Cloudbusting

The music video, directed by Julian Doyle, was conceived by Terry Gilliam and Kate Bush as a short film. The video features Canadian actor Donald Sutherland playing the role of Wilhelm Reich, and Bush in the role of his young son, Peter.{{Cite web |last=Dazed |date=21 June 2024|title=The story behind Kate Bush's Cloudbusting video |url=https://www.dazeddigital.com/music/article/27217/1/the-story-behind-kate-bush-s-cloudbusting-video |access-date=21 August 2024 |website=Dazed |language=en}} The video shows the two on the top of a hill trying to make the cloudbuster work. Reich leaves Peter on the machine and returns to his lab. In flashback, he remembers several times he and Peter enjoyed together as Reich worked on various scientific projects, until he is interrupted by government officials who arrest him and ransack the lab. Peter senses his father's danger and tries to reach him, but is forced to watch helplessly as his father is driven away. Peter finally runs back to the cloudbuster and activates it successfully, to the delight of his father who sees it starting to rain.

Filming took place at the Vale of White Horse in Oxfordshire, England. From the eminence on which the machine is positioned can be glimpsed the bald chalk top of Dragon Hill, immediately below the Uffington White Horse, a prehistoric hill carving which can be seen briefly in a couple of the shots.{{cite news|title=Kate Bush's Cloudbusting video: 7 minutes of heaven|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/rockandpopfeatures/10992003/Kate-Bushs-Cloudbusting-video-7-minutes-of-heaven.html|publisher=The Telegraph|access-date=4 February 2019|date=27 July 2014|last1=McNulty|first1=Bernadette}} Bush found out in which hotel Sutherland was staying from actress Julie Christie's hairdresser and went to his room to personally ask him to participate in the project.[http://suicidegirls.com/interviews/Donald+Sutherland/ Donald Sutherland Interview] by Suicide Girls 7 May 2006 In the UK, the music video was shown at some cinemas as an accompaniment to the main feature. Due to difficulties on obtaining a work visa for Sutherland at short notice, the actor offered to work on the video for free. Although the events depicted in the story took place in Maine, the newspaper clipping in the music video reads The Oregon Times, likely a reference to Reich's home and laboratory "Orgonon".{{cite web|last=VanDevender|first=Steve|title=Love-Hounds Digest #8.38|url=http://gaffa.org/archives/1992-06/msg00060.html|access-date=6 May 2013}}

The Cloudbusting machine in the video was designed and constructed by people who worked on the Xenomorph{{cite web|url=http://gaffa.org/dreaming/hol_clb2.html|title=* * DREAMING * * A 'Best of' Love-Hounds Collection Hounds Of Love The Songs "Cloudbusting" Pt. 2|author=Wieland Willker|date=September 1995 – June 1996|quote=worked with some designers that worked on the Alien|access-date=8 September 2011}}{{cite web|url=http://thehomegroundandkatebushnewsandinfoforum.yuku.com/topic/17191|title=HR Giger and the Cloudbuster|year=2009|quote=HR Giger designed the cloudbuster. ... one of those fan myths|access-date=8 September 2011}} and bears only a superficial resemblance to the real cloudbusters, which were smaller and with multiple narrow, straight tubes and pipes, and were operated while standing on the ground.{{Cite web|url=http://www.theorderoftime.com/science/free_energy/4.html|title=The Energy Question and the Order of Time - the Paradigm for the New World Order - 4 - An invention: thinking with one's hands|website=www.theorderoftime.com}} In a reference to the source material of the song, Bush pulls a copy of Peter Reich's A Book of Dreams from Sutherland's coat.

The full-length video features a longer version of the song, which is different from the Organon Mix released on 12-inch vinyl. This version was commercially available on "The Red Shoes" single.

