"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", becoming the first female ...

, 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 C ...

'' (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, where it peaked at number two (for three weeks) and was the 20th best-selling single of the year. A rock 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 licen ...

digital synthesizer.

Background and composition

Kate Bush recorded "Babooshka" between January and June 1980, during the recording sessions of ''

''. It was described as a rock song. The track features John Giblin 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 created with the newly available

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) 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", in which a woman dresses as a highwayman 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 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."

Music video

The music video depicts Bush beside a double bass (contrabass) that symbolises the husband, wearing a black

bodysuit A bodysuit is a one-piece form-fitting or skin-tight garment that covers the torso and the crotch, and sometimes the legs, hands, and feet, and cannot be used as a swimsuit. The style of a basic bodysuit is similar to a one-piece swimsui ...

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 Chris Achilleos 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

tragicomedy Tragicomedy is a literary genre that blends aspects of both tragic and comic forms. Most often seen in dramatic literature, the term can describe either a tragic play which contains enough comic elements to lighten the overall mood or a serious ...

, 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

dysphemism A dysphemism is an expression with connotations that are derogatory either about the subject matter or to the audience. Dysphemisms contrast with neutral or euphemistic expressions. Dysphemism may be motivated by fear, distaste, hatred, contempt, ...

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".

Reception

"Babooshka" became Bush's second top five hit in the UK and was certified

silver Silver is a chemical element with the Symbol (chemistry), symbol Ag (from the Latin ', derived from the Proto-Indo-European wikt:Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h₂erǵ-, ''h₂erǵ'': "shiny" or "white") and atomic number 47. A soft, whi ...

for sales of over 250,000 by the BPI. In 2021, the song experienced a resurgence in popularity due to the app

TikTok TikTok, known in China as Douyin (), is a short-form video hosting service owned by the Chinese company ByteDance. It hosts user-submitted videos, which can range in duration from 15 seconds to 10 minutes. TikTok is an international version ...

, giving American audiences exposure to Bush.

Track listing

Personnel

–

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or witho ...

;

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a musica ...

;

Yamaha CS-80 The Yamaha CS-80 is an analog synthesizer released in 1977. It supports true 8-voice polyphony, with two independent synthesizer layers per voice each with its own set of front panel controls, in addition to a number of hardwired preset voice set ...

Paddy 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", becoming the first female ...

–

balalaika The balalaika (russian: link=no, балала́йка, ) is a Russian stringed musical instrument with a characteristic triangular wooden, hollow body, fretted neck and three strings. Two strings are usually tuned to the same note and the thir ...

;

backing vocals A backing vocalist is a singer who provides vocal harmony with the lead vocalist or other backing vocalists. A backing vocalist may also sing alone as a lead-in to the main vocalist's entry or to sing a counter-melody. Backing vocalists are u ...

*Garry Hurst – backing vocals *

Alan Murphy Alan Murphy (18 November 1953 – 19 October 1989) was a British rock session guitarist, best remembered for his collaborations with Kate Bush and Go West. In 1988, he joined the jazz-funk band Level 42 as a full-time band member, and played wi ...

–

electric guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic gu ...

*Brian Bath – electric guitar * John Giblin – electric

bass Bass or Basses may refer to: Fish * Bass (fish), various saltwater and freshwater species Music * Bass (sound), describing low-frequency sound or one of several instruments in the bass range: ** Bass (instrument), including: ** Acoustic bass gu ...

Max Middleton David Maxwell Middleton (born 4 August 1946) is an English composer and keyboardist who was originally a docker on the London docks. Middleton is known for his work on the Fender Rhodes Electric piano, the Minimoog synthesiser and his percussiv ...

–

Fender Rhodes piano The Rhodes piano (also known as the Fender Rhodes piano) is an electric piano invented by Harold Rhodes, which became popular in the 1970s. Like a conventional piano, the Rhodes generates sound with keys and hammers, but instead of strings, t ...

* Stuart Elliott – drums;

tambourine The tambourine is a musical instrument in the percussion family consisting of a frame, often of wood or plastic, with pairs of small metal jingles, called " zills". Classically the term tambourine denotes an instrument with a drumhead, thou ...

Charts

Certifications

References

External links

* AllMusic review of "Babooshka"* {{authority control 1980 singles Kate Bush songs Songs about infidelity Songs about letters (message) Songs written by Kate Bush 1980 songs EMI Records singles