Tori Amos : Christmas Album Confirmed!

[Si Hunt]

Hurrah! It's a 20 tracker!

Yo, George 1:25 *
Big Wheel 3:18
Bouncing Off Clouds 4:08
Teenage Hustling 4:00
Digital Ghost 3:50
You Can Bring Your Dog 4:04
Mr. Bad Man 3:18
Fat Slut 0:41 *
Girl Disappearing 4:00
Secret Spell 4:04
Devils and Gods 0:53 *
Body and Soul 3:56
Fathers Son 3:59
Programmable Soda 1:25 *
Code Red 5:27
Roosterspur Bridge 3:58
Beauty of Speed 4:08
Almost Rosey 5:23
Velvet Revolution 1:19 *
Dark Side of The Sun 4:16
[* interlude track]

"Fat Slut" could be a treat.

Si.

[buglass]

Don't forget the three bonus DVD tracks!

21 Posse Bonus Album 01:50
22 Smokey Joe Album 04:16
23 Dragon 05:05


Of course all this is from 'a reliable source'. So who knows?

I like what I assume is going to be the cover shot.



Bible in one hand. 'Shame' written on the other. And blood running down her leg because women bleed y'know...

Yep. That's Tori.

[Si Hunt]

She knows.

Si.

[Matthew T]

Death becomes her.

[Carol Baynes]

Bible in one hand. 'Shame' written on the other. And blood running down her leg because women bleed y'know...

She looks the spits of me on a Sunday, stood outside the local Catholic church!

I'm looking forward to a new Tori album actually, although I never got "The beekeeper".

[Si Hunt]

It's worth buying - like all her stuff, there is half a CD of great stuff ("Cars and Guitars" and "Sleeps With Butterflies" are classic), and lots of filler. You can tile a bathroom during the title track though, and still have time left to buy chips.

And "Garlands", the DVD bonus track, is four hours long with no chorus.

Si.

[WhiteCrow]

Yay - the most pretentious woman in music is back!!!

Photo still doesnt outdo her "breastfeeding a pig" one from Boys for Pele, which made my wife quite unwell, he he ...

[Si Hunt]

Unbelievably, the bible/bloody leg/treading on fish image is NOT the cover.

It's just not barking enough. Enter THIS.



Icon! She's holding a hen on her album cover for Gods sake.

Si.

[buglass]

It's not a great cover is it? Overwhelmingly grey and the text is far too dark.

By the way, you know that's not a fish in the other picture right?

Big Wheel is currently streaming on the website.

[P-Bal]

Fringe!

[Si Hunt]

Apparently no-one will play Tori's lead single "Big Wheel" because it features the taboo word "Milf" several times in the chorus. They're scrabbling around trying to do an edit, but they can't because the word is featured in the song so frequently.

Si.

[buglass]

That's in the US. Apparently Bouncing Off Clouds is to be a 'European' single.

Meanwhile The Twang are having no problem in the UK with their single Wide Awake which features the line "What was I doing with that milf?". Played often on Radio 2.

The song's complete crap but it makes a point.

[Si Hunt]

I've been getting stuck in to this new "record". 22 bloody tracks and 80 minutes! It makes it impossible to find the good songs. There's things like "Fat Slut" which is 30 seconds of angsy groaning that you just wonder why on Earth she had to include! I think we just have to accept that since she stopped making singles, Tori's decided to stick all her b-sides in with the main album. She's found a way of getting no radio play AND making her albums unlistenable! God bless her!

That said I have unrooted some classics - "Secret Spell", "Bouncing Off Clouds", "Big Wheel", "Beauty of Speed" and "Almost Rosey" are great. I've not found anything else yet but I'm looking. It's like trying to find an aubergine in a vat of treacle. And I don't know why she's got off so lightly with the reviews - why do they love this so much more than "The Beekeeper"? I mean, that was full of shit too but at least it was ever so slightly shorter.

She's odd, I've been also listening to a compilation of her best songs I made and it's just wonderful. Yet she fills up her albums with interminable dross around the gems!

Si.

[Si Hunt]

Torid was on Graham Norton last night looking gaunt and old and in a big wig. I think I've only really seen her in the last 10 years in airbrushed videos and photos, so it was something of a shock to see this mousy, thin little forty something for the first time. They spent most of the time talking to some fat french bloke, but she did "Bouncing Off Clouds" at the end.

Elsewhere, I found some good quotes from when she was making her rarities box set:

"You get more of an octave with this piano. It’s keys, and you open the keys, and inside this box there’s the music five discs and a picture book really. Not, not a pamphlet, but a real book. I felt like Billie Piper in the TARDIS."

A REAL BOOK!

Si.

[Si Hunt]

Tori Amos launched a foul-mouthed rant towards a pair of fans at a gig on Wednesday night.

The singer was performing at San Diego's Copley Symphony Hall when she became angered by two girls on the front row who had repeatedly left their seats.

Stopping half-way through the song 'Code Red', Amos shouted: "Get the f**k out of my show! It's a privilege to sit in the front row and I reserve those seats for people who appreciate music, get the f**k out!"

The fans were then removed from the venue by security guards.

Hurrah! That's what you want!

Si.

[Matthew T]

Tori gives her opinion on Britney's "Toxic":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8HfH2D9JMI

TWART!

[Si Hunt]

Mad as cheese!

WIG!!!

Si.

[Si Hunt]

1. 'Give'
2. 'Welcome to England'
3. 'Strong Black Vine'
4. 'Flavor'
5. 'Not Dying Today'
6. 'Maybe California'
7. 'Curtain Call'
8. 'Fire to Your Plain'
9. 'Police Me'
10. 'That Guy'
11. 'Abnormally Attracted to Sin'
12. '500 Miles'
13. 'Mary Jane'
14. 'Starling'
15. 'Fast Horse'
16. 'Ophelia'
17. 'Lady in Blue'

No barking cover this time (and she does NOT look like that! Airbrushing gone mad!) and still 17 bloody tracks. But apparently every track has "visual content" so presumably there will be a DVD with it.

