Siobhan Kane on Consequence of Sound is thrilled by Director’s Cut:
“The thesis around Kate Bush‘s Director’s Cut is about fulfilling an original vision (or visions and versions), and the results are overwhelmingly thrilling. In a sense, “The Flower of the Mountain” becomes the centerpiece of the record; it is the one song she changes the title of (from “The Sensual World”) and for good reason–she finally gained permission from the Joyce estate to use Molly Bloom’s soliloquy from the end of Ulysses. So where her earlier work paraphrases passages, “Flower of the Mountain” is Bush unbridled, in a dialogue with Joyce, accessing his breadth of ideas, sense of female sexuality, and there is a sense that, finally, two titans are meeting each other …. The most important thing about the record is that it is a document of a genius at work; her sense of musicality, hold on philosophical, physical, and romantic ideas, all of this is bound up in that lyric from “Moments of Pleasure”: “Just being alive. It can really hurt.” And, just like Molly Bloom losing her head and heart in Ulysses, Director’s Cut feels like “After that long kiss I near lost my breath.” Astonishing.”
