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Post by Lori on Aug 1, 2003 23:58:26 GMT
I still dream of Orgonon I wake up crying You're making rain And you're just in reach When you and sleep escape me
You're like my yo-yo That glowed in the dark What made it special Made it dangerous So I bury it And forget
But every time it rains You're here in my head Like the sun coming out Ooh, I just know that something good is going to happen And I don't know when But just saying it could even make it happen
On top of the world Looking over the edge You could see them coming You looked too small In their big, black car To be a threat to the men in power
I hid my yo-yo In the garden I can't hide you From the government Oh, God, Daddy I won't forget
'Cause every time it rains You're here in my head Like the sun coming out Ooh, I just know that something good is going to happen And I don't know when But just saying it could even make it happen
The sun's coming out Your son's coming out
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Post by Xanadu on Jan 29, 2004 19:12:21 GMT
Just thought I'd move this over here... it seems to get buried under the videos section and was lost during the Song Meanings move. I forgot to post it here. I have this portion of an interview and I thought you might find it interesting. I also read later that Peter Reich, the author of the novel, said that he was very pleased with the song and Kate captured his feelings about his father at the time. Supposedly Kate heard he was pleased and was glad that her interpretation touched him. So here's the quote: "The last song is called "Cloudbusting" and this was inspired by a book that I first found on a shelf nearly nine years ago. It was just calling me from the shelf and when I read it I was very moved by the magic of it. It's about a special relationship between a young son and his father and the book was written from a child's point of view. His father is everything to him, he is the magic in his life and he teaches him everything, teaching him to be open minded and not to build up barriers. His father has built a machine that can make it rain; a cloudbuster and the son and his father go out together cloudbusting, they point big pipes up into the sky and they make it rain. The song is very much taking a comparison between a yo-yo that glowed in the dark that was given to the boy by a best friend and it was really special to him, he loved it but his father believed in things having positive and negative energy and that fluorescent light was a very negative energy as was the material they used to make glow in the dark toys then and his father told him he had to get rid of it, he wasn't allowed to keep it. But the boy, rather than throwing it away, buried it in the garden so he would placate his father but he could also go and dig it up occasionally and play with it. It's a parallel in some ways between how much he loved the yo-yo and how special it was but that it was considered dangerous. He loved his father (who was perhaps considered dangerous by some people) and how he could bury his yo-yo and retrieve that whenever he wanted to play with it but there's nothing he can do about his father being taken away, he is completely helpless. But it's very much more to do with how the son does begin to cope with the whole loneliness and pain of being without his father. It is the magic moments of a relationship through a child's eyes but being told by a sad adult." The book is "A Book of Dreams" by Peter Reich in 1973. I guess it pretty hard to find now. Since I have yet to read a copy, here's a little overview from a review on Amazon: "The Book of Dreams tells the true story of a man (Peter Reich) recalling (through a series of flashbacks) his close and loving relationship with his father - the famous scientist Wilhelm Reich. Wilhelm Reich was at the forefront of scientific thinking on human sexuality and, in particular, the 'Cosmic Orgone Energy Theory' in the 1930s and '40s. He wrote many books on the subject, including the then enlightening 'The function of the Orgasm.' He also experimented with various forms of energy, attempting to capture 'Orgone' - energy in its purest form. Together with his young son, Peter, he went on to build a machine that could affect cloud formations, capture 'Orgone' and, to all intents and purposes, make clouds rain. Although the book touches on many interesting scientific ideas, the book concentrates mostly on Peters memories, on the love, devotion and encouragement he received from his father. On his father's insistence that he stay in touch with his feelings and not become hard like most people in the world -hardness in people, Reich senior believed, made people ill. He didn't want Peter to suffer from that illness as he grew up. Reich senior was later arrested for his beliefs and his experiments and died soon after in prison. Much of his research was destroyed by 'the authorities,' leaving a (still) young Peter with only his memories, most of which as an adult he could only recall through his dreams. Informative, gripping and eminently readable." I have some furher information I will find and post about Reich's Organon Box, and the harnessing of sexual energy. I believe this may connect to the metaphors in Cloudbusting as well.
