so no one else is wronged the way she was – see what she had to say.

In 2005, Kesha at the age of 18 signed a six-album contract with Dr. Luke. Over the last decade, Kesha has been at war with Dr. Luke, battling through lawsuits for emotional distress, sexual harassment and abuse.

The two have since settled the lawsuit out of court, and Kesha late last year finally became free of Dr. Luke and Kemosabe Records after releasing her fifth album, ‘Gag Order’ with the label in May 2023. Late last month, she announced the launch of her own label, Kesha Records.

Now, in a new cover feature with Elle, Kesha has revealed that she has a 10-year plan to upend the music industry and protect musicians so no one else is put in the same situation as her.

She told the publication: “The music industry should be fucking terrified of me. Because I’m about to make some major moves and shift this shit. I really want to dismantle it piece by piece and shine light into every corner. I hope my legacy is making sure it never happens to anybody ever again.”

“I do have a sense of feeling protective of young women in music,” she added. “I really hope my joy can stand for others to know that it’s available to them and to not give up. I enjoy feeling my power, which hasn’t been available to me for a really long time, and I’d love to give that gift to others if I can”.

This is a conversation that a lot of women are having. At least a dark corner women are shining a light on. The fact that there are abusive, controlling, coercive and predatory men working in studios and subjecting young women to assault and harassment. The abuse and torment that Kesha face had a huge impact. Even though she is perhaps in a better place and has been able to share her stories and experiences through interviews and her music, how much has the industry reacted to it?! Kesha’s experiences are unique or rare. So many other women have faced similar things. Many more who have not come forward or have gagging orders. It is shocking when you consider the potential depth of this toxicity and abuse! Whether it is women who are working in studios where they are subjected to harassment and abuse or wider through the industry where there is this misogyny and assault, the distress and harm women are experience should ring alarm bells. Definitely, women through the industry know how bad things are and they need to change! I do say this with every feature like this I produce. Where is the chorus of male allyship?! Those who say they are aware and support women need to do so in a more vocal and visible manner. It is no good being an ally if you are not making your voice heard! From journalist to artists through to label bosses and those at the top level, every year we see women talking about their experiences and some real horror stories without much support. Not to that the vast majority of men in the industry don’t care. They are not forthcoming in coming forward. This needs to change. Producers and those in studios talking about that culture and how things can be improved.

Kesha’s ten-year plan to take apart the music industry seems like an insurrection and overdue calling out. A crisis moment where the dam has to break. It is testament to the strength of women like Kesha. They are risking so much by calling out those in the industry who are causing so harm and abuse. Those who are sliding under the radar. Those who have been accused by some women but not all. The full depth of their behaviour and crimes. It sounds like this will be a real shake-up. It is not an idle threat either. If a major artist like Kesha has reached a point where she is going to open up the music industry and exposure truth and those who are abusing and harassing women, then it should send a message to men out there. Whether producers like Dr Luke or artists who have assaulted or harassed women. I keep saying how there should be a #MeToo movement. Something widespread and enormous that brings to justice so many men who are preying on and abusing women. Maybe this is the start of it. It takes time to really clean up and improve things. That noble aim of Kesha’s to help young women and turn her experiences into something positive and important. That is to be commended. It is a big act of bravery considering the backlash or hurdles she could face. It does seem we have reached a state where things are beyond belief. The almost weekly naming and shaming of a man in the music industry accused of abuse, assault, harassment or some other reprehensible act. It is so routine that we sort of become numb to it. Women in the industry are not. They are angry and calling for change. To be protected, believed and supported. There is not a tonne of that beyond other women through the industry. Kesha’s quest and plan to dismantle the music industry and improve things should be met with support and anger by men through the industry. Let’s hope that this lighting of the fuse leads to…

AN explosion.

FEATURE: Survival and Sanctuary: Inside Madonna’s Defiant and Empowered Bedtime Stories at Thirty

FEATURE:

 

 

Survival and Sanctuary

IN THIS PHOTO: Madonna in New York, September 1994/PHOTO CREDIT: Bettina Rheims

Inside Madonna’s Defiant and Empowered Bedtime Stories at Thirty

_________

IN terms of…

Pop turnaround or revivals, Madonna should not have been in the position to have to prove herself or save her career. 1989’s Like a Prayer turned her into an undisputed Pop queen. The biggest artist on the planet, she was peerless. 1992’s Erotica was a departure in terms of sound. Putting sex more to the fore, many critics took against it. Thought she had gone too far. An album that was quite cold and did not have the same uplift as Like a Prayer and her earliest work. This was Madonna adopting a new persona (Dita) and evolving her work. With the SEX book also out in 1992, critics piled onto her. There was so much attack and misogyny aimed at an artist who was being expressive and bold. Male artists at the time not receiving the same sort of judgement. Something that still happens to this day. Many were watching carefully to see what followed Erotica. Others had written Madonna off. A cross between a sanctuary and this album where she had to keep he music and name alive, Bedtime Stories arrived on 25th October, 1994. If some consider it is not among her five best albums ever, it is clear that Bedtime Stories was partially a move back to the more commercial Pop of before. Electronic influences that would make themselves more aware on 1998’s Ray of Light. Some sensitive tracks alongside the bold and brash. This was classic Madonna. It is a shame that she almost had to prove herself or compromise for critics. Even so, there is plenty of rawness through Bedtime Stories. One of Madonna’s best albums in my view, as Wikipedia explain, Bedtime Stories began a new phase in Madonna’s career:

“Critics reacted positively towards the album, applauding its romantic nature. Additionally, it was nominated for Best Pop Album at the 38th Grammy Awards. The album debuted and peaked at number three on the US Billboard 200 and was certified triple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). It reached the first spot in Australia, and charted within the top-five in many other countries, including Canada, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom. Worldwide Bedtime Stories has sold an estimated eight million copies. In retrospective reviews, it has been referred to as one of Madonna's most important yet underrated albums. Bedtime Stories has also been credited as album that started the "second phase" of Madonna's career, which began in the mid-to-late 1990s. Influence of the album has been noted on the work of contemporary artists”.

I want to get on to a couple of features around Bedtime Stories. In 2014, Philly Mag dedicated some time and space to an album that was career-defining. At a time when people were writing Madonna off, she produced an album that was hugely impressive without compromising her integrity and truth. Even if there would have been little patience for another album like Erotica, what she gave the world in 1994 was a blend of all her different sides and sounds. A truly remarkable and underrated album:

“A little up and down and all around, it’s all about survival,” coos Madonna on slinky boudoir groove “Survival,” the opening number of her just-turned-20 work Bedtime Stories. And, as all of us true Madonna queens know, prior to the release of this celebrated record, the Material Girl’s career at this point was indeed a little up and down and all around, and in definite need of survival.

Her previous studio set, the S&M-beat-blessed Erotica, ruffled the feathers of a lot of critics—and even some fans with its overt sexuality. Around the same time, her provocatively titled coffee-table book Sex prompted those same critics to throw up their hands. Had the queen of WTF moments reached her shock-value limits? Was America tired of her attention-getting ways? Many said yes. But those who doubted were eating their words after her infamous 1994 interview on Late Show With David Letterman, where she dropped F-bombs like they were going out of style. It was too much for a nation that was increasingly more conservative following Desert Storm and in the midst of a wallet-clenching recession. Girlfriend needed to reel it in.

After the Letterman debacle, Madonna must have realized she had some work to do image-wise, so she returned to the music scene with a more-polished, even kind of vulnerable style. To kick off her softer-side reinvention, she released the sensual “I’ll Remember,” a tender (and vastly underrated) ballad from the film With Honors. The radio-friendly pop tune became a No. 2 Billboard hit for the star, with an accompanying video that featured Madonna looking classic under a sleek black do. She came back later that year with “Secret,” an acoustic R&B-laced gem that served as the lead single from Bedtime Stories. Thus Madonna’s mid-’90s career comeback began.

