FEATURE:
Kate Bush: The Tour of Life
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush on 28th November, 1979 at The Melody Maker Pop Awards at the Waldorf Hotel, London/PHOTO CREDIT: Arthur Sidey/Mirrorpix via Getty Images
The Novembers and Decembers of the Music Icon: 1978-1986
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UNSURE if I had…
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1979
covered this before, I wanted to spotlight the Novembers and Decembers of Kate Bush during some of the busiest years of her career. Going from 1978 through to 1986, Kate Bush was not necessarily given a lot of time to rest at the end of the year. As we are in December, many of us are winding down and thinking about Christmas. However, for an international star like Kate Bush, the final two months of the year still saw her very engaged and busy. Maybe not entirely her own decision, I do feel a lot of sympathy for her. However, there were some interesting events that happened during these months. Thanks to Gaffaweb for their chronology information:
“November, 1978
Julie Covington, who has known Kate and her family for many years, releases an album including her own cover version of The Kick Inside.
Kate promotes Lionheart in the Netherlands, German and France [although I have no record of any television appearances dating from the trip].
November 7, 1978
Hammer Horror enters the British singles chart at the unexpectedly low place of number 73. [Contrary to usual record-company theory, saturation of the market place with new, rushed product nearly immediately after the success of a debut album is more often than not a poor business move, and usually does as much damage as good to the artist's budding popularity. The commercially mediocre sales of Lionheart should not have surprised anyone.]
Lionheart has its international launch at the 14th-century Ammersoyen Castel, two hours' drive from Amsterdam. 120 guests, from EMI Europe, Canada and the UK, and including disk jockeys Tony Myatt and Kenny Everett, as well as Dr. and Mrs. Bush, attend the reception. After dinner, in the grounds of the castle, Leo Bouderwijas, the President of the Association of Dutch Phonographical Industries, presents Kate with the prestigious Edison Award for the best single of 1978. Kate is also presented with a platinum disc for sales of the album in Holland.
November 8, 1978
Kate flies back to the U.K. for a private buffet at The Venue for the presentation of the Melody Maker 1978 Poll Awards. In the first year of her public career Kate has been voted Best Female Vocalist and Brightest Hope of 1978.
November 10, 1978
The international release of Lionheart.
November 17, 1978
Kate performs Don't Push Your Foot on the Heartbrake on The Leo Sayer Show, on BBC TV. She is off on a personal appearance tour of British record shops.
The first professional year for Kate Bush was very busy. We can see, even before reaching December, is that she was not given too much chance to unwind in November 1978. Barely a moment since she wrapped up promotion for The Kick Inside, she had released and was releasing Lionheart. Not much time to breathe and reflect after putting out this incredible and hugely popular debut album.
November 21, 1978
Hammer Horror reaches its chart peak, number 44. Lionheart enters the album chart at number 36.
December, 1978
Kate is off to promote in the U.S.A. for the release there of The Man With the Child in His Eyes.
December 9, 1978
Most importantly, she performs two songs on the U.S. NBC-TV programme, Saturday Night Live. [This is the only live entertainment programme on U.S. television, and is the most influential programme for the pop music market, as well the most important American showcase for "alternative" music. Kate performs The Man With the Child in His Eyes, seated on a piano, to the accompaniment of veteran rock keyboardist Paul Shaffer; and Them Heavy People, in a raincoat and Fedora hat. Nothing remotely like it has ever been seen on American television before.]
She is invited by Eric Idle, who is host of that edition; and she is visited by Mick Jagger. Paul Simon drops in to watch her performance.
Kate does press and radio promotion and moves on to Canada for more of the same. She is known to have made no other North American television appearances during this trip, however.
Back in England the Kate Bush Club, the official fan club, is formed.
November 18, 1979
Kate participates in the concert to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the London Symphony Orchestra, with Cliff Richard. Kate gives the first (and to date the only) public performance of Blow Away, the song she dedicated to Bill Duffield.
"Miss Bush was in breathtaking form...She emerged as the only star." (Simon Kinnersly, Daily Mail.)
November 28, 1979
Kate attends the Melody Maker Annual Poll Awards dinner at the Waldorf Hotel. For the second year running she is presented with the Best Female Singer award.
During November Kate records a track called December Will Be Magic Again, which she wants to release as a Christmas single. [For undisclosed reasons the release is postponed.]
November 30, 1979
A new recording of Lesley Duncan's Sing, Children, Sing is released, with Kate, Pete Townsend, Joe Brown and Vicki Brown on backing vocals. (Kate's voice is indistinguishable.) All profits from the single are to go to the U.N. Year of the Child fund.
