Albums to watch

ADM Chart topper

50 Words for Snow

Kate Bush

50 Words for Snow

The elusive pop singer-songwriter's 2nd album of new material since 1993, a collection of songs about winter

ADM rating[?]

8.2

Label
Noble & Brite
UK Release date
21/11/2011
US Release date
21/11/2011
  1. 10.0 |   Daily Telegraph

    50 Words for Snow should be heard standing alone at icy window panes, gazing out. Its seven long, snow-themed songs swirl around a delicate core of Bush and her piano
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  2. 10.0 |   The Independent

    A lush, immersive work which is sonically more homogeneous than her earlier albums
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  3. 10.0 |   The Guardian

    Packed with the kind of ideas you can't imagine anyone else in rock having
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  4. 10.0 |   Independent on Sunday

    To the relief of anyone who carries a torch for the reclusive genius, it's a beauty
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  5. 10.0 |   The Skinny

    Simultaneously sublime and understated
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  6. 9.0 |   Consequence Of Sound

    A sparse, beautiful, and ultimately pure backdrop for her creativity to soar
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  7. 9.0 |   Bowlegs

    Might well be Kate’s first album since 1985’s Hounds of Love to stake a claim as the artist’s most perfectly weighted collection
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  8. 9.0 |   Beats Per Minute

    These tracks are sparse but airtight, haunting but unrelentingly gorgeous, both logical successors to the stunning second half of Aerial and completely unlike anything she’s done
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  9. 9.0 |   musicOMH

    Absorbing and enchanting without having to resort to formulaic song structures, pop thrills or radio-friendly catchiness
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  10. 9.0 |   Drowned In Sound

    In the 26 years since Hounds of Love, Aerial and 50 Words for Snow have been her only truly fully realised albums. Kate Bush is more than fallible; but at her peak she is incomparable
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  11. 9.0 |   DIY

    Another impossibly beautiful and individually brilliant album. A perfect accompaniment to those long and dark wintry nights
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  12. 9.0 |   The Quietus

    50 Words for Snow is undoubtedly whimsical, but it's played and arranged so exquisitely that even the most po-faced should be able to acknowledge the scale of its achievement
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  13. 9.0 |   Clash

    She’s brilliant, sometimes inspired, and this tenth studio album finds her gifts undiminished
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  14. 8.5 |   Pitchfork

    Her best music, this album included, has the effect of putting one in the kind of treasured, child-like space - not so much innocent as open to imagination - that never gets old
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  15. 8.5 |   Paste Magazine

    Wintry, unhurried atmosphere defines every second of 50 Words for Snow, Bush’s most striking work since 1989’s The Sensual World
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  16. 8.3 |   The Scotsman

    Bush has clearly not lost her peculiar imagination but it is realised with a wonderful, compassionate maturity on this album
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  17. 8.0 |   No Ripcord

    The work of a mature and serious artist, who has made a unique and lasting contribution to pop, and this album will continue her reputation
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  18. 8.0 |   Mojo

    Within a snowball's throw of the winter solstice, it's hard to imagine another record scaling the lambent reverie of 50 Words For Snow. Print edition only

  19. 8.0 |   Uncut

    Kate Bush has never made a record that seems so ethereally disdainful of convention, of the parameters, themes and expectations of a simple pop song. But at the same time, she has never seemed so normal
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  20. 8.0 |   Q

    [This] is no jolly Christmas album. Bush's husky vocals rise through an ominous piano fog, generating a silvery chill. Print edition only

  21. 8.0 |   Evening Standard

    Kate Bush sings erotically throughout. Make of that what you will
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  22. 8.0 |   PopMatters

    Extended mood pieces and ambitious story-songs, set to muted keyboards, faraway string flourishes, sparse percussion
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  23. 8.0 |   State

    A welcome return to the weird world-creation of records past, a place where strange things live and play, amid the ever falling, multi-appellated snow of the title
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  24. 8.0 |   The Irish Times

    A sublime achievement, as uncompromisingly original as anything Bush has ever done
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  25. 8.0 |   Tiny Mix Tapes

    The album’s deliberate pace implies a marked growth to Bush’s creative spirit — never before has she taken such obvious and tender care with her work
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  26. 8.0 |   Rave Magazine

    Bush leaves us in no doubt that she is still in full possession of her otherworldly talent
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  27. 7.5 |   BBC

    The album only really reaches the heights Bush has set for herself when she appears centre stage
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  28. 7.5 |   A.V. Club

    While the album is as icy as its title implies, there’s a dormant warmth to 50 Words that compensates for its lack of hooks
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  29. 7.0 |   The Digital Fix

    Frustrating, exhilarating, enchanting, confusing, maddening, embracing, heartbreaking, heartwarming. So many words for Kate Bush
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  30. 7.0 |   Slant Magazine

    It succeeds as a transitional work, but first and foremost as its own singular world—a hushed, magnificent snow globe full of strange stories and characters
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  31. 7.0 |   Under The Radar

    A record that's more operatic in scope while staying within pop conventions in execution
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  32. 7.0 |   NME

    Musically. we're in the same expansive, unhurried territory as 2005's 'Ariel'
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  33. 7.0 |   The Line Of Best Fit

    It proves her credentials of distinct maturity as well as exhibiting her ability to experiment successfully with deep-set and sombre but thoroughly captivating music
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  34. 7.0 |   Spin

    The overall dark, diaphanous sound here almost oversells the title, but it's impossible not to get lost in ?the drift
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  35. 6.0 |   The Observer

    This album is rather better when it is winking at you, rather than seeking to cryogenically preserve emotion
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  36. 4.0 |   Entertainment.ie

    You have to have an affinity with Bush's earlier work to be able to appreciate this in any real way
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