“Secret” became another hit for the star, peaking at No. 3 on the charts and birthing a Harlem-shot black-and-white video that featured a blond-bobbed Madonna looking all ghetto fabulous—nose ring and all. Critics praised the single for its sexy guitar riffs and throbbing beat, but it was follow up single “Take a Bow” that truly put the diva back on top of her chart game. The classic rode the peaks of Billboard for seven weeks, and still remains her longest-running No. 1 hit to date.

However, as much as Stories put Madonna back on top, later single releases didn’t make as much of a rumble on the charts. After “Take a Bow,” she released “Bedtime Story,” but because of its not-ready-for-radio whirling and winding production, the track was vastly ignored on the airwaves and mainly gained buzz because of its eye-popping “Ray Of Light”-foreshadowing video. The same can be said for “Human Nature,” Madonna’s classic fuck-you-to-critics anthem that also barely got into the groove on the singles charts. In the end it would be the last mainstream single released from the Bedtime Stories era”.

There are a couple of other pieces worth highlighting, so that we can properly celebrate Bedtime Stories. I guess there was a combination of defence and defiance with Madonna’s sixth studio album. She wanted to ensure that she did not face the criticism of 1992. However, this was someone who embraced her sensuality and new depths, in addition to exploring and ensuring her sexuality and independence was very much in the mix. It is a fascinating blend of songs. In 2021, Dig! wrote how Bedtime Stories retained Madonna’s tease and sexuality, though it was softer and more seductive than it was hard-on and direct:

“Ever mindful of contemporary pop’s comings and goings, 1994’s Bedtime Stories was billed as Madonna’s first all-out R&B record, even though her self-titled debut album – released before those extraordinary videos defined her image in a way hitherto unheard of – found her routinely assumed to be a Black act. By getting into bed with the predominant R&B tastemakers of the time, however, there was a calculated effort to redefine her sound while dialling down on the fuss her previous record, Erotica, had created. Here, Madonna chose a number of songwriters, including Dallas Austin and Babyface, leading to a more textured collection than she had created before, though her reputation as a promiscuous collaborator was already justly deserved.

Breathless intensity, dramatic posturing

Few of the album’s 11 songs stick strictly to their respective musical lanes, with pop influences folding into clubby trance and trip-hop. There are nods to her then-consolidating legacy (notably in the lyrics, which often referenced past hits), but Bedtime Stories undoubtedly moved Madonna’s sound on more dramatically than before, leading gently towards the subsequent renaissance of Ray Of Light.

With its opening Dallas Austin cuts (the jazz-tinged Survival and the album’s accomplished lead single, Secret) the album gets off to a fine start. Secret proved a decisive return to both the US and UK Top 5 in September 1994, just ahead of Bedtime Stories’ release, on 25 October. Erotica’s co-producer Shep Pettibone earned a credit for his work on the song’s demo, but Secret couldn’t be more different from his era’s output, with Junior Vasquez notably picked for remixing duties, teasing out the song’s clubbier core.

Austin, then most famous for his work with TLC, co-wrote two further songs: the 70s soul groove of Don’t Stop and the meandering, meditative Sanctuary, which segues into the album’s most distinctive number, Bedtime Story, written by Björk, Nellee Hooper and Marius De Vries. Issued as the album’s third single, the latter’s hypnotic trance was the most out-there Madonna dance cut to date. She performed it at the 1995 BRIT Awards and, while it’s the only Bedtime Stories track not to credit Madonna herself, it holds together as a uniquely Madonna moment: all breathless intensity and dramatic posturing.

No space for apology

Softer moments include Forbidden Love, a Babyface co-composition, produced by the hitmaker and Massive Attack collaborator Nellee Hooper, and the charged Love Tried To Welcome Me, an in-part return to the brooding eroticism of her previous studio collection. Bassist Meshell Ndegocello, who would sign with Madonna’s Maverick label, guests on the equally provocative I’d Rather Be Your Lover, but it’s tracks such as the evocative Inside Of Me (created with Dave Hall, who had worked with Mariah Carey on some of her biggest hits) that make the most impact.

The album’s boldest statement was saved for Human Nature – Madonna’s chance to bite back at her critics, suggesting in its thumping electronic R&B that, while Bedtime Stories might momentarily soften the mood, there was no space for apology. It proved that her ability to read the room remained as pinpoint-sharp as ever: the public could accept Madonna’s sexual provocation… to a point.

Ultimately, it was time to move on, cast about for yet another new style and build some bridges. Bedtime Stories would prove an effective pathway between Erotica’s confrontational sexual caricature and the big-screen opportunity offered by Alan Parker’s upcoming adaptation of the Evita musical. There were other stories that needed telling…”.

I am going to end with this review from Photogroupie. They have some very kind and positive things to say about Bedtime Stories. Erotica got some heat because it was seen as too explicit or sexual. Bedtime Stories maybe not as direct or memorable as it could have been. It proved that, if you were a woman in Pop then, you could not do right no matter what you did! Luckily, in years since 1994, people recognise Bedtime Stories among Madonna’s best work:

“Rather than add fire to the flames, the release for Bedtime Stories was very low key; there was little media coverage to promote the album and no subsequent tour due to her filming commitments on Evita. As a result, the album is often overlooked in the cannon of her work, despite being one of her best. At first glance, you could be fooled into thinking that the title makes the album simply a sequel to its predecessor, and in some ways, you'd be right. The album is certainly sexy and erotic in part due to the R & B and dub influences which give it a smooth, soulful feel, but it's also deeply romantic and layered with lyrical depth. If Madonna was aiming to reinvent herself again with the album she succeeded tenfold. The compilation album Something To Remember released a year later continued to shake off the one-dimensional image of her as a provocative pop star and get her taken seriously as an artist. If these two albums didn't fulfil that brief, then her acclaimed performance as Eva Peron and the universally regarded album Ray Of Light certainly would undo any damage caused in the previous decade.

Survival opens the album with a distinctly different sound and has the singer proclaiming 'I'll never be an angel, I'll never be a saint it's true. I'm too busy surviving.' Lyrically it speaks volumes about her attitude towards the media and her chameleon-like status in the music industry. It's a hook-heavy track, with a sharp focus on harmonies and bass lines, something that is maintained throughout the album.

The lead single, Secret, stills sound contemporary as does the rest of the album. The choice of enlisting several different producers helps to form a fresh and timeless sound to the album. It's certainly evident on a revisit that much of Madonna's work from the 90s and beyond does indeed have a perennial sound quality to it, in a similar way to the work of Kate Bush, Michael Jackson and Prince.The hip-hop influence of Erotica's Waiting creeps through tracks like Rather Be Your Lover, Inside Of Me and Human Nature. The latter plays on one of the themes from Madonna's previous singles, reaffirming the notion that you should 'express yourself, don't repress yourself.' Here she confronts previous haters, labelling them narrow-minded, and debating societies reluctance to talk about sex, after all, it is human nature. She offers the suave, yet unsanitised put-down, 'I'm not your bitch, don't hang your shit on me'. The final sting in the tail comes from her ability to challenge gender norms in society once again by asking her critics to consider if they would have tolerated her behaviour better if she was a man. It's a classy track which serves as an unrepentant two fingers to the stuffy collared establishment. Of course, this wouldn't be her only paean for unapologetic behaviour; she would later pick up the concept in 2015's Rebel Heart.

Here on in, there's a much more subdued, understated feel to the album, although none the less emotive and alluring. Love Tried To Welcome Me combines elements of acoustic guitar, strings and a soulful sway to tempt us into the mournful song of loneliness and lust. It's a terrifically sensitive song which is enhanced by Madonna's gentle and silken vocals.

