2011: 50 Words for Snow - Kate Bush
Looking back at 30 years of music | Kate Bush, The Strokes, Wilco, Tom Waits
Usually, when we talk about great late career albums, we are talking about albums by men. Leonard Cohen’s You Want It Darker. The Tree of Forgiveness by John Prine. Dylan’s Rough and Rowdy Ways and just about everything else he’s done since Time Out of Mind. Solomon Burke’s Don’t Give Up on Me. Johnny Cash’s American Recordings.
They all deserve the praise they receive. They are all great records. Some were returns to form after years in the wilderness, some merely lived up to the reputation of the artist. Regardless of which category they fall in, each of these albums added something to the story of the man that made them. These albums have restored or cemented legacies. But the canon of great late career albums does seem to be dominated by the male experience; by male creativity and male longevity.
There is a missing voice. A huge Joni Mitchell shaped gap where - for reasons quite obviously out of her control - we are missing a definitive final word from her. We are lucky to have had her recent surprise appearance and performance at the Newport Folk Festival, let alone to have had it captured and released, including as it does the definitive rendition of Both Sides Now.
There are other gaps, too. We missed out on anyone producing a triumphant Aretha Franklin final act. As late as 2015, she was still demonstrating what a phenomenal performer and singer she was, when paying tribute to Carole King at the Kennedy Centre Honors. Carole King. There is another name.
Tapestry is one of the finest records of all time - I’ve never encountered anyone who had a single bad word to say about it - so it might be greedy to ask more from her, but, as the singer, writer and performer who defined the female perspective and story in song in the early 70s, it would be interesting to hear from her now that she has lived through her own 70s.
There are, of course, some exceptions. Françoise Hardy’s final album Personne d'autre. Hard Bargain by EmmyLou Harris. Just Like That… by Bonnie Raitt. Joan Baez’s swansong Whistle Down the Wind.
Mavis Staples continues to take us there with new music. Bettye LaVette has been reborn as a smokey-throated balladeer (so different from her early career voice and songs. Check out Soul Tambourine or Your Turn to Cry to alternately dance the night away or bawl your eyes out).
But none of these records are as big, and revered as Bowie’s Blackstar. As Dylan’s 21st century work. As Cash's American Recordings. It might not be that there aren’t enough great, late career records by women after all but that there are not enough listeners and audiences talking about them. Not enough of us keeping the spotlight on these albums after the initial buzz has died down. Not enough critics lionising and cannon-ising them so that the late career work becomes as important as the early.
I was certainly guilty of missing one such record until this week, when I listened to Kate Bush’s 50 Words for Snow for the very first time in order to write this article about it.
I can’t blame the critics for this one not being a bigger deal than it seems to be. Looking back at the reviews now, they are all rightly glowing. It was one of the very few albums by a woman to appear on the handful of ‘Late Career Classics’ lists I found online before writing this. Maybe everyone knows how great this album is but just doesn’t talk about it all that much. Maybe, like me, you missed it once the initial fanfare died down. Let’s talk about it now.
Kate Bush needs no introduction. She is the most exciting, creative and revolutionary artist of her generation. She could be the most exciting, creative and revolutionary artist that Britain has produced since The Beatles. I can’t think of any other act who has emerged from these shores since who is in her league, but there are plenty who are in her debt, and who are in her shadow.
She burst on the scene almost fully formed in 1978 with the absurd and absurdly good The Kick Inside, one of the greatest debut records ever released.
Even the sometimes maligned and much-rushed followup Lionheart, from the same year, has got gems on either side in tracks like Symphony in Blue and Hammer Horror. Already, Bush was starting to develop her sound. Something she continued to do into Never For Ever; building on the best elements of her previous work and adding new twists and flourishes in songs like Babooshka, The Wedding List and Army Dreamers.
With The Dreaming, Bush much more abruptly changed her tunes. Becoming an unpredictable creative talent, she was starting to explore new frontiers with her sounds and her style. Experimenting heavily on her Fairlight CMI synthesiser, Bush pretty much produced the album by herself. The Dreaming doesn’t sound really anything like what she had released before, but even still it entirely retains its essence of being an artistic vision by Kate Bush.
The same is true of her fifth album, one of her most popular and enduring releases, The Hounds of Love. This record brought some ingredients from her first few albums back into the fold - more structured and memorable melodies, more conventional instrumentation - and combined them with her new avant-garde and experimental elements to create one of her most beloved albums. The first side is made up of such masterpieces as Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God), The Big Sky and Cloudbusting whilst the second side, a concept album within the album subtitled The Ninth Wave, contains classics like And Dream of Sheep, Watching You Without Me and Hello Earth.
Just like Never For Ever was built of similar musical parts as The Kick Inside but did something new and interesting with them, so did The Sensual World after The Hounds of Love. There are astonishingly beautiful moments on this album, including The Fog, Reaching Out and This Woman’s Work. Even though Bush was only just entering her thirties at the time of this records release, there was a clear maturing taking place in the work.