Around the time of the release Bush sent Peter Reich a VHS copy of the music video. Reich was immediately a fan. He later told Dazed magazine "Quite magically, this British musician had tapped precisely into a unique and magical fulfilment of father-son devotion, emotion and understanding. They had captured it all."{{cite web|url=http://www.dazeddigital.com/music/article/27217/1/the-story-behind-kate-bush-s-cloudbusting-video|title=The story behind Kate Bush's Cloudbusting video|last=Dazed|date=30 October 2015|access-date=2 March 2018}}

The B-side to the single was "Burning Bridge", in which a woman desperately pleads with her lover to step up his level of commitment to her. The 12" featured the additional track "My Lagan Love", a traditional Irish melody with lyrics by John Carder Bush, Kate Bush's brother. The 12" version of "Cloudbusting" was a special remix called "The Organon Re-Mix" in which the verses were downplayed and the main focus was the development of the song's chorus. In the US, this mix was issued as "The Meteorological Mix", a title used in the UK for 12" version of Bush's later single "The Big Sky".

{{Track listing

| headline = 7-inch single (UK)

| title1 = Cloudbusting

| length1 = 5:08

| title2 = Burning Bridge

| length2 = 4:38

}}

{{Track listing

| headline = 12-inch single (UK)

| title1 = Cloudbusting

| note1 = The Organon re-mix

| length1 = 6:34

| title2 = Burning Bridge

| length2 = 4:38

| title3 = My Lagan Love

| length3 = 2:31

}}

{{Track listing

| headline = CD single (US)

| title1 = Cloudbusting

| length1 = 5:09

| title2 = The Man with the Child in His Eyes

| length2 = 2:41

| title3 = Sat in Your Lap

| length3 = 3:31

| title4 = Cloudbusting

| note4 = Organon mix, listed as "Meteorological mix"

| length4 = 6:31

}}

• Kate Bush – lead and backing vocals, keyboards, string arrangements
• Stuart Elliott – drums
• Charlie Morgan – drums
• Paddy Bush – backing vocals
• John Carder Bush – backing vocals
• Del Palmer – backing vocals
• Brian Bath – backing vocals
• The Medici String Sextet – strings
• Dave Lawson – string arrangements

In Australia, "Cloudbusting" narrowly missed the Kent Music Report top 100 singles chart in January 1986.{{cite web|url=http://i.imgur.com/4lZKXb0.jpg|title=Kent Music Report No 601 - 20 January 1986 > National Top 100 Singles > Singles receiving significant sales reports beyond the top 100|publisher=Kent Music Report|access-date=17 January 2016}}

{{Certification Table Top}}

{{Certification Table Entry|region=United Kingdom|type=single|artist=Kate Bush|title=Cloudbusting|award=Silver|relyear=2006|certyear=2021|id=17468-1990-1|access-date=3 September 2021}}

{{Certification Table Bottom|nosales=true|noshipments=true|streaming=true}}

In 1992, Utah Saints sampled the song's line "I just know that something good is gonna happen" for their song "Something Good" as well as scenes from Bush's video for their video. It reached No. 4 on the UK Singles Chart{{cite web|url=http://www.officialcharts.com/artist/27142/utah-saints/|title=Official Charts > Utah Saints|publisher=The Official UK Charts Company|access-date=17 January 2016}} and No. 8 when re-mixed and re-released in 2008 (the latter of which used a different sample from another artist).

Irish musician Gemma Hayes covered "Cloudbusting" on her 2014 album Night & Day.

Canadian musician Matthew Good covered "Cloudbusting" on his 2015 album Chaotic Neutral. Good's cover version featured Holly McNarland on backing vocals.{{Cite web |title=MATTHEW GOOD |url=https://www.matthewgood.org/ |access-date=2023-03-03 |website=MATTHEW GOOD |language=en-CA}}

{{Reflist}}

• [https://www.hulu.com/watch/7aebf9a8-4272-486c-a7d6-2ec6fb87fca6 Watch The Handmaid's Tale | Season 3 Premieres June 5, 2019]—Cloudbusting plays at the end of The Handmaid's Tale, Season 3 Episode 11.
• [http://gaffa.org/dreaming/hol_clb2.html Info on the video]

{{Kate Bush songs}}

{{Wilhelm Reich}}

{{authority control}}

Category:1985 songs

Category:1985 singles

Category:Kate Bush songs

Category:Songs written by Kate Bush

Category:Songs based on actual events

Category:Wilhelm Reich

Category:EMI Records singles

Category:Music videos