Kate Bush and Tori Amos

[gerald.paetsch@dortmund.netsurf.de (Gerald Paetsch)]

Hi everyone,

I've been reading the articles in this group for several weeks. And from time 
to time, there's always the try to compare Kate Bush with Tori Amos in a 
musical sense. I mean, it's absolutely okay to ask this sort of question, but 
when I read the answers... uh oh! 
Okay, there *are* some similarities between Kate and Tori - they are both 
female, they are both playing piano, and they both write their own songs. But 
that's it, in my humblest opinion. Regarding the piano: if you know a BIT 
about music, you will soon *hear*, that the influence of the piano plays a 
much bigger part in Tori's music than in Kate's. I'm sure that Kate's 
abilities on this instrument are there, but she doesn't show them in her music 
like Tori does. Just listen to the Tori Amos EP "Past the mission", with 7 
live tracks where she accompanies herself on the piano. It's great, and I 
think nobody could disagree when I say that her style of playing is a uniqe 
one. Now listen to Kate's music. I have to say, that I'm a *big* fan of Kate 
Bush. I love her music, her style, her way of producing, etc. But when it 
comes to the piano parts on her records, you have to agree that they're rather 
simple in comparison to Tori's. That's okay, the more simple piano playing 
works totally well with Kate's music, but that's nothing to compare Tori with.
Secondly regarding their voices: In my opinion, Kate has a totally 
unmistakable voice and a very unique style of singing, but so has Tori. I 
listened closely to the Tori Amos stuff I have (Little Earthquakes, Under the 
Pink, Paste the Mission EP), but I *couldn't* hear any similarities between 
her voice and Kate's, except one small part in the title song of Little 
Earthquakes, where she sings: "And I hate elevator music". But I don't know 
what other similarities between them there should be. 
I think, the people who say that Tori Amos "steals" or "borrows" ideas or 
styles from Kate Bush should listen carefully to both artist's music, and they 
would *hear* the obvious difference. You can't compare Kate to anyone else, 
and you can't compare Tori to anyone else. That's it, nothing more, nothing 
less.

Regards,
Gerald Paetsch

http://www.dortmund.netsurf.de/~gpaetsch