Kate Bush Album: “Sensual World”

I originally bought this CD in 1992 right after seeing the movie "She's Having A Baby," with Kevin Bacon. "This Woman's Work" was featured in this movie, and I frantically searched for the artist and title of this song after seeing the movie. At the time, I, too, was pregnant with our first child. After I had our son, Aaron, in 1992, I remember laying him on the floor on a blanket and lying next to him, looking into his eyes, and holding his tiny fingers in mine while we listened to this haunting, bittersweet song. My eyes would fill with tears at the realization of the miracle that he truly was, and how truly blessed we were to have such a beautiful child. My son died from S.I.D.S. four months later. I now bring out this CD only when I want to relive those moments with my son --always on his birthday, his death anniversary, and sometimes simply on days when I really miss him. It's been eight years, now, and of course, the memories have faded with time. But whenever I want to feel close to my son, I turn on the song "This Woman's Work." This song is the only thing that enables me to relive those beautiful moments that I had with my child. "I know you have got a little life, in you yet. I know you've got a lot of strength, left... I should be crying, but I just can't let it show...Give me those moments, back. Give them back to me. Give me that little kiss. Give me your hand... All the things we should have done, that we never did..." The words are tremendously haunting, yet touch me so much within the depths of my soul. Although I can't listen to it daily (it's too hard, still...), I truly thank Ms. Bush for this "gift" of emotional perfection that she gives me, each time I hear it. I think this song will remain a part of me, forever. -An eternally grateful mother

I have played this album then CD over 100 times, and it is better richer more gorgeous and perfect each time. Put on your earphones and let this magical mystical album take you places deep in your soul. I love it, if you can not tell. Kate is an underappreciated genius, lost in the shuffle of marketing ploys and teeny girl hyper sexuality... this is sexuality on a different level. A level beyond age time gender. Get it and be enriched, I mean it.

Most people don't seem to get this album. Sadly it draws immediate comparison to it's predecessor The Hounds Of Love, Kate's most critically acclaimed and well known album. While I will be the first to admit that Hounds is indeed a masterpiece, so is The Sensual World. Unlike most artists Kate changes the sound between each release, important for evolution and the reason we love her so much. Thankfully (from my perspective) The Sensual World wasn't Hounds Part II.

The Sensual World is unashamedly romantic and lush. Songs of love, lust and hate fill this disc; from the gorgeous, syrup-like open track The Sensual World (adapted from Molly Blooms narative at the end of Ulysses and inspiring 1990's singers such as Tori Amos and Bjork), through to the foresightful Deeper Understanding, the crazy Rockets Tail and the beautiful This Womans Work. My personal favourite is Heads We're Dancing, a chilling story of a woman (maybe Eva Braun, though the lyrics suggest she didn't of him - or perhaps it's written from the perspective of a whole nation?) who falls in love with Hitler. Great percussion, brilliant guitars and a good story!

The disc also seems to draw a response for lacking cohesiveness. I think it flows beautifully, the "sound" of each track is similar enough without becoming repetative, and the theme of the album runs strong through all the lyrics. Give the album some time to settle in, allow the songs to float in your thoughts, and I am sure it will soon become a favourite!

Words cannot express how much I love this album.It's one of the few I've ever listened to where every song gives me goose-flesh,even now,ten years after I first heard it.Ms. Bush puts so much heart and soul and genuine,inspiringly HUMAN emotion into these breathtakingly crafted and played peices,one can only listen in awe.The opener "The Sensual World" blurrs the line forever between the divine and the erotic,"Love And Anger" combines hope and dread in a riveting interior monologue about love and loss."The Fog" a jaw-dropping dream-like reminiscence of childhood,is simply geogeous and indellibly haunting."Deeper Understanding",is another stunner about a woman who is seeking meaning and contact through endless hour in front of her computer;obviously,it's a song gets more relevent as the cyber-nation grows with each passing year."Never Be Mine" is almost overwhelming in it's primal,swoon-inducing longing(I may get hate-mail for this,but I always thought this song would have been smashing on the "Titanic" soundtrack).I don't knowhow to describe the next song "Rocket's Tail",featuring a soaring vocal by Kate,backed up by the Bulgarian Woman's Chior and David Gilmore (Pink Floyd) on guitar,the track blasts into the stratusphere,and leaves me speechless every time.You have to hear it to believe it,as I could never possibly describe it accurately.The album as a whole is an amzing amalgam of modern thems and ancient instrumentation and textures,with Irish pipes,and string sections and the above mentioned choir adding a timeless,eathy quality to Kate's never-better songwriting and vocals.Any one who hasn't heard this album should,immedeately.What are you waiting for?

