nessus@mit-eddie.UUCP (Doug Alan) (08/28/85)
["You had a temper, like my jealousy"] Hey, how about this: For every message I see telling me to shutup about Kate Bush, I'll post another article, that I wouldn't have otherwise, about her. This message I am posting is an example. > From: boyajian@akov68.DEC (JERRY BOYAJIAN) >> From: mit-eddie!nessus (Doug Alan) >> On Pat Benetar's debut album, there is a horribly butchered version of >> KB's "Wuthering Heights". > Oh, give me a break. I really think that your fanaticism for Kate Bush is > interfering with your critical judgement. Oh, give me a break! That's a load of crap! How do you explain the person I know who was a Pat Benetar fan, until he heard the original "Wuthering Heights" on the radio, and then threw out all his Pat Benetar albums? > I will grant that the *music* for "Wuthering Heights" as played by > Kate Bush is superior to that as by Benetar's band, but I think that > Benetar's *singing* of the song is far superior to Bush's. You must be joking! People aren't Kate Bush fans for the quality of her backing band. > First of all, Benetar (in my humble opinion) puts far more emotion > into the song than Bush does. And 1 + 1 = 53, right? You call belting it out in typical programmed heavy metal Benetar fashion putting emotion into it? I think that Kate Bush puts more emotion into her voice than any other singer I've ever heard. Only Peter Gabriel even comes close. This is one of the most very important features of Kate's music! > Secondly, the lower register of Benetar's voice is much more > palatable. Who wants "palatable" music? I want challenging music! > "The Man with the Child in His Eyes" (which precedes "Wuthering > Heights" on THE KICK INSIDE, as you well know) proves that Bush can > sing quite well in a lower register. That she then chooses to sing > "W.H." in a shrill falsetto which is high enough to give one > nosebleeds is especially irritating. It's not falsetto, but yes it is painful. Wonderfully painful and wonderfully irritating! And that's what is so good about it. It is sung that way, because Kate made the wonderful artistic choice of singing it that way. The song is sung by the ghost of Cathy who has come back from the dead to try and steal away Heathcliff's soul. It it sung in a wailing, brittle, painful voice that so perfectly conjures up the desperation and jealousy and hateful love of the ghost of Cathy. > There's certainly nothing wrong with you preferring Kate Bush's > version over Pat Benetar's, but to call the latter "horribly > butchered" is silly. But it is butchered! It isn't different enough to be interesting. It has all the wailing pain stripped from it. It has heavy metal guitar riffs thrown in at all the wrong places for no good reason. Benetar has her voice chorused in a manner totally inappropriate for the song -- it destroys the intimacy. Some of the melody was rewritten in assinine ways. Pat Benetar rewriting Kate Bush is tantamount to Sidney Sheldon rewriting Shakespeare! > Besides, it served what you might consider a useful purpose --- it was > one of the reasons that tempted me to try one of Kate Bush's albums. > :-) Well, perhaps. A significant fraction of the people who I know that have ever heard of Kate Bush, have because of Pat Benetar's version of "Wuthering Heights". Even some of Kate Bush's most fanatic fans (most of whom now dislike Pat Benetar). This doesn't mean Benetar didn't butcher the song though. "Ooh, let me have it -- Let me grab your soul away" Doug Alan nessus@mit-eddie.UUCP (or ARPA)
cjbiggin@watmath.UUCP (Colin Biggin) (08/31/85)
Doug Alan spews on: > > Hey, how about this: For every message I see telling me to shutup about > Kate Bush, I'll post another article, that I wouldn't have otherwise, > about her. This message I am posting is an example. > > "Ooh, let me have it -- > Let me grab your soul away" > > Doug Alan > nessus@mit-eddie.UUCP (or ARPA) Doug, we're not telling you to shutup about Kate Bush, we're telling you to go seek professional help. You have the dreaded disease known as 'Bush On the Brain'. It manifests itself by a proliferation of repetitious, boring, fanatical, pointless articles in net.music. Not only do you constantly talk about Kate Bush, but every article you post on another topic has references to Kate Bush in it. Eg: " Well, I'd rate this horrid piece of dog-shit vinyl a 0.00000000000000001E-30000 on the KB scale of poetic/prose/literature in esoteric meanderings of the criminally brilliant." And of course when anybody tries to criticize Kate, they are met with a torrent of abuse. Eg: Joe User: Well I think KB's 'The Dreaming' doesn't stand up to close scrutiny when viewed against the works of Mozart, Brahms, Beethoven, Schubert, etc.... Doug Alan: Where does this pansy-ass over-sensitive nerd from Bell Labs come off saying this blatant piece of record-company hype. Anybody who knows anything recalls that all of those artists are in the back-pockets of the swine record companies and in league with