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14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
One of the truly great eighties albums, March 4, 2004
"Hounds of Love" is the best Kate Bush album, her most successful, and yet it may be her least accessible. Certainly it contains a much wider musical range than most albums in 1985, what with the drums, guitars and pianos, followed by the bouzoukis, fiddles, uillean pipes, cellos and balalaikas. The album also has a wide range of allusion. Not only does it include a clip from "The Wall," but it also makes reference to Tennyson and Reich. Even more amazingly it actually make the portentous imperialist and the pseudo-scientific quack sympathetic and aesthetically successful. It starts off with the unusual love song "Running up that Hill," ("I'd make a deal with God/And get him to swap our places"). The video consists of a strange, intimate pair of dancers, which slowly spirals out of the attic where they are dancing to a strange foreign runway. "The Hounds of Love" is next and it is probably the song I care about the least. But then there is the joyful cheeriness of "The Big Sky." Then there is the carefully understated "Mother Stands for Comfort," ("She knows that I've been doing something wrong/But she won't say anything.") "Cloudbusting," one of Kate Bush's triumphs, refers to William Reich and his crackpot belief that by manipulating "orgone energy" (energy from orgasms) he could make it rain. Yet the song is a moving success, with its cello-driven melody, notwithstanding the fact that in both the song and the video Bush is playing a boy. ("Ooh I just know that something good is going to happen/And I don't know when/But just saying it could even make it happen.")Then there is the second side, "The Ninth Wave." The songs are all clearly different from each other, in style and tempo and instrumentation, and they discuss such subjects as sleeping, ice-skating, witch-hunts, ghosts, Irish jigs, the evening and a statement of love. But they are all united in their theme about a drowning woman. It starts off with the apparently soft and increasingly sinister "And Dream of Sheep." ("Like poppies, heavy with seed/They take me deeper and deeper"). Then there is the short, effective and quite chilling violin driven "Under Ice." The dramatic "Waking the Witch" follows, where Bush is confronted by a demonic inquisitor and which contains the aforementioned Pink Floyd reference, a forceful drumbeat as well as a brief sequence of bells. But the best cut is "Watching you Without Me," about the strange ghostlike presence, which is my favourite Kate Bush song of all. Here her voice, singing relatively understated material, shows off its true power and nuance. Then there is "Jig of Life" as well as "Hello Earth." The latter is the longest song on the album, as it starts off with childish innocence (Hello Earth/With just one hand help up high/I can blot you out,) and then moves on to a threatening storm. Finally there is "The Morning Fog," with its simple melody, relatively simple arrangement and genuine expression of love for her family. (The 1998 CD includes six other songs, including remixes of "Running up that Hill" and "The Big Sky." The four unreleased songs are all good, though they do not cohere with the original album. The best of them is "Burning Bridge.")
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29 of 33 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The extra tracks are definitely worth a few extra bucks, December 28, 2001
Even without the extra tracks, this album is worth at least five stars. However, even if you already own the original, it's worth plunking down a few extra bucks for the bonus tracks.'The Big Sky Meterogical Mix' is really fun, creative remix with different voice-overs added. The 'Running up that Hill' remix is also more than decent though I admit I like the original better. 'Be Kind to My Mistakes' is a sweet song about when you love someone you have to accept their blemishes along with the rest. 'Under the Ivy' is a gorgeous and sentimental piece -- it's one of my favorite Kate songs ever. Also, her piano playing really gets to shine on this track. 'My Lagan Love' is a beatiful a cappella piece -- the music is taken from an original Irish/Scottish folk song and Kate's brother wrote the words. 'Burning Bridge' is an upbeat pop tune with great vocals. It's really nice to have all these rare tracks together (ligitly) on one CD. If you are a real Kate fan you can do what I did - resell your original copy on amazon and buy this one for the bonus tracks.
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13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Generally haunting favourite of both casual and serious fans, March 19, 2005
"Hounds Of Love" by Kate Bush
Genres: Rock, Prog-Rock/Art Rock, Alternative Pop/Rock, College Rock
Release Date: 1997(1985-6,1988)
This entirely self-written and produced album was a huge success for Kate both in England and overseas, the single "Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)" being a hit in America. She produced it all inside her own private studio at her house in England, and when released in September of 1985, it knocked Madonna's "Like A Virgin" off the top of the album charts.
The success is understandable, as this is Kate's best album to date. However the two halves of it are very different. There is the first half of the album entitled "Hounds Of Love" and features the more commercial, pop-orientated arrangements and tunes on the album. The second half is a mini concept album called "The Ninth Wave" in which Kate tells the story of a drowning woman which may end with her surviving and waking up, or dying and being reborn. This was extremely ground-breaking and sounds like nothing else that came out of the '80s and is therefore not dated in the least today. It's a shame that movie plans for this concept fell through. Everyone who brought this album the first time around probably brought it for the four hit songs packed on side one, the only non-single being a strange song ("Mother Stands For Comfort" that would only be out of place with the rest of "The Ninth Wave" for the mood ring synthesizers. It too could have been a hit single with the crashing glass sounds (used also on "Running Up That Hill" and an earlier Kate masterpiece "Babooshka"), cold piano, and warm electronic waves. All four singles are spectacular, and even groundbreaking on "Cloudbusting", a beautiful if not instantly catchy number full of strings and heavy drums about a machine that makes it rain. Kate rocks out on "Hounds Of Love" and "The Big Sky" and performs with sensual and energetic catharticity on "Running Up That Hill". Full, bewitching and layered pop/rock is not where the album description ends.
Riding the death-whale that is "The Ninth Wave" Kate moves on to haunting territory with the sentimental sounding "And Dream Of Sheep" (Kate sings and plays the piano beautifully) that leads onto the tense and brilliant "Under Ice" which stirs up the imagery of a snowy day with a tragic accident waiting underneath the ice on the lake, through to the calm but ominous and eventually terrifying "Waking The Witch", then onto the mellow "Watching You Without Me". Sampling is used very expertly on all of those tracks. Kate then experiments further with the Irish sounds used on 1982's "The Dreaming" album with the dramatic, unforgettably epic "Jig Of Life" (Complete with recited poetry by her brother John during the climax). Then the creepy "Hello Earth" breathes down your neck like a scene out of "Nosferatu" during the dark cathedral chants before Kate is reborn in some way through the light and bouncy "The Morning Fog".
Arguably the best and most enduring album released in the 1980's, this is widely regarded as Kate's masterpiece. It shows off all her best qualities and in their best light. The British reissue in 1997 by EMI adds 2 uneventful remixes (although the commentaries on the appearances of clouds by the disguised voices of Kate and her brother on "The Big Sky" remix are enjoyable to listen to) and a few B-sides, "Under The Ivy" and the beautiful a-capella rendition of the traditional myth-song "My Lagan Love" standing out more than anything. Someone should have told EMI that 1988's "Be Kind To My Mistakes", although good, would have made a better inclusion on a future re-issue of 1989's "The Sensual World". "The Handsome Cabin Boy" or "Not This Time" would have been better. Also, the Orgonon remix of "Cloudbusting" should have been used rather than the extended 12" remix of "Running Up That Hill"
Best Tracks: Every single one. "Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)" is the most catchy, and "Under Ice" the most instantly memorable from "The Ninth Wave". The B-side gems "Under The Ivy" & "My Lagan Love" a impress greatly.
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