 

Sanctuary hints at the hypnotic and mystical production that William Orbit would draw out in Ray Of Light. There's also elements of a similar sound in the ethereal and concupiscent, Bedtime Story, co-written by Bjork. These musical seedlings would grow to fruition on Ray Of Light, hinting at an artist who has a very clear foresight of what she wants to achieve musically. In many ways these two tracks bridge the gap between the two albums, showing the continued evolution of Madonna as an artist.

Take A Bow, the effortless ballad on the album makes use of strings and a lilting Japanese style piano refrain. It's stylistically different from anything else on the album, which is a credit to Madonna and the track's co-producer Babyface. There is an innocence, a vulnerability to the music, but also empowerment in the lyrics which serves to confuse us emotionally. It's certainly a graceful and unexpected end to a varied and noteworthy album.

Bedtime Stories may be a far cry from the explicit sounds of Erotica, it's more of a teasing, seductive pillow fight in comparison, yet it still had the power to create controversy. It's sexually suggestive which may have got people's back up, but the most crucial part of the album's legacy is the fact that Madonna refused to be silenced by critics and was steadfast in her unwillingness to kotow to their pressure to show remorse – a quality which has ensured that Madonna has stayed true to her artistic vision. That is something that she should never apologise for”.

On 25th October, we mark thirty years of Bedtime Stories. I hope that the Queen of Pop takes to social media to salute a remarkable album. One that arrived at a very difficult time. A moment when she had to get the balance and tone right. In 1994, what she produced is a masterpiece! Some of her strongest songs. Her voice better and stronger than ever. A mix of bite and soul-baring. Such a deep and beautiful album with plenty of emotions and angles. Fire and spark in songs like Human Nature. If critics felt Madonna would be finished after 1992, she very much…

PROVED them all wrong.

FEATURE: Spotlight: Holysseus Fly

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight

  

Holysseus Fly

_________

THIS is an artist that I am quite new to…

but I have seen recommended and spotlighted by some pretty big sources. According to her Bandcamp biography, she is “Vocalist, co-writer and pianist with critically acclaimed collective Ishmael Ensemble, Holysseus Fly has already made a powerful impression as a solo artist. The EP’s singles, Marigold, Bloom, and Teach Me have caught the attention of everyone from BBC 6 Music’s Chris Hawkins to Annie Mac, Craig Charles, Jamz Supernova, and ITV News. Holysseus Fly’s star is very much in the ascendant”. The tremendous Holysseus Fly is someone who should be on your radar. You may know Ishmael Ensemble’s Holly Wellington in that role. A sensational talent, I am going to bring some more attention to her. There are interviews and a review that I want to bring in. Last year’s E.P., Birthpool, is a work that I would urge everyone to listen to. It is stunning. When she was performing live last year, there were some wonderful review of her shows. When she played The Exchange last year, this is what The Fix observed:

“When she emerges onto the stage at to the sound of a low drone at The Exchange, Holysseus Fly is obscured by a net curtain. She begins with her back to the rapt audience, enigmatic through the shroud as she begins to sing Bloom – “Don’t expect me to sing / I’ll bloom / When I choose to.” In a simple but hugely effective piece of stagecraft that is indicative of the entire show, she turns to pull down the curtain, revealing herself. And if this hometown launch of her EP Birthpool is about anything, it is about Holysseus Fly revealing herself, exposing her art as well as her soul.

The performance tessellates around two themes. Firstly, there is the breast cancer she was diagnosed with and treated for four years ago, when about to go on tour with surging Bristol band Ishmael Ensemble. She recovered enough to join them at Glastonbury in 2019, and made a triumphant return this year, to the West Holts stage. Holysseus Fly is candid about her treatment, her recovery and mental struggles. It was her diagnosis that sparked this solo venture – her first reaction to being given the news was “but I haven’t made a solo album yet.” The strength is clear in her voice during her first single Marigold, the flowers on her chest seen by her mother and aunt.

The second theme is water, and the show is full of imaginings of the sea. During Anchors, written after she saw the Little Mermaid, she sings “the anchors on my chest rest on the seabed of my heart.” If forced to choose between living in the clouds or under the sea, she explains, there is only one place she would go – down to the depths, among the shipwrecks and seaweed. From the ethereal singing of Within the Water, to the name of the EP, to the way her long train is billowed behind her like waves, the show is blue and deep and watery.

Describing her style as a mixture of James Blake and Lady Gaga, Holysseus Fly is unafraid to mix downbeat melodic electronica with flashes of pop exuberance. She covers Moses Sumney’s version of Björk’s Come to Me with reverberation, before Brook Tate and Bethany Kyle join her onstage for a joyful version of the aforementioned Lady Gaga’s Telephone. Teach Me, meanwhile, takes a danceable but piercing stab at the world of mansplaining.

Holysseus Fly showcases the kind of voice and stagecraft that could envelop and enthral much larger venues and audiences. This is an emotionally raw, beautifully sculpted show, which reaches a fitting finale with an evocative take on Swan Lake and the emergence of a fully-formed being. It is clear that Holysseus Fly is destined for great things”.

I do not normally bring in features and spotlights from other sites. However, as The Guardian have highlighted and championed Holysseus Fly, it is clear that this stunning artist should be embraced fully. She has a great fanbase already, though more and more people need to check her out. I guess another E.P. or album will come along fairly soon. Go and check out what music there is online:

“While London has been celebrated for a jazz scene that fuses improvisational traditions with the lively sound of the city’s diaspora, other areas of the UK have been fostering fresh talent. In Leeds, saxophonist Jasmine Myra channels meditative melodies, while Glaswegian trombonist Corto Alto was nominated for the Mercury prize for his high-energy ensemble work. In Bristol, meanwhile, jazz has melded with electronics, hip-hop and soulful songwriting to produce groups such as Ishmael Ensemble, Waldo’s Gift and Snazzback.

Ishmael Ensemble singer and keyboardist Holly Wellington, AKA Holysseus Fly, has spent the past two years since the release of her debut single Marigold creating her own blend of Bristolian jazz-soul. Going solo after her diagnosis and treatment for breast cancer in 2019, Wellington’s ensuing releases have journeyed through introspective, piano-laden balladry on Marigold to expansive soul on 2023’s debut EP Birthpool.

Accompanied on stage by a crew of backup dancers cum vocalists, Wellington’s recent performances at Glastonbury and Bristol’s Forwards festival have made reference to improvisatory freedom as much as Self Esteem’s bombastic theatricality. “I’m doing my own thing in my own way, being bold and not being afraid to say how I feel,” she has said. With her latest single, Out of This World, Wellington pushes this striking sound further via rumbling synth-bass and electronic drum programming, proving that the Bristol sound is as diverse as it is enticing”.

I want to look back at an interview from last year that Picky Bastards published. James Spearing chatted with the amazing Holysseus Fly. Someone who has been given kudos by among others BBC Radio 6 Music’s Chris Hawkins, it is a clear sign that her wonderful music is hitting ears and minds. I think that next year in particular is going to be a phenomenal one for her. In terms of the shows she plays and the way her fanbase will rise and expand:

“JS: So for my generation it was Robbie leaving Take That and Geri leaving the Spice Girls. Obviously there’s nothing that dramatic going on here, but I’m interested to know about the dynamic with being in a band and being a solo artist.

HF: Haha, great question. It’s like Geri staying in the Spice Girls…but both Geri and the Spice Girls can support one another…but Geri also knowing she can use her own voice and has her own ideas.

JS: Do you identify with Geri?

HF: I hadn’t until now but maybe I do. Which Spice Girl do you identify with?

JS: I’m not sure I identify with any of them but I think Mel C was always secretly the best. She’s got a great voice. Getting back your music, I wanted to ask next about your writing process? Did you set out to be a solo artist or was it the normal writing you’d do for Ishmael but it felt like something different?

