You know, everybody says that Tori Amos has gone down. Or everybody in my circle says so, anyway. For them, it was like, Oh, Little Earthquakes was great, but since then... and then then they shrug their shoulders and look around the room, searching for the Tori they loved.
But I've been oddly faithful throughout her career, not exactly wanting to openly declare myself as a Tori Amos fan. It's the sore spot in my otherwise hip-hop-dominated collection, if you will. "Well, I really like Mos Def, and I've always been a Tribe fan, Tori Amos is cool, and I have every album The Roots have ever made." You see? It just doesn't work.
Anyway. Via Rhapsody I have again had my music ignorance pointed out to me, having totally missed the boat on Tori's latest CD. I've been listening to it all night, mainly because I discovered Suzi Suh via NPR and Tori made for a nice segue from the smoky, female voice thing Suzie has going on.
And you know what? I think I actually prefer The New Tori to The Original Tori. Less gut-wrenching, screaming, piano-bench-humping (she totally does it) and more interesting combinations of different voices and floaty, life-is-weird-but-happy stuff that makes me think of driving the car down Highway One on a day when it's too cold to have the windows open, but you do anyway because the air smells so great right by the ocean.
The end of the story is that I'm a fan. Through and through. There. Said it. Done. My one criticism would involve "Witness." It's been taken off my Rhapsody list. Otherwise, great album.
Eww.. piano-bench-humping?!
You know, I like both old and new Tori. She fits for different moods, I think. After all, sometimes you just have to hump piano benches and scream ...
I have to say that I think her new(est) album is completely bland. I too stayed along for the ride since most jumped off (Boys for Pele, I find usually) but I just don't listen to the new one.
I stumble upon your blog through Google and read this post and decided to put my 3 cents.
I joined Tori-fan community in Russia in 1996 when a girl sent me a tape from Amsterdam with Boys for Pele. BLOOD ROSES gave my heart to Tori forever. I saw her 7 times altogether and met her personally 5 times. She has this amaizing quality... and the last record is great... the voices, exactly! I would love to see her more than 2 times each tour... like now I hope something will happen and I will go to Italy to catch Rome or Modena shows...