Campus Calendar, etc.

[Doug Alan <nessus@athena.mit.edu>]

The following is a review of *The Sensual World* from the November
*Campus Calendar: Boston's Independent Guide to College Activities*.
It is a free rag that is published in Brookline and littered around
college campuses in the Boston area:

     Kate Bush
     THE SENSUAL WORLD
     Columbia
        On the surface, Kate Bush's first album in four years is a
     letdown, especially in comparison to 1985 masterstroke *Hounds of
     Love*.  You expect more from this British art-rock veteran,
     especially in the face of all the female newcomers (Enya, Sinead
     O'Connor, the Cocteau Twins' Elizabeth Frazer) who have scored
     with etherial vocals which echo those of Bush.  But a closer
     listen to *The Sensual World* reveals a more personal album, as
     Bush searches within herself, as a person, a woman and an adult.
     Musically, the album is less grabbing, but eclectic touches still
     exist, including the use of Irish pipes, a "psychiatrist"
     dialogue and the Bulgarian female vocal group The Trio Bulgarka.
     Producer Bush keeps the Bulgarian vocalists low in the mix,
     except for "Rockets' [sic] Tail," where their exotic style
     distracts from her own vocal.  That piece erupts into a lurching
     rhythm a la Pink Floyd -- it is one of two songs featuring Floyd
     guitarist David Gilmour, who financed Bush's first demo tape in
     the mid-'70s.  Bush is more in focus on the glorious "Reaching
     Out", about a child's "push and pull" with its mother, and "This
     Woman's Work," a piano ballad about missed chances with a mate
     who has passed on.  It is surely one of Bush's barest, most
     emotive songs in many years.

It doesn't compare to "Under The Ivy", however.

> [Peter Manchester:] "Hounds of Love" is one of the most important of
> the single releases, because the 12" (12KB 3) presented "Alternative
> Hounds of Love," an early sketch of the song that goes in a
> different direction than the final version, and has become my
> favorite.

What makes you think that this in an "early sketch" of the song rather
than a later variation?

> "The Big Sky" was a complicated release.  The main thing here is 
> the mighty song, "Not This Time"--a major, major song--that was 
> the B side.

A mighty song???  You mean that lousy song that might have been really
good if Kate hadn't totally botched it with a wretched Journey-esque
arrangement?

> "C'MON, WE ALL SIN"      
>       --Not This Time        

It's "C'mon, we all SING" -- not "C'mon, we all sin"!

A quick note on Kate Bush's status in Boston: On WFNX, the only
commercial, "New Music" radio station, "Love and Anger" has been the
number one requested song fevery week for the past month.

|>oug

"A is for Amy who fell down the stairs"