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50 Words for Snow

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50 Words for Snow
Studio albumby
Kate Bush
Released21 November 2011(2011-11-21)
Recorded2010–2011
StudioAbbey Road(London)
Genre
Length65:29
LabelFish People
ProducerKate Bush
Kate Bushchronology
Director's Cut
(2011) 		50 Words for Snow
(2011) 		Before the Dawn
(2016)
Singlesfrom50 Words for Snow
  1. "Wild Man"
    Released: 11 October 2011

50 Words for Snowis the tenth studio album by English singer-songwriterKate Bush,released on 21 November 2011. It was the second album released on her own label, Fish People,[5][6]and Bush's first all-new material sinceAerial(2005). The album includes the single "Wild Man".

Background and release[edit]

50 Words for Snowwas released on 21 November 2011, Bush's second album of that year, followingDirector's Cut.The album consists of seven songs "set against a background of falling snow" and has a running time of 65 minutes.[5][7]The songs "Lake Tahoe" and "Misty" are the two longest songs in Bush's catalogue and her only individual songs that are over ten minutes long. In November 2018, Bush released box sets of remasters of her studio albums, including50 Words for Snow.

A radio edit of the first single "Wild Man" was played onBBC Radio 2'sKen BruceShowon 10 October. The single, featuring both the radio edit as well as the album version, was released on 11 October.Andy Fairweather Lowguest stars on this story of a group of people exploring theHimalayaswho, upon finding evidence of the elusive, mythicalYeti,out of compassion cover up all traces of its footprints. Priya Elan in theNew Musical Expressgreeted the single with enthusiasm, saying: "For those of us who have been secretly longing for a return to the unflinchingly bizarre and Bush's ability to conjure up strange new worlds, 'Wild Man' is a deep joy."[8]

"Everyone will know that events in Tibet have taken a terrible turn. I want to express my sadness at such a gentle and spiritual culture suffering so greatly. I am so shocked by the desperate measures being taken by people whose only way to call out for help is by taking these horrific actions. I would feel ashamed if I didn’t express my feelings. I just hope the world is listening."

—Bush expressing her concerns aboutTibetin 2011 prior album's release[9]

In an interview with the American radio station KCRW, Bush said that the idea for the album's title song came from thinking about how theEskimo have 50 words for snow,[10]which led her to use fantastical words and phrases, such as "spangladasha", "blown from Polar fur", and "Robber's Veil".[11]The album's songs are built around Bush's quietly jazzy piano andSteve Gadd's drums (she had just started working with him and praised his "brilliant drumming"[11]), and utilize both sung and spoken word vocals in whatClassic Rock'sStephen Daltoncalls "a...supple andexperimentalaffair, with a contemporarychamber popsound grounded in crisp piano,minimalpercussion and light-touch electronics...billowingjazz-rocksoundscapes, interwoven with fragmentary narratives delivered in a range of voices from shrill toLaurie Anderson-style cooing. "[12]BassistDanny Thompsonalso appears on the album.

On the first track, "Snowflake", is a song written specifically to use his still high choir-boy voice,[13]Bush's son Albert sings the role of a falling snowflake in a song expressing the hope of a noisy world soon being hushed by snowfall. "Snowflake" drifts into "Lake Tahoe", where choral singers Stefan Roberts and Michael Wood join Bush in a song about a rarely seen ghost: a woman who appears in aVictorian gownto call to her dog, Snowflake. Bush explained to fellow musicianJamie Cullumin an interview on Dutch Radio[14]that she wished to explore using high male voices in contrast to her own, deeper, voice. "Misty" is about a snowman lover who melts away after a night of passion, and after "Wild Man",Elton Johnand Bush as eternally divided lovers trade vocals on "Snowed In at Wheeler Street", while actorStephen Fryrecites the "50 Words for Snow". The quiet love song "Among Angels" finishes the album.[15]

