FEATURE:
Kate Bush: The Whole Story
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1983 promoting The Single File
The KBC Article Issue 15 (Christmas 1983), Dear Friends, and the Short Story, On the Road Home
__________
THIS is…
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in the studio on 23rd September, 1983/PHOTO CREDIT: Mirrorpix
the final time I am using this resource for inspiration for Kate Bush: The Whole Story. It is The Published Writings of Kate Bush. Her writing short stories, conducting her own interviews or being interviewed. Updating fans in different ways. The final article I am grabbing is from Christmas 1983. Or it was published at that time. Bush looking ahead to Christmas. Little did people know that she was working on Hounds of Love. In 1983, she was putting together a bespoke studio right by East Wickham Farm and the seeds were being sowed. It was a happy and productive year, so I did want to source a great article and a lovely story. Here is Kate Bush’s writing for Issue 15 of the Kate Bush Club:
“Dear Friends,
Here we are at Christmas again, so soon. Looks like a white one this year, with thermal underwear doing a booming trade.
Hopefully by now the video The Single File is readily available in the shops, and I hope those of you who have invested are pleased with the contents--I'd love to hear your comments.
As you will notice, we have a newcomer in this issue: Gray Levett, who has written us a Christmas article, and will be bringing us news in every issue from across the ocean in his Letter From America.
I met Gray a long time ago, when I went to stay at his house by the sea. He was very charming, and we talked of many interesting things. He was a perfect host, and we had a wonderful time. We've kept in touch over the years, through letters and calls, and since Gray moved out to America, his career has blossomed and grown, and now he is a very busy and sought-after man. But he still finds time to carefully research and compile his information and send it here to us, and I hope that you will feel as we do, that his material in our magazine is exciting and keeps us in touch with all the news, views and progress in America. [In fact, however, the readers--at least the American ones--did not find Mr. Levett's material very satisfactory. I was not the only American fan who wrote to this "American" correspondent to help him out and set him straight on some of his "facts", without ever receiving any acknowledgement or reply. Finally, after two more "Letters from America", Mr. Levett quietly dropped off the Newsletter writing staff, and he has not been heard from since 1984.]
Although Bush did not release an album in 1983, she was still promoting The Dreaming, which came out the year before. Night of the Swallow came out as a single in November 1983. The Single File (released in November 1983) was possibly a way of getting some commercial success after The Dreaming did not perform as well as EMI had hoped. It reached three in the U.K., but it did not have the same massive sales as an earlier album, such as her 1978 debut, The Kick Inside. Gray Levett someone who a lot of Kate Bush fans do not know about. I did not. It seems that his association with the Kate Bush Club was pretty brief! In any case, Bush was probably not as successful and popular in America as she would become. Hounds of Love reached the top thirty, but The Dreaming struggle. The Single File got the odd positive review, but I don’t think it is an official greatest hits. That would come in 1986 with The Whole Story. Instead, it provided fans a chance to see all these incredible videos up to this point. The Single File was after Hounds of Love, so it was popular because of that, and the videos from that album are so brilliant. Riding the tide of massive acclaim, whereas some critics were mixed towards The Dreaming.
I'm afraid there has been a delay with the boxed single set, and this will probably be released early next year now, rather than before Christmas. But as with the video, I hope the finished thing will dispel any disappointment from waiting. [Again, fans were not entirely pleased with this product, when it finally did arrive. There were numerous complaints about the poor quality of the re-pressings and their flimsy picture-sleeves. I, for one, have always admired the design of the box, even if some aspects of the product as a whole were disappointing.]
I hope you enjoy our Christmassy stories and games, and may all your Christmasses be white.
Lots of love,
Kate xx
Disappointment from fans regarding that compilation. It is why I do not consider The Single File cannon, where The Whole Story is. I still think that the videos need to be HD and 4K, as you go on YouTube and some of them still suffered from looking bad. Christmas 1983 was not white, either. Bush’s predictions of it being white did not get realised. On Christmas Day, it was also slightly mild in some parts of the U.K.! There was still magic happening, as Bush was working on Hounds of Love and building this masterpiece. She would release it on 16th September, 1985.
