|>ifferences begged

[IED0DXM%UCLAMVS.BITNET@MITVMA.MIT.EDU]

> Dr. Who as the basis for a KB album???  Now, that's something /I
> hadn't ever imagined!!!  Hmmm....  -- |>oug

     Who'd a thunk |>oug would fall for a gag like that? Don't tell us
he didn't realize it was posted on April 1st?

      [	No, mommy.  Say it isn't true!  Tell me there really is a
	Santa Claus!  -- |>oug ]

> |>oug thinks that IED's interpretation of the seventh and eighth
> verse are incorrect.  He thinks that it is fairly clear that at the
> end of the song Kate is in jail and that she is reminiscing about
> better days, when she wasn't paying the price for her criminal acts,
> but rather enjoying her ill-gotten gains.  -- |>oug

     But that's just the problem, |>oug: It's _not_ "fairly clear," at
all. You're entitled to your opinion, of course, but how do _you_
account for the inconsistencies between the end of the song and the
film?  At least IED has found a way to reconcile most of the details
from each, and without stretching the meaning of the words, either.

      [	There aren't any inconsistencies between the end of the video
	and the end of the song.  Both are flashbacks to better times.
	That's precisely why the flashback begins with "Ooh, I
	remember", and the video at this point is in sepia. -- |>oug ]

     Also, your interpretation assumes that the gang were
experienced thieves who had successfully robbed before, whereas
the implication in both the song and the video is that this is
a first-time job by a group of amateurs. So what earlier "ill-gotten
gains" would she be reminiscing about?

      [ No implication is given whatsoever that this is a first-time
	job by a group of amateurs.  All that is said is that the
	narrator feels nervous, and that things this night go
	tragically wrong.  But remember that Kate believes strongly in
	premonitions.  Besides, who says that one can't be nervous
	even if they have robbed a hundred banks?  -- |>oug ]

     On the other hand, there's the end of the video, and the very odd
phenomenon of the gang running down a street, as adults, with smiles
on their faces, amid a rain of money. This part of the film is in
sepia, which might support your theory that the scene represents an
incident from the gang's earlier days.
     _Except_ for the facts that the lyrics themselves

1.) describe the same scene in the present tense;

      [ The flashback begins with "Ooh, I remember" and continues
	until the end of the song.  The tense switches to present as
	the narrator gets more engrossed in it.  The part that begins
	"Ooh, there goes a tenner" is CLEARLY part of the flashback!
	First she says "I remeber when you would carry me and money
	floated in the breeze."  Then she becomes more engrossed in
	the reverie and switches to the historical present tense,
	saying, "Ooh, look at the money floating by!"  How could it be
	any clearer???  -- |>oug ]

and

2.) draw great attention to the _anachronism_ of the obsolete
    ten-shilling note.

These two facts seem to indicate that the narrator is having a sort of
Rip Van Winkle-like experience, very like that of a prisoner who has
_finished_ her term and is talking with friends about their now
out-dated loot. If she were merely imagining all this, or remembering
an earlier incident while still in prison, such details would make no
sense.

      [	And why doesn't it make sense?  It makes perfect sense.  Why
	can't memories have detail?  You'll have to argue better than
	this, Andrew!  In any case, I don't think that Kate is in jail
	yet by the end of the song.  I think she has just woken up at
	the scene of the crime.  She wakes up covered in rubble as all
	the police surround her.  The explosion has sent money flying
	all over the place, and as some bills float by in a draft
	(there must now be a hole in the building), she daydreams back
	to some time in the past when her life was wonderful -- when
	perhaps they were actually playing with money they had gotten
	from a heist - throwing it in the air and laughing at their
	conspicuous consumption of letting money fly away on the wind.
	-- |>oug ]

     IED never wanted to present his interpretation as fact. Clearly
the song's storyline still holds mysteries. But |>oug, your
interpretation is certainly no less problematic.

