Christmas album may make good background music

English singer-songwriter Kate Bush marks the release of her tenth studio album with the release of “50 Words for Snow.”

“50 Words for Snow” is seven songs and 65 minutes of a seemingly emotional and poetic album from Bush. Each song is over six minutes in length, the longest being 13 and a half minutes and the shortest is nearly seven minutes.

The first song, “Snowflake,” is a dark piano ballad. It’s beautiful but the words seem absolutely meaningless. They don’t seem to form coherent sentences. It seems as if she wrote a poem and decided to add music to it.

The second track, “Lake Tahoe,” is another beautiful and depressing ballad. The lyrics sound like she is calling out for someone to rescue her in a snowstorm and she fears they may never come. Bush must have had a bad experience at Lake Tahoe.

The most distinctive of the tracks is “Wildman.” This song has a different beat than the others and is the only one that is semi-catchy; it is reminiscent of ’80s music, but followed the theme of the others.

The next four tracks are semi-similar to the first two songs; “Wildman” is the only variation on the album, but it is definitely the most enjoyable. Bush’s voice sounds distorted and husky.

The words seem meaningless. They probably have deep meaning to Bush but the spacing of the words and dragging a single word into a massive note makes it hard to understand what was being said in her music.

Many will appreciate Bush’s poetic words and smooth voice and, most of all, her piano playing in every song. The beautiful melodies and ballads are the most captivating.

This album is pretty depressing but filled with beautiful piano playing. This would be great to play in the background at a holiday party but it is in no way mainstream Christmas/holiday music. You will feel like you’re outside in a snowstorm and that is what Bush was aiming for.