All You Cruisers - THE KATE BUSH VOTING THREAD (ilm artist poll #24: deadline Saturday 25 August)

remember staring at it for quite some time c. age 14 31

i often have trouble with theatrical approaches that combine precision of vocal delivery, refined art music aspirations, a sense of intellectual distance, and what seems a "genteel" manner. such styles remind me too much of estate gardens and conservatories, a suffocating sort of upper-crust fussiness.

kate bush might seem to fit comfortably in this reductive ballpark, and that's what kept me away for years, but once you get through the distinctly mannered surface, her music is extremely direct and emotionally expressive. and catchy, inventive, otherworldly, etc.

― contenderizer, Tuesday, August 21, 2012 5:51 PM (20 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Good analysis... Who do you think exemplifies that style you describe? It rings very true, but I'm having a hard time thinking of my own examples.

contederizer, what do you mean by "a sense of intellectual distance"? If an artist like Bush uses her intellect, by its very nature then she's not distancing herself from the material, no?

Your description made me realize that perhaps I perceive it as aesthetically unpleasantly discontiguous when very theatrical vocals are married to somewhat restrained/studied/refined backing music... Freddie/Bruce works for me because the music is also highly intense, over-the-top, etc.

or Bowie/Ferry?

Love them both, though both can veer very slightly into yeesh. But the music is so meaty.

I mean, Roxy Music positively smokes instrumentally speaking.

in response to alfred, what clarke just said. when theatricality loses its restraint and refinement, it can seem to more fully commit to its moment. there's little sense of intellectual distance in queen's music - you're right there in the midst of the carnival. due to its basic reserve, kate's material can rather studied, and that in turn encourages me, as a listener, to adopt a studying distance.

my go-to example of the style i was describing (and why i don't like it) has long been wim mertens, but i just listened to several of his vocal performances, and find that i now like him quite a bit. so maybe i'm now more open to these approaches than i used to be...

one too many nows

exactly when on Saturday is the deadline cos i'm pretty busy this week?

End of Saturday. I'm planning on starting the countdown on Monday, so I'll need Sunday free for adding up.

k i will try to bite the bullet then

Clarke, I tend to agree (I prefer the post-'80 material) but even on the early stuff Bush isn't Scott Walker.

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, August 21, 2012 2:34 PM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

And thank Christ for that!

― Clarke B., Tuesday, August 21, 2012 2:34 PM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Kate would never give a full-throated vibrato to a line that didn't deserve it, or a melodramatic word just because it ends a line. These reference points (Freddy Mercury!) are so bizarre to me. Kate is "studied" in the sense that she's well versed in classical vocal technique and cleaves to it at the expense of obvious blues or gospel phrasing, but the way she uses intonation, melody and--most of all for me--the expressive capabilities of her entire vocal complex--larynx, soft palate, secondary respiratory muscles--is so immediate... so PUNK ROCK. Or maybe post-punk, whatever. Her tone is often so strangled yet controlled; she can choke on a word ("hounds" in that song's second chorus) then open up (the sound, the emotion) a little with each subsquent line. Not to mention all the donkey braying. Or gutteral groaning through lines like, "I love a life..." What I hear in her performances is someone who came of age during the punk/post-punk eras and turned a well-trained and versatile instrument into a mimic of the multiplicity of voices that exploded during this era and the unexpected emotions they foregrounded. "Theatrical" as in a competing/complementary chorus of voices rather than just some cockfarmer belting bad Jacques Brel.

"Hounds of Love" is illustrative of her strenths for me--the way the drums stumble forwards like some exhausted prey, the way her vocal starts full strength and then loses breath with each line before the first chorus, the physicality and tenderness of the trapped & terrified fox and his outsize heartbeat, her renewed strength in the chorus's lines of abandon and the subsequent ambiguity of whether she's his captor or rescuer... Good lord this woman rules.

I like Queen fine (I'm sure Kate does too) but they are some cheesy motherfuckers. Sure, they're a fucking carnival, woo hoo. Freddy's a fucking belter. All this about restraint in Bush's music is a bizarre mischaracterization--when was the last time you actually listened to the Dreaming? "Genteel?" Pay attention to the lyrics. Listen to the braying, the screaming, the groaning, the random ambient blackouts. If anything it's too bizarre, a pop outlier, not some fucking Charlotte Church record.