Two stop-motion animation videos were released online to promote the album, one to accompany a section of "Misty" (called "Mistraldespair" ), the other to accompany a section of "Wild Man". "Mistraldespair" was directed by Bush and animated by Tommy Thompson and Gary Pureton,[16]while the "Wild Man" segment was created by Finn and Patrick at Brandt Animation.[17]On 24 January 2012, a third piece called "Eider Falls at Lake Tahoe", was premiered on her website and on YouTube. Running at 5:01, the piece is a black-and-white shadow puppet animation thatNPR's Dan Raby calls "...beautiful in its simplicity – emphasizing small subtle movements over big extravagance... The stark contrast between the black figures and the white world makes each set piece seem mystical."[18]Directed by Bush and photographed by award-winning British cinematographerRoger Pratt,the shadow puppets were designed by Robert Allsopp.[19]

The album's closing track, "Among Angels", was included in the setlist of Bush'sBefore the Dawnconcerts in 2014. In 2015, a remixed version of "Wild Man"was included onThe Art of Peace − Songs for Tibet IIcompilation album celebrating the 80th birthday of theDalai Lama.[20]

Critical and commercial reception[edit]

Professional ratings
Aggregate scores
SourceRating
AnyDecentMusic?8.2/10[21]
Metacritic85/100[22]
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[23]
The Daily Telegraph[24]
Entertainment WeeklyA−[25]
The Guardian[26]
The Independent[27]
Los Angeles Times[28]
NME7/10[29]
Pitchfork8.5/10[30]
Rolling Stone[31]
Spin7/10[32]

On 27 November,50 Words for Snowentered the UK album charts atNo. 5,making Bush the first female recording artist to have an album of all-new material in the top five during each of the last five decades.[33]Despite being released in the eleventh month of 2011, it was the eighth best-selling vinyl album of the year.[34]It also peaked atNo. 83on theBillboard200in the United States, while reachingNo. 7on theIndependent Albumschart.[35]

50 Words for Snowreceived widespread acclaim from most music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 85, based on 35 reviews, which indicates "universal acclaim".[22]

On 14 November 2011,NPRplayed the album in its entirety for the first time. In her accompanying review of the album, NPR music criticAnn Powerswrites: "Each song onSnowgrows as if from magic beans from the lush ground of the singer-songwriter's keyboard parts. The music is immersive but spacious, jazz-tinged and lushly electronic – the 53-year-old Bush, a prime inspiration for tech-savvy young auteurs ranging fromSt. Vincentto hip-hop'sBig Boi,pioneered the use ofdigital samplersin the 1980s and is still an avid aural manipulator. This time around, drummerSteve Gaddis her most important interlocutor – the veteran studio player's gentle but firm touch draws the frame around each of her expanding landscapes. But Bush won't be restricted. Like[Joni] MitchellonDon Juan's Restless Daughter[sic],she takes her time and lets her characters lead. "The Guardian's Alexis Petridis notes that "For all the subtle beauty of the orchestrations, there's an organic, live feel, the sense of musicians huddled together in a room, not something that's happened on a Bush album before."[36]

Will Hermes inRolling Stonewrites: "[50 Words for Snowis] an LP that finds a universe of emotions in its wintery theme – a sort of virtual snowglobe... the music... is full of plush, drifty ambience. The vocals sound nothing like the fierce cyberbabe on her 1982 LPThe Dreaming,or the strange angels onHounds of Love,but they are no less sublime... she sounds utterly at home defining her own world. It's an amazing place. "[37]Everything Entertainment Central's Tim David Harvey says: "The album begins with the beautiful fall of a song called 'Snowflake', before getting operatic, strange and even more sublime with 'Lake Tahoe' which is as deep and decedent as the place itself, it's that kind of picturesque music," and goes on to call the album "unique, concise, cohesive classic."[38]