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Post by Al Truest on Jan 29, 2004 22:39:48 GMT
I knew a bit of what you've so eloquently expressed here. It does give more substance to the song, which I love anyway. What are some of the metaphors you want to discuss? I'd like to continue the discussion.
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Post by Adey on Jan 30, 2004 12:21:59 GMT
Spot on Xan, a really useful post that combines most of KBs past sporadic comments about it. Thanks for putting this all together
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Post by Adey on Jan 30, 2004 12:30:20 GMT
Well there you go. After leaving this thread the first thing I see is a banner advertisement that reads thus - "Orgone Reich Books and More" and a web address, www.orgonelab.org/natural energy.htm" (this is not a link). Very clever this content linked advertising...
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Post by madscientist on Feb 3, 2004 21:20:45 GMT
[glow=red,2,300]Organon[/glow] An instrument for making scientific measurements.
MM
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Post by Al Truest on May 10, 2005 2:57:20 GMT
Just thought I'd move this over here... it seems to get buried under the videos section and was lost during the Song Meanings move. I forgot to post it here. I have this portion of an interview and I thought you might find it interesting. I also read later that Peter Reich, the author of the novel, said that he was very pleased with the song and Kate captured his feelings about his father at the time. Supposedly Kate heard he was pleased and was glad that her interpretation touched him. So here's the quote: "The last song is called "Cloudbusting" and this was inspired by a book that I first found on a shelf nearly nine years ago. It was just calling me from the shelf and when I read it I was very moved by the magic of it. It's about a special relationship between a young son and his father and the book was written from a child's point of view. His father is everything to him, he is the magic in his life and he teaches him everything, teaching him to be open minded and not to build up barriers. His father has built a machine that can make it rain; a cloudbuster and the son and his father go out together cloudbusting, they point big pipes up into the sky and they make it rain. The song is very much taking a comparison between a yo-yo that glowed in the dark that was given to the boy by a best friend and it was really special to him, he loved it but his father believed in things having positive and negative energy and that fluorescent light was a very negative energy as was the material they used to make glow in the dark toys then and his father told him he had to get rid of it, he wasn't allowed to keep it. But the boy, rather than throwing it away, buried it in the garden so he would placate his father but he could also go and dig it up occasionally and play with it. It's a parallel in some ways between how much he loved the yo-yo and how special it was but that it was considered dangerous. He loved his father (who was perhaps considered dangerous by some people) and how he could bury his yo-yo and retrieve that whenever he wanted to play with it but there's nothing he can do about his father being taken away, he is completely helpless. But it's very much more to do with how the son does begin to cope with the whole loneliness and pain of being without his father. It is the magic moments of a relationship through a child's eyes but being told by a sad adult." The book is "A Book of Dreams" by Peter Reich in 1973. I guess it pretty hard to find now. Since I have yet to read a copy, here's a little overview from a review on Amazon: "The Book of Dreams tells the true story of a man (Peter Reich) recalling (through a series of flashbacks) his close and loving relationship with his father - the famous scientist Wilhelm Reich. Wilhelm Reich was at the forefront of scientific thinking on human sexuality and, in particular, the 'Cosmic Orgone Energy Theory' in the 1930s and '40s. He wrote many books on the subject, including the then enlightening 'The function of the Orgasm.' He also experimented with various forms of energy, attempting to capture 'Orgone' - energy in its purest form. Together with his young son, Peter, he went on to build a machine that could affect cloud formations, capture 'Orgone' and, to all intents and purposes, make clouds rain. Although the book touches on many interesting scientific ideas, the book concentrates mostly on Peters memories, on the love, devotion and encouragement he received from his father. On his father's insistence that he stay in touch with his feelings and not become hard like most people in the world -hardness in people, Reich senior believed, made people ill. He didn't want Peter to suffer from that illness as he grew up. Reich senior was later arrested for his beliefs and his experiments and died soon after in prison. Much of his research was destroyed by 'the authorities,' leaving a (still) young Peter with only his memories, most of which as an adult he could only recall through his dreams. Informative, gripping and eminently readable." I have some furher information I will find and post about Reich's Organon Box, and the harnessing of sexual energy. I believe this may connect to the metaphors in Cloudbusting as well. Here you go DH. I pulled it up for you. May as well use Zan's erudite observations since you have broached the subject. We love recycling.