HF: I have always written for myself but never had the confidence. I didn’t push it that far and I didn’t see the value of it for a long time. Being with Ishmael lifted my confidence. Then in lockdown spring 2021 I realised I had to do it; I was going to sit down and write for me and how I wanted to. I was not going to let critical self-doubt drag me down. And I’m so glad I finally did because it turned out to be the best music I’ve ever written.

JS: Was it a product of lockdown or did something else motivate you?

HF: Well I received a grant for young people with cancer from an amazing charity called Young Lives vs Cancer so I needed to do it to use that. At the time I was feeling low so having the direction to do it helped massively. And as it was lockdown there was nothing happening and I set myself the task to write five songs in a month…and I did it.

JS: Have you kept up that rate of writing?

HF: No!

JS: Fair enough, it’s hard work! Ok, so you’ve written the songs, the next stage is the playing and recording them. One of the standouts of your sound in your music so far, and one of the things that really caught my attention the first time I heard it on the radio is the lush production with the layers of strings and backing vocals. How did you go about building this sound?

HF: So the song you would have heard was ‘Within the Water’. The strings aren’t real, they’re synth strings – I love synth sounds – there’s a boy choir sound in there too. But thinking about production for the whole EP – I wrote on piano first. Then I worked in layers, building one at a time. For me the piano and vocal are the most important. The sound I wanted to make is inspired by James Blake’s ‘Retrograde’. It’s both minimal and bold, that’s what I’m trying to achieve and you’ll see when EP comes out. All the layers are all considered to bring out what’s there. I’m obsessed with one sound on my Nord keyboard, not a synth but a keyboard. It’s called farfisa and it’s on nearly every song, so there’s lots of that in there. I didn’t know what my production identity would be before we started work on this EP. I worked with Rob Pemberton in Stroud and James Vine who also plays drums in my live band. So yeah as I said a bold minimal sound and hope we’ve achieved it. Also there loads of backing vocals because they’re my absolute favourite.

JS: I read somewhere that you’ve got “main character energy” now. What does being the main character in your music and as a solo artist mean for you?

HF: Yes! Main character energy! A publicist I’m working with wrote that for me and loved it. For me it means stepping into my creativity. It’s kind of Tik Tok language which I find funny. I’m doing my own thing in my own way, being bold and not being afraid to say how I feel. And dancing! I’ve got a dance routine in my new video and I never thought i would be doing that. I guess I am a spice girl now. The dancing is inspired by Self Esteem, love her.

JS: Ah you said ‘her’ because I was going to ask is that Self Esteem with a capital S and E, the artist, not self esteem the concept.

HF: Oh it’s absolutely both, Self Esteem and self esteem.

JS: There’s a tour on the way and I’m excited to see you at the Carlton Club in Manchester. What can we expect from a Hollyseus Fly gig?

HF: James [Vine] is playing bass synth with his left hand and drumming with his right hand. He has a lot of jobs. I’ll be playing keys and piano and sometimes getting up from the piano. I’ve got two amazing backing singers/dancers. Basically I’m making my Wembley show now. I’m being ambitious and I don’t want to wait any longer. But I also want to create intimate moments…and dance routines…and wear an outrageous 20ft cape. There’s going to be some genuine drama.

JS: That sounds great, I’m looking forward to it even more now.

HF: And the support act looks really cool too, Chia Kali, check her out.

JS: Among the editors on the site we’ve collectively thought that 2023 hasn’t been a great year for music. Who would you recommend I listen to to change my mind?

HF: yeah of course, I’ve got a few that come to mind. A Bristol producer T L K, she has a song called ‘Lioness’ that will break your heart. China Bowls is one my my backing vocalists and dancers and she is amazing, check out her song ‘Night Owl’. Today – so today I’ve been Obsessed all day with Divorce – ‘Scratch Your Metal’ is a 6music dad song for you. Also Tiberius B who is a non-binary artist from Wales and they have an song ‘Jet Ski’”.

I would recommend people also check out this earlier interview with “Fifteen” Questions. She spoke about her music and finding light and hope when she was receiving treatment for cancer. It is a very inspiring and moving read. I think that my favourite Holysseus Fly track is Out of This World. Back in May, PAPER spoke with Holysseus Fly about this remarkable track and how the visuals for it came together. Some interesting insight into the creative process:

“Holly Wellington (aka Holysseus Fly) had one take, live vocals and a dream, all culminating in the ambitious, blue-hued video for her latest single, “Out Of This World.” The song was written about dreaming of a big, delicious future and being open to all that future can hold. The singer pushed her boundaries with her creative team for the visuals, highlighting the “team that has been with me on the journey.”

“Shooting the video in one take and singing a live vocal [was the most challenging part],” she tells PAPER. “We had to rehearse and rehearse. If one small thing was out of place we’d have to start again.” Still, the final product showcases an artist with no intention of backing down from a creative challenge. “I’ve always had strong visual expression,” she says. “I love to paint and put myself in a visual world within my music.”

The track, which starts with Wellington singing clearly over sonics that mimic a heartbeat, follows the release of her debut EP, last year’s Birthpool. Below, she shares how the song and video came to be as well as exclusive BTS photos with PAPER.

What was the inspiration behind "Out Of This World"?

I wrote "Out Of This World" right after I went on my first writing camp. I had all these chords and melody ideas running through my head when I sat back at the piano at home. I was feeling inspired and really hopeful for what the future could hold. It’s really a love song. It's my mantra to manifest good things to go "out of this world." But also understanding that there are things I can’t control. The repeating line "the blue" is the mystery of it all. I’m always inspired by nature in my lyrics; the ocean as a metaphor for life is something I often come back to. The vastness of the ocean, the vastness of life.

How did you convey that in the music video?

The video is like a behind-the-scenes video that turns into my dream gig. I wanted to shine a light on the team that has been with me on the journey and given me hope (though there are many more not in the video!). A blue light is cast over all of us and everyone is dressed in blue, like we’re submerged in the ocean. There are little nuggets of references to previous work, too. It was amazing to work with my sister Amy Wellington, who came up with the concept, and long-time collaborator Jack Lilley as co-directors. This video was made possible by Sound and Music. Together, I think we conveyed the sentiment of the song together in quite a unique way.

What was the most challenging aspect of bringing the visuals to life?

We shot the video in one take and sang a live vocal. We had to rehearse and rehearse — if one small thing was out of place, we’d have to start again. It took patience and a lot of energy! James Vine was the drummer, sound engineer, and also co-producer with me on the track. Jack Lilley had the idea that we could put everyone in silent disco headphones so we could record my voice. It worked really well! The take we took was the penultimate one from the day and I feel we really nailed it. I’d just finished a support tour with Nick Mulvey, so I’d sung the song every night for a week, so vocally I was feeling okay but technically there was a lot to arrange.

What inspires you when it comes to visual art?

I want to feel free to express myself in ways that feel honest and true to the sentiment of my music. Visually I want to put myself within the metaphors of the song’s meanings. For the gig scene backdrop, I painted this calico material with Brook Tate — it’s the material I used in my music video for “Bloom.” We put the song on repeat and let loose painting abstract oceanic brush strokes. I love to create abstract paintings to music; it’s another one of my outlets. I’ve always had strong visual expression, I love to paint and put myself in a visual world within my music”.

I am going to wrap it up there. This remarkable and original artist that I am fairly new to, I can thoroughly recommend Holysseus Fly. I hope to go and see her play live one day. It must be a moving experience hearing her on the stage. I feel next year is going to be a very big one for her. It is clear that this amazing artist…

DESERVES every plaudit.

