Songoftheday 7/11/14 - And if I only could, I'd make a deal with God and I'd get him to swap our places...

Kate Bush - "Running Up That Hill"
from the album Hounds Of Love (1985)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #30 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 4

Today's Song of the Day is by English songstress Kate Bush, who grew up in a Catholic family in the London suburbs, who fell under the wing of Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour. He helped her get her demos in order and get signed by EMI Records back in the mid-70s, but it wouldn't be until 1978 that her first album, The Kick Inside was released. The first single from the record, "Wuthering Heights", was a huge success, going all the way to the top of the British charts (the first for a female songwriter with her own recording). The second single, "The Man With The Child In His Eyes", became her second top-10 in the UK, while scraping the American pop chart for the first time at #85.

She would continue to release albums through the early 80s, and with the exception of the international hit "Babooshka", which went top-10 all over Europe, her success as a singles was as a moderate pace, while fitting to the progressive/new wave pattern her albums were selling like hotcakes. In 1985 Bush released her fifth full-length studio album Hounds Of Love, which was frontloaded with accessible songs now ready-made for new wave radio that has caught up in American, along with a side of more experimental tracks. The first single from the project, "Running Up That Hill", was written and produced by the artist herself, fully realizing her stature as a performer in control of her art...

"Running Up That Hill" became Kate's sole top-40 pop hit in the U.S. in November of 1985, while also reaching the Mainstream Rock (#34) and Dance Club Play (#13) charts in Billboard magazine. Internationally, the record was a big hit, reaching the top-10 in Australia, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, France, Switzerland, Ireland, and her native England, where it was her fourth top-10 single.

Bush would continue to have success internationally, and even got attention with her collaboration with Peter Gabriel on "Don't Give Up" from his So album, which touched the American chart at #72 and gave her yet another top-ten single in the UK. In 1993, Kate's so-far final appearance on the Hot 100 came when her "Rubberband Girl" (a top-ten modern rock hit) went to #88. It took another eleven years for her next album to arrive, and the first single from the project, "King Of The Mountain", went to #4 on the UK singles chart.

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In 2012, Kate recorded a special version of the song for the use in that years' Summer Olympics in London, and returned her to the top-ten at #6 in the UK...

Within Temptation, a symphonic metal band from the Netherlands, covered "Running Up That Hill" in 2003 and went to #7 on their home country's singles chart and top-20 in Germany...

British band Placebo also took on the song the same year...

Finally, here's Kate with former benefactor Gilmour performing live in 1987...

I'll be off for a week, then will return with the biggest hit of 1985 as the Song of the Day....thanks for stopping by, and please come back in seven days!