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Post by Adey on May 12, 2005 2:52:34 GMT
At the risk of sounding flippant, this orgone energy sounds like mysterious stuff - if a little trippy and new age. Neo probably runs his car on it.. j/k Neo
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Post by brisbanekatefan on Jul 9, 2005 14:57:58 GMT
I used to think Cloudbusting was about the positives/negatives of sex between two men.
"You look too small" "To be a threat to the men in power" "Your son' coming out" "I just know that something good is going to happen"
Obviously, we know it is based on Book Of Dreams, but still great to ponder...
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amy
Reaching Out
Posts: 108
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Post by amy on Jan 16, 2007 20:00:02 GMT
I was listening to Patti Smiths 'Horses' and looking through the sleeve and there in the top left hand corner of one of the collages is "A book of dreams - Peter Reich". I've heard Kate is a Patti fan (Don't push your foot.. is apparently in tribute to her) so maybe Kate saw it and wondered what it was about? This album was released in 1975 so here's possible evidence that Kate has been directly influenced by someone else - makes a change. Maybe we could start a new thread where we add things Kate must have taken direct influence from. I can think of the monster in Experiment IV (1986) and the monster thing in Raiders of the lost ark (1981).
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mizzshy
Reaching Out
"Oh darling, Make it go, Make it go away..."
Posts: 214
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Post by mizzshy on Jan 16, 2007 20:49:54 GMT
I asked my mum who Willhelm Reich was the other day in the car and she said "I think he was a sex therapist." at which point my dad said "You can always rely on your mother to know that sort of thing..."
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Post by tannis on Nov 29, 2007 9:06:26 GMT
On top of the world Looking over the edge...I'm on the top of the world looking down on creation..."Top of the World" is the name of a 1973 song by the Carpenters. The song topped the Billboard Hot 100 in 1973, becoming the duo's second U.S. number-one single. Released: September 17, 1973 Writers: Richard Carpenter; John Bettis see more:The Carpenters - Top Of The World www.youtube.com/watch?v=mq5pLi0huhw----- 'Neither science nor fiction, A Book of Dreams inhabits its own special and highly vulnerable reality. The truth of what young Reich says he experienced is rooted in the timeless mysteries of fathers and sons, where the literal and the mythic cannot always be distinguished. Peter Reich the man makes no effort to do so. Molded by the overwhelming fact that the world did not accept and love his father as unquestioningly as he did, he cannot and does not want to intellectualize his past... His book took six drafts and endless soul searches. "My father was afraid that his wives and children would write books about him, and they did," he says. "Talk about guilt." Guilty or not, this book is deeply touching. Nearly every line seems balanced fearfully between devotion and the possibility of betrayal.' - TIME, Monday, May 14, 1973. Google: Wilhelm Reich was a controversial figure. He believed that traumatic experiences blocked the natural flow of life-energy in the body, leading to physical and mental disease. His work on the link between human sexuality and neuroses emphasized "orgastic potency" as the foremost criterion for psycho-physical health. Reich built "orgone accumulators" to harness orgone, which he believed was responsible for emotions and sexuality. Wild rumors spread that his "sex boxes" caused uncontrollable erections. Is Side One of HOL thematically linked? Is it about the psychopathology of 'lovesickness'?RUTH - 'Cathy & Heathcliff' - Though RUTH is a much darker version of the classic original... And of course at this time KB also recorded the "Wuthering Heights (new vocal)" version to appear on the TWS (1986); - see RUTH thread: katebush.proboards6.com/?board=houndsoflove&action=display&thread=1714&page=2 HOL - 'Hamlet & Ophelia'/Night of the Demon? Ophelia losing her purity? - "Do you think I meant country matters?"