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34 of 34 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Elegantly Beautifully, Increasingly Macabre, December 31, 2001
Although it clearly belongs to the same style as the previous THE KICK INSIDE and LIONHEART, NEVER FOREVER marks a decided change in Kate Bush's direction; less whimsical and considerably more overtly macabre, on this particular recording Bush largely eschews both the purely playful and the warm love songs of previous recordings. Her tone of voice is also fuller and considerably less girlish than on previous recordings.The material here is also considerably more violent in terms of lyrics. In her previous recordings Bush certainly showed a tendency toward images of impending or actual death ("James and the Cold Gun" and "Don't Push Your Foot On The Heartbrake" leap to mind), but in NEVER FOREVER she is less inclined to present such pieces as "character pieces," less inclined to romanticize them with a gothic flavor. And irony, never far beneath the surface in earlier work, is much more apparent. Such tracks as "Violin" (concerning a neurotic/erotic obsession with the instrument, in which Bush's voice mimics the tone of the instrument), "Wedding List," (in which a frustrated bride contemplates the slaughter of the whole wedding party), and "Breathing" (in which the singer is dying of radium posioning following an atomic blast) are perhaps the logical extensions of Bush's earlier work; at the same time, with such tracks as "All We Ever Look For" and "Army Dreamers," we begin to see a transition from material based on internal private fantasty into something much broader and considerably more subtle: deliberate commentary on the world around her. This is particularly true of "Army Dreamers," which is very clearly a percusor to her next album, THE DREAMING--which will be a radical departure from her earlier sound. Even as she is toying with new dimensions in her lyrics and vocal interpretations, Bush is also toying with increasingly complex arrangements. There is a sense of greater delicacy and greater deliberation in terms of pure music on this particular recording, again with "Army Dreamers" a case in point. Fans of the earlier recordings will find enough similarity to them in NEVER FOREVER to enjoy them as a continuation; fans of her later work, however, will see in it the build toward her two finest recordings, THE DREAMING and HOUNDS OF LOVE, both of which are as completely unlike her early works as can be imagined.
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13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Kate-Bush-ka, Kate-Bush-ka, Kate-Bush-ka, ya, ya, December 5, 2006
Surfing the Net recently, I came upon what in some circles was a notoriously nasty critique of Kate Bush's work by the American rock critic Dave Marsh. You may have read it in the first ROLLING STONE RECORD GUIDE from the 70s, namely that she sounded "like the consequences of mating Patti Smith with a Hoover vacuum cleaner." Well, Marsh was of course one of the founding fathers (or founding self-described teenage dwarves) behind CREEM Magazine, and if you remember CREEM, fondly or otherwise, you still have to ask yourself what the heck the editors of the RS RECORD GUIDE were thinking, assigning the likes of Marsh to review Britain's reigning queen or art rock. Marsh was the quintessential American ROCK--no, make that ROCK'N'ROLL critic: if it wasn't three minutes of three chord power pop, he didn't want anything to do with it. No way Kate Bush was not going to be his cup of meat.
But the Patti Smith comparison was certainly intriguing. Most people, when comparing the veddy British Kate with American female singer-songwriters, mention Joni Mitchell (Canadian by birth, but who's counting) or Laura Nyro (New Yorker by birth, which made her suspect to many other Americans, but who's counting there either). But Patti Smith? Well, that's not such a stretch as all that. There's a moment in Kate Bush's track "Delius," on this album, that she slips into a Patti-style-American-Indian chant. The similarity is actually uncanny: briefly. But of course, Patti Smith was carving out her poetry in a punk rock context. And Kate was coming from a British art rock tradition (she was discovered as a teenager by Pink Floyd's Dave Gilmour) that in turn had its roots in Celtic folk and Classical European traditions in general. But in significant ways, both women were already stretching those traditions and re-defining them from the very outset of their careers. So the similarity is real. The tradition actually mattered less than the urge to extend it and, to a great degree, move beyond it.