      [	My interpretation isn't problematic in the least.  It explains
	everything simply, straightforwardly, and cleanly.  -- |>oug ]

     Now, on to "Suspended in Gaffa". IED read your ideas re this
song with interest and care, and may he say he greatly appreciates the
attention you gave to IED's little essay. It's clear that you anticipated
several of the ideas that IED has so belatedly put forward as tentative
-- _very_ tentative -- possible ways of interpreting parts of the song.
     That said, let's look at the specifics. |>oug, you don't seem to
be disagreeing with IED's ideas about "Suspended". On the contrary,
your reaction seems to have run more along the lines of: "Of course
this is all true -- unquestionably true and very obvious!" To wit:

> No, this is not far-fetched.  It is obviously true!

> C'mon Andy!  "Out in the garden, there's half of a heaven", is
> obviously a reference to Kate's 8-track studio, which is almost
> literally "half" of a heaven.  I don't see that it's really even a
> matter of debate.

     Frankly, IED just can't understand this kind of dogmatism.  Where
on Earth do you find the kind of evidence that would justify such
certainty, |>oug? Even for the two modest little readings of those two
single lines from "Suspended" (suggesting that "busting through walls"
might refer to Pink Floyd, and that "half of a heaven" might refer to
the demo studio at East Wickham Farm), IED was careful _not_ to insist
on their validity, but only to offer them as possibilities (and remote
ones, at that).
     This is because when you get right down to it, there is _no_
direct evidence to support such readings.

      [	What do you mean by "direct evidence"?  Of course, Kate's
	never come out a said "Oh, yeah, by the way, I put in these
	little allusions about some details of my life."  So what?
	This doesn't mean that even if you know some of the details of
	Kate's life, you can't see how they have influenced her art.
	-- |>oug ]

None at all. Sure, we know that Kate felt intimidated by _The Wall_
for a while, and we know that she worked on early songs in her home
demo studio, but these are not solid support for interpreting lines
such as "We're not ones for busting through walls" and "Out in the
garden there's half of a heaven"! They give only very hazy intimations
-- ones which have also been more or less categorically denied by Kate
herself, to boot. IED happens to find both of these specific ideas
attractive, but he would never try to insist on their absolute
validity.

      [	When has Kate ever categorically denied any of this???  If you
	are refering to Kate saying that her songs aren't
	autobiographical, I think she means that her songs have a more
	general scope, which is true.  This doesn't mean that she
	doesn't also incorporate pieces of her own life into her art.
	All artists do. -- |>oug ]

Now, |>oug, in your own articles (of which you just re-posted some
extracts) you not only assume that these will-o-the-wisps are solid
evidence, you go much, much further -- even to the point of basing
elaborate and _totally_ unfounded schemes for _interrelating_
different songs in _The Dreaming_ . You write, for example:

> "Suspended in Gaffa" is strange in that it talks about some sort of
> crime -- as if someone is trying to take a short-cut to achieve their
> goals.  In "There Goes A Tenner", the metaphor for Kate's recording
> career is hidden very well and nearly obscured by a story of bank
> robbery.  In "Suspended in Gaffa", the two images are sort of jumbled
> together or superimposed surrealistically, with neither seeming to be
> the surface meaning or the hidden meaning.

> "Out in the garden, there's half of a heaven"

> The money from the bank robbery is hidden in the garden?...

     Now, what the hey? "The money from the bank robbery is hidden in
the garden?"?! How can you seriously argue that _Suspended_ is
referring to _Tenner_?  Sorry, that is just totally off the wall,
|>oug.

