KT News and Mailbag

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

 KT News:
 ^^^^^^^^

     Yet a _third_ Kate Bush "interview CD" has come on the market.
This one is from the "Baktabak" company. IED has not seen it yet, but
it is advertised in the latest _Goldmine_.

 > From: Alex Ferguson <mcvax!cs.glasgow.ac.uk!ferguson@UUNET.UU.NET>

 >   This rumour is rather substantiated by a television appearance by
 > Ure some weeks ago in which (to paraphrase rather approximately) he
 > stated: that he had finished recording his new *solo* (not
 > Ultravox) album; that this was considerably "deeper" than his
 > previous work (I dunno, don't ask me what he meant); and that he
 > had been working with people he hadn't had the chance to before,
 > such as Kate Bush (presumably he wasn't counting the above
 > capacity).

     And you didn't post this in Love-Hounds _immediately_ upon
hearing it? This is _great_ news! Many sincere thanks for it, Alex!
Did you hear that, folks? Kate's helping out on Midge Ure's next LP!

Mailbag:
^^^^^^^^

 >    really?  maybe my ears are not so discerning as some.  I think I
 > even played the "new vocal" version back to back with the original
 > and still noticed no significant difference.  Maybe in only comes
 > out on CD.

 >>     The original vocal and the new vocal are much different.  The
 >> new vocal is more "soulful" and "mature".  On the original, she
 >> wailed and screeched.  The original is much better.  -- |>oug

     Though IED sees equal but different strengths in both versions,
he can certainly understand |>oug's preference for the original.  One
thing is plain, however: the two versions are _very_ different from
each other. IED's advice: Cut down on the "Colourboxes", etc., Pete,
and practice listening to some _real_ music...Your ears clearly need
the experience.

 >     Come, come now, IED! We all know that Kate will never ever
 >     again do a live tour and that hoping and planning for one will
 >     lead to nothing other than despair and the shattering of all of
 >     one's hopes and dreams. On the other hand, if Kate should
 >     perchance ever just happen to do another tour, won't it be a
 >     pleasant little surpise? -- |>oug

     IED can't discipline himself to avoid anticipating future bliss
that way, |>oug. Kate _has_ to tour. She _will_ tour! Yea, cry
halelujah.

 >          Now, back to the issue of Kate making the videos in advance.
 >     What this means is that last time around, the record company
 >     must have pointed out that the timing of singles caused by
 >     Kate's delays in making the videos was awful. For example,
 >     in the US, the record company wanted to follow up the success
 >     of "Running up that Hill" with "Hounds of Love". But there
 >     was no video. They released it without the video, but it went
 >     no where. Finally, when the video was ready, EMI-America
 >     had already given up on it. -- |>oug

     That would be a reasonable explanation -- if it weren't for the
fact that Kate _will_ tour! Yea, cry halelujah.

 >     If we recall the days of yore, there has always been a period
 > when all announcements have said that the album will be out in six
 > months. This period has lasted for up to a year and a half. I'll
 > start believing things when I see an announcement for a single in
 > two weeks. -- |>oug

     IED isn't basing his convictions on any dumb ol' announcements.
He just feels it -- here, inside! Yea, cry halelujah.

 >> Date:    Fri, 10 Jun 88 14:50 PDT
 >> From: IED0DXM%UCLAMVS.BITNET@MITVMA.MIT.EDU
 >> Subject: Ending the _Suspense_?

 >>     The following, IED believes, strongly supports his theory that
 >> the studio referred to in _Suspended_in_Gaffa_ -- if indeed the "half
 >> of a heaven" in "the garden" is a reference to any studio at all -- is
 >> the primitive demo studio of Kate's earliest days, in other words the
 >> same outbuilding that the young Cathy used to escape to as a child.
 >> Certainly this passage from the Swales interview makes it every bit as
 >> likely that the half of a heaven is a symbol of her youth as
 >> otherwise.

    >>    Does it sometimes happen, then, that you resurrect songs
    >> years later, like perhaps any of those hundreds you wrote as a
    >> teenager?
    >>     "Little bits. There was a little bit resurrected in
    >> _Suspended_in_Gaffa_ on the last album..."

 > But IED, Kate used that studio to make demos for _The_Dreaming_,
 > and it did not even exist as a studio until Kate had made enough
 > profits off of "Wuthering Heights" to turn it into a studio.  So,
 > why is this quote evidence for anything? -- |>oug

     That is not IED's understanding of the facts. It is his
understanding that a great many recordings by Kate were made -- at home
-- well before profits from "Wuthering Heights" allowed the construction
of the "eight-track demo studio".

