Speaking in Kate Bush terminology, Aerial is like a friendly ghost running up that hill. There’s a lot to like about Bush’s new album, her first in a decade. With the first song, a question about Elvis and whether or not he still walks the earth in human form, joying in his deception and freedom, Kate Bush visits a new time via safe waters, issuing a single that sounds closely like something off of Hounds of Love. The single, “King of The Mountain” is as close as you can get to an earlier career that was going well. In that, the song already surpasses the final two albums that she released before musically disappearing, reasons unknown to most fans.
But is Aerial a reappearance marvel, treading new waters for the sake of a glorifying return to the fandom that loved her? That depends on whom you ask. For some, Bush’s evolutionary progression on through to her The Red Shoes album did nothing but increase her stock amongst devout fans. Others felt that her ability to produce in the style of her earlier works up to and including Hounds of Love was not as evident in her final two albums for Columbia. No matter whom you ask or what clique you belong to, Aerial has plenty for both camps to be happy about. Lyrically, Kate Bush’s work has always been mystical after a literary fashion with her songs imbued with a Wuthering Heights-like English feel. Musically, she has been experimental and classical, using conventional piano-driven tunes as well as guitar-compositions with twists of other sounds to sparkle the tune. On Aerial, she provides that again in abundance.
Aerial provides 2 albums; separate in feel and scope, even separately titled. The first disc, A Sea of Honey, gives us a collection of songs that fit together like an album should while her second disc, A Sky of Honey, is more conceptual in sound and lyric. That’s spreading the butter on the bread, making for a better tasting sandwich.
A Sea of Honey starts with the before-mentioned single, “King of The Mountain,” and works through the pop-styled “Pi,” a very English sounding, “Bertie,” and the ballad, “Mrs Bartolozzi” before launching the quite good “How to be Invisible.” The ethereal, and very Hounds of Love-like, “Joanni” is another track of excellent Kate Bush work. The first disc ends with a piano ballad, “A Coral Room.”
The conceptual, A Sky of Honey begins life as a prelude, whispering “Mummy…Daddy. The day is Full of birds, sounds like they’re saying words.” The album, the second disc, explores romanticism as a theme. It glorifies existence in a philosophical blend of metaphor and beauty. All of the songs are quiet and poetically rendered. They are classically delivered in colours of tones and phrasing, telling stories of things that we don’t otherwise pay attention to; a trademark of Kate Bush.
The question on everyone’s mind is “did Kate Bush re-emerge as we knew her? Did she give us her past brilliance in a new fashion?” She has. We’re a lucky bunch. We have two levels of Kate Bush in a single return. We’ve gotten more than we bargained for.
Welcome back, Kate!
