Album title: The Dreaming
Artiste: Kate Bush
Genre: Art rock, Pop
Year: 1982
Label: EMI
Producer: Kate Bush
Chronological position: Fourth album
Notes: First of her albums to chart within the US
Album chart position: 3 (UK) 157 (US)
Singles: “Sat in your lap”, “There goes a tenner”, “Night of the swallow”, “Suspended in gaffa”
As would become her trademark, Kate threw all the success of
Never for Ever to one side and concentrated on making her fourth album as different as possible. As a result, though this also went high in the charts in the UK – and for the first time moved the US audience to put their hands in their pockets – only one of the five singles from it would be a hit, and her next album would take another three years to complete, this time recorded in her own purpose-built studio. This is believed to be her most experimental album. Lucky me.
Review begins
With the kind of tribal percussion that would characterise Peter Gabriel's albums in the eighties, “Sat in your lap” kicks things off, and was in fact the one successful single from the album, hitting the number eleven spot. There are plenty of samples in it, different vocal elements and sounds used, orchestral hits and loops. It's probably best remembered though for the “Ooh-ooh!” hits that finish every line, very distinctive. She uses a very cockney accent on “There goes a tenner”, with brass and bouncing percussion, fretless bass is very much in evidence on “Pull out the pin”, again utilising male backing vocals, the familiar effect of helicopter blades and a screeched, almost wounded vocal from Kate. Sounds like samples of the melody from “Babooshka” being used there. Not convinced about that one, now. “Suspended in gaffa” has a bouncy piano line and a sort of sing-song vocal (if that makes sense) with some nice organ work and thumping, Beatlesesque drums.
She's back to copying Siouxsie for “Leave it open”, a slower, marching, kind of threatening in a way track, with phased vocals and something like kids singing distantly in the background, then again we're very much in Gabriel territory for the title track, the rhythm of which sounds really similar to his “The rhythm of the heat”, though I think that was two years later? No: same year. Bloody Hell! Released
seven days before this! Can that be coincidence? Very tribal sound anyway, not surprising as it's about the plight of the Australian Aborigines. Features Rolf Harris on didgeridoo. No crude jokes please. The Chieftains (well, some of them) and Planxty show up to help on “Night of the swallow”, a slower moody tale of a smuggler and his wife. The song has, you'll be unsurprised to hear, a very Celtic feel, with uileann pipes, whistles, fiddles and bagpipes. More fretless bass on “All the love”, a nice ballad, though there's not much more to say about it other than that, apart from the spoken samples (on the telephone?) near the end, all of which apper to be saying goodbye. The ballad style continues into “Houdini” (any guesses who
that's about?) which also reflects the cover art of the album, but it fails to work any magic on me. Good croaking vocal from Kate, yes, and some lovely violin, but again I don't see this remaining in my head for long after the album is over. And speaking of being over, it closes with “Get out of my house”, based around
The Shining, and which has a quite rock feel about it and features a return to her Lovich personality. The percussion here is very good, and the title screamed by Kate is very effective, the clanging guitar chords reminding me of early Police, but overall I'm kind of relieved to be finished this, and leave her with her weird house.
Track listing and ratings
Sat in your lap
There goes a tenner
Pull out the pin
Suspended in gaffa
Leave it open
The Dreaming
Night of the swallow
All the love
Houdini
Get out of my house
Afterword:
Well, when I saw that it was her experimental album I expected to struggle with it, and I did. There are good tracks on it, sure, but as an attempt to provide me with a Kate album I can point to and say “I really like that” it really has not done the job, but then I never expected it to. The next one I do know, so the review will be a lot kinder. This one I can't see myself coming back to.
Rating: 