On the Road Home
It had been a good day, and as I tied the tree on to the roof it showered me in its green perfume. For just a moment it took me to that place where all my Christmas days meet as one; where there are reindeer and chimney pots and blazing fires. It hung in my head for an instant and then was gone as I checked the clock and made for the shops.
It was unusually quiet for an afternoon so near to Christmas. It had even snowed that morning, and the shop attendants seemed almost happy at their work. It felt like some kind of magic, wrapping everyone and everything up.
The ever-growing list was finally getting smaller--tick, tick, tick: the turkey, the pudding, the crackers. Tick, tick: a present for David, a present for Granddad.
With just five minutes to spare, I had finished the shopping and was wading back to the car through the snow. It really was quiet that night, and it had been dark for a good hour. I opened the car boot and wedged as much as possible into the already full space.
It was great to be in the car and on the way home. Everything looked so beautiful in the snow! It was like driving down a tunnel of trees to Narnia. I was in no hurry, and didn't feel like the radio--the snow and my thoughts were just right together. Not too fast, remember the driving conditions, ease off the accelerator, check the mirror (no-one around), nice and easy...
I wonder, when it comes to her stories, how based on her own life it is. Bush wrote several short stories for the Kate Bush Club. These traditional Christas themes and images that Bush put some of her into her 1980 Christmas single, December Will Be Magic Again. 1983’s Christmas not as snowy and idyllic as she was wishing. Though we do get this vivid and happy story. Many people can relate to the duties and stresses around Christmas. Getting everything prepared, bought and organised!
It was just as I started thinking about checking the tree on the roof that I got this feeling...this feeling that there was someone else in the car. I dismissed it--ridiculous, I'd have seen them. Check the mirror. There. Nothing. But what if he's lying down on the back seat and I can't see him?
I slowed right down, and twisted my head round. Nothing.
Check the mirror. It must be paranoia. I'm going just a little faster now. I know it's nothing, but it's just this feeling...
Then his face is right there, in between the two front seats:
"Look out, look out...Stop."
My eyes turned from his moving lips to the road, my foot already reacting on the brake. I skidded to a stop. After just a few seconds I had taken in that there was nothing in the road. Nothing in front, nothing behind...and no-one in the back of the car.
The thought of having to get out into the night--out of the car-- was more terrifying than staying in it, so I started up the motor, put my foot steadily on the accelerator and turned on the radio-- light music, nice and loud.
By the time I turned into the drive I was wondering if it had really happened at all. I was shaking, and hadn't checked my mirror once since I'd had to stop. I ran into the house. As soon as I saw David I released the tears.
The story taking a sinister turn. It starts to sound like The killer in the backseat (also known as High Beams). There is also folkloric anthologies like Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. In it, a driver is relentlessly followed and flashed with high beams by another car, only to discover later that the driver was trying to save her from a killer ducking in her back seat. I took that information from this Facebook page. Kate Bush is a Horror fan and many of her songs and videos bring in Horror and something darker. I think many of us have that paranoia of someone being in the back of the car when it is dark and we are alone. It is the same with being at home alone in the dark. Something that our mind does that is hard to control! I wonder who the ‘David’ is. People might jump to say David Gilmour. A dear friend and mentor, perhaps he was not as in her mind and life as much in 1983 as he was in 1978 and before.
I don't know if he believed me or not, and it didn't matter at the time. He acted like he did, that was all I needed. After all, I was seriously doubting it myself.
It was a week later, and we were all to go out for the evening. We arranged for our friends to pick us up on the way. It was Christmas Eve--the first time for years we'd left the house on that night. We were looking forward to the break, and once we were at the party we relaxed and enjoyed the rest from the rush. None of us really drank, but we ate as much as possible, working our way up the table--the food was delightful; and like perfect guests, as soon as we'd had our fill we left, in order to be in our homes to celebrate Christmas.
