well it's fairly obvious that this song is about a wife that tests her hubby to see if he would fool around on her, and he falls in love with her pseudonym. So yeah bad move!

This song is how about people take things for granted and, as soon as the 'novelty' of the good things they have wears off, forget how valuable they really are. Be this a friend, a lover, family, or material possessions such as a car or a house perhaps, human nature is to inevitably get bored of what they have and go after something else. It may be identical to what they once had, but it looks better just because it`s 'painted new'.

Based on this principle, the woman in the song 'paints herself new', to test her husband`s reaction.

Am I overly optimistic, or is there a hint of a bittersweet happy ending here?

When he shouts out "I'm all yours, Babooshka!", is it in a final betrayal of his wife, or in realization that it is, in fact, her?

I prefer to think the latter. :)

babooshka means old woman/grandmother in russian

this song is just a dark version of Escape, Jimmy Ruffin's pina colada song.

Not Jimmy Ruffin, Rupert Holmes, and yes, I AM ashamed to know that. It is indeed a darker version, but after watching the video recently, there is a great reason to love the song besides the artistic merits. rrrrowr!

Whilst most people would have little sympathy for the man as he is, or seems like he is, cheating on his wife - I believe Kate wrote it thinking that the wife was the manipulative one here. Her husband loves her but it was her who went cold on him. Yes - relationships can't keep the same passion/lust as the beginning but they can deepen over time into real love. It's a shame the woman here didn't put enough energy into her relationship in an open honest way as she did into tricking her husband. Their relationship has all but died and this stunt has only backfired and made them both seem like fools.

From Kate:

"The games we play -- boredom breeds suspicion."

‘Babooshka’ is a song of love and hate. Her husband has, one suspects, lovingly stood by her for years, weathering her moodswing tears and frigid temperament (her neurotic depression?). If ‘Babooshka’ calmed down, she would know this! She knows him exactly! Just like she knows exactly the type of woman he would fall for (someone just like herself all those years ago!) Yes, if only she calmed down! … But she is self-destructing on jealous delusions, mid-life boredom, idle fantasy, etc. etc… She can’t be nice with him. Instead, she recklessly uses her ‘insight’ to test his fidelity, scheming the perfect trap! … “Exactly! A pseudonym to fool him!” … She wants him to fail the test. Why? I doubt she could answer that. Maybe she just ‘wants out’… But she is too reckless to consider impact… She wants drama… She couldn't have made a worse move…

The husband is excited by the scented letters. But they only arouse in him feelings and longings for his wife all those years ago! He is bewitched by her charm all over!

The wife is similarly seduced and aroused by ‘Babooshka’… So she wants to take her own trap further… The alter ego works on them both like a Circean drug… Indeed, the wife both is and is not ‘Babooshka’… So is the husband ever tempted to commit an infidelity? …

The denouement? … He is left with confused longing for what she is not and only too aware of what she has become… And the hard-won lesson fills her with a shattering fury…

The song reminds me of the myth of Jason and Medea … that is, before he went off with Creon's daughter! :o)

It is a tragic reflection on the breakdown of communication and the foolish consequences of a distorted sense of reality.

The happy ending? … She rediscovers the ‘Babooshka’ within herself!

whats it with the broken glass sounds in the song, and the pieces o fbroken glass in the clip? What do they mean with that? do they mean she hits him with glass, or that he starts freaking when he finds out his wife is testing him? Can ANYONE explain this to me, its breaking my head for over three days now... *sigh*

Perhaps (and I'm just taking a stab at this so feel free to add in your 2 cents and constructive criticism) the glass breaking sound is possibly thin ice cracking/breaking. What made me think this was the line "Just like his wife before she freezed on him". To me, it sounds like the ice cracking and breaking away from her and she (as Theresa_Gionoffrio so wonderfully put it) rediscovers the 'Babooshka' within herself! But that, is just my guess :-p

Actually, I saw an interview where Kate talked about what the glass shattering sound was in the song, and it's the wife, in a fit of anger at her husband responding to "Babooshka"'s advances, throwing a glass/cutlery/whatever she could find at the husband. That was Kate's explanation for it.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=64sqReQ14Kc

everything explained here

haha yes i always thought the smashing glass was the wife throwing a tantrum and hurling plates at the husband.
this song is hilarious, i can just picture a manipulative, jealous, aging wife going crazy on her meek, submissive husband.

entrapment... bad move...

