FEATURE:
Blow Away
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush shot by Andy Phillips in 1980
Kate Bush’s Never for Ever: An Album of Sheer Beauty
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MAYBE it is very limiting…
to call an album beautiful. When it comes to describing Kate Bush’s music, there are so many other words and expressions that one can use. On Never for Ever, there are songs that take your breath because they are quite heavy and epic; others that are dramatic and have an edge to them. Though I think her debut album, The Kick Inside, is her best album, Never for Ever has a big place in my heart. It is the beauty and sheer wonder of Never for Ever that amazes me. As the album turns forty on 8th September, I am minded to talk about it, because not that many people give it a lot of love and appreciation. Many people overlook anything prior to The Dreaming of 1982. I know Bush herself feels that her albums pre-Hounds of Love were not necessarily her favourite. Maybe at the time of release she loved Never for Ever, but she rarely discussed Never for Ever later in her career. If 1978’s Lionheart was a rushed follow-up to her debut and she couldn’t really progress in such a short time, I think Never for Ever was a big step forward and a much more rounded and complete work than Lionheart. I have talked about this before, but Never for Ever was a big shift for Bush. Recorded between September 1979 and May 1980, Bush was fresh from her Tour of Life of 1979 – that tour ended on 14th May, 1979.
Producing alongside Jon Kelly (who was the engineer on her first two albums), IK can imagine the atmosphere for Never for Ever was a lot different compared to that on The Kick Inside, and Lionheart. Kelly, as a younger producer than Andrew Powell, had less experience, but I think the bond between him and Bush would have been closer, as they were very similar in terms of age. Bush had recently discovered the Fairlight CMI, which opened her mind and provided her music so many different sounds and possibilities. The album’s three singles, Breathing, Babooshka, and Army Dreamers, are classics, and they are among the rawer and more urgent tracks on the album. Breathing’s subject of nuclear war as viewed from the perspective of a foetus is an epic closing track, whilst Army Dreamers’ lighter vocal and Irish accent cannot disguise the fact that Bush is singing about young men being wasted in battle; Babooshka is about a woman with two different personalities: the housewife who has doubts about her husband’s fidelity, and this younger version of herself that is fiercer and more alluring. I love these tracks, and I can see why they were selected as singles! I feel a lot of people distil Never for Ever into these three tracks, and they ignore the enormous beauty and wonderfulness of the remaining numbers. Maybe critics were looking for something a lot different and more ‘mature’ than the songs on The Kick Inside, and Lionheart.
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1980
Never for Ever has a faster and darker side, but I really adore the songs that are slower or has a different tone. The Wedding List, for instance, is more similar to Babooshka in terms of its energy, but not many people remark on this stunning song. Delius (Song of Summer), Blow Away (for Bill), and All We Ever Look For follows Babooshka, and they are fantastic and so engrossing. Some were a bit put off by Bush’s vocal sound and style on The Kick Inside, feeling it was too high-pitched or wild. On Never for Ever, we can hear her voice growing and expanding, and I think that gorgeous aspect of her voice was more accessible and diverse. Countering Ian Bairnson’s bass vocals on Delius (Song of Summer), Bush produces something almost choral and spiritual; similar in some ways to vocal performances on her previous two albums, but somehow different and more effecting. All We Ever Look For, as we discover, mixes serious subject material with a vocal that is heavenly and touching:
“One of my new songs, 'All We Ever Look For', it's not about me. It's about family relationships generally. Our parents got beaten physically. We get beaten psychologically. The last line - "All we ever look for - but we never did score".' Well, that's the way it is - you do get faced sometimes with futile situations. But the answer's not to kill yourself. You have to accept it, you have to cope with it. (Derek Jewell, 'How To Write Songs And Influence People'. Sunday Times (UK), 5 October 1980)”.
Before I look at the second side of Never for Ever, I wanted to reference an interesting thing I read in Homeground: The Kate Bush Magazine: Anthology One: Wuthering Heights to The Sensual World. On page 593 of the hardback edition, which included a document that lists some of Bush’s songs and writes why they are explicit or controversial. In terms of disturbing morals or creating offence, one can imagine that this list came from an American church or religious body – I cannot work out whether it is a joke or not (even though the book’s authors claim it is not). The list shows that, on so many of Bush’s songs, she was discussing themes that few artists were. All We Ever Look For is, apparently, includes references to breasts, drugs, and tombs, so it should carry a warning. Babooshka relates to infidelity, whilst Army Dreamers is about death. Blow Away (for Bill) included sacrilege and death, whilst Egypt contains demons and female sexual organs. The Infant Kiss concerns paedophilia, and Violin is about satanism –not to mention the murder and revenge on The Wedding List. I am sure a lot of the songs on Never for Ever ruffled feathers in more conservative parts of the U.S. but, whether you find this attempt at judgement and censorship funny, it does show that Bush could easily blend beauty and ethereal layers into songs that are a lot deeper than most other tracks.
A lot of people overlooked the complexities and fascinating elements of a lot of Never for Ever’s tracks. On the second side, The Wedding List kicks things off with its tale of a vengeful bride. Maybe the vocals are not as beautiful as other tracks on the album, but I love the composition and how seductive it is. Even when Bush’s voice was more charged and intense, she still managed to make something about the music utterly beguiling and entrancing. The Infant Kiss, and Night Scented Stock are big examples of the impact Bush’s voice has when she is going for the heart! The latter is a short track (under a minute), that provides breath and relief before two big and moving tracks close the album – Army Dreamers, and Breathing. Again, whilst I have huge respect for the weightier (in terms of sonics) songs on Never for Ever, it is the dreamier and tender tracks that really move me. The Infant Kiss, as you would expect, is not about Bush lusting after a young boy - the story is about a governess who believes the ghost of her predecessor's dead lover is trying to possess the bodies of the children she is looking after. As Never for Ever turns forty next month, I wonder why it remains so underrated. A couple of the tracks - Blow Away, and Violin – are not overly-strong, but I just really love the album as a whole. Bush’s voice is stronger and more eclectic than on her first two albums, and I think the compositions are so rich and stunning. Never for Ever is a wonderful album that is….
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1980
A lot richer than many people give it credit for.