      [	What's so off the wall about it, Andrew?  I never said that
	this point was definite.  That's why it has a question mark
	after it.  What do you have against interrelated themes,
	Andrew?  There are interrelated themes throughout the whole
	album and through much of Kate's work.  In any case, it seems
	likely to me that in part of "Suspended in Gaffa", Kate is
	refering to some sort of crime.  Kate has even said somewhere
	or another that part of the song deals with people trying to
	take short-cuts to get to their goals, because going the long
	way is too difficult, but that short-cuts never work.  Indeed,
	crime is one such short-cut.  -- |>oug ]

     Apparently you see the line about a "witness who'll talk when he's
called" as a reference to a "crime". IED doesn't see that at all. If you
read the lines in context --

     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.

-- you can see that these unidentified people are trying to prove that
they deserve to "have it all". It's not that they're guilty of
"crimes"; it's simply that they're unable to prove that they've worked
hard enough to catch another glimpse of God.

      [	Maybe.  It could also be a story about some people who have
	made a deal to get paid for doing something, but the people
	with the money won't pay it all until they have some guarantee
	of success.  -- |>oug ]

     And even if for some unknown reason you insist on seeing some
kind of "crime" in _Suspended_, the subject is still totally unrelated
to that of _Tenner_.

      [	Unconnected in plotline thread?  Or unrelated in theme?  I
	have no argument with the former.  To say the latter, however,
	is just plain daft.  -- |>oug ]

_Suspended_ is a song about highly ephemeral aspects of consciousness
and the struggles of life in general, whereas Kate has said over and
over again that _Tenner_ is a story about bank robbers, and _just_ a
story about bank robbers.  Why is that so hard to accept? To connect
_Tenner_ with _Suspended_ based on this kind of "evidence" is like
trying to catch quicksilver.

      [	"Just a story about bank robbers"?  What does that mean,
	Andrew?  Does that mean it can't have any themes, overtones,
	morals, etc.?  Don't be ridiculous.  Kate has said it is (in
	part) a song about fear.  Does fear have absolutely no
	relation to "Suspended in Gaffa", Andrew?  -- |>oug ]

> But the 8-track studio is only good enough for demos.  She needs a
> 48-track studio to make final recordings.  It's only half of a
> heaven.

     Now, |>oug, you made this point twice in one posting, and it made no
more sense the second time than the first. If you're trying to see some
_literal_ significance in the term "half" relative to the "8-track"
studio, then shouldn't you be looking for a line like "one sixth of
a heaven"?

	[ C'mon Andrew!  Be real! -- |>oug ]

     The truth is that there's no basis for such a _literal_ reading
at all. We simply have no way of knowing what Kate means specifically
-- or indeed _whether_ she means anything specific at all -- when she
refers to "half of a heaven". Sure, it's fun to remember that Kate
herself worked in a studio in the garden of _her_ house when she was
young, and that does make it tempting to think that this might be an
autobiographical reference. (Working against this are Kate's repeated
denials that these songs are specifically self-referential.)

      [	We are not at all "remembering that Kate herself worked in a
	studio in the garden of her house when she was young."  What
	we are remebering is that Kate herself worked in a studio in
	the garden of her house while she was recording *The
	Dreaming*.  That the demo for "Suspended in Gaffa" was indeed
	written and recorded in the very studio in question.  Also, to
	claim that a song by Kate about the quest for perfection is
	totally unrelated and unconnected to her own quest for
	perfection in her life and art, would be completely inane and
	asinine.  -- |>oug ]

But even if you do proceed on the hypothesis that this line is about
Kate herself, it's still almost insulting to assume that she's talking
about the _number_of_tracks_ her studio is capable of handling! Isn't
it a bit more likely that she's referring to the theme of the whole
song, namely the difficulty of achieving one's goals in life? "Heaven"
for the artist would be the creation of one's internal artistic ideal;
and the narrator in the song has only realised "half" of that heaven:
She's caught only "a glimpse" of God.

