Kate Bush’s sprint to the top of the music charts is an example of how nostalgic cravings are a driving force behind pop culture right now, industry experts say.
After the British singer-songwriter’s song “Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)” was featured in the fourth season of the wildly popular Netflix series “Stranger Things,” the 1985 track is once again a hit, climbing to number one on the charts in Sweden, Switzerland, New Zealand and Australia, and inching closer to the top spot in North America.
“Last time I checked, it was fourth on the Billboard Top 100, it was the most streamed song in the world on Spotify last week,” Alan Cross, a Toronto radio broadcaster and music blogger, told CTV National News.
But Cross said that given the recent Hollywood trend of revivals and remakes, it’s unsurprising that while old fans may be rediscovering Bush’s music, new fans are discovering it for the first time.
“One of the things we have to realize today about entertainment is that it is all available to anybody with just a couple pokes of your phone,” Cross said. “The song may be old, but if it’s new to you, then it’s a new song. And I think we’re going to be seeing more and more of this sort of thing as we get deeper and deeper into the streaming era.”
The same success occurred after a “Saturday Night Live” spin-off film released in 1992 included a memorable scene featuring a song that’s part ballad, part opera, and part rock ‘n’ roll.
“’Wayne’s World’ brought ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ back to an audience that saw it as a nostalgic song, but also to a younger audience who didn’t know of Queen when that song was recorded in the 1970s,” John Einarson, a Winnipeg-based music journalist, told CTV News.
This kind of musical feat has been pulled off before, with soundtracks often reawakening interest not just in singular songs, but in entire genres.
“All we have to do is go back to ‘The Big Chill’ soundtrack,” Cross said of the 1983 classic American film starring Glenn Close and Jeff Goldblum, with an accompanying album that generated just as much buzz. “Look what that did for Motown. (It) brought that music to an entirely new generation.”
While Bush’s music may be nostalgic for some, the appeal for others is that it feels timeless.
“It speaks to the kind of music that she wrote and recorded. It was never fitting of its time,” Einarson said of “Running Up That Hill.”
“It didn’t have that time stamp to it, so it could sound just as new today as it did 37 years ago, when it was first released.”
For Bush’s part, the notoriously reclusive artist – who once took a break from touring for three decades – is enjoying her surprise return to the spotlight.
On her official site, Bush wrote: “How utterly brilliant! It’s hard to take in the speed at which this has all been happening since the release of the first part of the Stranger Things new series. So many young people who love the show, discovering the song for the first time….”
Bush was involved in her song’s use in the show, according to the show’s creators.
Matt and Ross Duffer, known by fans of the show as The Duffer Brothers, wrote a full story arc around “Running Up That Hill.”
“We just prayed that Kate Bush would be into the idea, because we were going to be using her song a lot,” Ross Duffer told YouTube’s WhenInManilla.com.
