nessus@mit-eddie.UUCP (Doug Alan) (05/12/85)
[Rosabel, believe!] I just got some tapes of some radio shows Kate Bush did where she was interviewed and played some of her favorite songs and told about some of her influences. Kate Bush appears to be have been influenced by a fairly strange and rather eclectic bunch of music. Since they're at least six or seven Kate Bush fans out there, and one who was definitely interested in her influences, I'm going to list the musicians which Kate Bush cited as influences or selected to play. Some of them I know very little about (other than hearing the song Kate selected), and I would be very interested in hearing anything anyone might have to say about them. A lot of the music Kate Bush likes is traditional Irish and English folk music, so I'm posting this to net.music.folk too. Kate Bush influences I know enough about: David Bowie, John Lennon, Pink Floyd, King Crimson, Peter Gabriel, Beatles, Roy Harper, David Byrne, Brian Eno, Stevie Wonder Kate Bush influences I know something about: Captain Beefheart, Rolf Harris, early Roxy Music, Nat King Cole, Frank Zappa, Donovan, Steely Dan Kate Bush influences I know little about: Everheart Faber, Alan Stivel, Bert Loyd, Euin McCall, Delius, Pipers Rock, Kate and Anna McGarrigle, Choir of King's College Chapel, Bossie Band, Billy Holliday, Buddy Holly, Jove and The Polar Bears She also claimed to be influenced by the energy, emotion, and newness (at the time) of Punk music. She says that her song "Sat in Your Lap" was inspired by seeing a Stevie Wonder concert. How "Sat in Your Lap" came out of that, I don't know... but art is strange! The song she played by Rolf Harris is called "Sun Arise" and was actually very good and progressive. Nothing like "Tie Me Kangeroo Down"! Does anyone know more about Rolf Harris doing reasonable music? Other strange things of note: (1) Kate said about John Lennon's "Number Nine Dream" something like "The backwards voices -- they're really things that I love". Also when asked about the message "Well done J.B." that appears engraved in the run-off groove of her single "The Dreaming", she said something like "John Barrett [an assistant engineer] did something very clever for me on the album". When asked "Are you going to tell us what?", Kate replied "No." Does any of this add any credibility to my claim about the two-way message on "The Dreaming"? (2) Kate drank a pint of milk and two chocolate bars right before doing the vocals for "Houdini" in order to get a lot of mucus and gunk in her throat. Sounds like it worked! "Them heavy people hit me in a soft spot" Doug Alan mit-eddie!nessus Nessus@MIT-MC.ARPA
lsmith@h-sc1.UUCP (liz smith) (05/13/85)
Another stray fact - Freddie Mercury (Queen) used to say that Kate Bush was his favorite performer. (almost embarrassed to admit to knowing that from years ago . . .) Liz Smith