      [	Andrew, Andrew, Andrew....  the sentence "X is about Y" does
	NOT also imply "X is not about Z".  The fact that Kate may
	have put in a cute little allusion doesn't mean that she had
	to delete something else out of the song in order to fit the
	allusion in.  Things can have more than reading, and they can
	have been created with the multiple readings intended.  In any
	case, is it insulting to assume Kate alluded to the number of
	tracks her studio can handle?  No, not in the slightest.  In
	fact, it would be insulting to say that she couldn't be
	refering to this!  For Kate, one of the ways for her to reach
	her prefection is through her music.  Yet at the time, she
	only had an 8-track studio to work with.  Imagine how
	frustrating it must have been for Kate to hear in her mind's
	ear the glimpse of perfection that she wanted to put on vinyl,
	but which she couldn't because she didn't have sophisticated
	enough equipment.  Clearly she wanted a better studio, but she
	just couldn't afford it.  Surely she would wish for a
	short-cut! That a 48-track studio might suddenly appear in
	place of her 8-track studio.  Then she would be even that much
	closer to being able to reach perfection.  But she knew that
	no 48-track studio was going to magically appear.  That there
	weren't any short-cuts.  That she'd have to work very hard for
	years before she could have a 48-track studio.  And then once
	she had one, she'd still have to work hard for years to use it
	effectively.  It is not conjecture, Andrew, that thoughts like
	this must have gone through Kate's head.  It is plain,
	irrefutable fact.  Anyone who has the slightest inkling of
	empathy and how the artistic mind works, would know this.  --
	|>oug ]

     This touches on a complaint that IED has to make about several of your
interpretations of Kate's work, |>oug, and it concerns your tendency
to _reduce_ and particularize the meaning of her lyrics by attempting
to bind them to quite trivial and insignificant details of Kate's
personal -- and even more implausibly, her business -- life.

     [	No, Andrew, it is your mistake to assume that my saying that
	some lyrics allude to something specific, in any way limits
	those lyrics, and prevents them from having a more general
	meaning.  That, Andrew, is your limitation -- not mine.
	-- |>oug ]

     Of all the artists working today in the pop field, Kate Bush is
just about the very _last_ one IED could think of who would be
interested in devoting her artistic energies to writing songs about
her dealings with record-label executives! The notion is utterly
absurd. Yet here you go:

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

> Unless Kate can convince the record company that her "The Wall" will
> be as successful as Pink Floyd's, they won't let her use the fancy
> fully digital studio?  Well it didn't turn out as successful
> commercially (though it's certainly more successful artistically) as
> Pink's did it?

     Quite apart from the fact that there is _nothing_ in this song
except a mention of walls and a garden which supports even the
_vaguest_ theory of autobiographical reference,

      [ Geez, Andrew, the song is about about Kate's PURPOSE IN LIFE.
        I think that is evidence enough to support the hypothesis that
	there may be some more specific allusions.  There's even one
        there in the friggin' title.  Why Gaffer's tape, Andy?  Huh?
        Huh?  Well, go ahead....  Okay, well I'll tell you.  It's
        because Kate's road to heaven is through her music, but
        sometimes it feels to her like she gets gummed up in the
        process of trying to make it!  -- |>oug ]

it should be glaringly apparent that to read this song as a metaphor
for record-company problems belittles Kate's artistic intentions --

      [	I NEVER said that "Suspended in Gaffa" is a metaphor for
	record company problems!  I merely said that they were alluded
	to.  -- |>oug ]

just as does the interpretation of "Hounds of Love" as a metaphor for
some kind of difficulty that Kate is imagined to have with her fans.

     [	See above.  -- |>oug ]

Not only are such ideas unfounded, but they're silly, too. Maybe you
could just save them for your precious Sinead O'Connor tunes...

     [	Well, many of Sinead O'Connor lyrics are CLEARLY
	autobiographical, but they are not nearly so deep, so I won't
	bother.  We could try with Suzanne Vega, however.  -- |>oug ]

-- Andrew Marvick, not actually feeling as nasty as he sounds.

     [ |>oug, as always, feels nastier than he sounds.  -- |>oug ]