The comparison with Laura Nyro is also significant. Nyro was similarly eclectic and similarly inclined to shatter the traditional forms she loved (in her case American R&B, Doo Wop, Broadway, folk and some classical). She also had her own unique sense of language and an ability to create whole universes within three minute pop songs. All three women met with initial critical acclaim and quickly garnered strong cult followings (and some mass recognition to boot). And then they all pretty much retreated--much to their fans chagrin and to some critical taunts of burn-out--mainly to raise their families. Dropping out was not a permanent state for any of them, and, in many ways, their refusal to sacrifice their personal and (just as significantly) their ARTISTIC lives on the altar of show biz actually serve to make them all the more credible as genuine artists.
And of course, when they DID come back, they did so on their own terms.
But I digress, I suppose. At the time of NEVER FOR EVER, Kate Bush was still a relatively new phenomenon. And in her home country, she really was a phenomenon. Her singles had all done quite well, thank you very much. And if she remained a virtual unknown in the US, her popularity extended to the European continent handily. I recall that when my ex and I were staying with a French family she had previously lived with on an exchange program, I innocently asked their teenager daughter if she knew Kate Bush, "Mais oui," she said and starting singing, "Babooshka, Babooshka, Babooshka Ya Ya."
Now Kate had been a European discovery for me and my then-bride when we were living in Germany. NEVER FOR EVER was the one recording I had not heard yet when I posed that question to the young Veronique in France, but as soon as I got back to Deutschland I sought out a copy of the cassette version of that record--in part because of Vero's cute little rendition of Kate's continental hit. (Spot on, actually). And I was not disappointed. We had bought THE KICK INSIDE and THE DREAMING pretty much at the same time, loved them both, but were curious about how she got from point A to point OMEGA-to-the-nth-power. (Yes, I had never heard anything quite like THE DREAMING before in my life). LIONHEART had proven to be KICK INSIDE TWO (aka: KICK HARDER). Finally, laying my hands on NEVER FOR EVER was the great aha! moment. That's where you hear the transition. Still lots of whimsy and girlish charm, but things start getting a little more dangerous too, a little spookier.
And not just in terms of the lyrics. Kate Bush had always had a Gothic sensibility from the outset, leavened with humor, of course, a delightful sense of off-handed mysticism. And lots of melodic hooks, hooks, hooks! The girl could just churn out tune after quirky, catchy tune. Well, the hooks are still here on this album, but they serve to highlight a darker lyrical vision. Murderous revenge for a Wedding Day Massacre (sounds as though it might have been ripped from current US headlines, but no, its inspiration is a Truffaut movie) and women feeling erotic impulses toward the children in their charge (even more of a contemporary headline case, but again, inspired by cinematic--and ultimately--literary sources: this time Henry James by way of Hollywood). Still this kind of stuff("The Infant Kiss"--or as it might also be called "The Child With the Man In His Eyes--could get you BANNED in this country. Luckily for Kate, it remains obscure enough for most people not to have had a chance to misunderstand it. (She's not advocating anything: she's telling a story).
The major departure for Kate with this record, though, is probably more in terms of production than in lyrical content. This was the first record that she co-produced, and it shows. There was always a certain textural (as well as textual) richness to the early stuff, but it's more sharply defined on this record. It is a solid step forward, maybe even bold--not yet a gigantic leap into the abyss (that would come a few years later with the release of--what many, including myself--consider her masterpiece, THE DREAMING.