	[ Ungh, uh.  Kate recorded some stuff songs on her piano in
	  her house with a hand-held tape recorder when she was twelve
	  or so.  She sent copies of these to record companies, but no
	  one was interested.  Later, David Gilmour became interested
	  in her stuff, and she did a fair amount of recording in
	  David Gilmour's home studio.  Later she built her own
	  8-track studio with the profits off of her early success.
	  And after *The Dreaming* she built her own 24 track
	  studio.  -- |>oug ]

Besides, IED's main point was that an outbuilding in the East Wickham
Farm compound served as the location for the _composition_ of many of
Kate's earliest musical ideas -- the argument that "half of a heaven"
must be a cryptic term for "eight-track studio" is yours, not IED's.
     IED didn't mean to offer the above quotation as proof positive
that "Suspended" refers exclusively to Kate's early years. But your
insistence that "half of a heaven" must and can only refer to the
recording of the demos of _The_Dreaming_ looks more and more
unrealistic in the face of comments such as Kate's above, in which she
goes out of her way to single out "Suspended in Gaffa" as a song
comprising ideas from her _earliest_ composing days.

      [	I never said that "half of a heaven" is a reference to "the
	recording of the demos of *The Dreaming*".  I said that "half
	of a heaven" is, in part, an allusion to her 8-track studio
	(which, she used for many years prior to *The Dreaming* and
	during work on *The Dreaming*).  The fact that Kate says
	"Suspended in Gaffa" has some bit from earlier days make
	*nothing* realistic or unrealistic.  The "bit" may be as a few
	notes somewhere.  It could be the phrase "I'm scared of the
	changes."  Kate nowhere says, "Oh yeah, 'Suspened in Gaffa' --
	that whole song was written during nap time when I was in
	kindergarten".  -- |>oug ]

 > From: Lazlo Nibble <cscbrkac@CHARON.UNM.EDU>
 > Date: Wed, 6 Jul 88 01:41:38 MDT
 > Subject: Re: Mailbag (Kate-echism XV.7.v)

 > <flame IGNITED>

 >     IED is herewith invited to take his undying exclusive devotion
 > to the One True Faith and shove it where the sun don't shine.
 > Foolish me, thinking that this sort of juvenile "you like theeeem?
 > ewwwwww!"  whining was the exclusive territory of the
 > junior-high-school crowd...  heaven forbid that IED (certainly the
 > most pedantic monologuist in the entire Love-Hounds community --
 > *how* many times have you read the _Secret_History_, Andrew dear?
 > Or did you *write* it?)

     Ech! Faugh! _Secret_History_, indeed.

 > be exposed to discussion of any music not directly pertaining to or
 > created by KaTe!

     Well, at least he seems to have got a rise out of Lazlo! If it
will help patch things up between us, Laz ol' chum, IED hereby admits
that there are some musicians having little or nothing to do with
Kate, whose work IED appreciates very nearly as much as he does Kate's
own.
     It's just that they're all dead...

 > ...diehard Trekkies, anime-heads, and sadly, Katefans.  You'd think
 > that the Katefans would have learned a little bit about
 > openmindedness in the process of listening to Kate's music...

     Now, it's not fair to generalize. As far as IED knows, he and Del
Palmer are the only Kate fans around who are truly exclusive in their
pop-music listening habits. IED counts himself in damn good company.
     Oh, yeah, add a third: Kate herself, who has several times
admitted that she listens almost not at all to other popular music,
because she spends so much time in the studio -- listening to her own!

	[ That's only when she's working on a record.  She says she
	  almost never listens to her old stuff.  -- |>oug ]

 > guess some people are more interested in the ritual and ceremony of
 > the worship itself than the substance of what they're spending all
 > that time worshipping.

     Now, that's not altogether fair, is it? IED is far _too_
interested in the substance of what he's spending all that time
worshipping.  Though it's true, he wishes there were a bit more ritual
and ceremony, too.

 >     You want to see a really good example of "appalling," Andrew?
 > Take a healthy look at what you posted up there.

     Impossible. IED is not capable of taking healthy looks. For that
matter, his looks are decidedly unhealthy, which is why the paper bag.

 > I appreciate the bricks of information you're constantly supplying
 > us with but the mortar holding them together can be pretty
 > distasteful.

    Well, such are the travails of Love-Hounds life. You want IED's
News and Information Service, you gotta take a little swig of IED's
Exclusive Patent Recipe Medicine along with it, Lazlo. Come on, take a
big, "healthy" swallow -- it'll do you a power of good.

 >   You shouldn't be so hard on poor IED. After all, can you really
 >  expect sense from someone who would think that the ending of
 >  "There Goes A Tenner" refers to a happy time in the future, rather
 >  than in the past?  Besides, if you push him too far, he might
 >  break down and start posting articles about his secret idol,
 >  Samantha Fox.  You wouldn't want that now would you?  (I promised
 >  not to tell, but I just couldn't keep it to myself any longer...)
 >  Also, don't think that in all of these overly pompous articles,
 >  there's a bit of tongue in his chic?  I do. -- |>oug

     IED will never trust you again, |>oug.
     His tongue _is_ pretty chic, however...Samantha says so all the
time.

 > "Kate Bush" - nothing new to add, I just had to put her name in
 > quotes to annoy IED.

