FEATURE:
Leave It Open-Minded
Kate Bush’s The Dreaming at Forty-One: She Let the Weirdness In…
_________
EVEN if Kate Bush…
PHOTO CREDIT: Trinity Mirror/Mirrorpix/Alamy
felt that The Dreaming was the album where she went a bit mad, I can appreciate that she may have worked too tirelessly to appreciate all the depths and brilliance. As her first solo producing outing, she put so many hours and ounces of her being to ensure that The Dreaming was a success and as she imagined in her head! One of the things that happened after Never for Ever is this increased popularity and pressure. Never for Ever was number one in the U.K., and it saw Bush produced with Jon Kelly. Maybe feeling she had to go to the next level or do something even better and bigger for The Dreaming, many fans still cannot connect with her fourth studio album. I am going to do a few features about The Dreaming, as it turns forty-one on 13th September. I will end with a bit about why the album is underrated and should be celebrated and seen fresh by those who have avoided it - or feel that it is one of Bush’s less necessary and accomplished albums. Before that, the Kate Bush Encyclopedia compiled interview snippets where Bush spoke about The Dreaming. I will also come to a long interview from 1982. It is intriguing what Bush remarked about Never for Ever and how she followed it:
“After the last album, 'Never For Ever', I started writing some new songs. They were very different from anything I'd ever written before - they were much more rhythmic, and in a way, a completely new side to my music. I was using different instruments, and everything was changing; and I felt that really the best thing to do would be to make this album a real departure - make it completely different. And the only way to achieve this was to sever all the links I had had with the older stuff. The main link was engineer Jon Kelly. Everytime I was in the studio Jon was there helping me, so I felt that in order to make the stuff different enough I would have to stop working with Jon. He really wanted to keep working with me, but we discussed it and realised that it was for the best. ('The Dreaming'. Poppix (UK), Summer 1982)
Yes, it's very important for me to change. In fact, as soon as the songs began to be written, I knew that the album was going to be quite different. I'd hate it, especially now, if my albums became similar, because so much happens to me between each album - my views change quite drastically. What's nice about this album is that it's what I've always wanted to do. For instance, the Australian thing: well, I wanted to do that on the last album, but there was no time. There are quite a few ideas and things that I've had whizzing around in my head that just haven't been put down. I've always wanted to use more traditional influences and instruments, especially the Irish ones. I suppose subconsciously I've wanted to do all this for quite some time, but I've never really had the time until now. ('The Dreaming'. Poppix (UK), Summer 1982)
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1982
The thing about all my album titles is that they're usually one of the last things to be thought of because it's so difficult just to find a few words to sum the whole thing up. I've got this book which is all about Aborigines and Australian art and it's called The Dreaming. The song was originally called "Dreamtime", but when we found out that the other word for it was "The Dreaming" it was so beautiful - just by putting "the" in front of "dreaming" made something very different - and so I used that. It also seems to sum up a lot of the songs because one of the main points about that time for the Aborigines was that it was very religious and humans and animals were very closely connected. Humans were actually living in animal's bodies and that's an idea which I particularly like playing with. (Paul Simper, 'Dreamtime Is Over'. Melody Maker (UK), 16 October 1982)”.
As I have said before, I think that The Dreaming was always acclaimed. There were some who found it weird and left-field, but Kate Bush was always that to an extent. None of her music is conventional or what was happening in Pop around the late-1970s and early-1980s. She was always different. I feel like she might have been ahead of her time with The Dreaming. There were definitely not many female artists producing something as unusual and layered as this. Some felt that there was sensory overload and some pretention. I think many were writing Bush off or felt that she shouldn’t be writing and producing the way she was. By that, I sense a degree of sexism and her really ‘staying in her lane’. If a male artist had delivered The Dreaming, I don’t think they would have been criticised or seen as weird and inaccessible. I might come to a review too. Perspective has changed in terms of The Dreaming’s value and brilliance. A technical masterpiece where Bush was using the Fairlight CMI more and building these incredibly interesting sounds, it was seen as a commercial flop. Even though it went to number three in the U.K., it didn’t perform as well across Europe. It was a bit of a failure in the U.S. Maybe a darker, denser and more paranoid predecessor to 1985’s Hounds of Love, the wildly experimental and head-spinning experience still sounds like nothing else to this day! Bush has looked back on The Dreaming seeing it as an angry album – and she was not sure why she was so angry. In terms of legacy, Björk and Big Boi cited The Dreaming as one of their favourite albums. Not particularly commercial, I think that is a big strength of The Dreaming. You do not really get bored or too used to song, as they are not going for instant hits and catchiness. Instead, you revisit the album and find something new in every song!
