Thursday, September 13, 2012

the dreaming








Kate Bush took the helm for the first time and made a dramatic leap forward with the wild experimentation of this sophisticated and romantic art rock reverie. 'The Dreaming' was the first of her albums that she produced herself. Bush admits: "But it is quite...dark, I suppose, without meaning to be negative. I think it is saying...nearly all those songs are saying that people are great, but they really hurt each other, and you know, look at the things we do to each other. Why do we do this...you know, questioning. I think albums are like that, they're...they are little diaries. You know, you sort of sit there and write--not autobiographical things--but what you feel at the time, things that move you. I think it does say a lot about you at the time...I think the main difference was connected to my involvement. The more I get involved in the production, then the more I'm going to get exactly what I can out of it. Therefore, it automatically becomes a more demanding and personal project...I didn't have my own Fairlight and we had to hire one in. And really as soon as I met the Fairlight, I realized that it was something I really couldn't do without because it was just so integral to what I wanted to do with my music. I think I've always enjoyed synthesizers...I found them very interesting, but I never really enjoyed all the sounds. And what really gets me about the Fairlight is that any sound becomes musical. You can actually control any sound you want by sampling it in, and then being able to play it. I mean obviously, it doesn't always sound great, but the amount of potential exploration you have there with sounds is never-ending, and it's fabulous...Up until now, I've always written on the piano. It's been a very important part of it. The songs came from the piano and the chords. But with this album, the majority of the songs have come from the Fairlight and working with drum machines and things like that."

The album credits include a small army: Stewart Arnold on vocals and background vocals; Jimmy Bain on bass; Ian Bairnson on acoustic guitar, vocals, and background vocals; John Barrett as assistant engineer; Brian Bath on electric guitar; Haydn Bendall as engineer; Kate Bush on piano, strings, arrangements, keyboards, vocals, production, and fairlight; Paddy Bush on harmonica, mandolin, strings, stick, vocals, background vocals, and bullroarer; George Chambers as assistant engineer; Nick Cook as assistant engineer; Ian Cooper as cutting engineer; Danny Dawson as assistant engineer; Geoffrey Downes on trumpet and trumpet arrangements; Percy Edwards on sound effects and vocals; Stuart Elliott on percussion, drums, and stick; Gordon Farrell on vocals; David Gilmour on vocals and background vocals; Howard Gray as assistant engineer; Paul Hardiman on vocals, engineering, and mixing; Rolf Harris on didjeridu; Preston Heyman on drums and stick; Gary Hurst on vocals and background vocals; Seán Keane on violin; Nick Launay as engineer; Dave Lawson on synthesizer, synclavier, and string arrangements; Dónal Lunny on bouzouki and bouz; Alan Murphy on electric guitar; Liam O'Flynn on pipe, penny whistle, and uilleann pipes; Hugh Padgham as engineer; Del Palmer on bass, vocals, and fretless bass; Teri Reed as assistant engineer; Esmail Sheikh on drums; David Taylor as assistant engineer and mixing assistant; Danny Thompson on bass; Richard Thornton on vocals, choir, and chorus; Eberhard Weber on bass; Bill Whelan on horn arrangements and string arrangements; and Pete Wooliscroft on digital editing.



The recording process took over a year. Bush reflected at the time: “Yes. You see, from my point of view, although I’ve been out of the limelight, from the last album all I was planning to do was make another album as quickly as I could. But as soon as I wrote the songs I realized that it was very different, and all the time I do very much want to change my art, and I do actually think that the direction I’m going in is away from the commercial, well the obvious commercial. But I think from my point of view it wasn’t so much because I was out of the limelight that I had to do something more commercial, because at that time I wasn’t actually out of the limelight, I was just starting my next album, and I thought it was only going to take me a couple of months, but before I know it the whole thing has become much more involved, the songs are much more involved, and I know that it’s going to take me at least six months to a year to get it the way I want. So by the time it’s finished, I’ve been out of the public’s eye for maybe…apart from 'Sat In Your Lap', of course.”