After this initial burst and outpouring of creativity, there was only one more album released in the first half of Bush’s career before she quietly slipped out of view for twelve years. She didn’t release another album until 2005’s concept record, Aerial. From there, the wait was not quite as long until the next album.
In 2011, Kate Bush released her tenth and (still) most recent collection of songs, 50 Words for Snow.
Almost from the very first moment, it is plainly obvious that you are about to hear a wonderful album. From the first fall or flurry of piano notes in Snowflake, sounding themselves like a glacial drift of falling frost, there is a reverential, spiritual and grounding feel to the album.
When she was trying new techniques musically, digitally and instrumentally; crafting new styles and sounds and changing direction, the lynch-pin on all Kate Bush’s records was her singular and instantly recognisable voice.
But we are wrong-footed by the first voice we hear on the album here. It sounds like it could be Bush, if perhaps a little deeper than we’re used to hearing her. A little more nasal, a little breathier as the story unfolds; spoken at first more than anything else, really.
And then, softly sung, Bush’s voice for sure.
She is duetting here with her son, Bertie.
The story becomes clear; two snowflakes searching for each other. One falling to the ground, one already fallen. Describing what they can see, what they can hear, on their way back to each other. Underneath those words, Bush’s piano floats along, almost in free-time, in free-fall. This searching song, this duet goes on for almost ten minutes. It should not work, but it is enchanting. Captures you in a trance and pulls you into every note, every word.
Just as no two snowflakes are the same, neither are two Kate Bush songs. Some may seem similar at first glance, but on closer inspection they reveal beautiful and distinct intricacies.
Lake Tahoe opens with another smattering of piano, again it is untethered from musical time, but here, instead of being greeted by Bertie MacIntosh’s voice, we hear an almost Gregorian chorus.
They chant a warning about Lake Tahoe; not to swim in the cold mountain water. Stand on the edge, and look in. Bush now takes over the vocal duty to finish the thought, “And you might see a woman down there”, as if she had been singing the whole verse. Her voice sounds so much warmer than the piano, so much warmer than the water of Lake Tahoe, like a soothing antidote to the frost of the tale. It sounds like it is drifting down from the mountains, with a wisdom to impart.
Another long song, this misty mystery ballad feels cinematic; like listening to a story worthy of being passed down from generation to generation. There are flourishes here that can rival any of Bush’s best writing, like when she describes how the woman fell down into the water when chasing after her dog and then “tumbling like a cloud that has drowned in the lake”.
Throughout the track, there are icicle strings, a gentle rhythm builds and at times, beautifully discordant piano notes shock our senses. There is space where the story can build and the reality of what we’re hearing can dawn.
By the end, the lady of the lake has risen from the chilly water. She has drifted home, returned to the table she once sat and worked or ate at, returned to the house she once lived in. Returned to her faithful and fateful dog, lying frozen in place and dreaming of this very moment when she would come back to him.
At times on the opener Snowflakes, Bush’s son Bertie MacIntosh sounds a little like St Paul's Cathedral choirboy Peter Auty, who famously sang Walking in the Air in the timeless movie The Snowman. Whilst it is the vocal on Snowflakes which reminds us of that magical Christmas classic, it is the story here in Misty which puts us in mind of the film.
In the first verse, Bush rolls a body out of the snow. Makes a smiling face. Makes some eyes to see with. She heads back indoors to wash a cut on her hand, switches out the lights and heads to bed.
Throughout her career, Bush has received favourable comparisons with David Bowie so it is no surprise that, like him, she can bring snowmen to life.
In the song, she wakes to find her creation sliding into her bed. It must surely be cold outside, but it does not seem to be his motivation.
From here, Bush masterfully utilises every metaphor that the snowman character allows to describe their night together, their one tryst as she puts it, but also every night spent together with a lover grown cold; a lover who has frozen their emotions or desires away or a lover who melts in your arms or melts your heart.
The next song, Wild Man, is the first that doesn’t revolve around Bush’s piano playing, and the first to have a more consistent rhythm; a more consistent time signature. It sounds like Bush is back to experimenting on her faithful Fairlight CMI.
I can’t quite work out whether I like the tone of the string instrument sound that she’s settled on or not (and, to be honest, can’t even work out what instrument it is or is supposed to be), but I am leaning on the side of not. The parts of the track where that instrument drops out and a fuller band take its place are much more enjoyable, much more interesting and rewarding. This would be a great song if it was built around those sections instead.
Wild Man is the first track on this album that doesn’t make you feel like you’re snowed in, stuck in a cabin in the middle of nowhere; doesn’t make you feel like you’re walking through an endless meadow blanketed in white or like you yourself are the snow.
We don’t have to wait long to be put back into that picture, though. Snowed in At Wheeler Street is another long, languid, ethereal snowdrift of a song. We are back at the piano. We are back to drifting with low visibility.
What starts as a light dusting of piano and shimmering synths slowly builds up into a hailstorm of huge energy by the end of the song. I don’t recall ever hearing Bush howling like she does by the end. But before all that, we are treated to an even more unexpected duet than the one that started the album.