/"I think nothing, my lord!" - The inside sleeve picture of KB is her as Ophelia (her as "The Hogsmill Ophelia"?) ... - Kate Bush owns the "The Hogsmill Ophelia" (a painting of a cracked doll drowning in sewage) - gaffa.org/dreaming/tnw_gen.html- In Shakespeare's Hamlet, Ophelia will sing some "mad" little songs about death and a maiden losing her virginity. She will say "good night", exit and later be found drowned (TNW); - See HOL thread: katebush.proboards6.com/index.cgi?board=houndsoflove&action=display&n=1&thread=1715&page=2THE BIG SKY - 'That Cloud...' & The Rorschach inkblot test? A Psychotherapeutic intermission? Free-associative projection on to the Big Screen? A need for constant distraction, constant focus on an ever-changing bigger picture? ... Like watching the fish at the dentists' ... Obsessive-compulsive cleaning the cobwebs of the mind? ... The desperate need for fresh air? ...Cloud-busting! MSFC - Psycho (1960)? - Or a mother concealing 'Child abuse'?; CLOUDBUSTINGWilhelm & Peter Reich (father/son)... Child abuse recovery/'coming out' to tell the story? I still dream of OrgAn-on I wake up crying You're making rain And you're just in reach... You're like my yo-yo... What made it special made it dangerous... So I bury it And forget... (repression) Oh, God, Daddy I won't forget... (therapeutic/associative recall) The sun's coming out Your son's coming out... ('Peter Reich' is coming out of the dark to tell his difficult story). On the sleeve, KB sends "a big thank you to Peter Reich."KOTE BUSH & THE PHILASAPHER'S STANE... Freudian Slip?In the documentary COME BACK KATE, Peter Manchester, a Professor of Philosophy and Speculative Theology, tells his story of writing to Kate Bush. Mr Manchester wrote to Kate informing her that Peter Reich followed his father's practice in spelling Orgonon with an 'O' from Orgone energy, whereas her lyrics for Cloudbusting write Organon with an 'A'. Mr Manchester considers that Kate may have perpetuated a deliberate pun with reference to the logical treatises of Aristotle, but concludes that he has probably caught Kate in a spelling error. Kate Bush wrote back to him. "Dear Peter. Thank you for your extremely interesting letter. I enjoyed it very much. I am afraid the 'Organon' misspelling is a mistake. And we were aware of this as soon as we saw the copy. It is very difficult to correct everything, and this [Organ-on] one slipped through my hands. I'm sorry the spelling mistake annoyed you. It annoyed me painfully, until I got a letter from a 43 year-old Professor of Philosophy and Speculative Theology and he broke the spell! All the best, Kate Bush."Further, Kate Bush had addressed the letter to "Mr Peter Monchester" - Mon, not Man...Peter Manchester: "I got to play with Kate Bush!"But if CLOUDBUSTING treats child abuse or the psychopathology of lovesickeness, then maybe Kate deliberately made an ironic spelling mistake...Organ On... Organ Off... Maybe KaTe was being extremely intentional? ...
John Carder Bush, when asked directly about the spelling, replied, "It could be intentional."gaffa.org/dreaming/hol_clb2.htmlsee more:Come Back Kate (Kate Bush documentary pt. 1/6)www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmloRo5VoOICome Back Kate (Kate Bush documentary pt. 3/6)www.youtube.com/watch?v=lIitCbywSgI4:48"Cloudbusting" Pt. 2gaffa.org/dreaming/hol_clb2.html'It is undoubtedly significant that side 1 ends with Bush making rain in "Cloudbusting," an act in which the waters are at her mercy. In contrast, Bush is at the whim of the drowning pool on side 2, as if her rainmaking got out of hand...' ( On Record, Frith & Goodwin, 1990; pg 461.)
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Post by musiclover on Feb 12, 2008 6:12:40 GMT
Any opinions on the piano/vocal cover by Charlotte Martin from Nov 2007? It sounds fantastic and I think Kate would be proud.
