FEATURE:
A New Start; a Lost Ballad
Kate Bush’s Never for Ever at Forty-Three
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THE forty-third anniversary…
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1980/PHOTO CREDIT: Angelo Deligio/Mondadori via Getty Images
of Kate Bush’s Never for Ever is quite an important one. The album itself is important for a number of reasons. Released on 8th September, 1980, Never For Ever was Bush’s first number one album – though it would not be the last. It was also the first ever album by a British female solo artist to top the album chart in the U.K., in addition to being the first album by any female solo artist to enter the chart at number one. That is a remarkable achievement in itself! There are a couple of elements I want to zone in on for the first – of maybe a few – anniversary features. It is a shame that Never for Ever has not really got the reviews it deserves. Lionheart (released at the end of 1978, that was her second studio album) got some mixed reception. Bush’s debut, The Kick Inside, got positive reviews. If not overlooked, Never for Ever has never got the five-star reviews I feel it is worthy of. Not put up there with the likes of Hounds of Love and Aerial. That is a shame, as this was a real leap in ambition for Bush. I see 1979’s Tour of Life as Bush doing something where she had more control. The Kick Inside and Lionheart saw Andrew Powell produce (Bush assisted on Lionheart). Both albums, I feel, were a little disappointing to her as she did not have production control. With Jon Kelly on Never for Ever, it was the first time Bush had a big say in the sound and direction of the album. As both were similar ages and had a closer bond, Bush felt more pleased with Never for Ever than her previous work. The confidence and acclaim she got for The Tour of Life definitely inspired her songwriting. I feel like Bush wrote this album with a mind to performing it live and making a concept out of it. That never came to pass.
Recorded between September 1979 and May 1980, Bush utilised AIR and Abbey Road Studios to full effect. You can hear more space and atmosphere on the album. Her first clear evolution in terms of content and dynamics, a happy studio environment – where Bush and the musicians would often hang out and record late because it was a relaxed space – and Bush wanting to put a stamp on her music resulted in this underrated classic. Tracks like Babooshka show the first signs of Bush’s fascination with and use of the Fairlight CMI. That discovery – it was Peter Gabriel who introduced Bush to the technology, as he was already using it in his music – came late, but you can feel Bush experimenting more with technology and sounds. This would explode and multiply through her next album, 1982’s The Dreaming. Not having constraints or having to answer to anyone, aged twenty-one, she began to produce this album that would break records and showcase some of her greatest songs. I am going to move on soon. Before that, and thanks to the Kate Bush Encyclopedia, this is what Bush said about her third studio album:
“Now, after all this waiting it is here. It's strange when I think back to the first album. I thought it would never feel as new or as special again. This one has proved me wrong. It's been the most exciting. Its name is Never For Ever, and I've called it this because I've tried to make it reflective of all that happens to you and me. Life, love, hate, we are all transient. All things pass, neither good [n]or evil lasts. So we must tell our hearts that it is "never for ever", and be happy that it's like that!
The album cover has been beautifully created by Nick Price (you may remember that he designed the front of the Tour programme). On the cover of Never For Ever Nick takes us on an intricate journey of our emotions: inside gets outside, as we flood people and things with our desires and problems. These black and white thoughts, these bats and doves, freeze-framed in flight, swoop into the album and out of your hi-fis. Then it's for you to bring them to life. (Kate Bush Club newsletter, September 1980)
Each song has a very different personality, and so much of the production was allowing the songs to speak with their own voices - not for them to be used purely as objects to decorate with "buttons and bows". Choosing sounds is so like trying to be psychic, seeing into the future, looking in the "crystal ball of arrangements", "scattering a little bit of stardust", to quote the immortal words of the Troggs. Every time a musical vision comes true, it's like having my feet tickled. When it works, it helps me to feel a bit braver. Of course, it doesn't always work, but experiments and ideas in a studio are never wasted; they will always find a place sometime.
I never really felt like a producer, I just felt closer to my loves - felt good, free, although a little raw, and sometimes paranoia would pop up. But when working with emotion, which is what music is, really, it can be so unpredictable - the human element, that fire. But all my friends, the Jons, and now you will make all the pieces of the Never For Ever jigsaw slot together, and It will be born and It will begin Breathing. (Kate Bush Club newsletter, September 1980)
It's difficult to talk about the album without you actually hearing it, I suppose it's more like the first album, The Kick Inside, though, than the second, Lionheart, in that the songs are telling stories. I like to see things with a positive direction, because it makes it so much easier to communicate with the audience of listener. When you see people actually listening to the songs and getting into them, it makes you realise how important it is that they should actually be saying something. (...)
There are a lot of different songs. There's no specific theme, but they're saying a lot about freedom, which is very important to me. (Deanne Pearson, The Me Inside. Smash Hits (UK), May 1980)
For me, this was the first LP I'd made that I could sit back and listen to and really appreciate. I'm especially close to Never For Ever. It was the first step I'd taken in really controlling the sounds and being pleased with what was coming back. I was far more involved with the overall production, and so I had a lot more freedom and control, which was very rewarding. Favourite tracks? I guess I'd have to say 'Breathing' and 'The Infant Kiss'. (Women of Rock, 1984)”.
I think this was a new start for Kate Bush. I love her first two albums, but still a teen for most of that time (she turned twenty on 30th July, 1978), this was a more assured artist having received acclaim for her live tour determined to make an album that was more in her own vision. In addition to successful and timeless singles such as Babooshka and Breathing, the deeper cuts are wonderful! A perfectly sequenced albums in terms of emotion, balance and quality, treats such as Blow Away (For Bill), The Wedding List and All We Ever Look For are not played and talked about enough. If Egypt and Violin are seen as weaker tracks on the album, I actually think they are growers. If you have not heard Never for Ever before or in a while, then do so now. I am going to end thinking about a song that never appeared on her third album, yet it was recorded. Bush usually puts a title track on her albums. Aside from Director’s Cut, the only occasion where she has not had a title track or a song with the title in it – I am counting Oh England My Lionheart in this – is Never for Ever. Intriguing, there was a title track that could have seen the light of day. Recorded during the sessions for Lionheart, it shows that Bush already was working on./thinking about her third album when she was recording of her second. Producer Andrew Powell recalls his memories of the stunning Never for Ever. I wonder whether this song will be remastered and be released or available on YouTube at some point:
“It was a beautiful ballad - Kate sang it at the piano - and was just for Kate with her piano, (no rhythm section) and a large string orchestra. We recorded Kate at Superbear Studios in the South of France, and the orchestra parts at the original AIR studios in Oxford Circus, London. I think it may have been the best arrangement I ever did for Kate - Kate loved it too - so I wish it could be allowed to see the light of day sometime. It was a great, and very intimate, song”.
A number one album here and in France, Never for Ever, was a massive success. Bush was voted Best Female Artist of 1980 in polls taken in Melody Maker, Sounds, The Sunday Telegraph, and Capital Radio. Even though only a few Kate Bush fans rank it as their favourite from her, I think it should be in everyone’s top five at least. It is a remarkably strong album. It would lay the path and forge a clearance for The Dreaming which, in turn, then led to 1985’s Hounds of Love. Rolling Stone included Never for Ever in their 80 Greatest Albums of 1980 list. The songwriting and production is stunning throughout. As Never for Ever turns forty-three on 8th September, I wanted to salute, praise and show my love to…
A remarkable album.