 > -- Peter E. Lee

     Oh, so you noticed that little gimmick, eh? And it seems to
have touched a nerve. Gratifying.

 >    At the risk of prolonging Kate monotheists' agony, is anyone
 > familiar with a Midge Ure/I-can't-remember-who collaboration,
 > _The_Bloodied_Sword_?  It gets mercilessly hyped in a Chrysalis
 > catalogue as "a highly acclaimed fantasy concept album", but I've
 > never seen (much less heard) it.

 > -- Alex Ferguson.

     Yes. The music was by Ure and Chris Cross (also of Ultravox), but
unfortunately nearly all of it was obscured and, in IED's opinion (of
which the L-Hs know well the worth), virtually ruined by an
interminable poetry-recital by some jerkus unheard from before or
since.
     If you're looking for obscure but good Ultravox offshoots, try
the two singles put out to date by Helden, Warren Cann's "group" name;
or the Ure-produced singles of Phil Lynott ("Together") and Strasse
(lightweight German pop band); or John Foxx's early production of
Antena; or Ure's productions of "Torch Songs for the Heroine", Peter
Godwin's (ex-Metro) first solo single, and of Ronny's (French female
singer who made three or four extremely high-quality "New Romantic"
dance records before sinking back into obscurity) second single, "If
You Want Me to Stay"; or the Ure theme music for the original UK film
of "Max Headroom"; or the twenty-plus non-LP Ultravox tracks that have
been put out so far, among which are some of the Ure line-up's best
cuts. And there's also the first two Visage LPs, of course. Ure's
cover of Tom Rush's "Regrets", and its b-side, are high-quality
Ultravox, too.
     All of which goes toward weakening the "Kate Bush monotheist"
rumours surrounding Andrew Marvick's alter ego.
     Hey! IED is warning you people: Any more digs about his
obsessive, swelling itching brain and he'll resurrect Gyro and
Raffles!

 >     I would expect that Kate will never do a tour in the sense of
 > doing about 50 venues over a period of 3 months like a lot of rock
 > groups.  Rather, she is likely to do say a week at Wembley, or
 > Birmingham NEC.  That way she does not have to keep packing and
 > unpacking her stage show. She could set everything up to perfection
 > in one place (which can handle thousands of punters) and then
 > concentrate on the performance. Whether she would feel like taking
 > this show abroad is perhaps less likely and might well depend on
 > how the album was received. Watch out for LIVE DATES in the Spring.

     Sorry, IED has to disagree with this hypothesis. If Kate designs
a concert show at all (and she will, she will!), she'll do it right:
it'll cost millions, it'll be enormous, and it'll tour everywhere.
Betcha.

 > From: keving@GAFFA.SGI.COM (Kevin Gurney)
 > Subject: KaTe stuff

 >    More ammunition in the on-going "half of a heaven" battle
 > between IED and |>oug: The video for "Suspended in Gaffa" (or at
 > least the version I've seen), was filmed or takes place in what
 > looks like an old barn. I seem to remember some mention months ago
 > about the early demo studio being in a barn or similar building.
 > Coincidence, or was KaTe really trying to communicate with her fans
 > that know everything about her life????  You be the judge.

 >> Notice too, the big "wheels of Katherine". -- |>oug

     You'll get no argument from IED on these points. All the above
are definitely there...and Kate's ma Hannah, too.

 > For God's sake folks, let's start talking about KaTe again. Nothing
 > against other music/musicians, but come on, there's been a real
 > dearth of KaTe KonnecTed material here of late.  -- keving @
 > gaffa.sgi.com

     Yeah, but then there's been a real dearth of _Kate_ of late, too.

 >  From: Thomas Affinito <taff%venus.UCSC.EDU@UCSCC.UCSC.EDU>
 >  Subject: Re: Mailbag (Kate-echism XV.7.v)

 > about "IED's pomposity":

 > I regarded the latest header by IED as quite amusing. It continues
 > the strong character that Andrew has nurtured for his three letter
 > identity, and provides wonderful jingoistic support to all us
 > breathless Kate fans. Yes, I do listen to other artists, but on
 > this board I'll swear I just listen to Kate, (and maybe even claim
 > that I listen to the Dreaming backwards twice a night before my
 > Dreaming), or make other conceits just for the fanatic heck of it.

     Yeah. Now where are those two naughty little giraffes, anyway?

 > It's fun, and is probably a sort of camaraderie for all us soldiers
 > struggling to winter the war of Limited Kateness in our surround.
 > So "here here" for pomposity!! {To those posters of other
 > Alternate/New music info: I'm sure the majority of us KTians "share
 > and enjoy" your articles -- after all no one has made any "don't
 > post this stuff here" responses, right? -- it's just that we have
 > to maintain a required disparaging tone now and again.}

     That's correct. Even IED was only rueful, not censorious. He
learned his lesson the hard way in this group.

 > Let's not start a Flame war!!!!

     No, let's! Let's!

     Shut up, Gy.

-- Andrew Marvick