On her official site tonight, Kate has warmly congratulated her fellow-nominee Adele, who won the Best British Female at this week’s Brit Awards. Kate writes:
From Kate… I am so thrilled to have been nominated in the BRIT Awards. It really meant a lot to be placed among such talented artists. Many, many congratulations to Adele. She is just fantastic and really deserved to win.
Kate
UPDATE: Listen to the whole interview here: http://blog.kexp.org/2012/02/24/exclusive-kexp-interview-kate-bush/
DJ El Toro has interviewed Kate about 50 Words For Snow on the brilliant US radio station KEXP (can you tell it’s one of my favourites?) The interview will be aired today, Friday February 24th on The Afternoon Show on http://www.kexp.org/ 2pm to 6pm PT USA time / 10pm to 2am UK Time and also on February 29th on DJ El Toro’s show on http://www.kexp.org/ 9pm to 9.30pm PT USA time / 5am to 5.30am UK Time (early on 1st March) It will be also be available online at the KEXP Blog. Read more at their Facebook page here. (with thanks to Louise)
The Guardian’s “Old Music” segment gets to Wow:
“Kate Bush’s second album may have been a rushed disappointment, but it provided one undisputed highlight.
Wow was the second single from Kate Bush‘s difficult second album, Lionheart. It was difficult not for the usual reasons – overindulgence, procrastination, artistic crises – but because it was rushed. Lionheart came out only nine months after her debut, The Kick Inside, and frankly, it’s a bit of a stinker. It’s fortunate she was starting out in the late 70s rather than the impatient music scene of today, or we may never have enjoyed the rich pickings of her subsequent work ...”
Editorial in The Guardian 7th February 2012:
One of music’s most original talents is riding high again with the hauntingly beautiful and surreal 50 Words for Snow
Kate Bush‘s unique musical repertoire has been winning her fans since 1978 when, at age 19, she topped the UK singles chart with Wuthering Heights – the first woman to do so with her own material. And 34 years later she is again riding high after her recent nomination for a Brit award. But the album for which she is being rightly acclaimed, 50 Words for Snow, as well as cleverly weaving together some hauntingly beautiful melodies with a characteristically surrealist narrative, also perpetuates a widely held myth about the semantic capaciousness of the Inuit language. One author has called it the Great Eskimo Vocabulary Hoax. For contrary to popular belief, there are as many words for snow in English as there are in Inuit. Still, as the crisp white stuff beloved of children turns into freezing grey slush, it’s worth another laugh at the old British Rail “wrong type of snow” excuse. Noticeably, that old chestnut wasn’t rolled out at Heathrow this week.
The resurgence in popularity of vinyl albums continues to grow which should make Kate very happy. A BBC article has revealed that 50 Words For Snow was one of the best-selling vinyl titles in the UK in 2011. Are you loving your brand new Kate Bush vinyl albums? Send us a picture of you and your copy of Director’s Cut and/or 50 Words for Snow and we’ll feature it in a gallery here on the site! Send pics to sean@katebushnews.com (with thanks to Malcolm Calder for article link)
Top 10 UK vinyl album sales of 2011:
1. The King Of Limbs – Radiohead
2. Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds – Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds
3. 21 – Adele
4. Let England Shake – PJ Harvey
5. Suck It And See – Arctic Monkeys
6. Bon Iver – Bon Iver
7. Different Gear Still Speeding – Beady Eye
8. 50 Words For Snow – Kate Bush
9. Submarine (Original Soundtrack) – Alex Turner
10. The Dark Side Of The Moon – Pink Floyd
Blogosphere buzz on Kate’s beautiful new film has been very positive: Huffington Post “The simple tale matches the animation technique, which, in an era of stop-motion this and 3D that, is almost more impressive to watch and be completely taken with. Thank you, Kate Bush, for this short moment of reflection.” Perez Hilton: “What a beautiful music video. The exquisitely devine Kate Bush has released a new music video for her latest track…so, so lovely. The song matched with the animated video is really something you don’t want to miss.” BBC America: “Kate Bush – the last shadow puppeteer?” Chart Attack: “…still a master of her art — both sonically and visually” Stereogum: “I somehow had goosebumps for almost the entire running time, and I got a tiny bit choked up when the lady and the dog came face to face….Kate Bush has put together yet another bewitching piece of work.” Prefix: “visually engrossing” Electronic Beats: “What’s the perfect medium for Kate Bush’s thoughtful, melancholic music? How about some old-school shadow puppetry? ‘Eider Falls At Lake Tahoe’ is the simple story of a lost dog, his owner, and the house they share that is eventually washed away on a mysterious ocean. Perfectly performed, it captures the bleak beauty of the track, shortened here from its 11-minute length since we last heard it on Bush’s 2011 cold masterpiece 50 Words For Snow.” Fistfullofculture: “a simple but surprisingly moving video” Listenbeforeyoubuy: “one of the most beautiful videos we’ve seen in a long long time”
Kate has this evening premiered the third visual piece from the 50 Words For Snow album. It is called “Eider Falls at Lake Tahoe” and is of course based on the third track on Kate’s new album. The film runs for just over 5 minutes. Kate writes a note about the track on her official site:
From Kate… Here is our third visual piece: “Eider Falls at Lake Tahoe”. It is all done in camera with shadow puppets, one of my favourite art forms because of its simplicity and something I have really wanted to do for a long time now.