Will this be any good, do we think? The last one was about 50% genius, 50% dross, as is her way.

Si.

[Si Hunt]

Why has this thread been merged with another Tori thread?

Si.

[Pip Madeley]

I remembered there was already a Tori Amos thread and I thought there wasn't really any need for two separate threads so I merged them as there's a history in this forum of one thread per act e.g Kylie, Genesis, Pink Floyd, Spice Girls, Super Furry Animals, Keane, etc etc...

Just trying to be helpful.

[Mr BHT]

Do any of Tori's fans ever feel a bit sick of her sometimes?

I was listening to Scarlet's Walk earlier and loving it, but when I hear the news that there's going to be a new album I find myself groaning in frustration. Not sure why really.

[Si Hunt]

It's because like clockwork, her albums as impenetrable but contain half a CD's worth of superb songs. So you can't really appreciate anything she does until you've picked out the good ones and put them on a home-made compilation with other good stuff.

When she's good, she's brilliant, but the woman's a LOT of hard work.

Si.

[Mr BHT]

I think your right with that assessment. There's simply just so much material to wade through sometimes.

So which albums are generally peoples favourites.

For me it's...

1. Little Earthquakes
2. From the Choirgirl Hotel
3. Under the Pink
4. The Beekeeper
5. To Venus and Back

Only Tales of A Librarian really falls flat for me.

[Si Hunt]

The new songs on "Tales" are good but it's typical of her to subvert the concept. There's no explanation as to why she's left off anything from "Scarlet", one of her best albums at that point, and included the rape monologue album track "Me and A Gun". So the album just has no point.

I came to her with "Choirgirl" so it's one of my favourite albums - nice and dark and full of great songs. So although I can see that "Little Earthquakes" is good, I can't ever really get into that or "Pink", let alone the inpenetrable "Boys for Pele".

I didn't like "Venus and Back" at the time, but it's really grown on me. And "Bliss" and "Concertina" are great songs in the mould of "Choirgirl". The album sits in the shadow of the earlier effort though, and seems designed to capitalise on the success of FTCH in the states.

"Scarlet" was of course brilliant and I love "A Sorta Fairytale" and "Taxi Ride" to bits. The album as a whole is a little too long though, and with all the subsequent albums, "Beekeeper" and "Posse" there are highlight songs as good as ever ("Sleeps With Butterflies", "Bouncing Off Clouds", "Ribbons Undone", "Cars and Guitars") but the albums are filled with filler. I'd love her to do a great 12 track album again, though of course you couldn't trust her to leave the good songs on (and why should she choose the tracks I like, I suppose?) so at least you have to chance to edit the albums later.

The Tori I like is defined by "A Sorta Fairytale" though - glossy, precise production, a definate rolling piano melody, delicate harmonies and a chorus.

One area I think she lets herself down though is lyrics. I have no idea what hardly any of her songs are actually about, so I don't connect with them at all. Even "Fairytale" I sing along to, "Looking for some Indian Blood" and whatnot, and I have no idea what I'm singing about. The few songs I get the point of ("Spark", "Northern Lad" and even that's nonsense - "Me and my mollasses" anyone?) I really, really connect with and I always wonder how much more I could love her songs if I had just a clue what they were about. But they seem written in code, so you have no chance at all of deciphering them.

Si.

[Mr BHT]

I came to her with "Choirgirl" so it's one of my favourite albums - nice and dark and full of great songs. So although I can see that "Little Earthquakes" is good, I can't ever really get into that or "Pink", let alone the inpenetrable "Boys for Pele".

I first got into her in 1995 when I was looking for an alternative to Kate Bush, so as you can imagine, with the exception of a handful of songs, I was a little bit disappointed with Little Earthquakes and Under the Pink at first. But some time, and a few painful experiences later Little Earthquakes started to come alive. Around this time I purchased Choirgirl too, because some of the reviewed referred to it having a more 'down to earth' nature. For the next few years Tori could do no wrong for me. Northern Lad, Concertina, Winter and Crucify still have the power to hit me in all the right places even now.

I divide her career into two sections really - the first half is everything up to To Venus and Back where each album sounded different to the one before it and Tori really experimented. Stick with Under the Pink - it took me ten years to really love it, it's worth persevering with. It still have to break Boys For Pele though.

Everything after whilst been consistantly excellent and demanding seems to have lacked that flare that made the first five albums so unique. But there's a hell of a lot to love about the dark Scarlet's Walk. Gold Dust is as good a contender for 'best Tori song ever' as any of them. I adore the much maligned Beekeeper to bits, Jamaica Inn, Mary's the Sea and the title track especially. And Posse has Bouncing Off Clouds on it, one of her best, most upbeat singles ever.

One area I think she lets herself down though is lyrics. I have no idea what hardly any of her songs are actually about, so I don't connect with them at all. Even "Fairytale" I sing along to, "Looking for some Indian Blood" and whatnot, and I have no idea what I'm singing about. The few songs I get the point of ("Spark", "Northern Lad" and even that's nonsense - "Me and my mollasses" anyone?) I really, really connect with and I always wonder how much more I could love her songs if I had just a clue what they were about. But they seem written in code, so you have no chance at all of deciphering them.

Si.

The beauty of that approach is you can always interpret the songs anyway you want. Just take the feel of a tune to your heart and the words don't always matter. But, I agree, I do love good lyrics and I tend to bond more with songs that I can relate too, as opposed to just average pop music.