Two years ago, Kate Bush decided to do the unthinkable and return to the stage. Until then, she'd only ever done one tour, and that was her 1979 Tour Of Life, where she changed her costume 17 times, belted out the octaves to 24 different songs, emerged from a giant animatronic egg like a human-shaped chicken, and pretty much invented the headset stage microphone so she could do all of this while keeping both arms free.Everyone who went to her 2014 tour said it was a similar, life-changing experience, but for 99% of the population who couldn't make it, she is just about to release a new triple-album of live recordings titled Before the Dawn. Sure, you still won't be able to actually see the tour, but at least you can listen to it, close your eyes, and imagine what it was like.Anyway, ahead of the album's release on November 25th, Kate Bush has agreed to an interview with BBC 6 Music. The full interview, which is her first in five years, will be aired later this month on November 20th. Ahead of that, the BBC have released a snippet which you can listen to here. Alternatively, you can read all the important bits below:On why she returned to perform in 2014: "I'd done two albums in quick succession and I really felt like doing something different that wasn't going to mean sitting in the studio for a couple of years. It felt like the right time."On her fear of performing: "It was a fun idea to toy with, but actually pushing the button to go was something I had to really seriously build up to…I was terrified. The idea of putting a show together was something I found really interesting and really exciting – to be able to put a visual, theatrical piece together. But to actually step into it was something I had to work hard on because I was terrified on doing live work as a performer again."On staying in the present: "The most difficult thing for me was to be continually in the now, because I naturally tend to race ahead in my mind. I'm always thinking about situations and running them through. Maybe it's that primeval thing of thinking "can I get to that tree before the tiger gets me?" My head is always moving ahead to try and get to the conclusion of whatever this journey is. Once we started running the show, I had to be absolutely in that moment, and I was so terrified that if my mind wandered off, that when I came back, I wouldn't remember where I was."On whether she'd do it again: "The thing about that show is that most of the material was already written, and to start something like from scratch in another world of work. I don't know. It was an extraordinary thing to be involved in, especially to get the response that we did. It was wonderful for everybody involved in the show - that kind of positive feeling every night was really magical. But I don't know. I don't know what I'm going to do next. I want to do something new."Listen to the whole thing here.(Lead image by Phillip Chappell via Wikimedia)
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