Very special thanks to Robert Allsopp for creating the most beautiful puppets and to Rob and the puppeteers for their hard work. A big thank you to Roger Pratt, to Bertie for his determination and help and to everyone who has been involved in this project.
I hope you enjoy it.
Kate
There is also a write up about the new film on the NPR website here. “Her use of shadow puppetry matches song’s dreamlike quality. The stark contrast between the black figures and the white world makes each set piece seem mystical. The dog runs through phantasmagorical lands filled with spooky woods, looking for his owner. It’s beautiful in its simplicity — emphasizing small subtle movements over big extravagance. The elegant design of the puppets mixes fantasy elements like the moving trees with realistic pieces such as the soft sway of the woman’s hair.”
[youtube width=”640″ height=”360″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKPHA3_cBus&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]
This year – 2012 – is the 30th anniversary of HomeGround magazine, the world’s longest published Kate Bush magazine and it will also see the long awaited publication of the Homeground Anthology book. To celebrate these two events we are going to organise a party as both a birthday and a book launch. 
It will almost certainly be on a Sunday late afternoon/evening in early June and at a Central London location. Please note that this will not be an official Kate event or convention, it’s a fan gathering to celebrate that we are still alive! We can promise lots of like minded people and lots of Kate music, there may even be cake! We will sell tickets through the website and will try to keep the cost as low as possible and will confirm details ASAP.
We are currently looking at venues and it would really help us to know a rough idea of how many people are interested, so please just leave a comment or send us a message. We would love to see as many of you as possible!
Dave, Krys and Peter
It’s been a year since we heard the last part of this excellent BBC Radio 3 series, presented by Lucy Duran. As she says herself, “what makes this island of strange dreams, ancestral worship and sorcery so special is its music” Now back for part 4, Paddy Bush and Justin Vali join Lucy again on this musical journey. You can listen to it here. Perfect aural sunshine to rid us of the January grey.
The Brit Awards nominations are being announced at this moment at an event in London and Kate has been nominated for best British Solo Artist. More as we get it! Congratulations Kate, great start to 2012!! Update: Other nominees in this category are Adele, Jessie J, Florence and the Machine and Laura Marling. Kate’s nominee page at the Brits website is here. Full list of nominees here.
Telegraph | Daily Mail | Mirror | Artrocker | TNT | Guardian
Wishing you all a peaceful and safe 2012 filled with all the good things! Thanks for all the feedback and support. We’re looking forward to following the adventures of the Fish People into the next year and beyond – they have our attention! Speaking of good things, here’s a few images from 2011 to remind us of Kate’s stunning year.
Peter, Krys, Dave and Seán xxx
Wishing you all a very happy Christmas and here’s looking forward to a wonderful 2012! This has been without question one of the most extraordinary and exciting years ever to be a Kate Bush fan, we’re so proud of her and thrilled for the success she’s enjoyed in 2011. Thank you Kate for these sublime new recordings.
As a special way to celebrate, below you’ll find a link to Dave’s story from Issue 79 of Homeground, which is out now (a few copies *are* left, click HERE to order)… and we thought it would be a nice Christmas treat for everyone who hasn’t seen the actual magazine.
Merry Christmas to everyone from
Seán, Peter, Krys and Dave. xxxx
The Homeground Christmas story has been a tradition over the past 30 years – at least in our minds – and I have wanted to do a Doctor Who/Kate crossover tale for a while… So this story doesn’t actually mention either Homeground or Christmas but it is something fun for the festive period. It was inspired by the recent series of Doctor Who and The Sarah Jane Adventures and of course an important moment in Kate’s own time and space continuum. Special thanks to Collin Kelly, who did some lovely tweaking for me and I’d like to dedicate it to the memory of the wonderful and much missed actress Elisabeth Sladen.
Dave
Whatever your thoughts about applying a “prog rock” label on to Kate’s music, there’s no denying that this looks like a nice special issue from the makers of Classic Rock magazine. It features a new interview with Kate and reader’s top 25 tracks among other Kate-related content. The quote from David Gilmour on the cover reads: “Those who have followed in her shadow are but pale imitations…” This edition hits shop shelves in the UK, Ireland and possibly other places from next Wednesday 28th December. Read more at the magazine’s Facebook page here. Thanks to Louise and to Graham Rhodes who published these cover shots on his blog here.
Kate writes on her official site:
We want to say a special thank you to Barney who is sadly leaving us to go on to a very exciting new job. He has put so much incredible work into both the projects this year. Good luck Barney, we’ll miss you.
With love and best wishes,
Kate and everyone on the team
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