Bush sings the first few lines, dragging them out over a minute whilst her piano does most of the work. After she asks “Haven't we met before?”, Elton John answers without a moment’s pause, “we've been in love forever”.
For the rest of the song, the snowstorm builds and so does the push and pull between these two iconic artists. They trade a line at a time over eight gloriously sprawling, building minutes until they reach the breathless crescendo and push each other to vocal heights not heard anywhere else on the album.
50 Words for Snow is the kind of musical idea that only works because Kate Bush has always so perfectly been able to balance her genius with a playfulness and lightness which allows her more experimental ideas to have a sense of fun and not play as pretentious.
Like Wild Man, this is a rare song on the album which is not a piano ballad. It shuffles along, driven by a steady drum beat and given colour by synth pads, distorted guitars, bass and a few other indistinguishable sounds. There is no great story or meaning behind the lyrics here. Rather, Bush counts upwards for the duration whilst Stephen Fry reels off a new word for snow, all the way up to 50. Some favourites:
blackbird-braille
swans-a-melting
mountainsob
psychohail
blown-from-polar-fur
Every now and again, Bush takes over for the chorus (“Come on man, you've got 44 to go” / “Come on, Joe you’ve got 32 to go”). The track becomes almost hypnotic. And probably works far better to listen to than to read about. I can’t think of many other artists who would be as audacious and willing to try something like this, which could so easily fall flat with the wrong delivery.
And word number 50? Snow.
The final song sees Bush back at the piano. Her voice is at its melodic best here, full of aching and sorrow, and paired beautifully with her simple but deeply emotive playing. With no other accompaniment for the most part - there is the swell of a string section in the back end of the track - this song, and indeed most of this album, proves that when you strip away the experimental instrumentation and studio techniques, Bush, by herself, is one of the most emotionally engaging artists we have; one of the most impactful, interesting and, one of our truest geniuses.
This is not a light album to listen to. It is heavy in its delivery, and in the way it weighs on you as you listen to it. It is a challenging but immensely rewarding piece of art; full of wonderful and crazy ideas, wonderful playing and singing. It is one of Bush’s very best pieces of work, and stands among her most famous, most iconic and most loved albums. Whilst The Kick Inside and The Hounds of Love are still my favourite of her releases, at various times when listening to 50 Words for Snow I wondered if it might even be her strongest album. Maybe not, but it certainly stands up alongside other great late career work from the titans of popular music like Bowie, Dylan, Cohen and all the rest.
From now on, I’m going to start talking about it in the same reverent way that I do with all those other records.
Elsewhere in the year
The Strokes returned with Angels. Just like pretty much all of their releases it’s powered by a driving rhythm section, is full of great lead guitar parts and wonderfully slurred vocal deliveries from Julian Casablancas. At times on the album they experiment with moving away from this trademark sound and into a more indie/dream-pop direction, which doesn’t quite come off. Games doesn’t sound as vital and alive as anything from their first two albums, but on songs like Machu Pichu, Under Cover of Darkness or Taken For a Fool, when they stick to the formula, they are at their best.
Following up Sky Blue Sky and Wilco (The Album), the Chicago alt-country/rock group completed their trilogy of “my favourite Wilco albums” with The Whole Love. They were really on a hot streak here; really in the groove on every track in these years. The songs on this record are masterfully produced; they have so much depth. They are so alive, full of space and warmth. And the songs speak for themselves: Art of Almost, Dawned on Me, Black Moon, Born Alone, Capitol City, Whole Love and the towering, simplistic, gorgeous and hypnotic One Sunday Morning (Song for Jane Smiley's Boyfriend) are all just so good.
Kate Bush wasn’t the only experimental singer-songwriter who got their start in the 70s and released their most successful, artistically challenging music in the 80s to put out an album in 2011. Tom Waits’ Bad as Me is classic Waits. He is at his mischievous best on tracks like Raised Right Men and the titular Bad as Me (“No good you say? Ha, well that’s good enough for me!”) and alongside the devilish, as always with Waits, is the divine. Kiss Me and, especially, Last Leaf are gorgeous heartfelt ballads.
Just like Bush and 50 Words for Snow, Waits hasn’t released a new album of material since.
Notable Album releases
Adele - 21
Arctic Monkeys - Suck It and See
Beyonce - 4
The Black Keys - El Camino
Bon Iver - Bon Iver, Bon Iver
Coldplay - Mylo Xyloto
Florence + The Machine - Ceremonials
Lady Gaga - Born This Way
Paul Simon - So Beautiful or So What
PJ Harvey - Let England Shake
Next up: Either Taylor Swift’s Red or Bob Dylan’s Tempest. Neither one of these artists really needs anything else written about them. Hey, maybe I’ll cover both records!
Just beautiful. I really enjoyed this article and am looking forward to hearing the album for the first time after reading this.
Brilliant record and brilliant write-up!