_________

Follow Holysseus Fly

FEATURE: Good Graces: Sabrina Carpenter and Normalising Women Embracing Their Sexuality

FEATURE:

 

 

Good Graces

IN THIS PHOTO: Sabrina Carpenter

 

Sabrina Carpenter and Normalising Women Embracing Their Sexuality

_________

IT has been just over twenty-five years…

since Britney Spears released her debut album, ...Baby One More Time. Many look at that album for kick-starting a wave of female artists expressing their sexuality through their music and videos. In some cases, the videos for Britney Spears have not aged too well. Think about ...Baby One More Time the track and her schoolgirl outfit. The fact that she was infantized and made to dress younger and very sexually for some shoots. As a teenage artist, it was quite unseemly to think she given this image and persona that was exploitative. In years since, Spears struck out and put her own stamp on videos. A more liberated woman, I know she has influenced a whole new generation of women. The same goes for peers such as Christina Aguilera and Jennifer Lopez. Follow it through with artists such as Rihanna and modern-day greats such as Dua Lipa or Charli XCX. You can look back to the 1980s and 1990s when Madonna was releasing this evocative, provocative and confident music that was so expressive and confident. No doubt compelling artists who followed. All of these women at times have faced judgement, criticism and misogyny. Madonna especially. This idea that you cannot be sexually expressive or true to yourself in the music, through videos or on the stage. Perhaps not as prevalent today, female artists are still facing backlash and sexism when they are expressive and revealing on stage. Or they release an album that is sex-positive or bold. Sabrina Carpenter is one of the world’s biggest artists. Recently, as NME reported, she has experienced some criticism during her Short N’ Sweet tour:

“Sabrina Carpenter has responded to criticism of her embrace of sexuality on her ‘Short N’ Sweet’ tour.

Now, in an interview with TIME, Carpenter has opened up about her boudoir-inspired stage fashion and choreography, admitting that “you’ll still get the occasional mother that has a strong opinion on how you should be dressing.

“And to that I just say, don’t come to the show and that’s OK,” she said. “It’s unfortunate that it’s ever been something to criticise, because truthfully, the scariest thing in the world is getting up on a stage in front of that many people and having to perform as if it’s nothing. If the one thing that helps you do that is the way you feel comfortable dressing, then that’s what you’ve got to do.”

Carpenter also addressed fans shocked that she would express her sexuality in front of family members at her Madison Square Garden show, with Carpenter responding: “My fans online are like, I can’t believe she’s bending over in front of her grandparents!

“I’m like, girl, they are not paying attention to that,” she continued. “They’re just like, I can’t believe all these people are here”.

Even though we are not in a puritanical or necessarily prudish age, I do feel there is perhaps less tolerant of women in music pushing boundaries the same way as women who came before them did. There has always been misogyny aimed at women who are confidential expressing themselves this way. Neither immoral or reckless, it is a shame that we are in an age where women are judged or seen as wrong for embracing their sexuality in any way. That somehow they are pushing things too far. It is a double standard. Despite the fact there are not a lot of oldskool male Rock bands who are talking about sex and bringing that sexuality to the stage like in decades past, there is still very little in the way of condemnation or judgement their way. Women seen as irresponsible or explicit when they dare to show any flesh or the slightest hint of their sexuality. Men almost embraced and idolised. I have talked about this before. We are still experiencing such misogyny and sexism. It opens up a bigger debate and conversation about female sexuality in Pop. Sabrina Carpenter is among a group of incredible young women who are writing and performing songs that examine and explore their sexuality without it being exploitative or overly-explicit. They are speaking to and inspiring girls and young women. There is an argument today as to whether female sexualisation in Pop is expressive or exploited. This feature from earlier in the year looks at various sides of the argument:

“Today, Miley Cyrus has become more famous for twerking and swinging naked from a wrecking ball rather than for her wonderful voice, and makes highly sexualised videos directed by men like Terry Richardson (who has been accused of sexual assault by a few of the models he’s worked with).

In fact, while some argue that Cyrus and other celebrities are empowering women by expressing female sexuality in pop, the reality is that often these women and their actions are managed and directed by men.

Larry Rudolph, for example, is the man behind Britney’s ‘Baby One More Time’ video, and the rebranding of Brit as ‘a sexy pop princess’. Perhaps unsurprisingly, he’s now Miley’s manager, too – and he’s the man behind the idea of having Miley twerk and simulate masturbation on stage with Robin Thicke at the MTV Music Awards.

He also started a gyrating girl group called G.R.L. along with Pussycat Dolls founder Robin Antin and producers Max Martin and Dr. Luke. Who just happens to be the man behind Kesha’s success. And guess what? Kesha has since been locked in a legal battle with him. She claims he abused her for years.

Who Benefits?

Blatant female sexuality in pop may be masquerading as female empowerment, but who are these sexual displays truly aimed at? And what results do they have?

Certainly, they sell music – to both male and female fans. But they also sell messages: messages that say women’s value is based largely on the size and shape of their body parts and the sexual things they do with them. Messages that tell young girls that being highly sexualised is the norm. And that tell young boys that women are always  available and ‘up for it’.

Sure, it’s fine to have a large sexual appetite, but if these women were really all about being empowered, wouldn’t they be showing themselves say, lording over loads of gyrating, oiled, half-naked male bodies rather than showing off their own? It’s clear from just about any music video that the viewer is assumed to be male, and the content of the video is aimed to titillate him.

Double Standards

Indeed, the double standard for women and men in pop is as strong as ever. Male pop stars are constantly surrounded by scantily clad women, while they sing in anything from jeans and a tee shirt to a full suit. (Robin Thicke’s ‘Blurred Lines’ video, as seen above, is a great example).

This clearly shows how the female sexuality expressed in pop music videos like this is designed specifically for the ‘male gaze’. Can you even imagine the uproar if a little boy were to be dressed in a nude coloured bodysuit, dancing with very adult-like moves to a song about one-night stands and alcoholism, or writhing around a cage with nearly nude adult? And yet Sia did this with two of her hit videos and very little was said about it. Because the child in question was a girl.

A Devastating Impact On Girls

Such explicit videos of female sexuality in pop are certainly exerting a negative influence on little girls. Even back in 2007 the American Psychological Society issued a report on the sexualisation of young women. They found “virtually every media form studied provided ample evidence of the sexualisation of women”. And since then, things have only gotten worse. One word, my friends: WAP.

In study after study, women – and increasingly, young girls –  are portrayed in overtly sexualised ways. Vastly more than men. Unlike films, music videos are available for young children to watch without restriction. But some are getting so raunchy, there is a warning of ‘Adult Content’ before them. For example? Miley Cyrus’s MTV Music Awards performance where she ‘ejaculates’ smoke and glitter. Since the music video was originally created for youth culture, it’s a sad day when MTV has to carry warnings of ‘adult content’.

It’s About Safety, Too

The hypersexualisation of women in pop is more than a morality issue. It is one of women’s safety and equality. Studies show that girls who are exposed to sexualised content are more likely to endorse gender stereotypes and place attractiveness as central to a woman’s value. Boys who are exposed to this content are more likely to sexually harass females, and have inappropriate expectations of them. A shocking one in three girls in the UK say that they are ‘groped’ at school, or experience other unwanted sexual contact. Sexual harassment is practically routine at work, on public transport and other public spaces”.

If one would argue there is not the same rampant misogyny and double standards in the music industry regarding artists expressing themselves, we are still in a position when artists are being condemned. Although the criticism aimed at Sabrina Carpenter was not huge or especially vicious, there is still that judgmental tone and feeling that she is not age-appropriate. Too revealing for her young audience. Maybe not setting a good example. As she said herself. If they don’t like it then don’t come to the show. She is hardly pushing things at all. When Madonna recently started her Celebration Tour, she drew a lot of criticism because of being sexualised on stage. Ageism and misogyny, many attacked her and felt that she was rather unbecoming or should act her age. Attitudes towards women expressing themselves like any male artists often calls into question whether they can escape judgment and misogyny. Earlier this year, Kim Petras stated how everyone should be equal when it comes to sexuality in music. A transgender artist, she has faced plenty of approbation for her sex-positive music and stage performances. This NME explains more:

“In a new interview with the BBC, the German-born singer was talking about her latest EP ‘Slut Pop Miami’, which she released on February 14. The release contains several tracks that allude to themes of sex-positivity and LGBTQ+ inclusivity.