Since we'd arrived the weather had broken into a storm--heavy wind and rain. We piled into the car--our friends in the front, David and I in the back--and rolled toward home. After a while I realised what route we were now taking on the way to our house: past the shops...My eyes fixed on the road ahead. I felt uncomfortable --it was that same feeling--I would not panic—
We came to the spot where I had stopped that night, that figure shouting in my ear. We were travelling at a fair speed. Then there he was--standing in the road, waving his arms to and fro. He was right in front of us.
"Look out, look out...Stop."
The words came out as if they were not my own.
I am not sure if there is an urban legend or Horror story where this thing happens exactly. It is Bush looking at folklore and stories she would have heard about when she was young. Adding to it. I do wonder why Bush never made these short stories into films, as it would have been great to see this one come to life. Bush as an actor is something many would have liked to see explored more. This figure that apparently Kate Bush – or the heroine – saw in the road but others did not.
The car ground to a halt, all four of us staring ahead. Still held by my fear, the other three slowly turned their faces toward mine.
"God, what's the matter with you?" shouted David, his face pale.
"Didn't you see him?" I screamed.
"See what?"
I couldn't believe it--he must be joking.
"What did you see?" queried my two friends, now laughing a little as they shook off their fright.
"The man...in the road!" I gasped.
As I pushed open the back door and got out, I looked back-- nothing. I looked ahead of the car--nothing. I would not have this! I knew I had seen him this time--he was real. The car headlights--the light beams filled with rain--stopped dead about six feet from the car. After that, darkness. Maybe he had fallen down. He must have been further ahead than I had thought. My friends, now concerned by my worry, were sitting with knitted brows in the car.
"Please," I said, "move the car forward very slowly--I need the light on the road."
The light slowly moved across the tarmac. I waited for a shoe, a hand. Then the edge of the light hit a rough brown surface.
How she thought she had hit something and there was nothing there. What caused this hallucination, I wonder? After starting out with this pleasant Christmas and build-up, it then gets darker and terrifying. I have not quite seen a story or film with this synopsis. Perhaps someone will suggest a few. I guess Identity, or Hallow Road, do something similar. It seems like a trope that would be in a lot of films but, doing some research, not that many that have this exact arc.
"There's something here!" I shouted. The light steadily moved forward and revealed the huge bough of a tree. It must have been a twenty-, thirty-footer, fallen in the storm. The car stopped. All four of us stood, fixed on the object.
"The speed we were going..." David said. "How did you see it? it?"
"I didn't," I answered. I hadn't seen it.
None of us could say anything--we were too shocked. We couldn't believe it. It had been close. So strange.
In the distance the clock struck the first chime of Christmas day.
And in the distance but coming towards us was the constant buzz of an engine. We'd all heard it. Something travelling fast: a motorbike, and now he's in view, he's coming straight towards us. He's not wearing a helmet, and with his hair pelted back by the rain, his face is white and stark in the night. His face is very like that man's--that man who was first shouting, then waving, is now coming straight for us.
"Look out, look out...Stop."
-- Kate Bush”.
The tension that builds and builds before that clock strike! It would make an amazing video. I wonder whether Bush was ever tempted to do something with it. That motorbike coming towards them at the end. Who was that pale-faced man?! It is a great haunted Christmas story. There were bits and pieces happening in 1984, but it was not until 1985 when we would get this activity. Hounds of Love coming out. In 1984, aside from working on Hounds of Love, The Single File was doing well in the U.K. On 16th January, Bush helps launch the Sky Channel, the first satellite T.V. station in the U.K. I can’t find video of that, but she did all these cool things outside of music. After getting this great update from Kate Bush in 1983, it would take a while for Hounds of Love to come out. Though, very few people could have any idea…
WHAT was in store.