What happened to the Sensual World? What of this woman's work, and where did Lionheart go? In other words, where has Kate Bush been? It's now six years since her last album, 2005's “Aerial”, and a whopping twelve years between that and its predecessor, 1993's “The red shoes”. So what has she been doing in the interim? Well, setting up her own record label, for one thing, on which this is the first album proper to be released (earlier in the year saw a re-recording of songs from “The sensual world” and “The red shoes”, but this is the first new album), and writing one damn fine album for another. I think I can safely say it's been worth the wait.
50 words for snow --- Kate Bush --- 2011 (Fish People)
The album has only seven tracks, but in typical Bush fashion each one is a gem. Well, near as dammit. On opener “Snowflake” --- it's not a coincidence; every song here concerns snow or winter in some way, hence the title --- Kate's son Albert joins her on the vocal, her plaintive piano creating a fragile, delicate melody that is counterpointed by Steve Gadd's insightful drumming. In typical off-the-wall Bush style, “Snowflake” concerns the thoughts of a snowflake as it drifts to the ground. Albert's not-yet-broken voice naturally drags the mind to thoughts of Aled Jones on that perennial Christmas favourite “Walking in the air”, but it's Kate's mesmeric piano playing that really draws the ear on this gentle first assault in what will be an overall attack on your senses and emotions, albeit a warm and fuzzy one.
To be fair, though there are only seven songs they're all quite long, only two coming in at below eight minutes, and one is thirteen. “Snowflake” is almost like a prelude, gently rising and falling with the cadences of first Bush then Albert's voices, carrying you along like that little boy in “The Snowman” as he flies to the North Pole with his snowy friend. Bush's vocal hardly rises above a soft whisper throughout the track, and the overall feeling is of being wrapped in a soft blanket by a loving mother and sung to sleep as the wind howls and the snow falls outside.
There is guitar here, but it's so restrained and so economically used that you almost don't notice it. There is, however, no guitar on the second track, “Lake Tahoe”, carried entirely on Bush's at first somewhat discordant piano, while choral singer Stefan Roberts duets beautifully with her on, what else, a Victorian ghost story. This woman is the very essence of romantic drama in music. This track is just over eleven minutes long, and to keep that going, and keep it fresh, with nothing more than a piano and drums, and of course, her most potent weapon, her ethereal, spectral voice, is no small thing, but Bush manages it not only with aplomb, but with absolutely no question that there ever was going to be a problem doing so. It's almost an operetta in itself.
The longest track though comes next, beating out the previous by a good two minutes. “Misty” is the tale of a girl who falls in love with a snowman, in perhaps a more adult interpretation of the animated classic. Bush's piano is a little more animated and uptempo on this song, showing how versatile she can be on the instrument. She takes all vocals on this one herself, putting more than a little motown soul into her singing, the passion evident in lines like
“So cold next to me/ I can feel him melting/ Melting in my hand” and
”He won't speak to me/ His crooked mouth is/ Full of dead leaves.”
It's a tender, tragic dark fairytale, driven at all times by the whisper-quiet longing passionate voice and feather-light fingers of Bush on the piano keyboard, Gadd's drumming providing just the right amount of percussion, while bass from Danny Thompson completes the rhythm section, little touches of guitar from Dan MacIntosh adding the final flourish. Bush's piano gets more insistent and desperate as the night ends and morning dawns, and the woman finds her snowman lover has melted away. An allegory, perhaps, for those selfish lovers who steal away in the night, having taken what they wanted?
Andy Fairweather Low guests on vocals next on “Wild man”, almost the shortest song on the album, would you believe, at just over seven minutes? For this track, Kate swaps the piano for a keyboard, and it's a much more uptempo song, though still gentle, with again no guitar and some pretty sterling vocal harmonies. The song itself concerns an expedition into the Himalayas during which evidence of the mythical Yeti (the Abominable Snowman) is found. Rather than sensationalise and report the footprints though, the group decide to wipe them out, so that the Yeti will not be disturbed and hunted by men. It's an interesting idea, but would have been hilariously misplaced had the aforementioned Yeti come charging down the hill to attack them!
Bush's keyboard works hard on this song, taking the role of most instruments and keeping the melody and the rhythm going, and it's certainly so far the most boppy of the songs --- well, the
only boppy song, thus far anyway --- on the album. She adds the piano to the keys for the next track, which utilises the talents of Sir Elton John on the duet “Snowed in at Wheeler Street”, which seems to follow the doomed relationship throughout various lives of two lovers, where Kate sings
”Then I saw you in '42/ But we were on different sides/ I hid you under my bed/ But they took you away” and Elton recalls
”When we got to the top of the hill / We saw Rome burning.”
The music is very urgent and desperate on this song, the piano getting loud and brash as the two lovers try not to be separated again, though they know they will never be together. Excellent vocal performances from both the leads, and it's a powerful, dramatic and yearning song, leaving you as it fades with a real sense of loss and sympathy for the characters, knowing you can do nothing to help them.
The title track features Stephen Fry as Professor Joseph Yupik narrating fifty words that either denote or pertain to snow while Kate keeps a count as he heads towards, well, how many do you think? The melody and rhythm behind the song is excited, fast and encouraging as Kate exorts Fry to continue, pushing him towards the magical number. To be honest, it's excessively indulgent. I don't like Fry's self-congratulatory view of his own limited talent, and the song itself is a little pointless. As a title track, and as a song to stand amongst the greats that are on this album it fails on every level. It's complete tosh, too: half the words Fry uses to describe snow is just that word in another language, which you could then apply to any word. I thought the whole idea was to have fifty different words --- English words --- for snow? Bah! A small dip in the overall quality of the album, a little snowdrift you fall into that turns out to be a lot deeper than you at first thought, and you lose your footing and sink in.
Luckily, the album recovers from this minor (but very annoying, and more so the more you listen to it) bump, ending triumphantly with a real vintage Bush ballad, “Among angels”. Just her on vocals and piano, as it was in the beginning, so it is at the end. Painfully heartfelt, simple and beautifully elegant, this is Kate Bush at her very best, and it's fitting that the album, which has up to now maintained such a consistent high quality, should end on an ethereal, haunting note, and when she unleashes her voice, really lets it do what we know it's capable of, her fifty-plus years fall away like a blanket of snow from the shoulders of a coat as its wearer steps into the warmth.
At its heart a collection of songs, prayers even, to snow, to winter and to the colder side of Mother Nature, “50 words for snow” is a minor masterpiece, showing that Kate Bush still has it, and even if she takes her time letting her light shine through the darkness, it shines all the brighter for it. A child of nature in her own soul, a drifting spirit who haunts dreams and fantasies, Kate Bush is the Snow Queen and our Fairy Godmother rolled into one, with a little touch of Cinderella, Snow White and Sleeping Beauty, all fusing into one glorious entity, with the true voice of an angel.
TRACKLISTING
1. Snowflake
2. Lake Tahoe
3. Misty
4. Wild man
5. Snowed in at Wheeler Street
6. 50 words for snow
7. Among angels