Katechism XXXVI.7.xi

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

 To: Love-Hounds
 From: Andrew Marvick (IED)
 Subject: Katechism XXXVI.7.xi

    Richard Caldwell, apparently feeling some heat from his earlier
criticism of Del Palmer, has posted a lengthy and certainly thoughtful
explanation of his views. Though IED takes Richard's opinions in good
part, he cannot find a way to agree with them. Here's why:

 > _The Sensual World_ really isn't
 > superior to her other most recent efforts in any way.  Not musically
 > as a work of art and certainly not technically as a recording.
 > Therefore, if we can a assume that Kate is at least as capable as
 > ever we must conclude that Del's increased participation did not have
 > a positive effect, i.e. it did not make TSW a better record.

   Your premise is unsupported by evidence here, Richard. IED for one
dislikes your terminology. Although IED would not try to argue that _TSW_
is a "better" record than _The_Dreaming_ or _Hounds_of_Love_, he would
certainly not feel sanguine judging it a "worse" one. Such one-word
appraisals of Kate's albums seem to IED to have less than no practical
value. Kate's albums--_TSW_ included--are so rich and multi-faceted
that to dismiss one over another in such cavalier fashion seems to IED
unwise, to say the least. IED would answer, however, that _TSW_ is a
_departure_ from _The_Dreaming_, as it is from _Hounds_of_Love_. Kate
herself has explained that she was emphasizing a different side of her
aesthetic on _The_Sensual_World_. Therefore, simplistic "better-or-
worse" rating games serve no useful purpose in this context. How does
such a valuation benefit us? What new insight do we gain from the
unsupported statement that one album is "better" than another? Such
judgements don't even begin to address the myriad artistic elements,
large and small, which make up the intricate and _unique_ fabric of
_The_Sensual_World_.

 > After having lived with TSW for some time and coming to love it
 > dearly I must still conclude that it is not as great a work as
 > either _The Dreaming_ or _Hounds of Love_.

   IED has no doubt that you have listened to the album very carefully
over a long period of time, Richard. But this doesn't in itself tell
your readers anything about what you learned about the music, or what
standards you used to judge it. How can IED accept your judgement that
"<_TSW_> is not as great a work as either _The Dreaming_ or _Hounds of
Love_" if your only specific discussion of these three musical
cornucopiae is confined to a brief and extremely vague discussion of
sound quality and drum samples? IED is amazed that these are
apparently your primary criteria for judging the quality of the
work of Kate Bush. They may have some relevance on the quality of
_Del's_ work, but you have several times gone to some effort to
use your discussion of Del's contributions as the foundation for
a judgement of Kate's entire album _The_Sensual_World_. It makes no
sense to IED.

 >   First there's the sound.  The longer I live with TSW the more the
 > assorted audio flotsam and jetsam that were allowed to creep into the
 > album annoy me.  There has been enough talk here about the noise level
 > on TSW that I'd say that many, and perhaps most, Love Hounds agree.
 >   So if TSW is a less than ideal recording who gets the blame?
 > Ultimately Kate does because she's responsible for the finished
 > product but more specifically Del is credited with "Recording" the
 > bulk of the album.  Note that the credit is for "recording" not
 > "engineering" and to me that just about sums it up.

   Well, sorry, Richard, but IED hasn't seen anything summed up here.
IED agrees that there is perhaps a slight--a _very_ slight--diminution
in the clarity of the recorded sound on _TSW_ as judged against that on
_TD_. _HoL_'s sound, however, is scarcely any clearer, and there are
many passages on that album which bear even stronger audible tape hiss
and blurred definition.
   Two other points which IED has made twice before in this forum: first,
the final character of the sound on _TSW_ is certainly as much the
responsibility of the mixer, Kevin Killen, as it is that of the engineer
(or "recorder"--an interchangeable term, for all practical purposes),
Del Palmer. In fact, if the sound is, as you say it is, distinct in
character from that of _The_Dreaming_ and _Hounds_of_Love_, does it
not make more sense to ascribe the differences to the newcomer to the
project--in this case Killen--rather than to the veteran--Del--who
didn't, after all, do that much more on _TSW_ than he had already done
on _TD_ and _HoL_?
   The second point is that the UK import CD has slightly, but
noticeably, cleaner sound than the US version. Have you taken that into
account?

 >   Andy Marvick counters that Nigel Kennedy had high praise for Del's
 >engineering ability.  It's does seem that Del is capable of capturing
 >some superb sounds on tape and Kennedy's parts on TSW are a good
 >example of this.  If you take only the recording of Kennedy's part of
 >the album I can see why Kennedy would have praised Del. Unfortunately
 >the sound quality of the rest of the album simply doesn't measure up.
 >Kennedy's praise is based on one of the high points of a rather
 >spotty recording.