December 21, 1979
The Winter Snowtime Special is aired on BBC TV. This is the second of two films for which Kate had contributed performances on February 18, 1979. However, the original film of Kate singing Wuthering Heights while walking barefoot in the snow is not included. Instead, a hastily filmed video for December Will Be Magic Again is aired on the programme.
It is interesting how she wound down 1978 and 1979. In 1978,t here was that U.S. promotion and her only appearance on Saturday Night Live. Kate Bush records her only Christmas single in 1979 and that would come out in 1980. I did not know that Bush recorded this version of Wuthering Heights with her walking in the snow. It would have been amazing to see that! I love how Bush performed Blow Away (For Bill) in November 1979. One of the best tracks from 1980’s Never for Ever, it was perhaps a good chance to break away from promotion and the interview treadmill and do something more interesting. It is a shame that this gem of a song was not performed live more. However, we can also see how, in 1979, she was still busy at the end of the year. In the run-up to Christmas, Bush was not really spared that much. That need to keep her in the public eye and ensure that she was very visible.
December 28, 1979
Kate, a forty-five-minute television special, is screened on BBC TV, featuring songs old and new. Some of these were filmed during live television-studio performances, others were videos prepared in advance and featuring studio recordings in more or less the same form as their album counterparts. Among the songs performed are Violin, Egypt, and Ran Tan Waltz (which would emerge as the b-side of Babooshka in 1980). In addition, one or two small pieces of incidental music are recorded specifically for the programme, which includes a guest appearance by Peter Gabriel, and a duet by Gabriel and Kate of Roy Harper's song, Another Day.
November, 1980
Kate writes an article for the magazine Woman's World, entitled How Can You Eat Dead Animals?
Meanwhile she returns to the studio to record the single version of December Will Be Magic Again.
November 17, 1980
December Will Be Magic Again is released. No promotional video is made for this single.
Kate is working with Peter Gabriel. They record a new version of Roy Harper's song Another Day, for a projected single. They also attempt to co-write a song for the b-side, and a song called Ibiza results. (Note: PFM spells this "Ibizza", but this is probably an error. "Ibiza" is the spelling for the Spanish coastal resort island.) They are not satisfied with it, however, and the project is shelved.
November 25, 1980
Kate appears on the BBC TV chat programme The Russell Harty Show for an edition dedicated to the composer Frederick Delius. She is interviewed with the cellist Julian Lloyd Webber and Delius's assistant and collaborator Eric Fenby. Following a screening of part of Kate's Dr. Hook video of Delius, Fenby suggests that the composer would have seen it as "a very gracious tribute."
December, 1980
Babooshka, which, outside the UK, has been the lead single from Never For Ever, is an international hit, reaching "top ten" status in most countries in Europe, as well as Australia and Canada. Kate's music has still made little impact in the United States, however. Her second and third albums have not even been released there, although a small but fiercely devoted cult following cause a vigorous trade in imports.
Meanwhile Kate tapes an extensive interview at her home for a Canadian television production company which is preparing a series of programmes entitled Profiles in Rock, with interviewer Doug Pringle, to be aired on CITY-TV, Toronto.
I did not know the record schedule for December Will Be Magic Again. I always assumed that the 1979 version recorded was the single version. I know there is more than one version, though I was unfamiliar with the fact she returned to record December Will Be Magic Again in November 1980. That Profiles in Rock interview is one of the standouts. I have watched that conversation several times. Bush so relaxed throughout. It is an extraordinary interview and one where we learn new things. One of the few from that time period where she is not patronised or subjected to sexism or endless questions about her personal life.
December 30, 1980
The first of two special forty-five minute programmes is broadcast on BBC Radio 1, in which Kate plays and discusses with DJ Paul Gambaccini some of her favourite music by other artists. This programme is devoted to traditional and classical favourites.
December 31, 1980
The second forty-five minute programme is aired over BBC Radio 1, this one including some of Kate's favourite tracks by "popular" artists.
November 12, 1981
Kate attends a party at Abbey Road Studios to celebrate the studios' 50 years of operation. She cuts the celebration cake with Helen Shapiro.
November 21, 1981
Kate appears on the commercial TV programme Friday Night Saturday Morning, a new chat show, at the invitation of the host, zoologist Dr. Desmond Morris, to talk about her music and expressive dance.
December 22, 1981
Kate takes a break from recording to tighten melodies and lyrics.
November 1982
Kate is in Germany promoting album and single. [She gives a lip-synch performance of Suspended in Gaffa, known as the "puppets" or "marionettes" version.]