Speaking of comparisons, the only time I ever subscribed to an actual fanzine was one dedicated to Kate. Called BREAKTHROUGH, the ads for it used to say, "Bigger Than The Beatles!" I used to wonder why anyone would compare a solo woman performer with ANY group--let alone a group as iconic as the Beatles. But I realized later that it's no more absurd than comparing Kate to Patti Smith or Laura Nyro (I don't really see much basis for a Joni comparision, however--other than they've both been boldly experimental). Listening to the production values of NEVER FOR EVER, I'm reminded of the great Beatles experiments of a decade or so earlier. Slamming doors, footsteps, disembodied voices lecturing about the aftereffects of nuclear war, "--all of these "effects" are successfully interwoven into the musical whole. The music doesn't suffer for their inclusion. These are sound effects that actually work. They hold up over repeated listenings. And that's hard to achieve. And what about those eerie tape loops on "Egypt" reminiscent of nothing so much as "Tomorrow Never Knows." I don't know if the young Kate Bush could fairly be described as "BIGGER than the Beatles," but the comparison is certainly interesting. For a solo artist to even be in the same league is remarkable. For a young woman barely out of her teens at the time this album was released), it's pretty darn astonishing.
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12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Wonderfully weird and melodic sounds from Kate's 3rd album, December 11, 2003
Never For Ever followed the sweet and mellow Lionheart. This time around, Kate Bush's entry into weird sounds and vocals is in the making. And this album came out in 1980. Pretty progressive and avant-garde-ish. This tops Lionheart and The Kick Inside in its sheer innovation of strange sounds, vocals that reach a manic frenzy, and some sobering songs on social issues."Babooshka" tells the story of a woman who tests her husband's fidelity by writing him anonymous letters, disguising herself as a younger her, and seeing if he'll go through with an adulterous affair with his own wife. The piano is struck forcefully during the verses, before the electric guitar riffs kick in the prechorus and chorus. And what's with the glass-shattering special effect towards the end? "Blow AwayEis a showcase for Kate's voice, which has her singing about a man too obsessed with music. She wonders where the music he plays goes. "Surely not with his soul?"she surmises. The slow but brisk piano number, "All We Ever Look For," sporting an accompanying whistle, is another highlight here. Weird stuff: in the second verse, there's a cookie monster sounding growl that comes in every fourth beat. Another open door is what "all we ever look for," where one might find "the truth," "a little hug," "our own tomb," and other things. There are some sound effects that come in when someone walks down the hall and opens doors in search of that something. "Egypt" is of someone falling in love with the ambience of Egypt, be it the shifting sands, the pyramids, and the Nile. The rhythmic melody is like a ship that keeps time with the beater, and towards the end, a weird cacophony of multiple voices comes in. "The Wedding ListEis a bit of a shocker, as it tells of a pair of newlyweds, where a "mystery man"shoots the groom in a passion crime. Kate's lyrics are a bit on the bloody and violent side, speaking of swooning in warm maroon, and "I'm gonna fill your head with lead." In the final lines, we find out why the groom was killed. The frenzied guitar rocker "Violin" is the closest to punk rock Kate will ever come to. Her voice swoops up to a lunatic pitch when she sings "Filling me up WITH shivers." And her voice soars to a weird pitch and manic madness. Even today, I can still think of people going, "What is this? It's so weird!" "The Infant Kiss" is a bit of a controversy, as it details a Lolita-like obsession, only the genders are switched and the younger party is a little boy, the older party being an adult woman. The soft melodic guitar "Army Dreamers" featuring a group of male backing singers in the chorus, including an accompanying male voice. The repeated refrain "B.F.P.O."is a reference to the British Forces Post Office. This tells the lack of opportunity and assets of a now-dead and mourned for army recruit. "What could he do-should've been a rock star/but he didn't have the money for a guitar/what could he do-should've been a politician/but he never had a proper education/what should he do-should've been a father/but he never made it till his twenties/what a waste of army dreamers." The brooding and haunting piano number "Breathing", a chilling anti-nuclear single, is sung from the POV of a baby still in the womb, affected by the radiation her mother is inhaling following an atomic bomb explosion. The baby knows it's dangerous to take in the fallout, but her instincts tell her to keep "breathing my mother in/breathing my beloved in/breathing her nicotine/breathing the fallout in out in out in..." After a casual and authoritative report of a nuclear test, the music rises to a crescendo, climaxing with a heavy guitar and poignant refrain: "What are we going to do?/We are all going to die." One of Kate's best ever songs. Overall, a sign of better things to come.
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by Kate Bush 
