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The Dreaming

Pop / Art pop · 1982

The Dreaming

Kate Bush

Why listen

Recorded voices and sharply changing song lengths turn ten tracks into distinct scenes rather than one continuous display of intensity.

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English editorial edition

Album story

Sat in Your Lap establishes a compact opening, but The Dreaming does not keep every song at that scale. Pull Out the Pin extends past five minutes, while the shorter Houdini later gives way to the longer Get Out of My House. Changing proportions are one practical route through a record often introduced only through its intensity.

The 1982 album was Bush’s fourth and, in her own retrospective account, her first as sole producer. That does not mean she had previously made no production decisions, or that she now performed every instrument alone. The selected 2018 remaster retains the original ten-song order; its remaster date belongs to a different stage of the record’s history.

Where a sound is placed

Bush recalls bringing friends’ answering-machine voices into the project. Such material complicates the idea that every unfamiliar sound must originate as a synthetic effect. A recorded voice can acquire another role through placement. Rather than trying to identify every machine, listen for whether an inserted sound interrupts a phrase, sustains its atmosphere or redirects attention. Knowing its entire technical history is not a prerequisite.

The cover points towards track nine

Bush connects the cover’s key and kiss to a story about Houdini and his wife that she heard while making the record. That recollection explains an artistic image; it does not independently authenticate every detail of an escapologist’s performances. Notice instead that the visual entrance leads towards the ninth song rather than the first. An already familiar picture gains a different duration when encountered through music.

Do not stop at the explained image

Houdini is followed by more than five minutes of Get Out of My House. The cover’s apparent explanation therefore does not supply the album’s ending. Follow the relative sizes of the songs before attempting to decode every character or narrative. Their placement gives this album its own proportions, worth hearing independently of the later success of Hounds of Love.

The album through its tracks

Compare the compact opening with Houdini’s late position, then continue through the final track before judging the album’s conclusion.

  1. Sat in Your Lap

    At approximately three minutes and twenty-nine seconds, the opener establishes a concentrated entrance. When Bush’s voice presses forward, attend to the relation between short verbal units and the accompaniment rather than explaining the effect through vocal height alone. Compare passages that extend a melodic line with those that divide syllables more sharply. One voice can create different kinds of motion within the same piece. Continue into There Goes a Tenner before deciding that the opening tension defines the entire record. This is the first album track in the 2018 remaster, not a presumed single or video edit. Its actual beginning and ending provide the useful boundaries for this comparison.

    Reference · Fish People official store: complete ten-track 2018 remaster programme

  2. Houdini

    The ninth song lasts about three minutes and forty-nine seconds and connects directly with the cover’s key image. Bush’s account of its origin offers a way beyond seeing the kiss as a generic romantic picture. Yet understanding an image does not replace hearing the music. Follow the end of a tense phrase into the accompaniment that continues its time. Alternatively, listen once without consulting the cover, then bring the two experiences together. The track is not the album finale: the longer Get Out of My House follows. Keeping that continuation in view prevents a recognisable visual explanation from becoming a premature answer to the whole record’s shape.

    Reference · Kate Bush: first-person reflection on sole production, voices and Houdini cover

Listen next

Continue with Hounds of Love, comparing how the same artist organises individual songs and larger stretches across two distinct albums.

Hounds of Love ↗
References & editorial note

Written for English readers. Album facts are referenced below; listening suggestions are editorial interpretations. AI-assisted editorial review; not independently human-reviewed.