Tori Amos - Gold Dust - Royal Albert Hall

Tori Amos chased the muse around the Royal Albert Hall when she performed with the Dutch Metropole Orchestra as part of her Gold Dust tour this October. Dressed in an elegant green floral suit and black rimmed glasses, Tori evoked the woman behind the image of her 2003 album “Tales of a Librarian” when she played a selection of songs from her impressive twenty year repertoire to an orchestral accompaniment arranged by John Philip Shenale. The black rimmed glasses only came off when the muse turned around and chased her back, inspiring an improvisation – She Calls My Name – in between “Snow Cherries from France” and “Ribbons Undone” during the first half of the evening. Tori’s 12-year-old daughter, Tash, and her friends gave a shout out from one of the loggia boxes when Tori called to her down the mic, saying she hoped Tash would use discretion with her candy and give her best at school in the morning. Assuming Tori’s husband, sound engineer Mark Hawley, was among the crew operating the sound deck, it felt like Tori was very much at home in the grand London venue after overcoming a racing heart at the beginning of her opening number, “Flying Dutchman”. Tori left the stage to a standing ovation in a show that peaked with highlights, “Hey Jupiter”, “Programmable Soda”, “Leather” and “Precious Things”. Her art has been an inspiration to so many people over the past twenty years and the people who love what she does look forward to what’s still to come.

Link to Snow Cherries From France.

Tori Amos at Victoria Apollo

The Victoria Apollo became the best piano bar in town last night – for one night only. Tori Amos performed solo. No band, just the piano and keyboard. That’s the third time I have seen her live now; the second time up close. She really is a gifted artist; luminous, like a ray of sunlight pouring through the window of a forgotten medieval chapel somewhere in the mountains. She radiates so many visions and emotions when she performs – some of them earthly, some of them mythical – that I think she’s close to the peak of her ability as an aesthetic conduit in performance. There’s much more to an Amos show than the creation of sonic shapes and part of that “much more” is an element of reaching for the “sacred” sphere. It was difficult to tell, last night, whether she was actually highly sensitive to the moment or whether everything she did was controlled, contained and mastered: probably a bit of both. Every now and again, she’d “drink” from the audience and there was a kind of “chalice” transference, but she’d never get “drunk” on it. It’s probably taken some years to get that balance.


Highlights for me last night were Northern Lad, Space Dog, Hey Jupiter, Take To The Sky and – (the best) – Tori’s version of Personal Jesus by Depeche Mode in the encore. Wonderful (Can't match being there, though, whoever got it on camera.)

Tori Amos - Sinful Attraction Tour

I’m expecting nothing short of a religious experience at tonight’s Tori Amos gig at Hammersmith Apollo. No, really, I am just expecting something spiritual. Actually, what I am honestly expecting is a cross between enlightenment and a refreshed perspective on sexual politics. In fact, all I am really hoping for is a good time.

:)

Tori Amos Is Back

Just when you thought she had disappeared, Tori Amos is back. And she has been thinking about the world’s financial crisis:

http://uk.reuters.com/article/lifestyleMolt/idUKTRE5472Q020090508?pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0

Instead of coming up with dull, practical ideas like mine (http://workofmyownfiction.blogspot.com/2009/01/economic-crisis.html), she has decided the solution is to redefine what is a sexy, powerful male. I look forward to hearing how she does that on her new album. She is the best living, commercially successful female musician out there, after all.