"Babooshka" is a song by English singer
Kate Bush
Catherine Bush (born 30 July 1958) is an English singer, songwriter, record producer and dancer. In 1978, at the age of 19, she topped the UK Singles Chart for four weeks with her debut single "Wuthering Heights (song), Wuthering Heights", ...
, taken from her third studio album ''
Never for Ever
''Never for Ever'' is the third studio album by English art rock singer Kate Bush, released on 7 September 1980 by EMI Records, it was Bush's first No. 1 album and was also the first album by a British female solo artist to top the UK Albums Ch ...
'' (1980). Released as a single in June 1980, it spent 10 weeks in the
UK chart, peaking at number five.
It was an even bigger hit in
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
, where it peaked at number two (for three weeks) and was the 20th best-selling single of the year. A
rock
Rock most often refers to:
* Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids
* Rock music, a genre of popular music
Rock or Rocks may also refer to:
Places United Kingdom
* Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...
song, "Babooshka" is about a woman who sends love letters to her husband under the titular pen name. The song makes notable use of
Fairlight CMI
The Fairlight CMI (short for Computer Musical Instrument) is a digital synthesizer, sampler, and digital audio workstation introduced in 1979 by Fairlight.
— with links to some Fairlight history and photos
It was based on a commercial lic ...
digital synthesizer.
Background and composition
Kate Bush recorded "Babooshka" between January and June 1980, during the recording sessions of ''
Never for Ever
''Never for Ever'' is the third studio album by English art rock singer Kate Bush, released on 7 September 1980 by EMI Records, it was Bush's first No. 1 album and was also the first album by a British female solo artist to top the UK Albums Ch ...
''.
It was described as a
rock
Rock most often refers to:
* Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids
* Rock music, a genre of popular music
Rock or Rocks may also refer to:
Places United Kingdom
* Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...
song. The track features
John Giblin
John Giblin, is an active session musician, contributing mainly as an acoustic and electric bass player, and spanning genres of jazz, classical, rock, folk and avant-garde music. Best known as a studio musician, recording film scores and cont ...
on bass and marks the significance of
fretless bass A fretless bass is a bass guitar whose neck does not have any frets. While the instrument is played in all styles of music, it is most common in pop, rock, and jazz. It first saw widespread use during the 1970s, although some players used them befo ...
sounds as instrumental "male" partners through Bush's music in the early eighties. The song ends with a sample of glass breaking, one of the earliest examples of a
sample
Sample or samples may refer to:
Base meaning
* Sample (statistics), a subset of a population – complete data set
* Sample (signal), a digital discrete sample of a continuous analog signal
* Sample (material), a specimen or small quantity of s ...
created with the newly available
Fairlight CMI
The Fairlight CMI (short for Computer Musical Instrument) is a digital synthesizer, sampler, and digital audio workstation introduced in 1979 by Fairlight.
— with links to some Fairlight history and photos
It was based on a commercial lic ...
digital synthesizer.
According to an interview Bush gave to the Australian TV series ''
Countdown
A countdown is a sequence of backward counting to indicate the time remaining before an event is scheduled to occur. NASA commonly employs the terms "L-minus" and "T-minus" during the preparation for and anticipation of a rocket launch, and eve ...
'' in 1980, the song chronicles a wife's desire to test her husband's loyalty. To do so, she takes on the
pen name
A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name.
A pen na ...
of Babooshka and sends notes to her husband in the guise of a younger woman—something which she fears is the opposite of how her husband currently sees her
(hence the barbed lines "Just like his wife before she 'freezed' on him/Just like his wife when she was beautiful".) Bush said that's "something I didn't realise at the time",
when she learnt that ''бaбушка'' (
babushka
Babushka or baboushka or babooshka (from rus, ба́бушка, p=ˈbabʊʂkə, meaning "grandmother" or "elderly woman") may refer to:
Arts and media
* "Babooshka" (song), a 1980 song by Kate Bush
* "Babushka Boi" (song), a 2019 song by A$A ...
) is the Russian word for "grandmother" (although the stress in Russian falls on the first syllable, not the second).
The trap is set when, in her bitterness and paranoia, Babooshka arranges to meet her husband, who is attracted to the character who reminds him of his wife in earlier times. She thereby ruins the relationship due to her paranoia.
Bush cited the English folk song "
Sovay
Sovay is a traditional English folk song () about a young woman who dresses and arms herself as a highwayman in order to test her suitor. In disguise she robs her suitor of nearly all his possessions, but even under threat of death he refuses to ...
", in which a woman dresses as a
highwayman
A highwayman was a robber who stole from travellers. This type of thief usually travelled and robbed by horse as compared to a footpad who travelled and robbed on foot; mounted highwaymen were widely considered to be socially superior to footp ...
and accosts her lover in order to test his devotion, as an inspiration for the story of Babooshka. "I'm sure I heard about it on some TV series years ago, when I was a kid," Bush remarked of the song's story. "You know, these period things that the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
do. I think it's an extraordinary thing for someone to do... That's why I found it fascinating."
The music video depicts Bush beside a double bass (contrabass) that symbolises the husband, wearing a black
and a veil in her role as the embittered wife.
This changes into an extravagant, mythlike, and rather revealing "Russian" costume as her alter-ego, Babooshka. An illustration by
for the cover of the 1978 book ''Raven – Swordsmistress of Chaos'' was the basis for the costume.
The B-side contains her song "Ran Tan Waltz", her second non-album B-side. This song is performed as a
, where Bush portrays a man bemoaning his bad luck in life being married to a wayward mother. This song uses the word "dick" in the first verse as
for a penis. Bush has stated that she does not typically use such harsh language or write such sexually explicit material, but that she considered the song "good naughty fun".
, giving American audiences exposure to Bush.