An old and interesting article by Kate Bush

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

 To: Love-Hounds
 From: Andrew Marvick (IED)
 Subject: An old and interesting article by Kate Bush

            _Welcome_to_the_Working_Week_ by Kate Bush

             Reprinted from _Flexipop_ Magazine, 1980


Friday
^^^^^^
     One hell of a day. I get up at about half ten. I don't have
breakfast--I never do. Just a cup of tea. The first thing on the
agenda is an interview with Paul Gambaccini. Before I leave I
read my post, which is mostly business. Most other mail goes to
my fan club, which is really well organized now. Fantastic. My
driver picks me up at about noon. We go to a small studio in Soho.
I can't drive. Apart from my driver I go everywhere unaccompanied.
The reason I use the driver now is that it was getting ridiculous
with cabs, it really was. It's so much easier now, it's just
wonderful. <Kate does know how to drive, for those who were
wondering. She passed her driving exams in 1976.>
     About three o'clock we go from Soho to _Round_Table_ at
the Beeb, which Gambaccini also does. <This is a radio programme
in which celebrity musicians and critics sit around to listen to
and review new records.> We get there about four-thirty. A couple
of kids outside--one who's always there every time I go to the
BBC. His name is Keith. Must be in his early twenties. He always
shows me things I've never seen before, like posters out of record
shops. Old magazines. A picture of Pink Floyd before Gilmour was
in it--I went WOW. I was really surprised, you know--they were all
autographed and everything. I sign a few things, and then go in.
     I don't have a go at anyone on the show. There's never any reason
to do that. After, I have to go down to Abbey Road studios to re-mix
the new single. We get there at about eight-fifteen. About this
time I have my first bite to eat of the day--a toasted sandwich and
chips. And of course, lots of cups of tea. The only way I can tell
if I need food is when I feel sick. I smoke more at night, but I
still usually get through less than twenty a day. John Player Special
at the moment. We're still at it at three a.m. and I feel fine,
but the engineer wants to call it a day. He's a great engineer, and
I know he can finish it tonight, so I talk him into it. Come seven
a.m. I'm not exactly perky, but I'm still not at all tired. I'm very
much a nocturnal creature. My driver picks me up and I get to bed
about seven-thirty a.m.


Saturday
^^^^^^^^
     I live alone--in southeast London--and today I don't get up
until late: perhaps one or two p.m. A friend of mine from the Hare
Krishna teple rang me up about eight-thirty, but I was too tired to
natter much. About three o'clock I go over to my parents'--they
live twenty minutes' drive away, in Kent. I'm doing a TV
show in Germany on Tuesday <the programme was _RockPop_, and
the taping was in mid-September, 1980> and my Mum's got some
clothes to lend me. I'm going to do two numbers for the
show.
   _Army_Dreamers_ is one, and I want to dress up as a cleaning woman. My
mother lends me a headscarf, an old apron, and lots of my old jumble
clothes. The song is about a mother who lost her son overseas. It doesn't
matter how he died, but he didn't die in action--it was an
accident. I wanted the mother to be a very simple woman who's
obviously got a lot of work to do. She's full of remorse,
but he has to carry on, living in a dream. Most of us live in a dream.
     I stay round my parents for a few hours--after all, you can't
just go round, take all the clothes you want and rush off--drink
lots of tea and eat chocolate eclairs and sandwiches, the sort of
things that mothers like to fill you up with. I feel absolutely
delightful after that, and I go back to start work on my routines
for Tuesday.
     What I do is have a little cassette machine with the mixes I'm
going to work on, and I go into my back room where I have four mirrors
propped up against the wall, and I rehearse in front of them. It's
all very well to work out the routine for _Army_Dreamers_,
but the two dancers I work with <Stewart Avon-Arnold and Gary
Hurst> are busy--one's in _Godspell_ and one's in France.
So I needed people who would be able to perform. Paddy, my brother,
he does pretty well. And the guys from the band, who are natural
performers anyway. I am pretty wiped out still, and I don't
get as much done as I could have. After working out for a while
I don't feel too good, so I have a bath and try some more.
I work out for two or three hourse, then cook a meal for myself.
     I'm not a bad cook. I love making bread. It's such
a wonderful thing to do. So I watch the telly--the late-night
movie: guys having their eyes pulled out, or something really awful.
Paddy has come back by now, so we have a long chat and I get to bed
about three o'clock. <Apparently Kate was still sharing
the family's Lewisham building of flats with her two brothers.
She has since moved to a house of her own, situated nearer her
parents's home in Kent, and she uses a third building as
a private dance studio.>


