Kate Bush • Hounds of Love
Audio Fidelity/EMI Records AFZLP-087
33-RPM 180 g LP
Catherine “Kate” Bush was born on July 30, 1958 and her parents and siblings were each involved in some kind of artistic endeavour, which makes it no surprise that she followed in their footsteps. She released her first album, The Kick Inside, in 1978, at the still very tender age of 19, and became an immediate hit in her native England. Headstrong, and possessed with the desire to keep control of her own destiny, she set up her own publishing and management company after her displeasure of the marketing techniques used for her follow-up album Lionheart. She released two more albums (Never for Ever and The Dreaming) after Lionheart, both of which she produced on her own.
Recorded in her private recording studio, Hounds of Love was released in 1985 and contains the hit songs Cloudbusting and Running Up That Hill. It is to date her most successful album worldwide. As a huge fan of Ms. Bush, I have the general release pressing of this LP bought on day one, but this remastered version (on a purplish marbled-coloured disc of excellently pressed vinyl) is a joy to behold and listen to. It is super quiet with not an anomaly to be heard, and the dynamic range is as good as anything I have heard. Kate’s voice spans many octaves within the voicing spectrum, and not once did I hear a dilution of her vocal range. The midrange is clear and precise (a key measurement for me), and there was relatively no roll-off on the upper end. It also presented a quick and accurate tempo within the lower frequencies. No muddiness here.
It’s a shame that we have only had the pleasure of seeing her release three more albums in the last 25 years (The Sensual World, Red Shoes, and Aerial), but it comes as no surprise, to me, for someone as dedicated and committed to producing material on her own terms.