My twice-through listens of her subsequent albums have felt loving and familiar, letters from a godmother. This woman produced four miracle records: she is in the canon. The admission of “downgrading one’s fan status” sounds snooty and shitty, but there is happiness here. I subsequently gave my CD singles collection to a girl I was seeing, a newly converted fan. Tori Amos had already saved my life job done. By the time 2002’s Scarlet’s Walk arrived, aptly hailed as a departure, I was ready to downgrade my status as a fan. From Venus onward, the near-permanent hovering presence of a backbeat-loving rhythm section only boxed her, crated her, squared her - especially when compared to the spiky piano-and-kit partnership heard in Tori’s finest heiress, Fiona Apple. Tori’s piano playing, as a soloist, runs like a river, flapping in the wind like a Liberty scarf. Whether it was due to the withering pituitary gland in my 19-year-old head or the new thrill of having moved from country to city, or - forgive me - a drop in quality in the music is irrelevant.
Tori, like Trent Reznor, attracted all the queers and weirdos who were too young, too square, or too isolated for punk or hardcore.ġ999’s To Venus and Back came out shortly after I started college (the same day as Nine Inch Nails’ The Fragile, actually) and marked the end of my obsession.
Plus she attracted a hugely progressive (for the ‘90s) and understanding online community, replete with meet-ups and listening parties and support groups. Added to this: Tori’s frequent nearly-solo concerts where mothers and daughters would hold hands and sets would routinely feature surprise covers and deep cuts. In My Head,” a song only heard in North America at high school talent shows thanks to its appearance The Bee Sides, one of her many sheet music collections. Plus there was a plethora of EPs and CD singles boasting b-sides so worth it that I’d have dreams of finding a copy of the UK pressing of the “Crucify” single in the used bin, so that I might finally hear the recorded version of “Here. A strong - the strongest ever! - run of albums with no fan consensus on a favourite, as Tori fandom equally praises each of the Great Four: 1992’s Little Earthquakes, 1994’s Under the Pink, 1996’s Boys for Pele and 1998’s From the Choirgirl Hotel. Being a teenage Tori Amos fan in the ‘90s was, of course, the greatest.