Re: Cloudbusting; Kate's Explanation

["harrisonshinn" <jerjerrod@NAKED2THEworldnet.att.net>]

i hope i don't get throttled by kate for copyright infringment, but this
is what she intended "cloudbusting" to be about.  this is straight from
kate's mouth and i've copied it from the 1985 "Hounds of Love" album issue
of the KBC newsletter.

"The last song is called "cloudbusting" and this was inspired by a book
that i first found on a shelf nearly nine years ago.  it was just calling
me from the shelf and when i read it i was very moved by the magic of it. 
it's about a special relationship between a young son and his father and
the book was written from a child's point of view.  his father is
everything to him, he is the magic in his life and he teaches him
everything, teaching him to be open minded and not to build up barriers. 
his father has built a machine that can make it rain; a cloudbuster and the
son and his father go out together cloudbusting, they point big pipes up
into the sky and they make it rain.  the song is very much taking a
comparison between a yo-yo that glowed in the dark that was given to the
boy by a best friend and it was really special to him, he loved it but his
father believed in things having positive and negative energy and that
fluorescent light was a very negative energy as was the material they used
to make glow in the dark toys then and his father told him that he had to
get rid of it, he wasn't allowed to keep it.  but the boy, rather than
throwing it away, buried it in the garden so he would placate his father
but he could also go and dig it up occasionally and play with it.  it's a
parallel in some ways between how much he loved the yo-yo and how special
it was but that it was considered dangerous.  he loved his father (who was
perhaps considered dangerous by some people) and how he could bury his
yo-yo and retrieve that whenever he wanted to play with it but there's
nothing he can do about his father being taken away, he is completely
helpless.  but it's very much more to do with how the son does begin to
cope with the whole loneliness and pain of being without his father.  it is
the magic moments of a relationship through a child's eyes but being told
by a sad adult."

there was an interview with kate at the time that was conducted by some
chap from breakthrough and his interpretations were all wrong as to what
she was writing about regarding several tunes on the HOL album.  she's
always said that maybe because she's too close to the songs, what really
matters is what the individual gets out of it.  but during that interview,
kate pointed out to the interviewer that he was really off base on several
points in regards to what her songs mean.  she mentioned that perhaps some
people like to dig a little TOO deep into what a song is about and
sometimes choose to ignore what is blatantly in front of them.

harrison shinn

....scares me silly but it get's me going...
- kate bush

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