Happy Anniversary: Kate Bush, The Kick Inside

38 years ago today, the world was introduced to an idiosyncratic debut album - and we mean “idiosyncratic” in the positive of ways - which set the tone for the rest of Kate Bush's career.

All of 19 years old at the time of its release, The Kick Inside turned Ms. Bush into one of the biggest stars in the UK virtually overnight…or to be more specific, the album's first single did: “Wuthering Heights,” inspired by a TV adaptation of Emily Bronte's classic novel (she hadn't actually read the book when inspiration first struck), went to #1 on the UK Singles chart, making Bush the first female singer-songwriter to ever hit #1 with a song she'd written herself. Not bad,eh?

Five songs were released from The Kick Inside in various countries around the world, but the ones that mattered most in the UK were “Wuthering Heights” and “The Man with the Child in His Eyes,” which gave Bush a #6 single as well. “Them Heavy People” was only released as a single in Japan, but it nonetheless earned recognition in the US as a result of Bush performing it on Saturday Night Live. It didn't chart in America, but “The Man with the Child in His Eyes” did, hitting #85 on the Billboard Hot 100. (Hey, it's something, at least.) “Moving” was also released as a single in Japan, where it topped the charts, while “Strange Phenomena” was issued as a single in Brazil, where it apparently did not chart at all. D'oh…

No matter how it may have charted in your area, The Kick Inside has still come to be viewed as one of the great debut albums of all time. In 2008, the BBC's Chris Jones summed up the album perfectly with a mere seven words, “To this day, nothing sounds like it.”