Love-Hounds-request@EDDIE.MIT.EDU.UUCP (04/02/87)
Really-From: IED0DXM%UCLAMVS.BITNET@wiscvm.wisc.edu
KT news:
^^^^^^^
Item One: The Whole Story slipped to #108 on Billboard's LP chart,
and to #97 on the Cashbox chart.
Item Two: Kate Bush is God. (Woops! Wrong section of this posting.)
Now, for the mail-bag:
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
In answer to "Babooshka"'s questions re album cover art
for Kate Bush's first LP, The Kick Inside:
There are actually at least FOUR different album cover designs
for this album. The only one officially sanctioned by Kate
was the UK release's design, which shows Kate hanging from an
Oriental kite in front of (or "in") an enormous eye (a clear
reference to "The Man With the Child in his Eyes"). The
"windy-waily" landscape photograph on the back cover, taken
by Kate's brother John Carder Bush, was embellished by her
bass player/demo-engineer/boy-friend Del Palmer with a little
free-drawn figure of an Oriental man with a Kite (a figure
more or less echoed on the back cover of Never for Ever, in
another of John Carder Bush's photos). Del's sketch includes
the first depiction of the KT logo, which has been included
in more and more obscure hiding-places on each of her subsequent
albums.
The most common U.S. release of the LP features a photo of Kate
in blue-jeans, and is sometimes called the "country-western" cover.
The photo was chosen because EMI-America felt it might attract
American customers, and because they believed the official cover
was too weird for us poor dumb hicks to cotton to.
There was also a Canadian (Harvest label) cover design, which
had a darker, more "glamourous", soft-focus close-up of Kate on the
cover, framed in a brighter red than on the other covers. This design
was, in fact, also used by EMI-America for the first pressing of
the U.S. release of the album, but they quickly phased it out in
the States, in favour of the "country-western" cover.
Finally, there is an entirely different design on the Japanese
edition of The Kick Inside. On its front cover, Kate is shown
"pouting" (anyway, that's what the anti-Kate press called it)
in a tight, low-cut pink body-stocking. The photo became well
known in England in 1978 because it was used as a promotional
poster to sell the album, and because the original photo included
a "risque" view of the outline of Kate's breasts (later edited down
for the Japanese LP version.)
The back cover design, as well as the actual music, are both exactly
the same in all editions. There are no alternate LP mixes or extra
LP tracks, or anything like that (although the original UK single of
"The Man With the Child in his Eyes" featured a spoken introduction,
and there is now, of course, a "new vocal" version of "Wuthering
Heights"). So, unless you are desperate to acquire
every design, or to get hold of the first of Kate's several vinyl-
inscribed secret messages (available on the UK edition only),
it doesn't really matter which version you have.
For the record, IED did not overlook an L-H's recent request for
a list of all the KT video-clips known to exist. It's a very tall
order, and one likely to stir up worms, since most of the stuff
that's not "official" is more or less rare and "in demand".
Further enquiries should be made to IED personally. In the
meantime, he's trying to type up a video KaTalogue...
Welcome to the obsession, Phil Stephens, good to have you with us!
IED has spent about an hour listening to the "X4" secret message
with your suggestion ("I don't like much when they give me an
infinity of instruments") in mind. By the way, we are listening to
the same passage, according to your description of its location.
And it's not, as far as IED has ever been aware, a backwards
message; there's probably no need to look in that direction.
Now, not wishing to antagonize another KT fan only moments
after making his acquaintance, IED hopes you won't be offended if
he admits that he can't hear your phrase, or anything like it, in
the mix. First, there simply aren't that many syllables, period.
At the very most, there are thirteen, but IED hears only twelve,
and they are more distinct than ever: "I bet my mum's gonna give
me a little toy!" Your message contains sixteen syllables.
Whether IED has the message word-for-word correct or not, he is
absolutely certain that it's not just something "accidentally
recorded between sessions." It's definitely Kate's own spoken
voice; and Kate is almost certainly saying something very
deliberate; something having a specific personal, emotionally
associative meaning (very much like her line from "And Dream of Sheep":
"Come here with me now," which Kate has now explained the significance
of in the Zwort Finkle interview).
About your suggestion that Love-Hounds be split into Kate Bush
and non-Kate Bush fora, IED hopes nothing so drastic is necessary.
There were no floods of mail demanding that IED be banished from L-Hs,
and he certainly has no wish to be ostracized from the midst of those
fortunate few members of the group who seem to be less obsessed
than he. So until such time as an organized anti-Kate
(or anti-IED) campaign is mounted in this arena, let's all continue
just to scroll past the postings we don't want to read, whether those
be the Kate-related bits, or the other pointless, pathetic, heathen
garbage...!
-- Andrew (Ev'rybody's pal!)