"I love a life..."

is that what she's saying? I always heard it as just "I love life!"

A perhaps odd seeming point of comparison for Kate's vocal approach circa The Dreaming that nonetheless makes intuitive sense to me is David Byrne.

Thinking in terms of restrained vs theatrical isn't too helpful I think, unless we mean "theatrical" in the sense of performed, fully embodied characters that Kate sinks into vocally as well as lyrically.

But those characters can be restrained (from "Delius" to "Watching You Without Me" to "The Sensual World") or overblown ("Babooshka", "Get Out Of My House", "Waking The Witch" etc.) or anything in between.

that's an interesting read, cuz i what i hear in the music, themes and phrasing of her early career seems so strongly rooted in the pre-punk 70s: musical theater, classicism, prog, glam, story songs, the literary gothic, spiritualism, aspiration to sophistication, femininity as delicacy, etc.

she does often use her voice to suddenly and even violently rupture the texture of her songs, as you say, "the way she uses intonation, melody and--most of all for me--the expressive capabilities of her entire vocal complex--larynx, soft palate, secondary respiratory muscles--is so immediate." otm, there's a lot of this on the dreaming (and elsewhere). i don't know that i ever would have associated it with punk, but now that it's been said, i can sort of see the connection... then again, it reads just as clearly as a prog and/or avant-garde gesture, imo.

All this about restraint in Bush's music is a bizarre mischaracterization--when was the last time you actually listened to the Dreaming? "Genteel?" Pay attention to the lyrics. Listen to the braying, the screaming, the groaning, the random ambient blackouts. If anything it's too bizarre, a pop outlier, not some fucking Charlotte Church record.

― RCMP, Wednesday, August 22, 2012 12:41 AM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

well, i should only use the word "genteel" to refer to the more mannered, theatrical and self-consciously "refined" elements of her early albums. there's almost no trace of that approach left on hounds of love, and little of it on the dreaming. but craft, intellection, delicacy, and precision characterize her entire career, imo. this is certainly true relative to what i think of as punk.

I find the leap when Kate gets her hands on the production knobs extraordinary. Wuthering Heights et al are excellent songs and the arrangements and production are highly professional and effective, but totally conventional - then you get to something like There Goes A Tenner and it's so outlandish it seems like a joke.

I love a life..."

is that what she's saying? I always heard it as just "I love life!"

I swear there's an extra syllable in there, which is most obvious when the line's repeated at the end of the chorus. Or maybe it's just a legato of "Iloveliiiife." Which is how you might say it with the world about to blow up in front of you.

Contenderizer I'm not going to search for it now (it's late here) but there's an old mark s post where he footnotes the various dramatic ironies in each of the lines in the first verse of "God Save The Queen" (I think--anyway, one of the classic Pistols tracks). This is the spirit I'm approaching the NFE/Dreaming/Hounds era in--that punk/post punk expanded the vocabulary of the art song rather than killing it, or whatever.

Not to forget that Peter Gabriel, perhaps the epitome of "Prog Gone Dark", was a friend/inspiration. A lot of his approaches towards production, especially around his third album, influenced Bush.

Lyric sheet inside my vinyl of "The Dreaming" reads "I love life".

kate adds a little extra oomph syllable to the end of words sometimes, there are other examples on The Dreaming, can't think of them now, though.

I like Queen fine (I'm sure Kate does too) but they are some cheesy motherfuckers. Sure, they're a fucking carnival, woo hoo. Freddy's a fucking belter. All this about restraint in Bush's music is a bizarre mischaracterization--when was the last time you actually listened to the Dreaming? "Genteel?" Pay attention to the lyrics. Listen to the braying, the screaming, the groaning, the random ambient blackouts. If anything it's too bizarre, a pop outlier, not some fucking Charlotte Church record.

― RCMP, Wednesday, August 22, 2012 3:41 AM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this post rules (as well as the previous one.) my thoughts exactly re: comparing k.b. to other "theatrical" singers. for her everything is in service to the character of the song, it's not just style.