At a time when the mainstream has quite a lot of conventional music, many journalists were not sure how to approach Kate Bush. Misperceived and written off by some since she came through in 1978, this was her most daring and experimental album to that point. If most critics were on board by 1985, many were on the fence in 1982. Before rounding up and celebrating The Dreaming, there is one interview I want to bring in. Reaching Out has a whole host of interviews with Bush from throughout this year. Thanks to them for transcribing Bush’s 1982 talk with Karen Swayne for Kerrang!:
“Her first album in two years is The Dreaming, and it's as far-removed from the current chart sounds as you could possibly imagine (or hope for), but in it went at number three--proof that you don't have to conform to commercial formulae to be (or stay) successful.
A surprisingly slight but strikingly attractive figure with a direct gaze, clad in baggy jumper and jeans, Kate Bush is nothing like her dreadful public image--that of a breathless, squeaky-voiced girl whose vocabulary is limited to words like "wow" and "incredible". I wondered if she finds it disconcerting that people have such a weird image of her.
"Oh yeah, and it worries me a bit, too," she says. "That image was something that was created in the first two years of my popularity, though, when people latched onto the fact that I was young and female, rather than a young female singer/songwriter.
"Now it's much easier for females to be recognised as that, because there are more around, but when I started there was really only me and Debbie Harry, and we got tied into the whole body thing. It was very flattering, but not the ideal image I would have chosen."
Because people see that, rather than hear the songs...
"Right, and I've spent so much time trying to prove to those people that there's more to me than that. Just the fact that I'm still around and my art keeps happening should convince them.
"I can't go around all the time telling people where I'm at now. I just have to hope that there are people who see the changes and change with me. I think it was just that the media didn't know how to handle it, because it was so unusual at the time."
Did you ever feel like you were being treated as a child prodigy?
"I felt that because I was so young people weren't taking me seriously. They couldn't accept that I could be so involved in what I was doing.
"I was very lucky, because when I left school I knew what I wanted to do, and it worked out; and I suppose I did grow up fairly fast, because in a way, I was working in an area two or three years ahead of myself."
Kate is now twenty-four, and The Dreaming is undoubtedly her most mature work to date. It took over a year to make, and the result is an intricate, complex web of ideas and images, with sounds used to create pictures which are sometimes too abstract for easy comprehension. I wondered if she was occasionally being deliberately obscure.
"No, not at all [Ha! Why does Kate say things like this?], because although there's a lot going on in some of the tracks, to me they're kept on a simple basic level within themselves--all the ideas are aiming towards the same picture.
"Like, some people have said it's 'over-produced', but I don't think it is, because I know what I was trying to get at. I think of over-produced albums as the ones that have strings, brass, choirs, that sort of thing."
What about the lyrics, though? As I sat struggling with them, I felt that you had made them consciously oblique in places.
"I don't intend them to be that way. [Ha!] It's just the way they come out. The thing is, when I have subject-matter, the best way I could explain it would be across ten pages of foolscap, but as I've got to get in a song, I have to precis everything.
"Maybe the album is more difficult for people than I meant it to be. It isn't intended to be complicated, but it obviously is, for some. A lot of it is to do with the fact that the songs are very involved--there's lots of different layers.
"Hopefully the next one will be simpler, but each time it gets harder, because I'm getting more involved. I'm trying to do something better all the time."
Do you worry about losing fans?