The Quietus' Joe Kennedy compares50 Words for Snowto the work of such artists asMichael Nyman,Brian EnoandScott Walker,writing "Snow brings about a state of exception in which there's no pressure to exert ourselves on the outside world: instead, it invites contemplativeness and the prioritisation of personal and domestic relationships over professional ones. Bush's habitual provocations to abandon day-to-day concerns while cultivating romantic, internal landscapes have always felt slightly like the work of someone gazing from a window into a blizzard. This, one senses, is her natural territory...Where her past work has often been heavily-layered and breathless, 50 Words for Snow uses negative space to impressive effect; much of the album features little more than voice and flurrying passages of piano which gust across the stave, changing pace and melodic direction as if they're suddenly hitting updrafts."[39]Other critics take exception to some of Bush's choices, greeting the album with scepticism. Ludovic Hunter-Tilsley inThe Financial Timeswarns that despite "slow eddies of piano chords and gentle percussion… wintry piano, atmospheric orchestral arrangements and an intimate, torch-lit vocal from Bush, who, at 53, has acquired a warm huskiness to her voice… the album wobbles with the hammy Elton John duet" Snowed In at Wheeler St ", and topples over on the title track in which Bush invites Stephen Fry to dream up 50 terms for snow...50 Words for Snowelucidates its wintry theme with flashes of brilliance but the odd treacherous icy patch too ";[40]

Australia'sABC Radio Nationaldeclared50 Words for Snowalbum of the week of 12 November 2011, calling the album "quiet, lush and otherworldly."[41]Mojoplaced the album atNo. 5on its list of "Top 50 albums of 2011"[42]whileStereogumplaced the album atNo. 11,Pitchforkplaced the album atNo. 36andUncutplaced it atNo. 40on their lists.[43][44][45]

Bush was nominated for2012 BRIT Awardsas Best British Female Solo Artist, but lost toAdele.She also made her first public appearance after 10 years, picking theSouth Bank Sky Arts Awardin the Pop category for50 Words for Snow,beating fellow nomineesAdele,for21andPJ Harvey,forLet England Shake.The same three albums were nominated for the Best Album award at the 2012Ivor Novello Awards,won by PJ Harvey. In 2019,Pitchforkranked the release atNo. 191in their list of "The 200 Best Albums of the 2010s"; editor Katherine St. Asaph describes the album as "music that rewards close attention in an age where that is increasingly rare."[46]

Track listing[edit]

All tracks are written by Kate Bush

No.TitleLength
1."Snowflake"9:52
2."Lake Tahoe"11:08
3."Misty"13:32
4."Wild Man"7:17
5."Snowed In at Wheeler Street"8:05
6."50 Words for Snow"8:31
7."Among Angels"6:49
Total length:65:06

Personnel[edit]

  • Kate Bush– vocals, piano (1–3, 5, 7), backing vocals (4), bass guitar (1), keyboards (4–6)
  • Dan McIntosh – guitar (1, 3–6)
  • Del Palmer– bass guitar (1), bells (4)
  • Danny Thompson– double bass (3)
  • John Giblin– bass guitar (4–6)
  • Steve Gadd– drums (1-6)
  • Albert McIntosh – lead vocal (1)
  • Michael Wood and Stefan Roberts – featured vocal (2)
  • Andy Fairweather-Low- backing vocals (4)
  • Elton John– featured vocal (5)
  • Stephen Fry(as Prof. Joseph Yupik) – recitation (6)

Production

  • Produced by Kate Bush
  • Recorded by Del Palmer
  • Additional recording by Stephen W. Tayler
  • Mixed by Stephen W. Tayler
  • Assisted by Stanley Gabriel
  • Additional assistants: Jim Jones, Robert Houston, Patrick Phillips and Kris Burton
  • Mastered byDoug SaxandJames Guthrie
  • Assisted by Eric Boulanger
  • Orchestral arrangements byJonathan Tunick
  • Orchestra conducted by Jonathan Tunick
  • Orchestra sessions recorded atAbbey Road Studios
  • Recorded by Simon Rhodes
  • Assisted by Chris Bolster and John Barrett

Charts[edit]

Certifications and sales[edit]

Certifications and sales for50 Words for Snow
Region Certification Certified units/sales
France — 20,000[80]
United Kingdom (BPI)[82] Gold 155,000[81]
United States — 42,889[83]

References[edit]

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External links[edit]

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