Mailbag

[IED0DXM%OAC.UCLA.EDU@mitvma.mit.edu]

 To: Love-Hounds
 From: Andrew Marvick (IED)
 Subject: Mailbag

     First, IED wants to assure Mike Palmer that he didn't mean to sound like
he was actually complaining for want of details re the latest _Newsletter_.
He greatly appreciated Mike's information.

 >Hey, is anybody out there interested in Windham Hill? I really am and I'd
 >like to talk to other people who are into this great type of music. (Don't
 >fret. I still love Kate Bush!!)
 >
 >-- Ed

     Kate herself actually was introduced to the Windham Hill label back
in 1983 (long before there was even a genre known as New Age music)
when two well-known Kate fans (not on this computer group) from
the midwest sent her what was then the entire W.H. catalogue. She
liked it very much, and mentioned Windham Hill in a couple of
interviews, calling it "very beautiful music". Of course that was
not only before the rise of "New Age music". At that time both the genre
and the label were still quite new and much less well-known and defined than
now. They were also far less overtly commercial than they often are now.
There were very few artists and albums in the W.H. catalogue back then,
so it actually meant something when Kate said she liked the whole
label. Now, of course, there is a much wider variety of styles and an
extensive Windham Hill catalogue, so it's far less likely that Kate's
present view of the label is the same as it originally was.
     It is possible that the choice of placing the photo of Kate with
Bonnie and Clyde (from the front cover of _HoL_) in the center of
the album's cover, on a plain white field, was influenced by the affection
she had at that time for the first wave of Windham Hill albums, which
she had seen for the first time all at once.

 >okay, i've posted this question before, but it apparently got lost in
 >the whatever-horrible-monster-ate-the-machine epidemic of a while back.
 >at any rate, one night we were all sitting around watching the whole
 >story, and it occurred to us all that the guy who plays the dad (reich)
 >in the cloudbusting video looks an awful lot like donald sutherland.
 >anyone out there know if this is the case, and, if not, then who it is?
 >enquiring minds want to know.
 >
 >-- trina

     Yes, it is Donald Sutherland (though not, so far as IED is
aware, donald sutherland. Just out of curiosity, and without
intending to sound critical, what is it that makes not capitalizing
proper names such an exciting activity for so many of you Love-Hounds?)
Kate was asked this question by practically _every_ person who interviewed
her in 1985, and (needless to say) the information has already appeared
in Love-Hounds at least a couple of dozen times.
     Kate envisioned Sutherland in the role of Peter's father from
the very beginning of her plans for the shooting of the video. She
felt that he would be perfect for the role. She got in contact
with Sutherland through a mutual acquaintance, and was surprised
and elated when Sutherland agreed immediately, saying that he happened
to have a few spare days between film commitments. Apparently also
there was a problem with obtaining a work visa on such short notice,
so Sutherland agreed to do the work on _Cloudbusting_ for free.
Another reason Kate chose Sutherland was to make it very plain from
the outset of the video that her intention was to make "a small piece
of film" rather than a video per se. And every time Sutherland's
name has come up in interviews she has always lapsed immediately into
superlatives about how wonderful, inspiring and all good things
he was when they worked on the shoot together. She also has said
that it was _not_ mainly because of _Don't_Look_Now_ (in which
S. also played a father, and which Kate counts as an all-time
favourite film), but because he seemed right for this particular
part, that she sought out Sutherland. IED would only add that
although Sutherland looks absolutely nothing like the real Wilhelm
Reich, he _does_ (perhaps co-incidentally, it's true) rather
resemble Kate's own father--at any rate, when IED made Dr. Bush's
acquaintance, his hair and mustache (though certainly not his
height or body type) seemed quite like Sutherland's in the video.

-- Andrew Marvick