     Here IED simply disagrees with you outright, Richard. How are
the sections of _TSW_ which happen to include Nigel Kennedy's parts
"high points" of the album? Your judgement is unexplained, and in IED's
view capricious. There is nothing about the recorded sound of Kennedy's
instruments which sets them apart and above that of Davey Spillane's
or Paddy Bush's or David Gilmour's. If you disagree, perhaps you can
describe just that ephemeral quality of sound that you feel puts Kennedy's
sections on a higher plane, and how that quality is missing from the
other parts of the album?
     This leads IED to what he considers a basic contradiction in your
argument, Richard. First, you write:

 > It strikes me that TSW is very much the sort of album that might come
 >about from not having someone to provide feedback who could view the
 >work more objectively.  Having someone there in this capacity doesn't
 >"water down" Kate's work, it provides an point of reference where
 >Kate can see how a track is coming together through the eyes of someone
 >who hasn't been listening to the same piece of tape for a week.

   On the face of it, this seems to be a reasonable opinion, at least
in regard to the average recording artist (a type to which Kate Bush
certainly does _not_ belong). But you then go on to say:

 > _Normally_ Kate wins.  How often is normally?  How many decisions on
 >this album didn't go her way?

     First you seem to be criticizing Kate for not allowing herself
to be influenced by other people's opinions--a quality which IED
has always respected Kate for, by the way. But in the next breath
you criticize Kate for--according to you--_allowing_ herself to be
influenced by Del's opinions! Besides, it's just not true that Kate
accepted no outside opinions other than Del's on _TSW_; just as it
isn't true that she worked completely on her own in earlier days.
The fact is, Kate has always been relatively open to the ideas of
a variety of other musicians during recording sessions--the _TSW_
sessions included--just as she has always been essentially her own
master when it came to selecting the final sounds for her songs--the
_TSW_ sessions included. Whatever change in the ratio of insularity
to openness can be detected in _TSW_'s final mix cannot be
safely ascribed by us outsiders to one specific person, such as Del.

 >How effectively can she maintain that position when her opposition is a
 >loved one who is in all probability more important to her than her
 >music?

   Again, IED thinks you're just making too much of Del's part in
all this. Kate has _always_ taken her music to her family for their
judgement, usually as soon as a song was written. This was true at
the beginning and when proximity allows, it is true today, as well.
But Kate has also made it clear in interviews on several occasions
that her own judgement of her work always takes precedence over
that of even her closest and most respected friends and family.
IED doesn't see that the situation has changed in any significant
way since _Hounds_of_Love_.

 > Maybe Del pushed for an album full of songs
 > like _Reaching Out_ or maybe he hated that track, maybe the uninspired
 > percussion was his doing or maybe Kate wanted it that way. In either
 > case Del is clearly taking a greater role in Kate's music...

   Well if Del hated _Reaching_Out_, how does Kate's inclusion of it
on _TSW_ constitute evidence that Del's influence is too great?! The
truth is, Richard, you are indeed speculating wildly about just what
influence Del had on the album; yet you nevertheless insist on blaming
him for what you consider the album's weaknesses. It just doesn't seem
fair to IED. (IED also disagrees with you that the percussion on _TSW_
is "uninspired". The percussion patterns and sounds on tracks like
_Never_Be_Mine_ and _Deeper_Understanding_ are absolutely brilliant,
and reveal, in typical Bush fashion, more and more subtlety with each
successive listening.)

 >  Andy was surprised at my remark that MTV Unplugged would have provided
 > an excellent venue for a live Kate performance.  I'm not sure why that
 > would be such a surprise.  Unplugged has seen some excellent
 > performances from a wide variety of acts.  I suggested it as a likely
 > venue because it would have given Kate the opportunity to perform
 > without feeling any need to reproduce her complex album tracks. A few
 > simple tracks performed on piano with minimal accompaniment would provided
 > enough material for the show.

