Watching You w/o Me, X IV, Video Party

[evs@dukecdu.mc.duke.edu (Ed Simpson)]

Very long posting follows!

Philip Stephens <prs@oliven.ATC.OLIVETTI.COM> writes:

> Well, here's my version, forward *and* backward [of Watching You w/o Me].
> 
> ========================================================
> Backward...
> ========================================================
> {end}
> ...hear me leaving 	...You can't hear me
> {chopped:}
>   talk to me, listen to me, listen to me, talk to me, 
>   talk to me, baby <I don't want you to leave, but you don't listen to me>
> {"cymbal crash"}
> ...You can't hear me
> {chopped:}
>   I was <here> before, you talked to me, 
>   <you said that you didn't think it was too late to > help me  
>   <you could> help me 
> 
> {fwd stuff, incl seagulls}

And regarding the chopped sections:

> Apparently she has a way of putting both fwd and bkwd phonemes
> into the same burst in a way that allows each to be ignored when
> played the opposite of its intended direction.  Stunning idea.

I've been catching up on the last 2 months of L-H's and saw Phillip's
article, so I went home and listened to WYWM for about 1 hour last night
with Philips "backward" interpretations in mind.  I used a backward
cassette recorded on a friend's 4-track.
The "...hear me leaving" part is questionable because that would be the
"You can't hear me leaving" line backward.  It just doesn't sound like
"hear me leaving" unless you stretch your imagine or have been listening
to lots of Led Zep backward lately.  The "...You can't hear me" lines
are definitely there!  Good work, Erik!  They seem to have been recorded
forward and then played backward during the mix down (not the other
way around as IED suggested).  As for the "chopped" parts:
your transcription of them as they sound backward seems absolutely
correct to me, Philip (except for the second "...listen to me...").
Amazing!  As you say, Philip, Kate has managed to incorporate a dualism
into the lines placing two different, yet related, messages in the same
place.

Backward version continued:

> {SOS is a palindrome}
> 
> you wont hear me
> 
> {amoung fwd stuff, maybe "I can not", but I think I'm imagining it}

To me it sounds like:

{SOS}

{... but I'm not here ...} (forward)

You can't hear me...       (backward)

{but I'm not here ... I'm not here ...} (forward)

> ========================================================
> And forward... 
> ========================================================
> 
> {begin}
> 
> {the following included because deviates from record liner notes}
> You won't hear me
> You won't hear me
> You won't hear me saying 
> You won't hear me saying to you
> 
>  [other stuff, etc.]
> 
> You won't hear me
> You won't hear me
> You won't hear me 
> You in the room with me     {especially note this deviation from record liner}
> You can't hear me saying 
> You won't hear me saying to you

I beg to differ with your translations here.  These sections
correspond exactly with the liner notes, as I hear them.

Regarding Experiment IV:

I listened to it for another hour and I couldn't hear anything about a
"symphony" or anything about a "little toy" in the section between "It
could sing you to sleep" and "But that dream is your enemy".
Bearing IED's suggestion in mind it is possible to hear "I bet my
mum's..." but I wasn't completely convinced.

On the 12" mix it sounds like she's saying:

"... experiment ... prove it to me."

Then it sounds like John Carder Bush saying something like:

"It's time for" or perhaps "... five" then
"experiment four, experiment four, experiment four, experiment four,
experiment four."

Then there is the part with the broken up voice (this comes after "But
that dream is your enemy") where Kate is singing a high pitched "eee
eee eee eee" on one side of the headphones (sounds sort of like the
sound track of "Psycho" during the famous shower scene).  There is also
a broken up voice in the center and on the other side which seems to be
mixed with another voice.  I can't tell what either voice is saying but it
sounds like one of them finishes with the word "like" at the end of each
of the two measures that this sequence spans.  Anybody have any ideas?

