Once Upon a Time in the Top Spot: Kate Bush, “Wuthering Heights”
37 years ago today, Kate Bush began the second week of her reign on the UK Singles chart with “Wuthering Heights,” which lasted until April 1, 1978. It would’ve been a pretty decent showing for any artist, but when you consider that she was only 19 years old and that it was her debut single, the accomplishment is all the more profound.
A self-taught piano player, Bush was a prolific songwriter from an early age, so much so that, even as she was attending St. Joseph’s Convent Grammar School in the mid-1970s, her family helped her produced a demo tape which included 50+ compositions by Bush. Although she failed to secure any sort of record deal as a result of shopping the tape, the endeavor still paid off when a copy landed in the hands of David Gilmour, who shared a mutual friend with the Bush family. Finding Kate’s efforts rather striking, Gilmour helped Bush work up a new demo, this one featuring a less intimidating number of songs – only three – and far better production, courtesy of Andrew Powell and engineer Geoff Emerick. In short order, the new demo found its way to Terry Slater of EMI, and the rest is music history.
As for “Wuthering Heights” itself, yes, of course, it was inspired by the Emily Bronte novel of the same name, features quotations from the character Catherine Earnshaw within its lyrics, and is about as epic as late ‘70s pop songs get, but in a very good way, indeed. Clearly, record buyers in the UK agreed, given its success. (Shame about the U.S., though, where it never even charted.) In a 1979 BBC interview, however, Bush acknowledged that her sudden success caused her tremendous stress.
“It was suddenly non-stop working,” said Bush. “I put up with 16 months of that and then I said, ‘Look, I’ve just got to stop or I’m not going to be able to write any songs any more.”
Thankfully, she did indeed manage to write more songs, and those were pretty good, too. But there’s little question that “Wuthering Heights” remains among the best she’s ever written.
