She is obviously and inarguably one of the most powerful intelligences of modern pop, exceptionally well-lettered in words and music, gifted with a facility for lyrics and the composition and (critically) the nerve to go for things that the muse suggests but others mightn't. And yet even that record had a cover painting with the caption 'The Rock Phython was tired and her babies were crying so she stopped at a cave and painted herself there,' which, read one way, is quite meaningful in the context of the song, but read another way is. One thinks of England, one thinks of her lionheart.Ĭompare that with her single of some years ago, 'The Dreaming', a work of what can only fairly be described as genius, and you'll see what I mean. That's not an easy burden to bear, even for one so obviously and prodigiously gifted, and her output since then bears all the hallmarks of such preconsciousness, some of it brilliant by even the most exacting standards, but some of it also self-indulgent, overstated, and sometimes downright wacky. And after three years away as well.īut what of the wider picture? Kate Bush peaked from the start. True, there's the fact that her single off this album 'Running Up That Hill' must go down as another victim of fate, a tour-de-force coming from nowhere to almost define the peak of the summer's pop charts. That first couple of sentences where you try to ensnare the reader's attention and make some kind of substantive statement that sums up the artist's work to date and his/her relationship to the public, god and mammon in no particular order. The opening paragraph is always the most difficult.

Kate bush the hounds of love album