When Cronos Met Kate Bush: A Teenage Fan’s Unforgettable Moment

On September 10, 1980, Kate Bush visited the Virgin Records shop in Newcastle’s Eldon Square to promote and sign copies of her third album, Never for Ever, which had been released two days earlier. Hundreds of fans showed up, including 17‑year‑old Conrad Lant, who would later become the pioneering Venom frontman and bassist known to the world as Cronos.

The teenage Cronos was a massive Kate Bush fan. “She just flattened me when she first came out with The Kick Inside,” he told Classic Rock in 2021. “The first thing of hers I heard was the ‘Wuthering Heights’ single on the TV, and I couldn’t believe it – it didn’t sound like anything else. On the day The Kick Inside came out, I bought it. I wore the thing out – absolutely amazing album. There was nothing I could compare it to… It was completely unique.”

His admiration never faded. “What’s not to love about Kate Bush?” the self‑described godfather of black metal told writer Dave Everley in a new interview. “She’s got an incredible way of writing. I even dyed me hair red with henna because of her.”

Cronos still vividly remembers the day he met Bush at that Virgin Records signing session. “I raced in and pushed me way to the front of the queue, got as near as I could,” he recalled. “She had these posters she was signing. I said: ‘Can you write “To Cronos…”? Then I said: Can I have a kiss?’”

“She leaned over and kissed me on me lips,” he remembered. “My knees went. As I was walking away in a daze, the guy behind us says: ‘Can I have a kiss?’ And I heard this voice: ‘No more kisses.’ I was the last one.” Cronos still treasures the memento from that day: “I’ve still got the poster. ‘To Cronos, lots of love, Kate Bush’.”

You can read the full interview with Cronos in the new issue of Classic Rock.