Sunday
^^^^^^
     Sunday is definitely the day that I have to physically work
out. When I get up I can hardly stand up. My calves are beginning
to feel sore from the night before.
     Again, I get up around early afternoon. I don't bother
buying Sunday newspapers--I don't read newspapers much at
all, though if there's one around I'll read it. I don't
read books very much either. I have a big guilt thing about that--I'm
missing out so much, I read fact rather than fiction, usually when
I'm on holiday. I tend to read religious things or theories
on the universe. <This sounds like an early reference to Stephen
Hawking, whose book, Kate has since explained, partially inspired
her 1989 recording, _Deeper_Understanding_. Another example of the
long gestation periods that are characteristic of many of Kate's
songs.> I love Don Martin (of _Mad_Magazine_), he cheers me up. And
if there's a _Beano_ around, I've just got to look at it. When I was a
kid that was really my thing. The illustrations are really great.
     I spend all the day working out the routine for _Babooshka_.
All Sunday is working out--dancing and miming. For miming you have
to get the inflexions exactly right. I don't do that in front
of mirrors, though. I hate watching myself sing. It's really
weird. I also do more work on _Army_Dreamers_. Gary, the dancer who's in
_Godspell_ rings me up--and I've been sending out messages for him to
ring me all day. We have this weird telepathic thing with the
telephone. Whenever I want him to ring and whenever he wants me
to ring him I get these 'messages'. So he rings up and says,
'I've been getting these messages all day, what's the
matter?' I tell him that we've been trying to work out these
routines, and quite honestly it would be useful to know what he
thought of them. He says he wants to see me anyway, so he comes
around at about midnight. He gets home at about five or six in the
morning. I have a bath and go to bed.


Monday
^^^^^^
     I have to get up early because the single is being cut.
I have to be at Abbey Road at two o'clock, and while I do the
cut, the band go off to get their army gear for _Army_Dreamers_.
Then we all go over to my parents' to rehearse--there's no
room for full-scale rehearsal in my flat. We do it in the garden.
That song is pretty well tied up by the evening, so I go home.
I generally get stuff ready for the trip. I don't take huge
amounts of stuff with me, just hand luggage. Waiting for luggage
at the terminal roundabouts is such a drag. Again, I get to bed
around four a.m.


Tuesday
^^^^^^^
     The car for the airport leaves at eight-fifteen, so I'm
pretty wiped out. No one hassles me at the airport. A few years
ago there used to be loads of photographers, but they don't
bother me anymore. It makes things a lot easier, not having to walk
up a corridor with everyone going 'OOOH LOOK'.
     We arrive at about half one, and go straight to the TV station.
I'm not very successful in Germany, and it's a big market,
so it's an important show for me. Problems straight away. The
stage has three tiers, which are going to get in the way. It has
a big glass sectionthey want me to work on--I work ninety-nine
per cent of the time in bare feet, and there's this huge chunk
of broken glass in the middle. I say, 'no way, you'll
have to get rid of it'. It takes them half an hour to take it
apart, and then I notice all these huge staples sticking out of it,
so I ask this guy to pull them out.
     The show starts at about eight--I fill in the time doing my
make-up, sewing up little bits and pieces of my costumes that are
falling to bits. I like to do that myself, it saves time. I'm
so pleased when the show is over, and it went well. We go for a
lovely meal courtesy of the record company. Things like that normally
aren't lovely but I enjoyed this a lot--really nice. Leave
the restaurant about one, go to the hotel, have a FANTASTIC bath
and go to bed about three.


Wednesday
^^^^^^^^^
     We have to be ready downstairs by half eight, and go straight
to the airport. Flying doesn't bother me too much--only when
I fly a lot in a short space of time, because then the odds seem
to get higher. I try to be philosophical about it--once you're
in the plane there's not too much to be done. Arrive in London
later than morning. Do an interview at the Heathrow Hotel, and have
some photos taken. Then I go home and feel wiped out again, so over
to my parents' to sit in the sun. I recuperate, and go home again.
I slob around, clean the flat up--it's in awful shape...I feed
the cats, Zoodle and Pyewacket. Even when I'm that tired, I still
don't get to bed till three or four. I spend a lot of time on
the phone.


Thursday
^^^^^^^^
     Radio all day. I was meant to start with Luxembourg, but
they pulled out, so I go straight to Capital. <Capital Radio is the
independend station that broke Kate in 1977 by playing _Wuthering_
_Heights_ months before its official release date.> There for three,
a very short chat. Then I do Radio One, then hang around a bit
to do Brian Matthews on Radio Two. I leave about nine, and go home.
On the way I pick up a Chinese takeaway. I don't need a bodyguard
or anything for stuff like that. If people do recognize me they're
not too likely to smother me in kisses or anything. Get home about
ten, look through some photos with my brother <this would be
John Carder Bush>, and natter about odd bits of business. If
I've got nothing to do I have a quick tinkle on the piano, which
I try to get to all the time. Bed as usual three a.m.

             Kate Bush (1980)