Record of the Day: Kate Bush, "The Dreaming"

Record of the Day: Kate Bush, “The Dreaming”

ByJohn

Kate Bush
The Dreaming (Cd EMI CDP 7463612)

Exploding into the world charts from a very young age with the album “The Kick Inside” and the single “Wuthering Heigths”, Kate Bush immediately revealed herself as a refinedly talented author and an artist with an original personality, capable of influencing with her very particular voice and his songs, many authors and singers of subsequent generations.
They have often compared her to Peter Gabriel for the obsessive care that leads her to spend even a decade between one album and another, but also for the absolute independence from business and the courage she has shown in wanting to embrace a musical field more experimental, leaving the past behind and risking the chart successes achieved with records like “Never for Ever”.

This 1982 album was a real shock for his first fans and must be considered among the absolute pinnacles of 80s rock, not surprisingly released at the same time as another masterpiece of the genre, “Peter Gabriel 3”, to be considered an authentic twin music from Kate's album. Very strong extra-European influences (particularly African) in the rhythmic textures and arrangements, dreamlike and distressing atmospheres, intense vocality (often distorted) which sometimes whispers and at other times pushes itself to the edge of screaming, great freedom of experimentation, absolute refusal towards of any commercial wink, dark and desperate themes (war, drugs, anger, paranoia, robberies, neurosis within the walls of the home) expressed in texts that are difficult to decipher at first reading but which gain interest with each new listen.

In America the reactions to the album were extremely hostile and Kate's commercial career was panned, but this album is considered by herself to be the best of her excellent discography, and time has led to a slow but constant critical re-evaluation of it.

Subsequent albums such as “Hounds of Love” and “The Sensual World” brought her back chart success (at least in Europe) but never as in “The Dreaming” has Kate delved so deeply into the darkest recesses of the psyche; the Vietcong of “Pull out the Pin”, the drug dealer of “Night of The Swallow” and the colonialist exploiter of the Australian lands of “The Dreaming” are memorable figures worthy of appearing in Francis Bacon's paintings and Sarah's plays.
Kane.

Carlo Boccadoro, composer and conductor, was born in Macerata in 1963. He lives and works in Milan. He collaborates with soloists and orchestras in different parts of the world. He is the author of numerous books on musical topics.

This text is taken from “Lunario della musica: A record for every day of the year” published by Einaudi, courtesy of the author and the publisher.

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John
John

With an untamed passion and deep, eclectic knowledge of music, John is the soul of RadioWise UK. Having worked in the music industry for over two decades, his vision was to create a platform that embodies the love and respect for music. John is known for his great attention to detail and insatiable thirst for discovering new talents and music genres.