“Cloudbusting” is a song by Kate Bush, released in October 1985 with “Burning Bridge” on the B-side as the second single from her fifth studio album, Hounds of Love. Written and produced by Bush, the song is a remarkable blend of art pop and progressive rock, characterized by its orchestral arrangement and compelling narrative. Inspired by a true story, “Cloudbusting” has become one of Bush’s most celebrated tracks, showcasing her innovative storytelling and emotional depth.
The song was inspired by the memoir A Book of Dreams by Peter Reich, which recounts his childhood experiences with his father, Wilhelm Reich, an Austrian psychoanalyst and inventor. Wilhelm Reich developed a controversial device called a “cloudbuster,” which he believed could manipulate weather by shooting energy beams into the atmosphere to produce rain.
In “Cloudbusting,” Bush adopts the perspective of Peter Reich, capturing the emotional bond between father and son and the heartbreak of witnessing his father’s arrest and persecution by the authorities, who dismissed Reich’s ideas as pseudoscience. The song is deeply poignant, reflecting themes of innocence, love, loss, and the resilience of memory.
The lyrics are poetic and evocative, narrating the story of Reich and his cloudbuster through Peter’s eyes. Lines like “I just know that something good is gonna happen” express a childlike optimism amidst the looming tragedy. Bush’s storytelling masterfully intertwines the personal and the mythical, creating a song that feels both intimate and universal.
“Cloudbusting” is built around a driving rhythm and a lush, cinematic string arrangement performed by the Medici String Sextet. Instead of relying on traditional pop structures, the song creates momentum through its orchestral swells and intricate layering of sounds. The Fairlight CMI synthesizer and Bush’s ethereal vocals add to the song’s otherworldly quality, while the absence of a conventional drumbeat highlights the organic, almost timeless feel of the track.
The music video for “Cloudbusting,” directed by Julien Temple, is a mini-film that vividly brings the song’s narrative to life. It stars Donald Sutherland as Wilhelm Reich and Kate Bush as his son, Peter. Set in a pastoral landscape in Vale of White Horse in Oxfordshire, England, the video depicts their bond and the construction of the cloudbuster device.
While “Cloudbusting” did not achieve massive commercial success upon release, peaking at No. 20 on the UK Singles Chart and in Germany, it has grown in stature over the years. It is now regarded as one of Kate Bush’s finest works and a highlight of Hounds of Love, an album often cited as one of the greatest of all time.