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Words From the Front
Kate Bush's Aerial
by Kristine McKenna
It's funny how a piece of music draws you in. First, a tiny fragment of it catches your ear, then before you know it it's colonized your mind. This is how it happened for me with Aerial, the new album by Kate Bush. Prior to Aerial the only thing I knew about Bush was that she had an obsessive cult following and had cut a few great singles ("Running Up That Hill," most particularly). I had no idea of the great majesty of her gift. I began to experience that gift several weeks ago when I heard a new Bush song on the radio. Titled "How To Be Invisible," the song had a seductive, vaguely sinister bassline, and the lyrics were fascinating: "I found a book on how to be invisible / take a pinch of keyhole, fold yourself up." It's a song about mysteries and hidden things, a sort of witches tale, and I just had to hear it again. So I bought Aerial, and played just that song, obsessively, for several days. Then one morning I was driving to the desert early in the morning with plenty of listening time to spare, and I decided to play the entire two disc CD, in sequence, as Bush intended it. I quickly discovered that Aerial is an impeccably constructed concerto and is best experienced as a whole; one song sets up the next and the entire piece builds to an ecstatic crescendo. It's an incredibly sensual work, and it can it really cast a spell if you give it the time it needs to work its magic. A celebration of the physical world—light, color, wind, water, the vista from the top of a hill, the sounds of insects and birds—Aerial sinks into your bones and warms you like the weather on a perfect summer day. This is Bush's first album in twelve years and you get the sense that the acute sensitivity to sensory experience that pervades the record is a result of her decision to slow her career down and immerse herself in her partnership with musician Danny McIntosh (the guitarist on Aerial). Mind you, Bush's music has always been perfumed with sensuality; her album of 1989, The Sensual World, went so far as to include a track inspired by Molly Bloom, the notoriously erotic figure at the center of James Joyce's Ulysses. Aerial's sexuality, however, is of a decidedly different sort, and reflects the happiness Bush has discovered in domesticity. Recorded in her home studio, Aerial evokes a life of cheerfully performed household chores (one song here, Mrs. Bartolozzi, sings the praises of doing laundry), a son Bush adores, and the physical world that surrounds her. The first disc—titled A Sea of Honey—is the more earthbound of the two, and is filigreed with specific references. Elvis turns up here, as do Joan of Arc, and Bush's recently deceased mother, who's the subject of the haunting song, A Coral Room. Aerial really clicks into gear with the second disc—aptly titled A Sky Of Honey—which is an intoxicatingly ethereal trip into the ether. An atmospheric cycle of seven songs, it opens with a chorus of birds heralding the dawn of a new day, and the mood deepens from there. Drowsy with a sense of the passage of time—the sort of thing one feels on a lazy afternoon—A Sky Of Honey unfurls itself at a leisurely pace as lovely and relaxing as a samba by Jobim. The fifth song in the suite (and my current favorite), Somewhere In Between is a shimmering meditation on the magical realm "between dreaming and waking up, between breathing in and breathing out," where time is suspended in a state of perfect peace. It's an absolutely enchanting song, and like the whole of Aerial, is a soothing antidote to the angry times we live in. Here's hoping it finds the wide audience it deserves. Kristine McKenna’s work as a journalist began in the late ’70s, when she covered the Los Angeles punk scene for various domestic and international publications. During the ’80s and ’90s she wrote art, film, and music criticism, and profiled directors, musicians, and visual artists for a variety of publications, including New York Rocker, Artforum, Rolling Stone, and the Los Angeles Times. She lives in Los Angeles and is presently working on a biography of the artist Wallace Berman. She wrote the liner notes to Rhino’s expanded X releases Los Angeles, Wild Gift, Under The Big Black Sun, More Fun In The New World, Ain’t Love Grand, and See How We Are. Two collections of her interviews, Book Of Changes (2001) and Talk To Her (2004), have been published by Fantagraphics. She is presently co-curating Semina Culture: Wallace Berman & his Circle, an exhibition that begins a tour of six U.S. museums in September of 2005. The exhibition will be accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue published by D.A.P.
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Comments:
I'm stunned at how few people realize what a painful song Mrs. Bartolozzi really is. The song is clearly about a woman who is in shock over the sudden death of her husband. I suspect he died in the house (the crew removing the body tracked in all the mud). She sees reminders of him in everday life. You don't really think the clothes wrapping themselves around each other is about laundry, do you? She's lonely and brokenhearted -- the song is a lament.
I completely agree that the second disc is where the magic is. I'm a couple decades long fan of Kate - I've been waiting on this disc for a long time! How to be Invisible is my favorite song, but the second disc is awesome - and, yes, I agree it must be listened to as a whole. I just can't seem to get into Mrs. Bartolozzi, though. Wish I could, as it's quite long
Great assessment. I've been buying and enjoying the fun, inventive and adorable songs of Kate Bush for 15 years, and I must listen to Aerial in toto, as the artist no doubt intended. I wish I saw more from writers like Kristine McKenna, who have the time to reconstruct and unfilter the narrow slices of art and music that are pushed towards us, bent and filtered, through the internet media strainer. -John in Logan square, Chicago
Welcome to a world of Kate Bush. She just gets better and better. This new lp is maybe the best that she has done. Like you said, this "sinks into your bones and warm you like a summer day".
She is the BEST. It is nice to know she is back and BETTER THAN EVER!!!!
Perfection at it's best.
Dave
I think tori and kate worship at the same place.
Excellent review, but I must ask...how can someone who began their career in the late 70's NOT know more about Kate Bush? especially someone who was unvolved in the criticism and profiling of visual arts? When i started reading this review, I had to assume that Kristine was in her 20's. better late than never, but Kate Bush has always been a fantastic and strikingly original, visually inspired yet extremely heartfelt, passionate artist
I'm just surprised that Kristine knew really nothing except some trivial thoughts of Kate Bush's "strong cult following" and a couple of singles, like Running Up That Hill. i couldn't imagine being involved with music and visual arts like this, and not know more about Kate Bush. For me, it was an instant lock in, back in 1982, when I first heard and witnessed her.
Someone as innovative, unique and passionate as Kate Bush, if anything, cannot be ignored.
Still, great review. I personally prefer Kate's absolutely brillaint 80's material, but Ariel, when given it's proper due, is a magical and worthwhile entry as well. I also prefer disc 2.
Marc
(NJ, USA)
I really do enjoied the new Kate Bush
even tho I know I would never here her
on the radio, I am a huge fan of kate's owning every slbum she recored
she is great to listen to when you get tired of the same old thing.
this new album is really uplifting from the same old thing you here
all the time.
this album is also just as good as her last one was and the movie that went with it was also great
Rog
Well, I don't think 'Mrs. Bartolozzi' sings the praises of doing laundry at all, which is just an unquesioned interpretation passes from source to source almost since the album's release. Rather, it seems to be about an abandoned women's suicide, if you follow the lyrics and Bush's vocals closely.
Tori Amos is much more original and more timely. Kate is boring and safe and for old people...
Another double decade long fan of Kate. And Tory, and diminishing one for the sake of the other is infantile.
Anyways, I still have to get back to side one. I listened to the entire album once, then started concentrating on disc two. Just incredible.
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