Gilmour interview from CHEZ FM 106 radio 1983

[Wieland Willker <willker@chemie.uni-bremen.de>]

repost from the archive:

Gilmour interview by Greg Torrington from CHEZ FM 106 radio 1983

FROM A REPRINT IN BREAKTHROUGH FIVE 

[Transcribed by Ron Hill.]

CHEZ: I'd like to ask you about Kate Bush. She is popular in very small
pockets of 
North America - this being one of them. I know that you had a lot
involvement in 
starting her career off. I would like to talk to you about the beginning of
Kate 
Bush's career in regards to you. How did you first meet her? 

DAVE: A friend of mine has a friend who told my friend that his sister was very 
talented. This friend of mine came to me and said, "My friend has a very
talented 
sister" and would I listen to her. And I said "sure", so I listened to her.
I thought 
she was very good. 

	I did some recording at her house, her parent's house, and then I had her
up to 
my studio and recorded some things. I decided that the way she sang and played 
the piano, just on its own, was not going to be very effective for
convincing A&R 
men at record companies of her value. So, I decided to pick some songs out
of all 
the songs that she had and go in and record them properly in a recording studio 
with an engineer, a producer, an arranger and an orchestra. I organized all
that, 
chose some songs and recorded three tracks which I then played to the EMI 
people over here and they made a deal with her and signed her up. It's quite 
simple. The three tracks that I had recorded, I sold them to EMI as well,
and two 
of them were on her first album. One was "The Man With the Child in His Eyes" 
and one was called "The Saxophone Song". 

 CHEZ: You are credited as the executive producer on these tracks. [Dave
indicates 
affirmative]. What was the song that she played when you first heard her, when 
you first went to her house? 

DAVE: I can't remember. I know that one of the first songs that I noted was
"The 
Man With the Child in His Eyes", our of many songs that she had written. She 
was only 14, I think, when I met her, maybe just about 15. 

CHEZ: Did you see that there was potential, commercial talent, or just artistic 
potential? 

DAVE: I didn't realize how commercially successful she might be. I thought
of her 
more really, I suppose, in the terms of someone like Joni Mitchell; the
level of a 
lady who's very talented, but would appeal to a more esoteric audience. But she 
had different ideas. 

CHEZ: Well, this certainly came out in later years. Are you still in touch
with her or 
is it pretty much a fair accompli? 

DAVE: Well, my involvement with her career specifically stopped at the
moment that 
I sold her on. I retained a small financial percentage on the tracks that I
did that 
were on the first album, and I got my expenses back out of EMI when I sold her 
on. I sold the tapes to them for what it cost to put them together. I
haven't had 
any financial interest in her career. 

CHEZ: Are you still friends? 

DAVE: Yes, I see her quite often. I actually sang some backing vocals on her
last 
album on a track called "Pull Out the Pin." 

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