When we talk about musical child geniuses, we can’t ignore the great Kate Bush. The English singer-songwriter wrote “The Man with the Child in His Eyes” when she was only 13. The mysterious song was released as a single on her 1978 debut album “The Kick Inside”. But what’s the story and meaning behind the song? Let’s find out!
The Story Behind the Song
Bush wrote the song when she was only 13. She recorded the track in 1975, aged 16, after Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour discovered her. In an interview with BBC Radio 6 Music Gilmour explained: “A guy I know called Ricky Hopper was a friend of Kate’s brother, and he came to me one day and said, ‘I’ve got this tape of this 15-year-old girl singing, and I think she’s talented.’ He played it to me, and I agreed that I did think she was very talented.”
Although Gilmour was impressed with Bush, he was unsure if record companies would be able to appreciate Bush’s unique sound. As a result, Gilmour decided to help Bush and allowed her to record three songs at his expense. The idea was to turn demos into proper tracks to showcase Kate Bush’s appeal to record companies. Gilmour chose three songs from the demo tape, including “The Man with the Child in His Eyes”.
The songs, which were produced by Gilmour’s friend Andrew Powell and Beatles sound engineer Geoff Emerick, were good enough to land Bush a deal with EMI. Her first album “The Kick Inside”, with “The Man with the Child in His Eyes” as a single, was eventually released in 1978.
The Meaning of the Song
“The Man with The Child in His Eyes” is a song about a relationship between a young girl and an older man. In an interview with Music Talk in 1978 Kate Bush said: She sees this man as an all-consuming figure. He’s wise, yet he retains a certain innocent quality. The song tells how his eyes give away his “inner light”. He’s a very real character to the girl, but nobody else knows whether he really exists.
The song originated when Kate Bush observed that most men were still a child at heart, which explains the title of the song. Bush considered this childish innocence a delightful and magical quality. Because of these qualities, the young girl in the song is capable of communicating with this older man.
The song left fans wondering who this mysterious older man was. In 2010, Steve Blacknell told the Daily Mail that he was “The Man with the Child in His Eyes”. Blacknell and Bush were first lovers in the spring of 1975. Due to Kate Bush’s musical endeavors, the two drifted apart. But Blacknell heard from those around Bush that he was in fact “The Man with the Child in His Eyes”.
This story, however, doesn’t make a lot of sense. Given the fact that Kate Bush wrote this song aged 13 (in 1972), the song could never be about Steve Blacknell. After all, the two fell in love in 1975, 3 years after the song was written. We do know Bush gave the handwritten lyrics of the song to Blacknell, because he offered it for sale in 2010. It is more likely to believe Blacknell gave extra meaning to the song, rather than being the inspiration behind it.
Kate Bush herself never spoke about who “The Man with the Child in His Eyes” is. For the better, because the mysterious aura of the song is part of its beauty.
The Song’s Legacy
“The Man with the Child in His Eyes” was released as a single in 1978. It is accompanied by a simplistic music video, which alternates between Kate Bush sitting cross-legged on the floor, and close-ups of her face. The song was a hit in the UK, reaching number 6 on the UK singles chart. The was also a small hit in the US, where the song reached number 85 on the US Billboard Hot 100. The song received an Ivor Novello Award in 1979 for “Outstanding British Lyric”.
Interested in more stories behind Kate Bush songs? Click here
The song has nothing to do with what this article believes. Kate wrote in her book ‘In Other Words’ the song is about a crush she had on an older man as a teenager but she never made him aware of it.
I believe she was seeing the future father of her child. He appears ‘with a child in his eyes”