Kate Bush video party:

Last Saturday (25 April) I attended a Kate Bush video party in Roanoke,
VA.  Since I only own "The Single File" and "Hammersmith" videos the
event was very enlightening.  It was put on by a former record shop
owner mainly for altruistic reasons (he lost money on the event).  It
started with the Nationwide interview which I unfotunately missed.  I'm
relying on memory and a program here, so I may get a few things wrong.
Then various vidoes, including the Kick Inside Scandanavian videos, were
shown.  I found the video for the song "The Kick Inside" especially
enlightening.  If you had never seen the video or read Kate's
interpretation of the song in an interview you might never know exactly
what the song is about.  The video shows Kate in gray silver tinted hair
lying in a coffin.  And when she sings "I pull down the lace and the
chintz" (or something to that effect) she pulls black lace down over her
face and goes floating off into a lake (all this while she's laying down
in the coffin).  You definitely get the idea of suicide from watching
this.  A version of her playing and singing "The Man with the Child in
His Eyes" at the piano was included - very good.  They showed a
"non-professional" video of "Infant Kiss", using clips from the film "The
Innocents" I presume, that looked very professional.  I forget who was given
credit for this video.  Also shown was a live version of "Wedding List"
from the Prince's Trust concert which included Pete Townshend on guitar,
Phil Collins on drums, Mick Carne (sp?) on bass.

Someone won a Single File Boxed Set in a trivia contest that was
supposed to be easy but I didn't find it too easy (perhaps easy for IED
and Doug).  I had no idea that "Moving" was dedicated to Lindsay Kemp
(Kate's dance teacher).

Then they showed the 1979 Christmas TV Program with Peter Gabriel which
included an interesting visual performance of Ran Tan Waltz with Kate
dressed as a man, goatee and all.  What part was she playing?  Someone
else dressed as her "wife" and someone else as the baby, diapers and
all.  A very interesting video of Peter and Kate doing Roy Harper's
"Another Day" is included in this.  They sit at a table during most of
it with a "painting" on the wall behind them showing them sitting at the
same table acting out parts of the song.

Then, YIPPEE, Columbia got them a copy of "The Whole Story" videotape.
I hadn't seen most of the "Hair of the Hound" stuff (sorry, I don't own
a TV).  "Cloudbusting" is truly amazing and is without a doubt a work of
art.  But then so is RUTH.  "Experiment IV" was everything I hoped for
and more.  How can you ever claim to have experienced this piece without
ever seeing the video?  Del Palmer's encounter with the siren/daemon
that was created by the experiment was enough to make me jump out of my
seat.  "Big Sky" is Kate animated as I have never seen her before - I
like the part where she and Del go dancing across the stage together.
I couldn't see much of the fans though (part of the video puts on sort
of a pseudo-concert and the devoted fans spent the entire day standing
around waiting to be filmed as a concert crowd - hey, I would have done
it).  Now I can see why Kate got sick at the end of filming that day.
Doing those parts over and over again would be exhausting.
This tape includes a redo of the "Wow" video - mainly just clips
from the Hammersmith concert (or that's what they appeared to be from).
I didn't think this attempt at a remake was anything different from a
lot of the stuff you see on MTV, I still prefer the original version.
My final conclusion, though, is: if don't ever buy another video, you
must at least get "The Whole Story".  Too bad it doesn't include
"Suspended in Gaffa", though.

Then a strange version of "December Will Be Magic Again" was shown with
Kate jumping around in her seat acting like an agitated 5 year old.  Odd
for a X-mas song (but I guess it was intended to be more than that).
The Dr. Hook interview was shown with "Delius" and "Babooshka" (we must
have seen at least three different version of "Babooshka" that night).
"Babooshka" in one version was very interesting with one half of Kate's
body dressed as a mysterious seductress (showing only this side during
the verses) and the other half dressed as a female daemon or sorceress
(shown during the choruses).

Also shown were clips from German concerts during the '79 tour, I
presume.  This tape included interviews with Kate and her family.  Her
father said he always knew she would be successful from the time she was
14.  Her mom had all kinds of adjectives for Kate's performance which I
can't remember but included "very professional".  John Carder explained
the business of running Kate's career (he seems to be her business
manager) - but made it clear that every important decision ends with
Kate which he said is unusual for people in her position.  He said she
was lucky in that she had good management from the beginning of her
career.

We heard a preview of "Be Kind to My Mistakes" - disco Kate.  Also heard
"Let It Be" - I agree with IED's assessment.

Overall the event was a success.  They plan on doing an eclectic video
party on June 21 including videos from BauHaus and Cocteau Twins.

Also there was some excellent original live music of the Japan/David
Sylvian vein performed by "Drums in the Deep" which included Mike Weaver
of Break-Through fame.  They performed one extraordinary piece that was
synched with an animated video done in the late '50s (I forget the
artists name, unfortunately).  This video was entirely hand drawn and is
on par with some of the best computer animation I have seen.

Ed Simpson

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Ed Simpson, P.O.Box 3140, Duke Univ. Medical Center, Durham, NC, USA 27710