'The Dreaming' charted at one hundred and fifty-seven in the US, forty-five in Sweden, thirty-six in Japan, twenty-three in Germany, twenty-two in Australia, twelve in Norway, eight in France, five in the Netherlands, and number three in the UK.












http://www.katebush.com/










The song 'The Dreaming' was originally titled "The Abo Song"; but was changed when it was discovered that it was a racial slur in Australia. Bush says: "It's very much based on aboriginal music that I'd been able to hear. And it does have quite a specific rhythm--that sort of slow, spacey thing. It's got so much space in it. And that was very much one of the things we wanted to get across, this... much like landscapes of huge deserted flatlands. That's what the music seems to say. It talks about, you know, where they --the aborigines--went; their environment. That was actually an idea I'd had since the third album. I knew I wanted to write a song that was about abuses-the aborigines, the Indians, these tribes whose counties had been taken away from them by so-called civilized man. I wanted it to be based around the aboriginal style of music. Their music says so much to me about space, earth, and living on the land. So the whole thing is based around the didgeridoo. I have a rough sample in my Fairlight, and I sort of worked out ideas from that. Then we got people in and pieced all the other sounds together. It was quite a visual song, because you could see so many things that suggested to you where to place sounds...I think it would be insulting to the instrument to suggest that the Fairlight could do it better--I don't know if you realize the sort of circular breathing technique that's involved in playing it. The didgeridoo is one of those incredible instruments with the circular sound that's incredibly...sort of rooted in the earth. And we got Rolf Harris in to play it, and he is a brilliant didgeridoo player. He could just keep it going for half an hour." The single went to ninety-one in Australia and forty-eight in the UK.

'Bang!' goes another kanga
On the bonnet of the van.
"See the light ram through the gaps in the land."
Many an Aborigine's mistaken for a tree
'Til you near him on the motorway
And the tree begin to breathe.
"See the light ram through the gaps in the land."

("Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha")

Coming in with the golden light
In the morning.
Coming in with the golden light
Is the New Man.
Coming in with the golden light
Is my dented van.

Woomera.

"Dree-ee-ee-ee-ee-
A-a-a-a-a-
M-m-m-m-m-
Ti-ti-ti-ti-ti-
I-i-i-i-i-
Me-me-me-me-me,"

"Dree-ee-ee-ee-ee-"
Woomera.
"A-a-a-a-a-
M-m-m-m-m-
Ti-ti-ti-ti-ti-
I-i-i-i-i-
Me-me-me-me-me.

"Dree-ee-ee-ee-ee-
A-a-a-a-a-
M-m-m-m-m-
Ti-ti-ti-ti-ti-"
The civilised keep alive
The territorial war.
"See the light ram through the gaps in the land."
Erase the race that claim the place
And say we dig for ore,
Or dangle devils in a bottle
And push them from the Pull of the Bush.
"See the light ram through the gaps in the land."
You find them in the raw.
"See the light bounce off the rocks to the sand."
In the raw.

Coming in with the golden light
In the morning.
Coming in with the golden light
With no warning.
Coming in with the golden light
We bring in the rigging.
Dig, dig, dig, dig away.

"Dree-ee-ee-ee-ee-
A-a-a-a-a-
M-m-m-m-m-
Ti-ti-ti-ti-ti-
I-i-i-i-i-
Me-me-me-me-me,"

"Dree-ee-ee-ee-ee-"
Woomera.
"A-a-a-a-a-
M-m-m-m-m-
Ti-ti-ti-ti-ti-
I-i-i-i-i-
Me-me-me,"

"Dree-ee-ee-ee-ee-
A-a-a-a-a-
M-m-m-m-m-"
Woomera.
"Ti-ti-ti-ti-ti-
I-i-i-i-i-
Me-me-me-me-me,"

"Dree-ee-ee-ee-ee-
A-a-a-a-a-
M-m-m-m-m-
Ti-ti-ti-ti-ti-
I-i-i-i-i-"
Woomera.
"Me-me-me-me-me."

