Kate Bush at the Hammersmith Apollo

Kate on stage (from the tour programme)

Kate Bush: Before The Dawn
Hammersmith Apollo, 2 September 2014

I can't believe I am writing this but I just saw Kate Bush live. It was everything I hoped it would be but also nothing like I thought it would be either. And it's easily the best show I've been to this year.

Everybody knows that Kate hasn't played live in 35 years: it had become part of her legend, that for some reason or another, the woman known as one of the greatest artists Britain has produced did one sole tour at the start of her career and then disappeared into the studio and eventually from the public eye altogther. I remember when I was at school there was talk going round that Kate Bush was about to tour but of course it was just a hopeful rumour and nothing ever came of it. I truly thought that was it, I would never get to see her live, it just seemed like an impossible dream. Then earlier this year the amazing announcement came: a 22-date run at the Hammersmith Apollo and the tickets sold out in 15 minutes. My hopes were dashed again. It was painful to know she was playing in my city and I couldn't go. Luckily for me though random tickets started popping up before each date and yesterday that elusive, golden ticket finally became mine. Seeing Kate Bush live is pretty much the musical event of this decade and I feel so lucky to now be able to say: I was there!

The show was like no other rock show I've ever been to, but then this is Kate Bush we are talking about, the woman who has always liked to combine drama, theatre, dance and pure eccentricity into everything she's ever done. The buzz in the Apollo before the show was absolutely electric: everybody felt the same way as me and when the lights went down and she marched on stage leading a line of her musicians to the beat, the love and anticipation caused the crowd to roar with happiness and leap to their feet. It was an amazing feeling to be part of and I can only guess how Kate must have felt being at the receiving end of it all, I'm sure it must have been overwhelming.

The first part of the show was pretty much a straight ahead rock show, with Kate standing front and centre with her huge band behind her and some spectacular lighting above. She looked incredible in a fringed back outfit, that I'm sure Stevie Nicks would be equally thrilled to own, and her little bare feet. She doesn't dance around like she used to, she is in her late 50s now afterall, but the voice, oh the voice!, sounded better than ever. Hearing her sing with such strength and emotion made you wonder how this woman has been off the stage for so long: it seemed so natural for her, a born performer who has instead chosen the studio to express herself for the past 35 years. Yet here she was, all these years on, as if she had never been away, it was such a glorious return. 

Starting off with the upbeat and soulful Lily, from The Red Shoes album, Kate preached from centre-stage, looking every inch the legend she is. It was pure joy to finally hear Hounds Of Love live, with the backing singers doing the dog-barking chorus full justice, while Joanni (from Aerial) was as fierce as Joan Of Arc herself and the moving Top Of The City again showed off Kate's voice has lost none of its power or range. Not surprisingly Running Up That Hill was met with huge excitement and it felt utterly magical to hear this iconic song sung by Kate herself standing there right in front of us. The first set then ended with King Of The Mountain, which again got an enthusiastic response (I've always loved it from the first time I heard it), and saw some kind of juggler arrive on stage in the final moments of the song, bringing with him thunder and clouds and with a loud bang the curtain fell.

The second part, which followed straight on from this, was more like a theatre production and featured all the songs from The Ninth Wave, which is Side 2 of the Hounds Of Love album. Although I knew they were connected I didn't know the concept and story behind this suite of songs but seeing it performed live as a story gave it a new power for me. It's a tale of a woman who is left alone in the water after her ship sinks and all that goes on as she waits for help as the coast guard search for her and, most importantly, her own desperate thoughts. It started with a film of a man who has accidentally caught the boat's distress signal phoning the coast guard and trying to convince them to search for the sinking ship, the Celtic Deep. Then we see a film of Kate in a life jacket in the water looking up at the camera, while she sings on the actual stage. The staging of this part of the show was absolutely stunning, with huge sheets and lighting to make it look like they were under the sea (and men in huge, gothic looking fish masks wandering the stage). There was also a lopsized room that was rolled on to the stage for a scene where her family discovered she was lost at sea (with Kate's son Bertie of course playing the mouthy teen), and a huge buoy that emerged for the final rescue. It was visually amazing, totally riveting and of course the music was sublime, taking on new poignancy and meaning for me. I don't think I'll ever be able to listen to The Ninth Wave in the same way ever again.

After a 25-minute break (well deserved after all that), Kate returned to perform another suite of her songs, this time the ten songs (well, nine, one was written especially for the show) that make up the A Sky Of Honey half of the album Aerial. This part had less story but was equally mesmerising, starting with Kate playing piano while a puppeteer operated a little wooden boy, who walked through huge doors in a forest and wandered the stage looking at all the musicians as they performed the song, in complete innocent wonder. Behind them on the screens were beautiful images of birds in flight. Then a huge moving painting was lowered onto the stage and her son Bertie this time played a Van Gogh-style painter working and even sang a song written just for the show, Tawny Moon. His vocals were a little shaky at first but by the end it was clear he too had a fantastic voice and has obviously inherited his mum's musical talent. Throughout the rest of the set the band donned creepy looking bird masks and Kate appeared to gradually turn into a bird herself, first just one black-feathred wing covering her right arm and then at the very end a flash of light showed her briefly rising in the air, flying with two huge black wings.

As if that wasn't enough, we also got an encore to round off a perfect night. First there was an absolutely spellbinding version of Among Angels (the only song performed from her last album 50 Words For Snow), with Kate playing it alone on stage on the piano, just the keys and her beautiful echoing voice. After all the spectacle the contrast was wonderful and showed she could easily do a whole performance like it if she wanted to. But the greatest moment of the night for me was hearing my favourite ever Kate Bush song as the finale: Cloudbusting. It sounded absolutely epic and glorious, with the crowd leaping to their feet and everyone joining in at the very end, with Kate herself grinning away on stage. 

What a performance. I'm so thankful I was there to witness it.

My Kate Bush goodies - ticket, tour programme and cloudbusting pendant