“It’s something I feel strongly about. I’ve always been surrounded by incredible women,” she said on the topic. “Even at school, the people who stood up for me and understood my condition were female.”

PHOTO CREDIT: Gina Wetzler/Redferns

In February last year, Petras became the first transgender woman to win Best Pop Duo/Group Performance at the Grammys, for her Sam Smith collaboration ‘Unholy’. She used her speech to pay tribute to the late SOPHIE.

“I think men’s desire to control women’s bodies has been the plague of this planet forever,” Petras continued. “It very much goes hand in hand with being transgender. The people who wanted to forbid me to transition are the same ones who want to forbid women to have abortions or have sex and even make money from it.

“I’m a big fan of Madonna’s work, and I feel like, when she celebrated sex in Erotica and her Sex book, people misunderstood it as just filth. But female sexuality isn’t filth, and it shouldn’t be written off like that. Neither is trans-feminine sexuality or anyone’s sexuality. I think everybody should be equal”.

I did read the articles about Sabrina Carpenter getting some negative feedback and flack from some people because of her latest tour and embracing her sexuality. I was going to leave it but felt, even in 2024, are women truly allowed to be themselves? Will they ever be allowed to explore their sexuality without facing criticism or misogyny? In some cases, it is male producers, directors and photographers exploiting women and pushing their sexuality in a seedy and dangerous way. When it comes to artists like Sabrina Carpenter, they are directing and controlling their own narrative. If people find their act and music too much then they can avoid it. Women should be seen as equal when it comes to their right to explore and project their sexuality. Talk about it. Perform any way they want. Misogyny and sexism are still prevalent. Women facing abuse and assault. Judgement and criticism. An industry that does not protect women from abuse or speak out are also one that judge women and call them out if they are sexual and expressive. Many men still moulding women and using their sexuality for profit and fame. Women should be celebrated and embraced. They should not be judged or told what to do. They should be seen as equal and allowed to express themselves how they like. Will we ever see a day where, in the music industry, there is…

TRUE equality?

FEATURE: Also Known as the Kangchenjunga Demon: Kate Bush’s Wild Man at Thirteen

FEATURE:

 

 

Also Known as the Kangchenjunga Demon

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in a promotional photo for 2011’s 50 Words for Snow

 

Kate Bush’s Wild Man at Thirteen

_________

ONE of Kate Bush’s most fascinating…

latter-day songs, there is something so significant about Wild Man. I shall get to the song in a minute. It is the lead single from 2011’s 50 Words for Snow. The only official single from the album. There is an animated video for Among Angels. Also, Bush wrote and directed a short, animated video to accompany Lake Tahoe, entitled Eider Falls at Lake Tahoe. That was released as a picture disc in in 2012 for Record Store Day. My final Kate Bush: The Deep Cuts will focus on Snowflake. The song opens 50 Words for Snow. Right in the middle of the seven tracks that appears on Bush’s current, tenth studio album is Wild Man. On an album featuring seven long songs, Wild Man is the second-shortest (behind Among Angels). Even so, it clocks in at over seven minutes. The language and lyrics of the song are fascinating! I think that all the tracks on 50 Words for Snow should have an animated video. Giving life to these amazing works. I would be fascinated to see ones for Snowed in at Wheeler Street, 50 Words for Snow and Snowflake. An interesting examination of Misty. However, Wild Man did get special treatment. As single, I guess it was considered one of the strongest cuts. Also, as one of the shortest tracks on the album, it was easy to cut down into a radio edit. I will come to some words from Kate Bush about the song before exploring it more. Released on 11th October, 2011, this was the first taste of a new album. In May 2011, Kate Bush released Director’s Cut. This was a selection of songs from 1989’s The Sensual World and 1993’s The Red Shoes that Bush re-recorded, as she was not completely happy with the originals. Something she had been wanting to do, it was a rare act of retrospection from Bush – in years since, she has grown more comfortable revisiting and repackaging her albums. Nobody thought we would get another album from her in 2011! One that is so different. She was clearing the way for new work with Director’s Cut. Almost clearing a path through a snowdrift to record an album all about the cold and snow. Among Angels is the only song on the album not about snow.

I love how many different dimensions there are to 50 Words for Snow. Bush explores being snowed in, fifty words for snow, a haunted cold lake, and a snowman coming to life and melting after a night of passion. Wild Man puts us away from a romantic street or a tryst and into the open. Into a forest or mountain. A hunt for an elusive creature that has been mythologised and given a black name. Something weird and dangerous, Bush adds life and sympathy to a wild man. Something seen as a beast by others, There was a short animation to accompany a segment from Wild Man. It was published on 16th November, 2011 as part of 50 Words for Snow’s promotion:

“Well, the first verse of the song is just quickly going through some of the terms that the Yeti is known by and one of those names is the Kangchenjunga Demon. He’s also known as Wild Man and Abominable Snowman. (…) I don’t refer to the Yeti as a man in the song. But it is meant to be an empathetic view of a creature of great mystery really. And I suppose it’s the idea really that mankind wants to grab hold of something [like the Yeti] and stick it in a cage or a box and make money out of it. And to go back to your question, I think we’re very arrogant in our separation from the animal kingdom and generally as a species we are enormously arrogant and aggressive. Look at the way we treat the planet and animals and it’s pretty terrible isn’t it?

John Doran, ‘A Demon In The Drift: Kate Bush Interviewed’. The Quietus, 2011”.

Stephen W. Taylor about ‘Wild Man (with remastered shimmer)’

It was something I worked on with Rupert [Hine]. I added layers of sound to it, but they’re almost inaudible, which was done with Kate’s approval. In fact, fans were pissed off because they felt it wasn’t any different to the original version. In fact, it’s completely different. It has a very different sonic approach. We asked Kate to name it and she said it should be “With Remastered Shimmer” so that’s what it was called. (Anil Prasad, Stephen W Tayler – Experiential evocation. Innerviews, 2020)”.

I love the combination of players on Wild Man. Kate Bush on keyboards and vocals. Danny McIntosh (her partner) on guitars. The great late Del Palmer (who engineered the album) on bells. Steve Gadd on drums. Andy Fairweather Low as a featured vocalist. John Giblin on bass duties. It is such a beautiful and evocative song. You immerse yourself in it! Hunting for this strange creature. Maybe an actual man or an animal that is hiding and trying to protect itself. I am going to end with a bit about Wild Man and how it ranks alongside Kate Bush’s other singles. First, I want to come to a couple of reviews. This is what Billboard wrote in their review for one of Kate Bush’s strongest singles:

“The weird and whimsical “Wild Man” serves as the first new single from British art-rock craftswoman Kate Bush in a whopping six years (not including the re-tooled tracks from this year’s “Director’s Cut”). A word of advice to first-time listeners: be sure to have an atlas and thesaurus handy. “From the Sherpas of Annapurna to the Rinpoche of Qinghai / Shepherds from Mount Kailash to Himachal Pradesh,” sings Bush in her breathy lisp, somehow sounding erotic while randomly referencing Indian provinces and Buddhist principles. For all of its impenetrable wordplay,”Wild Man” makes for a wicked headphone atmosphere, with Dan McIntosh’s expressionistic digital guitar curlicues wandering around a crisp Steve Gadd kit and John Giblin bass. As an announcement of Bush’s return, “Wild Man” is a tad off-kilter. But then again, when has the ever-singular Bush been anything but?”.

There was no denying that, thirty-three years after her debut single came out (1978’s Wuthering Heights), Kate Bush was proving she was a singular and truly distinct artist. I feel there is a shared mystery, darkness and chill to Wild Man and Wuthering Heights. Something gothic and intense. This intrigue and sense of the ghostly too. There was so much adulation for Wild Man upon its release. This is what NME observed in their review:

“Since she re-surfaced after her 12 year hiatus with 2005’s ‘Aerial’, Kate Bush’s output has been many things including gorgeously expansive and broad. But what it hasn’t been for many years is densely surreal, qualities which characterised the best of her early work. Until ‘Wild Man’ that is.

