No Subject

There were no crowds, no welcoming fanfares when
Kate Bush made her first trip to Australia.

The wide-eyed six-year-old was here to visit her
godmother.  She stayed about four months but, 13 years
later, does not remember much about it.

The second time around will be a different story.

Kate Bush, hauntingly beautiful and with the giant hits
Wuthering Heights and Man With The Child In His Eyes
behind her, will be here to headline the list of stars who
will appear at the 1978 TV WEEK King Of Pop Awards.

And Australia might be the country where raven-haired
Kate decides to premiere here second album, Lionhearts, [sic]
the follow-up to the enormously successful The Kick
Inside.

``I can't explain what it's like," she said of the album as
its finishing touches were completed.

``It's very hard to describe...perhaps it's just a little
bit more up-tempo than The Kick Inside.

``I want to perform some of the new songs in Australia.

``I'm really loking forward to the trip and to hearing
some of the local talent."

Kate Bush was just 16 when EMI Records decided that
she had the potential to become one of the most
important women in rock 'n' roll.

The company advanced her 3000 pounds living
allowance and, over the next three years, her song-
writing and singing talents developed beyond the wildest
dreams of even the most optimistic EMI executive.

Kate's fascination with relationships between people
prompted her to write Wuthering Heights, the song
which saw her emerge as the most exciting female
singer in Britain in 10 years.

It is a strange, almost mystical song, based around the
part of the novel by Emile Bronte where Cathy wants to
take Heathcliffe's soul so they can be together in the
spiritual world.

``I developed a kind of fascination with Cathy after I saw
the last 10 minutes of the television series where she
was at the window and cutting herself with the glass.  It
always stuck in my brain," Kate said.

``It was probably a lot to do with the fact that her name
was Cathy--and I was always called that as a child.

``My feeling about it was so strong that it kept coming
back to me again and again.

``Then I read the book and discovered that Emily Bronte
had her birthday on the same day as me, July 30, and I
really, really wanted to write a song about it all."

Kate said it was ``not for me to say" whether Lionhearts [sic]
would see the emergence of equally stunning material.

Kate Bush, the daughter of a general practition-
er, was brought up in a middile-class home in
Plumstead, Kent.

``I have two older brothers who were both very keen on
musical instruments, so I just grew up with music all around
me," she said.

``When I was about 11, I just started poking around at the
piano and started making up little songs.

``When I was 14, I started taking it seriously, and began
to treat the words to the songs as poetry."

Eventually, via a friend of a friend, Dave Gilmour, Pink
Floyd's millionaire guitarist, came to hear this strange little
girl who sang like an angel.

``I was really nervous about meeting Dave, but he was so
nioce and kind," Kate said.

``He told me to go into a studio to make a finished
demo tape and then to select the three best songs and to of-
fer them to a record company.  He took me into Air London
studios and put up all the money for everything.  It must
have cost a fortune, but he didn't want anything out of
it."

EMI jumped at the chance of signing Kate when they
heard the tape.

``But," she said, ``I was only 16 then and, though everyone
had been telling me for a couple of years that I was going to be a
star, I wasn't really capable of handling it.  I needed time."

Kate decided to study mime under David Bowie's former
tutor, Lindsay Kemp, then modern dance...and thus
evolved her striking stage presentation.

But her imagination and ambition obviously reach out
fuyrther than the expertise with which she is already
equipped.

``I went in thinking, `Oh well, I'll have this off in a
week'," she said.  ``But after a year I realised I didn't know
anything.  In 10 years, I might just be starting to get good."

After headlining the TV WEEK King Of Pop Awards
and making limited other appearances in Australia, Kate
will return to London to start training--not rehearsing--
for her first tour, scheduled for early next year.

The importance of dance movements in her act requires
her to be totally fit.

The tour will take Kate throughout Britain and
Europe, then she intends settling down to more writing.

The TV WEEK King Of Pop Awards might be the only
chance Australians get to see Kate Bush for some time.

-- 
James Smith          | Spelter was thinking, eight sons, that means he
Computing Centre     | did it eight times.  At least.  Gosh.
Newcastle University | 
ccjs@cc.nu.oz.au     |                 -- "Sourcery", Terry Pratchet