The Sensual World

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The Sensual World
Studio album by Kate Bush
Released October 17, 1989
Recorded 1989
Genre Alternative Rock, Art Rock, Pop Rock
Length 42:10 (LP)
45:58 (CD)
Label EMI, Columbia (US and Canada)
Producer Kate Bush
Professional reviews
Kate Bush chronology
The Whole Story
(1986)		 The Sensual World
(1989)		 This Woman's Work
(1990)

The Sensual World is the sixth all-new studio album by Kate Bush, and the singer's eighth album release in total.

Contents

[edit] Overview

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The increasingly personal tone of her writing continued on The Sensual World, with songs about unexpressed and unrequited love ("Love and Anger" and "Never Be Mine", respectively), the pressures on modern relationships ("Between A Man And A Woman"), and self-doubt ("The Fog"). "Deeper Understanding" showed a remarkable prescience in its portrait of a lonely person who finds solace in the company of a computer (made prophetic by the internet addiction that would surface at the end of the decade). "Rocket's Tail" (dedicated to her pet cat, Rocket) invoked the joys of indulging in another's fantasy. The quirkiest track on the album, touched by Bush's trademark black humour, was "Heads We're Dancing", about a woman who dances all night with a charming stranger only to find out that he is Adolf Hitler.

The title track drew its inspiration from Ulysses by James Joyce. Bush realised that the closing passage of the novel - a monologue by Molly Bloom - fitted the music she had created. When the Joyce estate refused to release the text, Bush wrote original lyrics that echo the original passage, as Molly steps from the pages of the book and revels in the real world. [1] She also alluded to Jerusalem by William Blake in a reference to the song's gestation ("And my arrows of desire rewrite the speech"). The song includes Irish instrumentation (Uilleann pipes, fiddle, whistle) under a breathy rendering of the orgasmic 'Yes' of the original text.

The songs "Deeper Understanding", "Never Be Mine" and "Rocket's Tail" all feature backing vocals by the Bulgarian vocal ensemble the Trio Bulgarka. The Sensual World went on to become her biggest-selling album in the U.S., receiving a Gold award four years after its release for 500,000 copies sold. In the United Kingdom album charts it reached the number two position.[2]

The song "This Woman's Work" from the movie She's Having a Baby (1988), was re-edited for this album. On November 27, 2005, it was featured in the British TV drama Walk Away and I Stumble starring Tamzin Outhwaite. Due to that broadcast, the song reached #3 on the UK download chart. [3] This song has also been used in a long-running UK television advert for the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, broadcast in 2005-2006. It was also remade by R&B artist Maxwell in 1997 for his MTV Unplugged album.

Released as CD players became increasingly popular, the original LP ended with This Woman's Work with Walk Straight Down the Middle included as a bonus track on the CD and cassette versions of the album. The gap between these two tracks is slightly longer to indicate the album proper finishes with This Woman's Work.

A video collection called The Sensual World: The Videos was also released; it contained videos for the title song, Love and Anger and This Woman's Work, as well as excerpts from an interview Bush gave to the music TV channel VH1.

[edit] Track listing

All songs written by Kate Bush

  1. "The Sensual World" – 3:57
  2. "Love and Anger" – 4:42
  3. "The Fog" – 5:04
  4. "Reaching Out" – 3:11
  5. "Heads We're Dancing" – 5:17
  6. "Deeper Understanding" – 4:46
  7. "Between a Man and a Woman" – 3:29
  8. "Never Be Mine" – 3:43
  9. "Rocket's Tail" – 4:06
  10. "This Woman's Work" – 3:32
  11. "Walk Straight Down the Middle" – 3:48

[edit] Personnel

[edit] Chart Performance

Chart (1989) Peak
position
USA Billboard 200 43
France 38
Australian Album Charts 30
Germany 20
Denmark 18
Ireland 17
Canada 16
Netherlands 8
Europe 6
Finland 5
UK Albums Chart 2
Norway's album chart 7

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ Littlejohn, Maureen. The Sensual Woman. Network magazine. Retrieved on 2007-04-03.
  2. ^ Kate Bush. NNDB. Retrieved on 2007-04-03.
  3. ^ Official UK Download Chart Book. DigitalStar.org.uk. Retrieved on 2007-04-03.


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