"Yeah, I do, because obviously from a purely financial point of view I depend on money to make albums, and if they're not successful it's quite likely I won't have the scope to do what I want on the next one.
"But, I'd rather go artistically the way I want to than hang onto an audience, because you have to keep doing what you feel. It's just luck if you can hang onto the people, as well."
The time and cost of The Dreaming has already been fairly well documented--did you intend to spend that long recording it?
"No, not at all. But I find that a lot of things I do now take so much longer than I thought they would."
What is it that takes the time? Translating your ideas onto record?
"Yeah, that's what's really hard. In so many cases you need to be in the studio to get the sounds, and it can maybe take a couple of days just to get one idea across. Sometimes you wonder if you should just leave them."
How do you feel about your early records now?
"I don't really like them. A lot of the stuff on the first two albums I wasn't at all happy with. I think I'm still fond of a lot of the songs, but I was unhappy about the way they came across on record.
"Also, until this album I'd never really enjoyed the sound of my own voice. It' always been very difficult for me, because I've wanted to hear the songs in a different way."
Why didn't you like it?
"I think a lot of people don't like the sound of their own voices. It's like you have to keep working towards something you eventually do like. It was very satisfying for me on this album, because for the first time I can sit and listen to the vocals and think, 'Yeah, that's actually quite good.'"
Were you pushing it more to create different sounds?
"In a way. But I probably used to push it more in other ways. I went through a phase of trying to leap up and down a lot when I was writing songs. I used to try to push it almost acrobatically. Now I'm trying more to get the song across, and I have more control. When I'm trying to think up the character is when it needs a bit of push."
Do you always try to put yourself in the role of a character, then?
"Yeah, normally, because the song is always about something, and always from a particular viewpoint. There's ormally a personality that runs along with it.
"Sometimes I really have to work at it to get in the right frame of mind, because it's maybe the opposite of how I'm feeling, but other times it feels almost like an extension of me, which it is, in some ways."
You have been accused in the past of living in some kind of fantasy world. Would you say you refuse to face up to reality?
"Now. I think I do, actually, although there are certain parts of me that definitely don't want to look at reality. Generally speaking, though, I'm quite realistic, but perhaps the songs on the first two albums created some kind of fantasy image, so people presumed that I lived in that kind of world."
Where do you get the ideas for songs from?
"Anywhere, really. They're two or three tracks that I had the ideas for on the last album but never got together. Others come from films, books or stories from people I know. That kind of thing."
What about Pull Out the Pin, a song about VietNam? Was that something you'd always wanted to write about?
"No, I didn't think I'd ever want to write about it until I saw this documentary on television which moved me so much I thought I just had to."
Do you hope to change people's opinions by what you write?
"No. Because I don't think a song can ever do that. If people have strong opinions, then they're so deep-rooted that you'll never be able to do much. Even if you can change the way a few people think, you'll never be able to change the situation anyway.
"I don't ever write politically, because I know nothing about politics. To me they seem more destructive than helpful. I think I write from an emotional point of view, because even though a situation may be political, there's always some emotional element, and that's what gets to me."
The thoughts and ideas are expressed through a variety of sounds, an adventurous use of instruments and people--from Rolf Harris on dijeridu to Percy Edwards on animal impressions! Kate has also discovered the Fairlight, a computerised synthesiser.
"It's given me a completely different perspective on sounds," she enthuses. "You can put any sound you want onto the keyboard, so if you go 'Ugh!', you can play 'Ugh!' all the way up the keyboard. Theoretically, any sound that exists, you can play.
"I think it's surprising that with all the gear around at the moment, people aren't experimenting more."
Whatever you may think of Kate Bush, you could never say that she's not been prepared to take risks. In the four years that have passed since her startling first single Wuthering Heights, she has grown increasingly adventurous and ambitious, creating music that she hopes will last longer than much of today's transient pop.
Of The Dreaming she says: "I wanted it to be a long-lasting album, because my favourite records are the ones that grow on you--that you play lots of times because each time you hear something different."
Never particularly a public fave, her last live shows were three years ago, and although she plans to do some in the future, they'll take at least six months to prepare. [Try six years and counting.]
