Discord & Rhyme: An Album Podcast

Discord and Rhyme is a podcast where we discuss the albums we love, song by song.

023: Kate Bush - The Dreaming (1982)

May 14, 2019  /  Amanda Rodgers

“I look back at that record and it seems mad. I heard it about three years ago and couldn't believe it. There's a lot of anger in it. There's a lot of 'I'm an artist, right!'”

-Kate Bush, reflecting on The Dreaming in 1993

Discord & Rhyme’s panel is just a power trio this week of John, Rich, and host Producer Mike, but that didn’t stop them from covering an album with some of the headiest concepts in popular music. On 1982’s The Dreaming, Kate Bush opines on the futility of squeezing the totality of human knowledge into your puny brain; tells a tale of a heist caper that’s more about the anxiety of pulling off a heist; and puts you in the head of a Viet Cong soldier who’s about to throw a grenade — and that’s just the first three songs! Mike loves The Dreaming because the music sounds like it’s “happening in some non-Euclidean space inside Kate Bush’s head,”  and if you’re only familiar with her already out-there hits like “Running Up That Hill” and “Wuthering Heights,” the pure sonic experience of this album may be overwhelming. But if you sit back and let the weirdness in, this is music unlike anything else on this plane of reality.

Miscellany

  • Neil Tennant of the Pet Shop Boys wrote a capsule review of “There Goes a Tenner” for Smash Hits magazine: "Very weird... Obviously she's trying to become less accessible. Even so this has a haunting atmosphere.” Not his wittiest moment, but we all come from somewhere.

  • John's surprised sound on learning Kate did all of the voices in “Leave it Open” was legit; not 30 seconds beforehand he had asked Mike if that was Gilmour providing some of the deeper voices, and John was genuinely surprised to learn the answer.

  • Will was scheduled to co-host this episode, but became ill right before the recording session. With permission, the production notes for this episode, available via our Patreon, feature comments from both Will and his friend Anne, who brought him up to speed on the album by emailing him tons of great insight about all the songs.

  • This goes without saying, but we would never actually edit Amanda out of our episodes.

  • Well, maybe H2O.

Other links

Discord & Rhyme Roll Call

  • Mike DeFabio (host)

  • Rich Bunnell (moderator)

  • John McFerrin

  • Amanda Rodgers (angry)

The Dreaming tracklist

  1. Sat in Your Lap

  2. There Goes a Tenner

  3. Pull Out the Pin

  4. Suspended in Gaffa

  5. Leave It Open

  6. The Dreaming

  7. Night of the Swallow

  8. All the Love

  9. Houdini

  10. Get Out of My House

Other clips used

Kate Bush:

  • Waking the Witch

  • Babooshka

  • Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God)

  • Wuthering Heights

  • The Wedding List

  • Big Sky

  • Pi

  • Dreamtime

Others:

  • Leroy Anderson - Syncopated Clock

  • Genesis - Down and Out

  • Genesis - Robbery, Assault and Battery

  • Peter Gabriel - Family Snapshot

  • Depeche Mode - Personal Jesus

  • Daryl Hall - Dreamtime

  • Whodini - Be Yourself

  • Komar & Melamid - The Most Unwanted Song

Songs we mentioned but didn’t clip

Kate Bush:

  • Rocket Man

  • The Sensual World

  • Flower of the Mountain

Others:

  • Pat Benatar - Love Is a Battlefield

  • Peter Gabriel - Don’t Give Up

  • Peter Gabriel - Games Without Frontiers

  • Peter Gabriel - Sledgehammer

  • Peter Gabriel - Big Time

  • Peter Gabriel - In Your Eyes

  • The Moody Blues - Never Comes the Day

  • The Rolling Stones - Dirty Work

  • Genesis - The Battle of Epping Forest

  • Genesis - Harold the Barrel

  • Genesis - Hold On My Heart

  • Blue Öyster Cult - ME262

  • Queen - We Will Rock You

  • Midnight Oil - Beds Are Burning

  • Anderson Bruford Wakeman and Howe - Birthright

  • Yes - Dreamtime

  • They Might Be Giants - Untitled

  • Black Flag - Damaged I

  • Sly & the Family Stone - There’s a Riot Goin’ On

  • The B-52s - Party Out of Bounds

The Dreaming personnel

  • Kate Bush – vocals, piano (exc. 4), programming, electronic drums, Fairlight CMI synthesizer (1, 2, 5–10), Yamaha CS-80 (2), strings (4)

  • Paddy Bush – sticks (1), mandolins and strings (4), bullroarer (6)

  • Geoff Downes – Fairlight CMI trumpet section (1)

  • Jimmy Bain – bass guitar (1, 5, 10)

  • Del Palmer – bass guitar (2, 4, 8), fretless and 8 string bass (7)

  • Preston Heyman – drums (1, 3, 5, 10), sticks (1)

  • Stuart Elliott – drums (2, 4, 6–9), sticks (4), percussion (8)

  • Dave Lawson – Synclavier (2, 4)

  • Brian Bath – electric guitar (3)

  • Danny Thompson – string bass (3)

  • Ian Bairnson – acoustic guitar (5)

  • Alan Murphy – electric guitar (5, 10)

  • Rolf Harris – didgeridoo (6)

  • Liam O'Flynn – penny whistle and uilleann pipes (7)

  • Seán Keane – fiddle (7)

  • Dónal Lunny – bouzouki (7)

  • Eberhard Weber – double bass (9)

Other voices:

  • Paddy Bush, Ian Bairnson, Stewart Arnold and Gary Hurst – backing vocals (1)

  • Paddy Bush – backing vocals (6, 10)

  • David Gilmour – backing vocals (3)

  • Percy Edwards – animals (6)

  • Gosfield Goers – crowd (6)

  • Richard Thornton – choirboy (8)

  • Gordon Farrell – "Houdini" (9)

  • Del Palmer – "Rosabel Believe" (9)

  • Paul Hardiman – "Eeyore" (10)

  • Esmail Sheikh – drum talk (10)

Technical:

  • Kate Bush – producer

  • Paul Hardiman – recording engineer at Advision and Odyssey Studios, all mixes at Advision Studios

  • Teri Reed, David Taylor – assistant engineers

  • David Taylor – mixing assistant

  • Haydn Bendall – engineer at Abbey Road Studios

  • Danny Dawson and John Barrett – assistant engineers

  • Hugh Padgham and Nick Launay – engineer at Townhouse Studios

  • George Chambers, Howard Gray and Nick Cook – assistant engineers

  • Peter Wooliscroft – digital editing

  • Ian Cooper – mastering engineer

Credits

“Discord & Rhyme (theme),” composed by the Other Leading Brand, contains elements of:

  • Amon Düül II - Dehypnotized Toothpaste

  • The Dukes of Stratosphear - What in the World?? ...

  • Faith No More - Midlife Crisis

  • Herbie Hancock - Hornets

  • Kraftwerk - Autobahn

  • Talking Heads - Seen and Not Seen

  • Kate Bush - Get Out of My House (this episode only)

You can buy or stream The Dreaming and other albums by Kate Bush at the usual suspects such as Spotify, iTunes, YouTube, and Amazon [affiliate link]. Follow Discord & Rhyme on Twitter @DiscordPod for news, updates, and other random stuff. Follow Rich @zonetrope and John @tarkus1980. Editing is by Rich, and special thanks to our own Mike DeFabio, the Other Leading Brand, for production duties. See you next album, and be ever wonderful.

tags / Mike DeFabio

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