Pre- ‘The Red Shoes’ there was an unpredictability and the sense of being a passenger into the wiles of Bush’s uniquely bonkers brain. Since ‘Aerial’ it’s been more steady, calm waters. This sonic sparseness was echoed by her lyrical conceits, which shifted away from magic realism and fantasy to elemental themes of flora, fauna and , um, washing machines.

For those of us who have been secretly longing for a return to the unflinchingly bizarre and Bush’s ability to conjure up strange new worlds, ‘Wild Man’ is a deep joy.

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in a promotional photo for 2011’s 50 Words for Snow

Lyrically we’re in a literal wilderness, where the ‘Wild Man’ of the title is a revealed to be a Yeti-type figure roaming the wiles of the Himalayas. Bush’s whispered vocal delivery of the lyrics (which are full of geographical intrigue and century old myth) is full of the right balance of fear, intrigue and empathy towards the plight of the shadowy figure (“I can hear your cry/Echoing around the mountain side/You sound lonely,” she sings).

As for the the chorus, it bursts forth mid-eruption; a choir of strange voices; echoing the ‘Wild Man”s own explosion out of habitation into civilization in the narrative of the song. Bush tackles this by a multiple layering of voices, creating several personas and the atmosphere of a village set adrift by the sudden intrusion. It’s a style which recalls some of her most classic work.

Musically, we’ve moved on subtly from the pared down production of ‘Director’s Cut’, and on ‘Wild Man’ a guitar riff-plays pan-Asian and ponderous, but there’s also a layering of sounds in the chorus (tinkling percussion, a bedrock of organs), which suggests her 80s heyday.

Multiple listens on, the references just keep coming; there’s ‘Scary Monsters And Super Creeps’ era Bowie and some of the ‘Tusk’ era Fleetwood Mac and her own ‘Sensual World’ and ‘The Dreaming’.

After the domestic bliss of ‘Aerial’, it’s a deep joy to have Kate roam the narrative wiles of her imagination. The result is her strongest single for decades”.

Of the seven songs on 50 Words for Snow, Wild Man is the fourth most-streamed song on the album behind Snowflake, Lake Tahoe and 50 Words for Snow. I am going to nod to Wild Man again when I publish anniversary features for 50 Words for Snow next month. Even though it only reached number seventy-three in the U.K. – maybe because of its length and distinct and uncommercial sound -, Wild Man is one of Kate Bush’s best songs. Wild Man premiered  on Monday, 10th October, 2011 on BBC Radio 2. The full version was premiered by Ken Bruce. The shorter radio edit was made available for streaming on Kate Bush's official YouTube channel after the radio premiere. The full-length Wild Man came out as a single and digital download on 11th October. It was not brought out as a C.D. single. Wild Man has never really been discussed or given a lot of examination. It did feature at number seventeen among Kate Bush’s best singles according to The Guardian. They were kind about the song “Seemingly released as a single to disabuse anyone who thought 50 Words for Snow might be a straightforward Christmas album, Wild Man deals with sightings of the yeti, features both Andy Fairweather-Low, pretending to be a Nepalese mountain-dweller, and an addictive, insistent guitar riff”. Earlier this year, What Hi-Fi? named Wild Man as one of the seventeen best Kate Bush songs to test your hi-fi to: “At seven songs and over 65 minutes, 2011’s 50 Words for Snow takes its sweet time – but the languorous nature of the record suits the richer tonality of the Bush singing voice. Wild Man is the most direct and immediate song on the album, and it’s weirdly moving in its use of the Yeti (or ‘wild man’) as a metaphor for mankind’s treatment of animals and the planet in general – her “run away, run away!” extortion is poignant in the extreme. As far as your set-up is concerned, there’s the staccato insistence of the instrumentation that requires careful management, the customarily conspiratorial, intimate vocal performance to be described, and a wide, tall canvas of a soundstage to be organised properly if the scope of the recording is going to be properly explained”. On 11th October, 2011, the world was gifted this incredible Kate Bush single. A month later, she released her tenth and most recent studio album. A stunning and immersive album you lose yourself in. Wild Man is one of the standout songs. Such a fascinating inspiration and compelling composition, make sure you give it a listen. It still sounds like nothing else…

THIRTEEN years later.

FEATURE: If You Were There: Wham!’s Make It Big at Forty

FEATURE:

 

 

If You Were There

 

Wham!’s Make It Big at Forty

_________

IF you were alive in the 1980s…

you could not escape the sensation that was Wham! I guess there were more male two-pieces than there are now. You had Pet Shop Boys, Bros and many other options. It is a dynamic that we have today. Nothing really matched Wham! You had boybands and male solo artists, though this Pop/Soul/R&B male duo was fairly rare. The distinct and unique sound of George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley. Such a close friendship. The amazing charisma and songwriting of Michael led their charge. The way they complemented each other and had this chemistry. Even if George Michael was clearly always going to be a solo artist and was considered the most talented member, Wham! would be nothing without Andrew Ridgeley. I think their second studio album, Make It Big, is one of the most notable leaps in Pop history. Not to say their 1983 debut, Fantastic, didn’t live up to its title. Songs like Bad Boys, Wham Rap! (Enjoy What You Do) and Young Guns (Go for It!) were mocked by some critics. The rapping and slightly edgy attempt wasn’t really pulled off. In years since, these songs have got more credit and respect. Even so, perhaps Wham! were trying to find their feet or were trying to project a sound or persona that was changed by 1984. The clear standout from Fantastic is the timeless Club Tropicana. Even if Last Christmas is the most-streamed Wham! song, exceptional cuts from Make It Big such as Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go, Freedom and Everything She Wants are right up there! I wanted to mark forty years of Make It Big. It’s anniversary is 25th October. Make It Big is an appropriate title. It reached number one in the U.S. and U.K. An album that saw Wham! break through. George Michael exerting more control as a producer really helped Wham!’s quality and sound. A much more complete and stunning album than their debut.

Make It Big album was a commercial success. Its four singles all reached the top three in the U.S. and the U.K. Make It Big was certified four-times platinum smash in the U.S. during the time of its release. In March 2024, Make It Big was reissued on vinyl for the first time in thirty years. Singles like Freedom and Careless Whisper are stunning. Deep cuts like If You Were There are so strong. I wonder whether any album has such contrasting opening and closing tracks. Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go is the natural opener and is jubilant and full of sunshine. Careless Whisper is emotional, slower and heartbroken. Wham! subverting expectation when it came to their music. Few would have predicted a song like Careless Whisper would have appeared on an album! Perhaps people writing off the duo as a novelty. It is well worth investing in Make It Big on vinyl. So little has been written about this album. One of the biggest of the 1980s. A true classic from a duo who would not remain together too long after it. 1986’s Music from the Edge of Heaven/The Final was their last album. They shone briefly but brightly. Make It Big remains their finest work. One of the only genuine and substantial features about Make It Big was published in 2021 by Classic Pop. It makes for interesting reading:

“Wham!: Make It Big – Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go

As manager Simon Napier-Bell battled to resolve the issue on their behalf, George and Andrew were dispatched to Studio Miraval in the South of France to begin work on material for their second album.

They had worked non-stop throughout a whirlwind two years, and this trip was intended to give them an opportunity to recharge their batteries for when their legal problems were resolved and they were free to continue making music.

“That break turned out to be a really positive thing,” George wrote in his autobiography, Bare. “I had been working very hard and I knew I needed to sit back and collect my thoughts, as a person and creatively, so that I could write the second album. I needed that breathing space. It would have killed most bands, but I never doubted that the material I came up with would be good enough for us to come back up.”