She admits that she found her initial success hard to cope with at times.
"I still find some things frightening. I've adjusted a hell of a lot, but it still scares me. There are so many aspects that if you start thinking about are terrifying. The best thing to do is not even to think about them. Just try to sail through”.
I am going to round off soon. Ahead of its forty-first anniversary on 13th September, I will write about various songs and Bush’s production and use of technology throughout The Dreaming. If you go to Wikipedia, you can see some of the reaction to and reception of The Dreaming. I would recommend article such as this one from Ann Powers. Last year, Garry Berman shared his opinions about the stunning The Dreaming:
“Now we come to the album whose 40th birthday we celebrate this year, The Dreaming. Kate began work on it shortly after the 1980 release of Never For Ever, and, for the first time, acted as sole producer.
What makes The Dreaming such a brilliant album? With a track list of ten songs, no two songs sound even remotely alike. The variation of arrangements, musical choices, and use of instruments is not only effective, but truly astonishing. Perhaps even more impressive is the range of topics she has written about, often from the perspective of the characters within the songs, rather than from her own, first-person experiences. The overall result is an album of remarkable creativity — and from a 24-year-old — presenting musical moments of unnerving power, romantic longing, and even humor.
Several highlights include:
“There Goes A Tenner” — A rare bit of jaunty fun from Kate, as part of a bank robbery scheme that goes wrong. Her character here details the plans to her fellow robbers, but warns, “I’m having dreams of things not going right/Let’s leave in plenty of time tonight…”
One of the more literal video treatments of a Kate Bush song.
“Pull Out The Pin” — What could be more diametrically opposed to “There Goes A Tenner” than this song, a nightmarish account of war, as seen from the perspective of a Viet Cong warrior stalking an American soldier through the jungle, almost mocking how out-of-place and unfamiliar the American is in such an environment (seriously, who else would ever even think of such a scenario for a song?)Kate’s blood-curdling refrain, “I Love Life! (pull out the pin)” raises the tension up to an almost unbearable degree.
“The Dreaming” — Kate takes us to Australia to lament Western Civilization’s exploitation of the continent’s wildlife and indigenous population (“ ‘Bang’ goes another kanga on the bonnet of the van…”) Rolf Harris — comedian, musician, and more recently disgraced due to a sex scandal — plays a native didgeridoo to add atmosphere; Kate reportedly wanted to respect the Aboriginal tradition of allowing only men to play the instrument, and declined to attempt it herself in the studio.
“Night of the Swallow” — Another haunting track (and my personal favorite) with a strong Celtic flavor, especially in the instrumental passage played by Irish musicians recorded in Ireland, during an all-night recording session with Kate. The somewhat mysterious narrative involves a secret, night-time escape by plane, possibly by a smuggler on his way to his next rendezvous, with Kate pleading, “I won’t let you do it/If you go, I’ll let the law know…” The dramatic final chorus is as gorgeous as it is spine-tingling.
Other songs such as “Suspended in Gaffa” and “Houdini” can also be considered highlights of the album, and again are as different from each other in theme and overall texture as are the rest of the tracks throughout. Kate doesn’t dip into the same well twice, that’s for sure.
Kate’s real mother makes a cameo in the latter part of the video.
The Dreaming reached as high as #3 on the U.K. album charts, with five singles released, including the title track and the opening number, “Sat in Your Lap.”
The album is a triumph of imagination, songwriting, and musicianship. It shows Kate at full creative force”.
From the promise and excellence through Never for Ever in 1980, Bush took a big step forward in terms of confidence and sonic scope for The Dreaming. She created a more accessible and even more ambitious album for Hounds of Love. That being said, I don’t think The Dreaming should be seen as too weird or overly-experimental. Bush’s production throughout is incredible. Twenty-four when the album came out, it is remarkably accomplished. No doubt an inspiration for so many musicians today, if you are someone who has not been a fan of The Dreaming - or felt it is a bit too out-there -, I would urge you to take another listen. This incredible album…
WILL never lose its beauty and strange allure.