The Whole Story is Kate Bush's 'best of...' album. It was released in 1986 and covers her first five albums. It contains a good selection of songs and is a good starting point for anyone not familiar with Kate already. The five albums from which the songs are drawn (The Kick Inside, Lionheart, Never For Ever, The Dreaming, and Hounds of Love) are very different in feel - Kate is known for daring to be that bit different - and this collection is really the big singles that came out of them. The are a total of twelve tracks on the album and these are described below.

WUTHERING HEIGHTS
This was Kate's first ever single and must be her most famous song. It is literally like no other song I have ever heard and sends shivers down my spine every time I hear it. The song is based on Emily Bronté's novel of the same name and is sung from the perspective of Cathy's ghost coming back to haunt Heathcliff.

"Too long I roam in the night
I'm coming back to his side to put it right
I'm coming home to wuthering, wuthering, Wuthering Heights"

This particular recording is actually a 'new vocal' version recorded for this album. Kate's voice is more mature and adds a haunting quality to the song. Still, I think I prefer the original version, which can be found on The Kick Inside.

CLOUDBUSTING
This song is based on a book that Kate read as a child about a boy whose father makes a rainmachine. In the song, the boy compares his father to a beloved yo-yo he was asked to throw away (the material that made it glow in the dark was thought to be dangerous) but which he actually hid in the garden so he could still play with it. The father is eventually taken away by the government for making his machine and the song is about the boy coping without him.

It's a great song with a catchy bit repeated that goes 'just know that something good is gonna happen'. This was actually sampled in a Utah Saints song in the early '90s.

THE MAN WITH THE CHILD IN HIS EYES
This song is slower and more mellow than the previous two tracks and is a favourite of mine. It is about a younger girl and her relationship with an older man who she sees as wise but, at the same time, to have a child-like innocnce. I'm not sure if the man is real or whether he just exists in the girl's imagination.

"Nobody knows about my man
They think he's lost on some horizon"

BREATHING
I think this is an indredible song, although I didn't realise what it was about for ages. The character she is singing as is a baby in the womb and she is documenting an incident of nuclear war.

"Outside get inside, Through her skin
I've been out before but this time it's much safer in"

Haunting stuff.

WOW
This song, taken from the Lioheart album, is a look at show business and all the crap that people starting out have to go through. It is about someone going to auditions and being constantly knocked back. It's a fun song though, done in a tongue-in-cheek way.

"Ooh yeah you're amazing
We think you are really cool
We'd give you a part my love
But you'd have to play the fool"

HOUNDS OF LOVE
The title track from what was probably her most popular album, Hounds of Love is a catchy, upbeat song which is essentially about fear. On a literal level, the person in the song is running from dogs, but what they are really running from is love. The song is saying that we are often frightened of good things - like love - because we are afraid of the bubble bursting and it all going wrong.

"And I'm ashamed to be running away
From nothing real, I just can't deal with this
But I'm still afraid to be there
Among your hounds of love"

RUNNING UP THAT HILL
This song, also fron the Hounds of Love album, is a great sing-along track which did really well in the charts. It's basically about the differences between men and women and the idea of a couple 'changing places' in order to understand each other better.

"C'mon baby c'mon darling
Let me steal this moment from you now
C'mon angel, c'mon c'mon darling
Let's exchange the experience"

ARMY DREAMERS
This is quite a catchy tune - though not one of my favourites - about a mother who's son has been killed at war. Her grief turns into a questioning of herself as a good mother and thinking of what else might have been.

"What could he do? Could have been a rock star
But he didn't have the money for a guitar
What could he do? Could have been a politician
But he didn't have a proper education
What could he do? Should have been a father
But he didn't even make it to his twenties"

SAT IN YOUR LAP
This is one of my favourie songs on the album - very catchy. I think it also says something so true of life - that we all want something for nothing. In this case it is knowledge, but can we be bothered to do what needs to be done to obtain it.

"I want to be a lawyer, I want to be a scholar
But I really can't be bothered, ooh just
Gimme it quick, gimme it, gimme gimme gimme gimme"

EXPERIMENT IV
This is the only new track on the album. It is about scientists working for the military to create something which can kill from a distance by sound alone. I'm not that fond of the song itself, but it's a good topic in a world where we are fast realising war is no longer just about men with guns. The video was also very good - starring Dawn French and Hugh Laurie as the scientists and Kate as the banshee-like creation who lures with her beauty and kills with her scream.

THE DREAMING
I've never really decided whether I like this song or not for some reason. It's all about the Aboriginal dreamtime and was inspired by a number of songs, including Rolf Harris' 'Sun Arise'. It also has some typical Kate Bush quirky lyrics, such as

"Many an Aborigine's mistaken for a tree
'Til you near him on the motorway
The tree begins to breathe"

BABOOSHKA
The last song on the album, this is a good upbeat finale and one of the best 'sing-a-longs' on the album. Babooshka is an alter ego created by a woman who wants to test her husband's fidelity.

"She wanted to test her husband
She knew exactly what to do
A pseudonym to fool him
She couldn't have made a worse move"

It's really pointing out how people tend to mess up stuff that is going well for them - in this case, the husband falls in love with 'Babooshka' when the idea of infidelity wouldn't have occurred to him if it wasn't for his wife's scheme.

Overall, this is a good album and great for anyone new to Kate Bush. She is not afraid to use unusual characters as the basis for her music nad she is certainly a unique artist to have in your collection. For existing fans, it is worth having for the new vocal version of Wuthering Heights and for Experiment IV, as well as the usual convenience of having the 'big songs' in one place.

I'd like to see a new 'best of..' album to inclkude some of her later material, but I don't see this happening any time soon. She has only had two further albums - though these contained some fantastic tracks - and the most recent of these was released in 1993. After 9 years, I'm sceptical that she'll release another album, but she wouldn't be the first person to make a come-back and it would be great to hear something new from her.