     IED didn't say he thought it would be a bad idea for Kate to
go on a show like _MTV_Unplugged_--hell, IED is a Kate fan, he'd
be happy if Kate went on _any_ damn show!
     What IED did say was that it was an extremely unlikely venue
for Kate, because Kate has no interest in giving a simple performance
of a sequence of her songs with minimal acoustic accompaniment. Here's
what Kate had to say on just exactly this subject, in a 1985 _Musician_
interview with Kate, Del and Paddy. The interviewer was Peter Swales:

     But in these performances, Kate--and really they are what I
wanted to talk about, not your videos--there are only a couple of
songs which you yourself perform _on_the_piano_, usually one or two of
the more gentle and intimate ones like _The_Man_With_the_Child_in_His_Eyes_.
     Yet someone like me, at any rate, would like to see you
as a performer, as a serious musician, singing at the piano and leading
the band, which I know you could do very well if you wanted to. I
told you earlier how the first time I saw Kate Bush was early on,
around 1978, when you did two or three numbers in that manner on a
TV show, and it was then that I recognized in an instant, that this
young kid was an exceptional artist who had to be taken very seriously,
I mean _musically_. Am I right in thinking that one of the reasons you've
never toured in the States is because you suppose you need this
big show with all the people involved and all the expensive props?
Do you not feel--and I suppose this is really what my argument
comes down to--that you could come to America just with your
band and play more or less straightforwardly?
     "No, no, I would feel that that was such a cop-out. I don't
think I'd be able to feel that I had any effort or sense of challenge
left in me. I don't really feel that happy doing something, in a way,
unless I've really pushed myself to the limit. And, you know, it's like
when we do videos and things, I don't really feel right unless we're
all filthy and exhausted by the end of the day. Otherwise it doesn't
feel like you've put enough effort into it. When you hear an album
you listen to the music; but when you go and see a show, you're going
there to _see_ that person or the band come alive, and hopefully give
you everything that they've got, so that you can really have a good
evening and enjoy the music within the concept of a _show_. And I think,
if I was just going to stand up there, then, you know, what
are the audience getting apart from seeing me just standing there
that they can't get on an album? On the albums, they get much better
arrangements, much better vocals which are in tune, all that sort of
thing..."
     Except
     Except that there are of course artists who can give a
straightforward performance yet who do it in such a way that they
invest it with something quite special in terms of musical
spontaneity and so on...
     "You see, I don't think I _want_ to be up there on the stage
being _me_. I don't think I'm that interesting for people to see.
I think what I want to do is to be up there actually being the person
that is there in the song. I think that is much more interesting for
people and it is much more of a challenge for me. If I can be the
character in the song, then suddenly there's all this strength and
energy in me which perhaps I wouldn't normally have, whereas if it
was just me, I don't think I could walk on the stage with confidence.
It's very hard for me to be _me_ on a stage, I just stand there and
twiddle my fingers."
     But Kate, it seems to me that all those in the States who've
taken Kate Bush so deeply to heart and who are feeling deprived not
to have had a chance to see her perform, what they love perhaps more
than anything is precisely that so much of your music is so deeply
personal. The personae you assume are fun, but it is the real Kate
Bush whom your fans love more than anyone else. Could you not come to the
States to perform and simply be yourself?
     "Well, that is great if you think people would like that, but
I cannot help but feel it is very important to give people something
visually special. That was what made me feel there was something
special when I saw Lindsay Kemp all those years ago. He opened up a
whole new world for me that I had not really thought about before,
the fact that he was doing something so incredible without even
saying anything! It really affected me emotionally, like when I was
younger and used to listen to records and the way they affected me
was incredible and I used to think, if I could ever do that one day
to other people through music, that would be great. I think in a way
Lindsay had a similar influence on me; what he was doing was so exciting
and powerful, I thought to myself, if you could possibly create music
_and_ have it accompanied by such strong visuals, then it would just have
to be good; and really interesting. And I don't think, by any means,
that the tour which we did some years ago was perfect, there were a lot
of things that were experimental, and we didn't know if they were
going to work, but I think we did explore new territory, visually
speaking, and the reaction was so positive--I mean, I think that
probably opened up more people to listening to my stuff than the
records themselves ever did. Partly, I think, because people didn't
expect me to be quite like that and they all enjoyed it. And I see
that as a very positive, rather than a negative, thing. Had they
not enjoyed it, then that would be a different thing and perhaps
I would not feel so inclined to want to do it again. But I have
had an extraordinary amount of encouragement from people not just on
the musical side but also on the visual side, maybe even more so!
And I do feel that, when eventually I get the time and money to do
another show, I hope we will continue working along those lines of
combining music with dance and with theatre and it would be even
better and much more interesting than the last time. I think that is
a very untouched area in rock music, and it has great potential."
     Del: "Yeah, anyone can set up their gear and sit down at a piano
and sing for an hour. But not everybody can put on a whole integrated
show. And as soon as we got our little band together years ago, right
from the word go it was theatrics and show. We were only playing little
pubs on tiny little stages like at _The_Rose_of_Lee_, but we had a
whole light show, we used dry ice, and all that. What you are saying
is that Kate's fans in America would love it even if she just came over
and set up and played. But think how much more they would love it if
she was there with a whole show."
     Well, are there any plans yet for a return to the stage?
     Kate: "No..."

-- Andrew Marvick