I'll scream. Can we limit responses to musicians please?

I can't think of anyone else but Kate Bush who could write and deliver a lyric that goes, "Wow wow wow wow, unbelievable" yet manages to send a shiver down my spine when I so much as imagine it to myself.

At their very best - that's Love Song and Lullaby to me - The Cure sound absolutely unique.

but I'd put them up there with Kate Bush for uniqueness. I also think Tom Waits is pretty incomparable.

...less so these days, but for a few years, he was the Man.

Has released a number of "Aerial" type albums (ones that grow and change the more you listen.) I know that the general consensus is that "Rock Bottom" is the "one". But I have found that the last three albums "Schleep" "Cuckooland" and the recent "Comicopera" are all pretty amazing. I just love the way the music grows and changes almost organically the more time you spend with it. "Cuckooland" is still revealing itself to me and I am expecting the same to happen with "Comicopera" A unique "One" then, a lovely warm and affectionate voice and instrumentation melding with jazz/pop/and god knows what else into such a hearty musical stew.

well you know what they say"One in Kate Bush is worth two in the Hand"
Tom Waits
Bjork

Respect to the bush, it is sad fact that at the ripe old age of 36 years old, I still don't own any of Kate's albums! What would you recommend as a starting point?

No matter what people think of the old crust, one thing is sure he is ploughing his own determined feisty furrow.

...is probably the key phrase in Patrick's original post, that makes Kate Bush so remarkable. Using that as a criterion, then of those suggestions so far, I'd discount Robert Wyatt and Bjork, both of whom arrived at solo idiosyncrasy via apprenticeships in equally idiosyncratic bands (Soft Machine and Sugarcubes respectively). Tom Waits only developed his more unique characteristics (Raindogs and everything after) following a series of more conventional albums. I'd go along with Sigur Ros (with whom I'm developing an obsession) and Prince, though. I'll add Arcade Fire, too. I really couldn't believe that "Funeral" was coming from a band with no significant prior history.

Sigor I agree with Arcade Fire sound like too much stadium rock stuff to these cloth ears.

But hang on, I assume record sales or widespread popularity is not always the issue here as some of mine are a bit niche. Also mine dont have the leotards of Kate Bush but each have ploughed their furrows honestly and with passion and i cant easily comepare them with someone else or substitute them if I cant find their CD in the car...unless you can easily exclude them for me?

Billy Bragg
Chris Rea
Richard Thompson
Martin Carthy & Waterson Carthy & Eliza
Bruce Springsteen, Tom Waits, Randy Newman & Dylan
Bjork
Dolly Parton
PJ Harvey
Madonna (not for me though)
Shirley Collins
Christy Moore
Chris Wood:

Hang on, there are loads more arent there?

Future possibilities?
Antony Hegarty
Cat Power
Julie Feeney

I think Nick Cave needs to be in there.

Brilliant as she is, I'm not sure that Kate Bush is operating in a field of one - Tori Amos is in the field with her, admittedly entering through a gate that Kate had opened. Like Joan Armatrading (who left the gate ajar for Tracy Chapman) Kate was a pioneer, but to be in a field of one I think you're looking for someone who has no obvious precedent and no subsequent imitators.

By that definition, many of the names so far mentioned qualify - Tom Waits after he adopted "the personna", Mark E Smith, Bjork, and more. Maybe you could add Ian Dury (despite his Music Hall influences) and Capt Beefheart (despite Frank Zappa) and some might say Joanna Newsome, but they won't have heard Victoria Williams.

But I'd like to offer a possibly contentious name: Brian May. He has his own, distinctive sound which I don't think has been imitated.

I guess someone will now prove me wrong!

Don't know if this will work - I'm not very good at this:

http://www.yessaid.com/pic/piglet2.jpg

www.ultra-pop.org/images/band/bush.jpg

Distinctive and immediately recognisable, from the literate bombast of Doll by Doll to the accoustic fury of nowadays. Ploughing his sole lonely furrow, uncompromising as ever.

...distinctive though many of the above may be, aren't we sticking in the mainstream, somewhat? Just to open things up a bit, let's toss in Diamanda Galas and Jim Thirlwell...

Distinctive, right enough.
But toss her in a well, say I.

They don't really make 'em weird like they used to. There was a time when every label had its offbeat/wacky/surreal act,* rather like an in-house court jester. We did a thread a while back on Great British Eccentrics where Kevin Coyne, Viv Stanshall and Ivor Cutler certainly got mentions, but, yes, they're a lot thinner on the ground now.

(*Except Pye, of course, whose entire roster was offbeat, wacky and surreal.)

but with a high level of commercial success? Tha would be my take on Kate Bush - number 1 albums, uniqueness and critical appreciation. There are very few artists who tick those three boxes.

Yoko Ono? I'd say undoubtedly one in a field of one. There has been a critical re-assessment I believe. I saw a live show a few years ago and can testify to it being unique.

She's always fascinating to listen to - here's
a terrific interview on Radio 4 from when just before Aerial came out. I hadn't heard it before.

As to whether she's leader in a filed of one: answer's yes. I don't really hear much of Kate in Tori Amos, for example, once the superficial similarities are set aside. I'd add that I think Tori Amos is very talented; to say she's not up there with Kate is praising with faint damnation.

Whose debut album came seemingly from nowhere, fully-formed and highly accomplished? Of the current crop, you could do worse than Amy Winehouse's Frank - it really is brilliant!

Valiantly ploughing on despite general public disinterest making sublime electronic pop classics 23 years on. Nobody else matches up - most other synth groups have fell by the wayside or mutated into something else completely (Depeche Mode come to mind).

You are , of course, so right. Who would have thunk it all, those years rolled by..and still making their own witty, unique sounding songs?? Tennant is one of my favourite singers and their music never sounds dated.

no matter what the line up he seems to get the same racket out of Motörhead and no one else sounds quite like them.

Must fall into this category - weird masks, world music obsession, some great music such as the Album 'So', 'Don't give up' (with the aformentioned Kate, ironically) Biko and Solsbury Hill. Not to mention the brilliant 'Counting out time' and peculiar beards / hairstyles etc...a much more interesting and unique individual than tory-boy Collins..

Have to admit though - 'Face Values' was an excellent album by the Phil Mitchell look-alike.
Sorry, wandering off subject...

There's no other outfit like The Blue Nile, partly because of the uniqueness of the sound, partly because no one else can be arsed with the average seven years spent honing an album.

I'd say he's a contender for this.