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Post by tannis on Apr 24, 2008 21:19:34 GMT
CLOUDBUSTING - A Book of Dreams
Kate Bush: "It must have been nearly ten years ago, when I used to go up to the Dance Center in London, that I went into Watkins' Occult Bookshop for a look, and there was this book and it said, A Book of Dreams, by Peter Reich. I'd never heard of his father, Wilhelm Reich, but I just thought it was going 'Hello, Hello,' so I just picked up the book and read it and couldn't believe that I'd just found this book on the shelf. I mean it was so inspirational, very magical, with that energy there. So when I wrote and recorded the song, although it was about nine years later, I was nevertheless psyched up by the book, the image of the boy's father being taken away and locked up by the government just for building a machine to try to make rain. It was such a beautiful book!" gaffa.org/reaching/i85_swa.htmlCLOUDBUSTING - Watkins Book Shop
Long established British bookshop specializing in occultism, mysticism, comparative religion, parapsychology, esoteric psychology, and related topics, founded by John M. Watkins in 1894. Watkins was a friend of Helena Petrovna Blavatsky and other leading occult figures of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The shop in Cecil Court, Charing Cross Road, London, was a meeting place for such famous and varied individuals as A. E. Waite, William Butler Yeats and Aleister Crowley. Watkins also published texts in the fields of occultism and mysticism.
All through the prewar occult boom of the 1920s and 1930s and the more recent occult explosion of the 1960s, the Watkins Book Shop has been a central focus of occultism, with a strong emphasis on mysticism and Eastern religion. As familiar to British students of occultism and mysticism as the Weiser Bookshop in New York.www.answers.com/topic/watkins-book-shopCLOUDBUSTING - A Family Affair
...in [Wilhelm] Reich's mind, good orgasms somehow became the keystones of good societies. In 1939 he claimed to have isolated the life force of the universe. He called it "orgone" and built "accumulators" to store and control it. He put his invention, the orgone box, on the market, claiming that concentrated orgone could cure diseases. The Federal Food and Drug Administration thought otherwise and eventually stopped the sales, destroyed Reich's boxes and even burned some of his books and papers. Reich was sent to jail—for contempt of court—and died there of a heart attack in 1957 at the age of 60. At times he saw himself as the victim of a Communist conspiracy and a heroic casualty in a cosmic war in which the enemy included aliens in flying saucers...
[Peter's] account of life with father appeals to the reader like a very private and surprisingly artful home movie. Facts are often blurred or underexposed. The plausible dissolves into the incredible. Yet the effect is undeniable: a unique re-creation of what it was like for a boy to grow up surrounded by events and emotions he could not—and still cannot—fully understand...
There are a number of fleeting images of Reich, quite different from the popular notion of the sexual liberator and the bold Promethean who stole knowledge from the gods. "My father was terrified of thunder and lightning," Peter writes. "He was afraid that the thunder was directed at him, for understanding it, for being able to play with it." Elsewhere he describes Reich stepping from the shower in dripping underpants and adds that "he never went naked."
Orgonon seems to have been a place where reality and the adventure fantasies of a boy could easily merge. Reich designated his son as a soldier in the Cosmic Engineers and even took him on missions. In Arizona, Peter operated a "cloudbuster," a gunlike device constructed of aluminum tubes that Reich believed could cause rain by directing the orgone in the atmosphere. Peter says it did rain; he also says he saw flying saucers (green and red disks) and even chased them with the cloudbuster.
Neither science nor fiction, A Book of Dreams inhabits its own special and highly vulnerable reality. The truth of what young Reich says he experienced is rooted in the timeless mysteries of fathers and sons, where the literal and the mythic cannot always be distinguished. Peter Reich the man makes no effort to do so. Molded by the overwhelming fact that the world did not accept and love his father as unquestioningly as he did, he cannot and does not want to intellectualize his past. "Until I learn more about what science does not know about Life Energy," he says, "I have no choice but to believe in everything I experienced as a child."
His book took six drafts and endless soul searches. "My father was afraid that his wives and children would write books about him, and they did," he says. "Talk about guilt." Guilty or not, this book is deeply touching. Nearly every line seems balanced fearfully between devotion and the possibility of betrayal.
A Family Affair by R.Z. SHEPPARD TIME, Monday, May 14, 1973.www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,907256-1,00.html
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Post by rosabelbelieve on Apr 25, 2008 2:12:47 GMT
^ This makes me very interested to actually read 'A Book Of Dreams'.
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