November 2, 1982
There Goes a Tenner is released in the U.K., and Suspended in Gaffa is released in all other territories. There Goes a Tenner is the "lost single". It is not promoted and gains no airplay on radio. It is the only single of Kate's not to enter the official chart. Suspended in Gaffa is, however, a great success, going top ten in most European countries and in Canada [? Top ten?] and Australia.
It seems that December 1982 was quieter than previous years. Though it was a quieter month for her compared to November, she did have commitments right at the end of the year. However, for The Dreaming, it does seem there was a bit of a break in December 1982. It was a commercial success but not as big-selling as The Kick Inside. However, there were singles released from it and Bush was very busy. Suspended in Gaffa is one of those Kate Bush songs that I think should have been released as a single in the U.K., as it would have charted quite high. It is one of best songs from The Dreaming. One of the best from her entire discography, in fact.
November 13, 1982
EMI-America releases The Dreaming album, which enters the Billboard Top 200, the first of Kate's albums to do so. The album begins to get a crop of very good U.S. reviews praising its creativity. The album is pushed by spots on U.S. college radio, and towards the end of the year airplay begins to pick up. Kate begins to expand her small cult following in the U.S. to attract a wider audience.
November 21, 1983
Night of the Swallow is released as a single in Eire.
December 1983
The Single File video compilation is released. Kate makes personal appearances in Kingston and Holborn.
November 17, 1985
Kate flies on the Concorde to New York (via Washington, D.C.) to promote the album and single. She makes a personal appearance at the Tower Record Store in Greenwich Village for which the queue extends for hundreds of yards around the block. She appears on the local New York news programme Live at Five, and tapes an interview for later airing on the cable programmes Night Flight, Heartlight City and Radio 1990. She also visits the MTV studios to tape a brace of short interviews. She is also interviewed by Love-Hound Doug Alan.
A track from the new album, Hello Earth, is featured as background music for a scene in the then-top-rated U.S. TV series Miami Vice.
From New York, Kate travels to Toronto where she tapes at least five more interviews (all from the same studios). These will appear on various Canadian programmes, including the national evening news, Much Music, The New Music, Good Rockin' Tonite, and various local news reports.
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush at Tower Records, New York in 1985 promoting Hounds of Love
November 30, 1985
Running Up That Hill peaks at number 30 in the U.S. Billboard chart.
Meanwhile Kate goes straight from Canada to Holland (taping an interview for Count Down), France, and Germany (where she gives a lip-synch performance of Running Up That Hill on the programme Extratour), and still manages to return to England in time to attend the first Convention organised jointly by the Kate Bush Club and Homeground. This is held at the Dolphin Centre in Romford. Approximately 400 fans attend. At the convention Kate is presented with a Platinum Record for the U.K. sales of Hounds of Love. [All of Kate's family and Del Palmer are present, as well.]
December 14, 1985
Hounds of Love reaches its peak position of number 30 the U.S. Billboard album chart.
December 23, 1985
In the annual Record Mirror poll Hounds of Love is voted Best Album, and Running Up That Hill is voted Best Single.
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”.
What we do get a sense of is how her year panned out. Even though November and December saw little in the way of promotion, there was still a lot in terms of activity. Things are different now. However, through 1978 to 1986 (and beyond), Bush was not given a lot of time to take her foot off of the gas. However, there were some really interesting events and happenings at the end of the years. The end of 1985 was especially interesting. Bush seeing Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) doing well in the U.S. and her doing well with Record Mirror and their readers. Possibly the peak of her powers. I did not mark the thirty-ninth anniversary of The Whole Story, but that was an important release. Her only greatest hits album. Given the success she had experienced the previous year, she was more malleable to the idea of a greatest hits album. It went to number one. I love how there was this party on 9th November that Bush went to in the middle of shooting a video! I would loved to have been there. The end of 1986 provided her chance to relax and reflect. We think about Bush and her albums and singles. This year, Bush has focused on her Little Shrew (Snowflake) track. The animated video (which Bush directed) appeared in cinemas with World War II German resistance feature film, From Hilde, With Love. Bush gave an interview to Animation Magazine and she posted updates to her website. There was the fortieth anniversary of Hounds of Love in September. Twenty years of Aerial in November. It has been an interesting year. We are not sure what next year holds, but we will soon get a Christmas message from Kate Bush, where she will reflect on the year. Even though we might not see a new album, I am sure there will be surprises and great stuff. The always-mysterious Kate Bush definitely will…
KEEP us on our toes.