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Wow. Just wow.

Oh, you were expecting something a little more informative? Well, OK then—-here’s the whole story.

I’ve listened to Kate Bush for a long time, and her music has gradually worked itself into the warp and weft of my life like a sparkling gold thread. I remember walking around suburban Surrey in the rain doing my brother’s paper round, listening to ‘Breathing’ on a Walkman and feeling real fear—-what if everyone I loved died in a nuclear holocaust? ‘Never Be Mine’ drew out the pain of a relationship that was never to be, like putting a poultice on a wound. ‘Get Out of My House’: howling along with the refrain provided catharsis and helped me to reclaim my space after things had gone wrong. ‘Sensual World’: Mmmm. Yes. I could list many more, but you’ve probably got the picture¹.

So I’m an informed, but also somewhat biased reviewer. I’m not uncritical of her work though—-I felt that while some of the ‘The Red Shoes’ was fantastic, other parts were a bit lacklustre. Anyway, a new Kate Bush album is a big thing for me. It’s not only a new thing in my life, but it will probably become part of my life in quite a meaningful way. When I saw the CD lying on the doormat, I was excited, but also a little frightened—-what if it just wasn’t very good?

I decided to really do the first listen justice (well, it has been 13 years since the last album). I borrowed Mr. Bsag’s lovely Grado headphones, lit a stick of my favourite incense, dimmed the lights, and listened to both discs straight through. I’ve waited to write this review until I had a chance to play the album a few more times, as Bush’s music often grows on you slowly rather than grabbing you immediately (although it sometimes does both). If you didn’t skip the first three words of this review, you already know that I really like it.

The album is a double one, with two ‘sub-albums’ within it: ‘A Sea of Honey’ and ‘A Sky of Honey’. Much like ‘Hounds of Love’, the second disc is a concept album, with the tracks merging together and a common theme of experiencing a perfect day from one dawn to the next. At first, I thought that I preferred ‘A Sky of Honey’, but with repeated listenings, I’ve become just as fond of ‘A Sea of Honey’.

Kate’s voice hasn’t deteriorated at all over the years since ‘The Red Shoes’. It’s as rich and varied as ever, plunging from a sweet and resonant tone to a sharp cry or an emotional break. There’s also what I can only describe as angry humming, laughter, breathing and bird imitation. She certainly knows how to use her voice to the utmost. She can also inject feeling into literally any subject. Her rendering of π to 116 decimal places is a revelation on ‘π’. I’m no mathematician, and regard numbers with distrust, but at the end of the song, I felt that π was indeed beautiful. On ‘Mrs. Bartolozzi’, she creates an incredible atmosphere which is deeply ambiguous. You can read it as woman doing her washing and daydreaming about her man standing behind her in the sea, or you can imagine that he has been murdered or has died suddenly, and she is shocked or guilty and imagining him there while washing his clothes. I can’t think of any other songwriter who can create so many possibilities within the same song, which flicker like that ‘vase/face’ optical illusion.

‘Bertie’ could be horribly saccharine, but the Renaissance musical style and her obvious simple and unconditional love for ‘luverly Bertie’ makes it impossible for me to dislike. I suspect that others (probably including ‘luverly Bertie’ himself when he hits puberty) may have a different opinion. ‘How to be Invisible’ is a rather witty song about privacy which contains a spell of invisibility:

Eye of Braille Hem of anorak Stem of wallflower Hair of doormat

The disc ends beautifully with ‘A Coral Room’, which is a moving song about the fragility of time, and how quickly things can slip away from us. Like many of her songs, it makes the hair on the back of my neck stand on end.

‘A Sky of Honey’ is shot through with bird song. It starts with wood pigeons calling, and fragments of blackbird calls and gull cries run through the whole thing. The one dodgy moment in the whole album is Rolf Harris’s contributions on ‘An Architect’s Dream’ and ‘The Painter’s Link’, but even that becomes endearing after a couple of listens. The songs ‘Sunset’, ‘Somewhere in Between’ and ‘Nocturn’ are all unbearably beautiful, and show Kate’s seductive way with words to the full. The way that she sings the lines, “Where sands sing in crimson, red and rust/Then climb into bed and turn to dust”, and “The sea’s around our legs/In milky, silky water” makes my knees go weak. Goodness knows what kind of effect it has on sensitive straight men and gay women.

She also imitates bird song. Actually, ‘imitates’ is the wrong word—-it’s more like jazz improvisation with a the bird, riffing and reveling in the challenge of making the human voice sound like bird song, without imitating it. On ‘Aerial’, she weaves her laughter into the blackbird’s song, and you suddenly see how similar they are in structure. I thought that was a moment of genius, and it makes me smile each time I listen to it.

Both discs, but particularly ‘A Sky of Honey’ are joyful and somehow serene. If you can imagine experiencing the most perfect day outside, surrounded by nature, that’s how it makes you feel. If this album is any indication, Kate Bush is now a very happy woman, and it shows in her music. Personally, I think that ‘Aerial’ is her best work since ‘Hounds of Love’, and since I think that is one of the best albums ever, that’s high praise.

¹ As an illustration of how integrated Kate Bush’s music is in my life, note the fact that I used two album titles in the first two paragraphs, without even noticing. ↑