FEATURE:
There Goes a Tenner (or Two!)
IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush on the set of There Goes a Tenner (from 1982’s The Dreaming)
Kate Bush and Self-Investment
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MAYBE it is common for most artists…
but it is amazing to think how much of their own money goes into what they do. When we think of mainstream acts and those legendary artists, there is an assumption that the labels pay for everything. When I discovered Kate Bush’s music as a child, that was my assumption. I did not know that artists do put their own money into their work! I have been thinking of this, as I was re-watching an interview Bush gave in 1980 (around the release of Neve for Ever). In the Profiles in Rock interview, she was asked about material things and what she would love to own. Typical of Bush, she was not interested in frivolity and excess. She was asked if there was anything spiritual that she wanted. That was a more complex question. When she was asked about what it was like to have money, Bush explained that the best thing was that she ploughed it back into her own career. There was genuine passion in Bush’s voice. Some artists might begrudge the fact that they would have to spend any of their earnings on new kit. I will talk about The Tour of Life soon It seems to me that, since the earliest days, Kate Bush has spent a lot of her own money making her work as good as it could be. Of course, EMI paid for most things.
By 1980’s Never for Ever, her music was getting more ambitious. The Fairlight CMI was introduced into her music. I feel technology as a whole became more important. At the turn of the 1980s, music was changing, and one could hear a shift – in terms of the sounds and role technology was playing. There is a feeling, to some, that Bush became famous and she kept her money aside - and that it was EMI that made sure she had everything she wanted. Like all labels and artists, there would have been a plan and budget. Bush became hungrier and more curious as a musician and producer. When she started producing her own music, the relative confines of the studio compelled her to think bigger. I love that interview from Profiles in Rock, as Bush seemed genuinely relaxed and philosophical. Many artists might be uncomfortable discussing their own money and materialism. Bush was raised in a comfortable setting and she came from a middle-class family. Some may observe that she never had to struggle financially. It isn’t the case that Bush was pampered or spoilt in any way. There would have definitely been caps and reigns to what could be spent and what she could have. Many artists of her generation would have spent their money on cars, houses and needless luxury. When it came to Bush, she was so detached from fame and that notion of being a ‘Rock star’. Although she did receive gifts through her career – she was gifted a £7,000 Steinway piano by EMI following Wuthering Heights' success and was flown to Paris for dinner (in March 1978) -, she used a lot of her earnings to improve and expand her music. That is an admirable quality!
Hearing and seeing how much of herself she put into the albums, one could forgive Bush for splashing out and spending a lot of her money on a big house. To be fair, at a point in her career, she was earning enough so that she could live in a very nice house and finance bigger ambitions regarding her music. She has lived in some very nice houses and is not struggling for a bob or two. She deserves that and has worked very hard to earn that sort of money, That was not the case when she was starting out and building her name. In fact, I get the impression that Bush would have constantly had a pressure on her shoulders. As an artist with no comparisons and a unique sound, perhaps she was not the most conventional and commercial. EMI had faith in her though, as I will explore in a feature soon, her chart positions were not always great. Her album sales were generally good, though I sense there was always this feeling that there was this fear of failing or not selling as many singles/albums as she would have liked. Think about The Dreaming and how the Fairlight CMI enhanced that. She built her own studio by her family home by the time of 1985’s Hounds of Love. Rather than this being a Pop/Rock star move, it was to allow her somewhere safe and homely to work at her best. Listen to that album and one can definitely feel the difference (from working at various studios around London).
I guess that people could argue that, if an artist has these big aims and plans, then they should kick in a bit of their own money – as it would be a financial risk for a label to invest so heavily! I would say that many artists, given that ultimatum/dilemma, would scale things back. Look at The Tour of Life in 1979. This was Bush’s first tour undertaking. To promote The Kick Inside and Lionheart in 1978, she travelled around the world and appeared on T.V. She had done nothing like The Tour of Life! This was a cross-continental set of dates whose production values and design were far removed from one would expect. Rather than a simple set or something generic and cold, Bush and her tea crated these incredible sets. This gave something back to the audiences and ensured that they were entranced and treated to an unforgettable live experience! The Tour of Life was more like a theatrical production that a gig. From the different scenes/designs to the incorporation of mime, magic, and readings during costume changes, it was a costly and time-consuming thing to pull off. Despite the success and adulation The Tour of Life accrued, it was not a financial success. Such was the cost of mounting the show and travelling, maybe that was a reason as to why Bush did not repeat the feat until 2014 (then, she kept things static at Hammersmith so she did not have to lug a huge production around the world).
The fact was Bush was so committed to her concept with The Tour of Life that she invested a lot of her own money. Prog expanded on this in a feature from last year about The Tour of Life :
“EMI were unsure what the show would involve, so the costs were reportedly split between the label and Bush herself. In return, they got an artist who threw everything into her biggest endeavour so far.
“She was very determined about how her music was presented and performed – that was pretty obvious from her first album,” says Southall. “So no one saw any reason to step in and stop it. The rock’n’roll story was that you put singles out, you put albums out, you went on Top Of The Pops, you toured. But she wasn’t prepared to do the conventional thing”.
There are so many cases of Bush spending her money in various areas in order to improve her art and aid her career. In this interesting article from last year, Penny Brazier looked at Bush and how she never compromised. Many would have looked down their noses at her. Being a woman in the 1970s (when she started out) would have been challenging regarding getting acclaim and respect. She was spending her own money really early on to ensure that, when she did release her debut album, she stood out and was prepared:
“I can’t imagine many teenagers would spend their record company advance on interpretive dance lessons, but Kate was wise beyond her years. She invested her EMI money in her studies with Bowie’s former dance teacher Lindsay Kemp and classes with mime artist Adam Darius.
This is such a great lesson for anyone who works for themselves in the creative industries. Ringfence some of the money you make to put back into learning — whether that’s your own industry or something complementary. You will only keep growing”.
Even though that advance was from EMI, it was Bush’s money - and there was no stipulation to say that she had to spend that money on anything specific. Rather than blow it on comfort and material emptiness, she was sowing seeds and planting trees. This wise investment, as articles like this highlight, was money well spent! Look at the videos and one is instantly gripped. Wuthering Heights’ video, to me, really flies because of the choreography and Bush’s dance training. That video would have helped boost sales figures for the single which, in turn, boosted album sales and gained her new fans. Although some costs (such as travel expenditure for The Tour of Life) wouldn’t have been too appealing to her, Bush’s attitude to money was very different to many of her peers. Post-Hounds of Love, maybe she was indulging more in living a more comfortable life. I feel that her commitment to perusing excellence and using a lot of her own money to strengthen her music is hugely admirable. This noble and commendable quality is one that has influenced a lot of artists through the years. Natural talent is the main reason why Kate Bush is a success and has had a fantastic career for over forty years. I do think that things could have been very different if her Bush had not invested her own money and pegged back her ambitions and curiosity. Maybe The Tour of Life would have been less layered. She may not have invested in technology or built her own studio. All these factors would have been detrimental. Rather than spend money on things that would have created ego rather than great music, Kate Bush wisely used her money to…
INVEST in herself.