https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/six-artists-inspired-by-kate-bush/

Six artists inspired by Kate Bush
Joe Taysom
SUN 6TH NOV 2022 14.00 GMT

Kate Bush is a timeless artist who continues to influence every generation that breaks through to this day. It has been over 40 years since her career was launched as a teenager with ‘Wuthering Heights’, a song which illuminated the musical world and thrust a budding musician into major leagues.
In 2022, Bush found a new demographic thanks to the hit Netflix series Stranger Things, a show that included her song, ‘Running Up That Hill’, and added a new chapter to her evolving legacy. Despite only reaching number three in the UK Official Chart when it was released in 1985, the song spent three weeks at the top of the chart following the release of the hit Netflix show.
In an interview with BBC Radio 4, Bush discussed her new-found success with the younger generation. She commented: “Well, it’s just extraordinary. I mean, you know, it’s such a great series, I thought that the track would get some attention. But I just never imagined that it would be anything like this. It’s so exciting. But it’s quite shocking really, isn’t it? I mean, the whole world’s gone mad.”
Even before the resurgence of ‘Running Up That Hill’, Bush still had a stranglehold over the musical landscape, despite not prolifically releasing material. Her influence can be felt across the musical spectrum, and the list below showcases the breadth of Bush’s talent.
Six artists inspired by Kate Bush:
St. Vincent
Simply drawing a line between Kate Bush and any female performer who writes, records and performs her own work is an easy thing to do. Drawing a line between Bush and the mercurial talent of Annie Clark, aka St. Vincent, is a drag of the pen that happens of its own propulsion. The New Yorker has often spoken of her love for the ethereal pop princess, but it was the notes of when she first discovered the artist that accurately reflect the moment most of Bush’s fans have experienced.
Speaking with Pitchfork in 2007, Clark noted: “this may sound really silly– but I just discovered Kate Bush, probably six months ago, and I think she’s so great. I know I’m very late to the party here, I know this is old news, but I got a Kate Bush record, and I forget– I think ‘The Dreaming’ is on it, though I’m spacing on the name of the record. [The Dreaming.] It has Kate Bush in this totally miraculous ascot, too, on the back. She just went for it. It’s so great. She totally went for it.” The commitment, disruptive nature and complete refusal to bow down to gender norms is something often cited as some of Kate Bush’s main draws, and it is easy to see how Clark would take this emboldened vision and apply it to her own sound.
Radiohead
Although Radiohead have never explicitly declared their love of Kate Bush, she’s clearly influenced their work. The sonic pallet used for OK Computer is cut from the same cloth as Bush’s oeuvre, and Thom Yorke’s vocal approach is also reminiscent of her work.
When Radiohead worked on A Moon Shaped Pool between 2014 and 2016, they even invited Bush up to their studio to visit them, according to an interview they gave with Q. Furthermore, they also revealed Bush also attended one of their shows in London, which proves the respect between the pair is reciprocal.
Big Boi
Outkast’s Big Boi’s love of Kate Bush is limitless. Undoubtedly, the rapper is in her top 0.1% of fans on Spotify. He even travelled to London from Atlanta to watch her perform at the Hammersmith Apollo in 2014 when Bush performed a 22-date residency. They’ve even built a friendship, and have hung out together, which was a dream come true for Big Boi.
Explaining why he loves the work of Kate Bush, he told Pitchfork: “Her songs tell stories; we also tell stories. Sometimes there is a double meaning in what she says. And the layers of production—how the songs morph, they might start one way then they morph and break down into something. It’s very theatrical.”
Björk
Björk has never shied away from heaping praise on Kate Bush. She’s a figure who the Icelandic singer has adored for years, and in Björk’s opinion, she believes this is a direct consequence of sexism in the music industry.
In an interview with The Guardian, Björk said: “It was kind of sexist. People thought that Kate Bush was insane. People were embarrassed about admitting that they actually liked her and I think that is something, actually, one good thing about feminism nowadays is that she is not a threat at all”.
Björk doubled down on her fandom of Bush in an interview around the time of her album Debut. She called Bush “one of my heroes” and referred to her as “one of the biggest pioneering producers. Everybody just says, ‘Oh, she’s just a singer. She’s just a chick’. But they forget all the other work she’s done, that woman. She’s very, very, very gorgeous”.
Placebo
Stranger Things introduced an army of people to the majesty of ‘Running Up That Hill’, but they weren’t the first to do so. In 2003, Placebo covered the track for their Covers album, charting at 44 on the UK chart. In an interview with The Guardian, frontman Brian Molko has spoken about his relationship with the work of Bush and his earliest memory of her.
“My first exposure to Kate Bush was the video for ‘Babooshka’ when I was a preteen,” he revealed. “I’d never seen anything like it: who is this person from outer space, singing an incredibly strange song? I was completely captivated by this beautiful woman who had such charisma and seemed so unique.
“Then I discovered that my older brother had [album] The Kick Inside, so I was introduced to ‘The Man With the Child in His Eyes’ and ‘Wuthering Heights’. Then [in 1985] Hounds of Love came out and blew my mind completely.”
London Grammar
London Grammar, who rose to prominence with their debut album, If You Wait, in 2013. Their debut was followed up in 2017 with the chart-topping record Truth Is a Beautiful Thing. The group’s USP is the classically-trained vocals of Hannah Reid, which adds a delicacy to their sound, and unsurprisingly, she listed Bush as a major influence.
In an interview with Fiasco Magazine, Reid revealed: “Being in London Grammar, I have found nuances distinctive to the songs we write, but there are female vocalists I am hugely influenced by who made me think I could hit notes – Kate Bush.”

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