It was a full four years after Hounds Of Love that Kate Bush reemerged with a new album, a new sound, and a new label, Sony.

The title track is one of her erotic songs a la "In The Warm Room" or "Symphony In Blue" from Lionheart, with Kate's girlish whispers almost tickling one's ears. and the lyrics are There is a distinct Irish sound with the Uileann pipes and a bouzouki.

The semi-calypso sound and prominent bass sets the tone of the mid-tempo "Love And Anger." Part of it has to do with saying the things one means, that "something so deep you don't think you can speak about it." Once that happens there'll be "two strings in sympathy", that someone who will help one change the past and the future.

After a burst of mad laughter, comes "The Fog". Kate's voice is at her most vulnerable here. Being overwhelmed enough by love has reduced Kate's persona to the frightened state of a child who's learning how to swim and has a kind father telling her the water's only waist high. She asks "Is this love big enough to watch over me, big enough to let go of me? Without hurting me" The emotional highlight has to be Nigel Kennedy's melancholy violin solo, and the orchestra arranged by Michael Kamen works well too.

"Reaching Out" shows how we all desire something and blindly reach out for it, whether it's a child reaching for fire, or a man for something he cannot have, but what they both have in common is "reaching out for Mama" which could mean certainty, but also an answer, harkening back to the universal navel.

The next two songs are the most imaginative from this album. The upbeat "Heads We're Dancing" is set in 1939, before "the music started" and has her dancing with someone, until she recognizes his face from a picture: "It couldn't be you/It's a picture of Hitler."

Before the proliferation of Internet recluses, the character of "Deeper Understanding," alienated and feeling lonely and lost by a colder world, turned to her computer and a new programme, a voice console, which talks to her. "Hello, I know that you've been feeling tired/I bring you love and deeper understanding." The Trio Bulgarka, consisting of the exotic voices of soloist Yanka Rupkhina, Eva Georgeva, and Stoyanka Boneva, all Bulgarians, chant while she sings the chorus. One of the songs I relate to.

The Celtic-flavoured ballad, "Never Be Mine" is a merging of Celtic Uileann pipes and the Trio Bulgarka. There's a conflict between wanting someone and a life as an ideal but missing the concrete reality of both. The two-sided coin of that concept is encapsulated with "The thrill and the hurting will never be mine."

"Rocket's Tail", also featuring the ethereal Trio Bulgarka, is about a woman who trying to emulate a rocket on November (I presume on Guy Fawkes night), goes as far as putting on a pointed hat, a gunpowder pack and stick (fuse), and standing on Waterloo Bridge, is ready to blast off. The songs starts a capella with Kate and Trio, till the line "and now shooting into the night", when Dave Gilmour's guitar signifies that the woman has taken off into the night. Creative!

The haunting and beautiful ballad "This Woman's Work" about a young unexpected mother-to-be who doesn't seem prepared, and is sung from the POV of a worried mother who anguishes over things she should've spoken to/or done with her daughter. Her vocals rise to a crescendo when she sings "Oh darling, make it go away" as in the feelings of angst. This was not only featured in the movie She's Having A Baby, but also was the name of the box set she released.

The Sensual World does not carry the romantic wonder of early albums such as Kick Inside and Lionheart, nor does its innovations top those of Never For Ever and The Dreaming. As for the sound, the constant drum backbeat is a bit distracting, as many of Kate's ethereal sounds did not require a steady drums. The songwriting though remains top-notch, even though some of the music doesn't reflect the lyrical quality. But both Celtic-flavoured songs, arranged by Bill Whelan, and the Trio Bulgarka songs add another dimension to Kate's sound.