Virginia Astley

[Sumita Mikio <sumita@ptij.or.jp>]

 Jodie O'Keefe wrote,

>Hi All!
>My name is Jodie and I am yet another avid fan of Kate Bush and Tori 
>Amos.  My first question to you is does anyone know of a time that Kate
>has ever been down under? I was thinking maybe she had been down under
>at one stage to gather her inspiration for songs like The Dreaming. I was
>hoping to track any footage of her in Australia at any point in her career. 
>My second request is along the lines of any other female artists from around 
>the globe who have similar lyric styles and music similarities to Kate or Tori?
>Heaven forbid me playing anything but Tori or Kate on my cd player but 
>sometimes I would like to discover some new music from other female
>artists that sound similar to them both.

 How do you like Virginia Astley? However, as for her album, I have only one,
that is _Hope in a Darkened Heart_. And a single"Melt the Snow" and one piece 
in an omnibus album called _Un hommage a Marguerite Duras_(she did not sing
but only play the piano). Her vocals and sounds are very transparent. But her
lyrics are ,I think, heavy and possessed with a sense of loss of past. Saying
metaphorically, it is song of late Autumn. Please don't misunderstand. I don't
criticize her lyrics. But comparing to Kate Bush, Kate's world is more rich in
emotion and imageries.
 And I recommend Faye Wong, as writing previously. Especially her latest album
_Faucho/Impatience_. Because it is her first album as singer/songwriter. It
seems western and eastern at the same time. Its sound gets closer to British.
Its lyrics have taste closer to Chinese classical poetry and Japanese Haiku.
And her vocals deviate from Chinese language and realize the language(voices)
that never exist (have existed) in this world.

    Sumita Mikio
      sumita@ptij.or.jp
      from Chiba Japan, cloudy