the bitch of vinyl, Madonna....ramble ramble... And now on the topic of Madonna. Doug has declared himself the messiah of music. He has instigated war on Madonna and the pop industry for a variety of reasons. Eg: "Oh come on, do you really believe this sexually aroused nymphette has the quality of music on her mind. We all know she's a publicity tease out to stroke the wallets of dumb consumerism. She has the morals of a gutter-rat and pales in comparison with the virginal, godlike, upstanding KB who glows with freshly new-born ideas and is in rapture with all that is lovely and beautiful. Madonna is a whore with a microphone while KB is a maestro with the Fairlight (god's gift to music)..." Whoops, he's onto Kate again... He just can't get off the topic (or should I say gets off on the topic).... Another annoying thing Doug does is incessantly break up every article into a million pieces. Eg: >> First sentence + 3 words from second sentence... DA:Criticizes the author's family and heritage and begins frothing at mouth. >>completion of second sentence + 2 words from third sentence... DA:Denies any complicity with A&M/RCA revolutionaries and begins a discourse on the wonders of KB record covers... Starts foaming at mouth... >>completion of fourth sentence + 2 WHOLE other sentences.... DA:Misinterprets (deliberately?) what author is saying and then once again starts litany on the quality of KB vs Everything&Everybody. >>completion of several more sentences and whatever... DA:calls author names and then blames British Press for world hunger and the threat of nuclear war... Fanatic gleam develops in left eye... etc.... etc... etc.... ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Well, this is getting really long and probably longer than it deserves. In conclusion, Doug, I would ordinarily send you a letter telling you what a twit you are but that obviously will have positively no effect. You are obviously a zealot who will not be satisfied with anything. You refuse to accept anybody else's opinion (on anything) and get nasty and abusive when others criticize. You recently started your own newsletter about KB, great, we'd all love to hear the occasional discussion in it. But that won't do... You have to continually abuse us with your endless stream of invective defending each and every action of KB. What you said at the beginning goes to show what a brat you are. Well, go ahead, post another article in response to this one telling you to shutup about KB... cheers, Colin Biggin cjbiggin!watmath! {allegra|clyde|ihnp4|utzoo} University of Waterloo Waterloo, Ontario PS: This is cross-posted to net.flame with follow-ups to net.flame ONLY.
nessus@mit-eddie.UUCP (Doug Alan) (09/06/85)
> From: boyajian@akov68.DEC (JERRY BOYAJIAN) >> From: mit-eddie!nessus (Doug Alan) >> How do you explain the person I know who was a Pat Benetar fan, until >> he heard the original "Wuthering Heights" on the radio, and then >> threw out all his Pat Benetar albums? > I can't explain that person, but so what? Personally, I'm not sure that I > could take seriously as a reference anyone who'd throw out *all* of his > Benetar albums just because he preferred Bush. He didn't throw out his Benetar albums because he *prefered* Kate Bush, but because after hearing the original, he felt that Pat Benetar had butchered it. > Wait a minute. First you claim that it isn't different enough to be > interesting, then you detail all of the differences you see in it. Are > you trying to have your cake and eat it, too? I feel that Pat Benetar's version doesn't have any *interesting* changes. All the changes are either inappropriate or make the song bland. An interesting cover version is This Mortal Coil's cover of Roy Harper's "Another Day". Faith Brown's parody of Kate's "Wuthering Heights" is interesting too, though I'm not too fond of the idea of people parodying Kate. > I submit that Benetar's version *is* different. She's made it into a > hopeful love song. *Maybe you don't agree with that interpretation, > but that doesn't make it an invalid one*. Well she should change the name then, since it doesn't have much to do with the novel "Wuthering Heights" anymore! > I understand your interpretation of Bush's version. So Benetar chose > to bring a feeling of hope to the song rather than pain. Why is that > wrong? It's not appropriate for the lyrics or for the story of Cathy and Heathcliff? Lyrics like "Ooh, let me have it, let me grab your soul away" aren't words of hope, but of pain. There are cover versions that I don't particularly like, but that I find interesting. I just don't think that Pat Benetar did anything interesting, she just made it bland and inappropriate. > And just to make your day, I thought I'd mention that in case you hadn't > known, THE KICK INSIDE is available on CD. The Harvard Coop had it the > last time I was there. "Lionheart" is on CD too. If you really want to make my day (year? life?), find me "The Dreaming" on CD! -Doug Alan nessus@mit-eddie.UUCP (or ARPA)