I don't think I'd characterize Kate as restrained as a vocalist at ALL; didn't mean to convey that if I in fact did. "The braying, the screaming, the groaning"--yes, that's what I mean when I said "yeesh, that's a bit much"... I just plain don't like the way she uses her voice sometimes. But other times I find it absolutely thrilling and captivating. RCMP, I enjoyed your reading above quite a bit. I listened to The Dreaming just yesterday, in fact, and the "I love (a) life" part was most certainly a yeesher for me. It's not an "I can't handle it" kind of thing, though, it's really more of a cringe.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oV9IrK69IDo

Three days left for voting. Get those albums in a line and do this thing.

man The Sensual World is such a letdown after how much better each album gets going from Kick to Hounds.

major lack of strong melodic ideas / general songwriting standard is a lot lower

agree for the most part, but i think kick is p remarkable. the next two are a drop down from that, followed by the massive leaps to the dreaming and then <<<hounds>>>

sensual world at least has some commitment to a personal/experimental songwriting & production approach. even that goes out the window on the red shoes.

Have submitted a ballot but it's essentially meaningless as all our music is packed-up for moving, so I've not been able to relisten to anything. :(

There is meaning elsewhere in life; I'm fine with that.

I've just downloaded a random mp3 of Experiment IV (hard drive death earlier this year, original got lost) and it has a two-minute violin intro I've never heard before O_O

Voted! Had something from every album except The Red Shoes.

Kick Inside: 1
Lionheart: 1
Never For Ever: 3
The Dreaming: 4
Hounds of Love: 4
Sensual World: 1
Aerial: 4
50 Words: 1
Other: 1

FUCK I forgot that "Breathing" is really great

i really like the kick inside for what it is but put next to what came later it seems...almost like a joke. juvenilia, certainly.

actually think there's a lot more going on production and songwriting wise in Red Shoes than Sensual. Sensual World is just so bland production wise - the songs don't distinguish themselves at all other than This Woman's Work. Red Shoes is pretty diverse and exciting in comparison for me

will be voting for Why Should I Love You?

Dude "The Fog".

the title reflects my memory of it, and i only heard it 30 minutes ago

I tried to rescue The Red Shoes from ignominy years ago.

my ballot is so ridiculously weighted towards my three favourite KB albums - they're responsible for 16/20 tracks :/ pretty much everything I shortlisted from the others got shunted further and further down the list when they appeared

we stand in the atlantic
and we become panoramic~~~~~~~

^^the finest moment of Kate's career

Now that's worth some thought - she does 'great moments' better & more than anybody else imo.

we stand in the atlantic
and we become panoramic~~~~~~~

^^the finest moment of Kate's career

― lex pretend, Thursday, August 23, 2012 12:15 PM (36 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

otm

Ballot sent, no attempt made to distribute things evenly:

Kick: 2
Lionheart: 0
NFE: 1
Dreaming: 6
Hounds: 5
Sensual World: 1
Red Shoes: 2
Aerial: 1
Snow: 1
Non-album single: 1

(If we had 40 like on the Cure poll, that would look a lot different -- I could easily come up with another 20 not from Dreaming or Hounds.)

the kick inside: 0
lionheart: 0
never for ever: 1
the dreaming: 5
hounds of love: 5
the sensual world: 1
the red shoes: 0
aerial: 6
50 words for snow: 0
non-album tracks: 2

i do actually like the albums that got 0, just...not as much

I've just downloaded a random mp3 of Experiment IV (hard drive death earlier this year, original got lost) and it has a two-minute violin intro I've never heard before O_O

Was just listening to "Houdini" on The Dreaming -- and agree re. her using her voice to interrupt the mood of the song. But I'm a little less sold on it being "punk." I mean, it's punk I guess in the same way Van Der Graaf Generator is punk.

It's punk in the way that "Bach swings" (Wynton Marsalis).

submitted

my album breakdown:

kick 2
lionheart 0
n4e 1
dreaming 4
HoL 4
TSW 3
TRS 1
aerial 2
50words 1
nonalbum 2