Once a settlement was reached in March 1984, work began in earnest on rebuilding Wham! What had started out as a relaxed atmosphere quickly changed into a tense environment as George felt the pressure to deliver a solid second album.

Wham!: Make It Big –Freedom

New label Epic, well aware of the fickleness of the music industry, made it clear that they were keen to progress as quickly as possible while the group was still riding an initial wave of popularity; they wanted a single almost immediately and an album before the end of the year, as they already had it planned as one of the year’s biggest festive sellers.

While the battle with Innervision had bonded George and Andrew in unison against their former label, cracks began to appear in their partnership as Andrew’s partying and drinking threatened to spiral out of control. The press proved relentless.

“I suppose they might be looking for some Rod Stewart rock‘n’roll kind of figure, but I do the things most people do on a Saturday night – I just get photographed doing it,” he protested to Smash Hits. “But the press seem to have an angle for everything: Randy Andy! Arrogant Andrew! Aggressive Andrew! Or the latest, Dribbling Andrew! I just can’t win. Maybe I should change my name to Trevor.”

While George beat himself up over meeting deadlines, Andrew was seemingly oblivious, essentially using the break as an extended holiday by inviting friends to visit and living the superstar lifestyle without, it seemed, putting in the work.

The final straw came when The Tube’s TV crew arrived. As they waited to interview George and Andrew, the latter was being bathed by his friends in order to wake him up as he’d got too drunk to do the job himself.

Wham!: Make It Big – Everything She Wants

Though he recovered and was able to be his cocky, charming self once the cameras were rolling, Andrew was warned to get his act together after the interview by George, who was beginning to feel taken advantage of.

Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go was released as the first single from the album on 14th May 1984. The track was a sugar-coated throwback to the Fifties rock’n’roll adored by teenagers, right down to its “jitterbug” vocal line and finger-clicking harmony.

The boys were overjoyed when the song became their first No.1 single. Although it would be regarded as one of Wham!’s signature songs, George was disdainful of it later on, branding it “naff” and “stupid” and citing it as one of the main reasons Wham! were so derided by their peers and critics.

Careless Whisper, a moody ballad with an instantly recognisable sax hook, was an attempt to redress the balance. Released as George’s debut solo single, the song revealed him to be capable of producing material with a maturity which belied his 21 years. Like its predecessor, Careless Whisper topped the charts on both sides of the Atlantic.

In August 1984, Freedom completed George’s hat trick of No.1 singles. The song, a bombastic Motown pastiche, ensured that when Make It Big followed weeks later, it was indeed the smash that Epic had hoped for.

As well as the three singles, the album featured the languid Like A Baby, an Isley Brothers cover in If You Were There, and two more pure pop confections influenced by Sixties soul music and Phil Spector’s Wall of Sound, Credit Card Baby and Heartbeat.

“It’s more of a black LP than the last one was,” George told Record Mirror. “It’s a black/pop LP as opposed to a black/disco LP. It’s been derived from so many areas… I’ve just written what I liked and got rid of my influences all in one go.”

Wham!: Make It Big – Careless Whisper

Completing the album was Everything She Wants, a throbbing synth-based dance track which towered over everything Wham! had released previously. Later released as a double A-side with Last Christmas, it remains the biggest-selling single not to reach the top spot in Britain. In the US, it gave Wham! their third No.1.

Wham!: Make It Big – The Reaction

Make It Big was a huge success, heading album charts around the world. Though ecstatic, George was furious that the critics couldn’t (or wouldn’t) see past Wham!’s image and listen (without prejudice) to his music at face value. Though he feigned bravado, the criticisms affected him deeply.

Going on to sell in excess of 10 million copies, Make It Big was the pinnacle of Wham!’s success, propelling them to a level of fame in which the music became almost irrelevant. Like The Beatles before them, Wham! had reached a level where they weren’t listened to – they were screamed at.

One of the biggest bands in the world, they had made it bigger than they had dreamt possible”.

I am going to end with a couple of positive reviews for one of the strongest Pop albums ever. Where we truly got the full potential and promise of Wham! This is what AllMusic noted when they put into words the merit and sheer brilliance of Wham!’s phenomenal second studio album:

“The title was a promise to themselves, Wham!'s assurance that they would make it big after struggling out of the gates the first time out. They succeeded on a grander scale than they ever could have imagined, conquering the world and elsewhere with this effervescent set of giddy new wave pop-soul, thereby making George Michael a superstar and consigning Andrew Ridgeley to the confines of Trivial Pursuit. It was so big and the singles were so strong that it's easy to overlook its patchwork qualities. It's no longer than eight tracks, short even for the pre-CD era, and while the four singles are strong, the rest is filler, including an Isley Brothers cover. Thankfully, it's the kind of filler that's so tied to its time that it's fascinating in its stilted post-disco dance-pop rhythms and Thatcher/Reagan materialism -- an era that encouraged songs called "Credit Card Baby." If this dichotomy between the A-sides and B-sides is far too great to make this essential, the way Faith later would be, those A-sides range from good to terrific. "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go" is absolute silliness whose very stupidity is its strength, and if "Everything She Wants" is merely agreeable bubblegum, "Freedom" is astounding, a sparkling Motown rip-off rippling with spirit and a timeless melody later ripped off by Noel Gallagher. Then, there's the concluding "Careless Whisper," a soulful slow one where Michael regrets a one-night stand over a richly seductive background and a yearning saxophone. It was an instant classic, and it was the first indication of George Michael's strengths as a pop craftsman -- which means it points the way to Faith, not the halfhearted Edge of Heaven”.

Prior to wrapping up, I want to bring in a review from Rolling Stone. Writing in 1985, they started a bit dismissively of Wham! Especially Andrew Ridgeley and his ‘point’. I hope the narrative has changed around his incredible work and essential role! This album was certainly not a George Michael solo outing. Wham! at their strongest and most interesting on Make It Big:

“Make It Big is an almost flawless pop record, a record that does exactly what it wants to and has a great deal of fun doing it. Sure, it's slight stuff and too thinly orchestrated at times, but George Michael can write and sing rings around fellow teen dream Simon Le Bon. He may be less soulful than Boy George (remember, we're talking British white boys only) but he's got a much wider range, from rumbly bass to keening falsetto, which he uses to first-rate effect on "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go."

As a songwriter and performer, Michael has learned his lessons well. Gripe all you want about the cops from Holland-Dozier-Holland's "It's the Same Old Song," but "Freedom" is truly irresistible: snappily written, perfectly arranged, superbly sung. His moodier side gets an airing on "Careless Whisper." While his voice may be technically accomplished, it also has a prissy side that sinks the song.

So much for the hits (each was Number One in the U.K.); otherwise, Make It Big is mighty short on material. What should be zingy three-minute pop songs are dragged out to four or five minutes to fill up vinyl. Though that's a minor failure in the pleasantly daffy "Credit Card Baby" or the Spectorish "Heartbeat," there's really no excuse for the minute forty seconds of instrumental lounge music with which "Like a Baby" bumbles to a start. Still, George Michael is a glossy-faced talent who can't be written off. Everyone has a guilty pleasure. Why not let Wham! be yours?”.

On 25th October, the globe-straddling and mighty Make It Big turns forty. It was a title worthy of the duo’s incredible talent. An album that also saw them go global. A chart-topper and massive-selling success, I think more people should explore it. From unabashed Pop joy through to sensitive and moving tracks, this is a finely balanced and broad album with impeccable songwriting and vocals. A big step on from their 1983 debut, Fantastic, Make It Big took them to new heights. I would recommend people check out last year’s amazing documentary, WHAM!. It gives you insight and build-up to Make It Big and how they were this huge act being mobbed wherever they went. You can maybe see why they did not last too long and George Michael went solo. It was such an intense and crazy ride! Even so, Wham! left us with such brilliant music. Make It Big, forty years later, is an album…

IMPOSSIBLE to deny.