Ma-ma-many an Aborigine's mistaken for a tree
("La, la, oo-ooh!")
"See the light ram through the gaps in the land."
You near him on the motorway
And the tree begin to breathe.
Erase the race that claim the place
And say we dig for ore.
"See the light ram through the gaps in the land."
Dangle devils in a bottle
And push them from the Pull of the Bush.
"See the sun set in the hand of the man."

"Bang!" goes another kanga
On the bonnet of the van.
"See the light bounce off the rocks to the sand."
You find them in the raw.
"See the light ram through the gaps in the land."
In the raw.
"See the light."
("Push 'em from the")
Pull of the Bush.
"See the light bounce off the rocks to the sand."
("Push 'em from the")
Pull of the Bush.
"See the sun set in the hand of the man."

("Oh, re mikayina!")













The thunderous single for 'Sat in Your Lap' was released more than a year before the album. It went to number ninety-three in Australia, thirty-two in the Netherlands, eighteen in Ireland, and eleven in the UK.

I see the people happy,
So can it happen for me?
'Cause when I am unhappy,
There's nothing that can move me.

Some say that knowledge is something that you never have.
Some say that knowledge is something sat in your lap.
Some say that heaven is hell.
Some say that hell is heaven.

I must admit, just when I think I'm king,
(I just begin.)
Just when I think I'm king, I must admit,
(I just begin.)
Just when I think I'm king,
(I just begin.)

I've been doing it for years.
My goal is moving near.
It says, "Look! I'm over here."
Then it up and disappears.











The single for 'There Goes a Tenner' never charted. Bush considers: "It’s about amateur robbers who have only done small things, and this is quite a big robbery that they’ve been planning for months, and when it actually starts happening, they start freaking out. They’re really scared, and they’re so aware of the fact that something could go wrong that they just freaked out, and paranoid and want to go home...It’s sort of all the films I’ve seen with robberies in, the crooks have always been incredibly in control and calm, and I always thought that if I ever did a robbery, I’d be really scared, you know, I’d be really worried. So I thought I’m sure that’s a much more human point of view."

You blow the safe up
Then all I know is I wake up
Covered in rubble
One of the rabble needs mummy
(What's all this then?)
The government will never find the money
(What's all this then?)

I've been here all day
A star in strange ways
Apart from a photograph
They'll get nothing from me
Not until they let me see my solicitor

Oh, I remember
That rich, windy weather
When you would carry me
Pockets floating
In the breeze

Oh, there goes a tenner
Hey look! There's a fiver
There's a ten-shilling note
Remember them?
That's when we used to vote for him










The revelatory 'Suspended in Gaffa' only stuck on the Dutch charts at number fifty.

Out in the garden
There's half of a heaven
And we're only bluffing
We're not ones for busting through walls

But they've told us
Unless we can prove
That we're doing it
We can't have it all

He's gonna wangle
A way to get out of it
She's an excuse
And a witness who'll talk when he's called

But they've told us
Unless we can prove
That we're doing it
We can't have it all
We can't have it all

"I caught a glimpse of a god, all shining and bright..."

Suddenly my feet are feet of mud
It all goes slo-mo
I don't know why I'm crying
Am I suspended in Gaffa?
Not until I'm ready for you,
Not until I'm ready for you
Can I have it all































'The Dreaming'
full album:





1. 00:00 "Sat in Your Lap"
2. 03:30 "There Goes a Tenner"
3. 06:57 "Pull Out the Pin"
4. 12:22 "Suspended in Gaffa"
5. 16:08 "Leave It Open"
6. 19:24 "The Dreaming"
7. 23:32 "Night of the Swallow"
8. 29:25 "All the Love"
9. 33:46 "Houdini"
10. 37:37 "Get Out of My House"






The non-album b-side for the singles for "There Goes a Tenner" and "Suspended in Gaffa" was "Ne T'en Fui Pas": a misspelling of the French phrase "Ne t'enfuis pas", which translates to "Don't run away".




No comments:

Post a Comment