Re: In Praise of Kate Bush

["Forward, Jonathan" <JForward@sitgbsd1.telecom.com.au>]

Wieland gave us: (thanks, Wieland!)

>OCR'd from:
>"ON RECORD - Rock, Pop and the written word"
>Simon Frith and Andrew Goodwin (ed.)
>Routledge, 1990, p. 450 - 465
>
>IN PRAISE OF KATE BUSH (1988)
>BY
>HOLLY KRUSE
>(C) copyright

[snip to discussion of "The Dreaming" - TSB]
> Not only does Bush use an Australian aboriginal instrument, the
>didjeridu, in the song; the very title of the composition is taken
>from the aborigines' concept of the eternal dreamtime. The dreamtime
>is an aboriginal cult's mythology, a mythology that is eternal because
>it is continually reenacted in rituals celebrating the creation. It is
>like dreaming because through the rituals the past, present, and future
>coexist as aspects of a single reality.

 This seems like a pretty confused account of the Dreamtime.
 The Dreamtime refers to the time before people existed, and has nothing
 to do with the present or future except insofar as the events which
 took place in the Dreamtime had some lasting impact on the world. The
 idea that the rituals celebrate "the creation" is off the mark too, as
 the rituals are rather re-enactments of various Dreamtime stories, such
 as how the echidna got its spines, how the emu lost the power of flight,
 etc. An aboriginal cult's mythology? It's an animist religion, surely.

 Also...
>Perhaps more than any other female artist, Kate Bush legitimized the use
>of the rather eccentric vocal ranges and phrasing that one can now find
>in the music of artists like Cyndi Lauper.

 len, you were saying?  :)


 TSB

 P.S. Hounds of Love was amply (over/mis)interpreted, but it was
 nevertheless an entertaining read.