FEATURE:
A Beautiful Song
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1993 in a promotional photo for The Red Shoes/PHOTO CREDIT: Anthony Crickmay
The Influence of Blackbirds on Kate Bush
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THIS might be something…
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush shot in 1989 at Worx Studios, London/PHOTO CREDIT: Guido Harari
people associate more with Aerial. That 2005 double album features blackbirds. I shall explain how and where. You may think that the influence of blackbirds in Kate Bush’s music is small. Another features connected to Leah Kardos’s 33 1/3 Hounds of Love book, she dedicates a section to blackbirds. I do want to explore some of what she wrote. I think bird song in general is something that compels Kate Bush. If you asked her what her favourite singer is, she might not choose a human. In a 1996 radio interview, Bush said her favourite singers were the blackbird and thrush. No surprise that someone who lives in beautiful homes with wonderful gardens would revel in the wonder of nature. If you look at Kate Bush’s music, there is nature and the natural world woven through it. Perhaps more present on albums like Hounds of Love and Aerial, the latter does have that sublime second disc which is a suite called A Sky of Honey. It is the cycle of a summer’s day. You get the light coming up and birdsong. Then we go through the night and into the next day. Listen to songs like Aerial Tal and Prelude. They are resplendent with the sound of birdsong. I love Aerial Tal. Kate Bush recorded blackbirds in her garden, transcribed their birdsong, and replicated the intricate melodies with her own voice. The iconic cover of Aerial features the actual visual soundwave of a blackbird's song. Some of Kate Bush’s albums were impacted by cities and smog. The anger and rush of the city. The music perhaps reflected that claustrophobia and tension. Aerial definitely does not suffer this. Whilst you get wonderful moments on albums where Bush was recording in London, those where she was at home and had the garden and nature around her impact me hardest.
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush performing during 2014’s Before the Dawn/PHOTO CREDIT: Ken McKay/Rex Features
I do love how she has this attachment to birds like the blackbird. I feel, when another studio album does arrive, the blackbird might make another appearance. It is one of the most graceful and pretty birds I feel. They are very small but have this beautiful song. To be woken by the chatter if blackbirds is a real luxury. Their influence stretches wider than Aerial. Leah Kardos notes that bird with black feathers – included are blackbirds, crows, ravens and corvids – are symbolic keepers of transitional realms in Celtic stories. The spaces between light and dark; sunset and the new dawn. Celtic legends say that if you put blackbird feathers under someone’s pillows then they will reveal their innermost thoughts and secrets. This all will be known to Bush. Someone who has always connected with things beyond the ordinary and ideas that provoke curiosity and wonder, the blackbird is this powerful bird. I do love where Leah Kardos lists where blackbirds feature in Kate Bush’s work. They did not feature until 1980 and her third studio album, Never for Ever. Among the things emanating from under her skirt – Nick Price illustrated Kate Bush and all manner of birds and animals flowing out, we can see a blackbird flying out with a trail of music notes accompanying it. Listen to Waking the Witch from Hounds of Love (1985). Featuring on The Ninth Wave, we hear the line “Help this blackbird!”. The image evoked as part of this ducking trial. Leah Kardos notes how the imagery is drawn possibly drawn from The Witch of Blackbird Pond. Guido Harari did a photoshoot with Kate Bush for The Sensual World in 1989. The images were manipulated years later “to include iridescent black plumage decorating Bush’s ace and hair. Harari named these images ‘Wings’ and ‘Birdfish’, in 2016”. An early demo of Why Should I Love You?, a song that features on 1993’s The Red Shoes, included these lyrics: “If I could sing like a blackbird, just like my heart was filled with summer/Of all the people in the world, why should I love you?”. Also in 1993, there are these great photos by Anthony Crickmay where bush wears a black and red gown. A blackbird is positioned on her head like a fascinator hat. Also staying in that year, in Bush’s short film, The Line, the Cross and the Curve, she encounters a trapped bird in the video for And So Is Love. She releases the blackbird, though it hits a window and dies. She picks its body up and kisses it to sleep. When Bush enters the mirror world to break the curse of the red shoes, she is dressed in the feathered gown from the Crickmay shoot. The blackbird is on her head and its wings are pointing up. Kate Bush’s favourite singer as of 1996 was the blackbird. I think she placed the thrush second. I am not sure if that order has changed and any humans have made the mix!
I forgot to mention that Sunset from Aerial also features the blackbird. On Aerial Tal, Bush mimics the blackbird song in the style of Indian Tala music. On the title-track finale, the blackbird is given an entire section of the song to sing. When speaking with MOJO in 2005, Bush said of blackbirds, “It’s almost like they’re vocalising light… And I love that it’s a language we don’t understand”. Bush said that some of blackbird song is aggressive and territorial. It is a complex sound and blend. If you listen to 2011’s 50 Words for Snow, the title track is where Bush names fifty imaginary words for snow. The fourth, Blackbird Braille, is another nod. In 2014, Bush brought her Before the Dawn residency to Hammersmith. Blackbird feature heavily. The Ninth Wave linked with A Sky of Honey. At the end of Waking the Witch, Bush can be seen dressed in black wings. At the gig’s conclusion – before the encore – when she performs Aerial, she takes flight. I think it is really great that the blackbird took on various forms through the years and weaved its way into her music. Its subtle appearance on the Never for Ever cover, though to more prominent placements on Aerial and Before the Dawn, Bush never losing her fascination with the majestic song of the blackbird. It goes beyond the purity and complexity of its song. Its symbolic meaning and connecting with Celtic stories. There has not been a lot written about Kate Bush and blackbirds. Her appreciation of birds and the natural world. Though she has a particular admiration for the blackbird. I am sure these are birds who are seen in her garden. Their glorious song greeting her as she wakes from sleep. Captured for Aerial and visually explored in photoshoots and during her residency, we may well see them appear again in the future. The blackbird has all these layers I think. In terms of their language and song. How they are depicted in Celtic stories, as we have seen. This 2017 blog piece on the blackbird makes some interesting observations: “Seeing a blackbird in meditation may mean you are on the cusp of a great change in your life. It may also mean that something that has been static or stagnant in your life for a long time will start to resolve itself, or move forwards. This could be a stale relationship, a job you feel stuck in, or perhaps a period of depression”. Above all things, the look, grace and song of the blackbird is…
UTTERLY majestic.