Babooshka is like an agent provocateur engaging in a sting operation, or a Morality Play telling of Man Vs Lust. Her spidery power to "take it further" suggests that she is doing all the weaving. But there is obviously a weakness, a willing, a longing on his part, like he is keen for the ride. He is the 'typical' male fly caught in the black widow web of feminine guile! A fatal attraction!

"She wanted to take it further
So she arranged a place to go
To see if he
Would fall for her incognito..."

The "All yours Babooshka, Babooshka, Babooshka-ya-ya!" suggests that he does 'fall for her incognito'. Her 'capacity to give him all he needs' overwhelms his cognitions. He does not solve the riddle of uncanny familiarity, and the alter ego Sphinx wins!

However, the crashing, backfiring finale suggests the wife is furious that her cunning plan was so successful and revelatory! And as you say Paul, I suspect that both parties are injured by glaring feelings of (self-)betrayal.

And yes, maybe it was he who stopped paying attention to the relationship and to her needs years ago - the romance and the passion. And maybe his 'frigidity' drove her passions to distraction! ...

The Babooshka (1980) video costume makes me think of Boudica, the warrior queen of the Iceni people of Norfolk who led an uprising against the occupying forces of the Roman Empire, or the Amazons. The Amazons were a mythical ancient nation of all-female warriors. In some versions of the myth, no men were permitted to have sexual encounters or reside in Amazon country; but once a year, in order to prevent their race from dying out, they visited the Gargareans, a neighbouring tribe. The male children who were the result of these visits were either put to death, sent back to their fathers or exposed in the wilderness to fend for themselves; the females were kept and brought up by their mothers, and trained in agricultural pursuits, hunting, and the art of war. In the Iliad, the Amazons were referred to as Antianeira ("those who fight like men"). In popular culture, the Amazons are seen frequently in the television series Xena: Warrior Princess.

The Ephesian Artemis was a divinity totally distinct from the Greek goddess of the same name. She seems to have been the personification of the fructifying and all-nourishing powers of nature. It is an opinion almost universally adopted, that she was an ancient Asiatic divinity whose worship the Greeks found established in Ionia, when they settled there, and that, for some resemblance they discovered, they applied to her the name of Artemis. As soon as this identity of the Asiatic goddess with the Greek Artemis was recognised, other features, also originally peculiar to the Greek Artemis, were transferred to her; and thus she is called a daughter of Leto, who gave birth to her in the neighbourhood of Ephesus. Her original character is sufficiently clear from the fact, that her priests were eunuchs, and that her image in the magnificent temple of Ephesus represented her with many breasts (polumastos). The whole figure of the goddess resembled a mummy: her head was surmounted with a mural crown (corona muralis), and the lower part of her body, which ended in a point, like a pyramid upside down, was covered with figures of mystical animals. The symbol of this divinity was a bee, and her high priest bore the name of king (essên). Her worship was said to have been established at Ephesus by the Amazons.

BaBushka reminds me of Dangerous Liaisons (1988; from the novel 'Les Liaisons Dangereuses' by Choderlos de Laclos).

- 'Babushka' is the Russian word meaning "grandmother," or more generally (but quite informally) "old lady." In recent years, the term has also come to indicate a strong, outspoken or opinionated woman of any age (wiki).
- As in TD ('The Pull of the Bush'), "BaBUSHka" can be regarded as a play on Kate's name.

A 'Babooshka' is also the set of Russian dolls that fit one inside the other! A nice analogy too, if you can see the irony...


T.