Music
Store

"Raining Blood" is one of the most shocking songs here. The original, by "extreme" metal band Slayer, was full of fierce vocals and crushing guitars. Here, Amos strips it to nothing but a piano and a weird bass synthesizer, and ironically injects the song with more menace and evil than the original ever had. It's a creepy cover that plays out more like the soundtrack to a nightmare than a song.

Amos' alteration of tone with these songs often changes them radically. What was an innocent little song before becomes threatening, wrenching, or indignant. Think back to the Crucify EP, where Tori completely warped Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" in a way that completely changed the impact of the song (at least for me). That's the effect she's going for, I figure. Her experimentation doesn't always work though. "Heart of Gold" is so cacophonous and the vocals so awkward that I can't really appreciate it. "Real Men" is pretty, but quite similar to the original. Even when I don't understand the message, I appreciate the lovely singing and minimalistic music. "Enjoy the Silence," "Rattlesnakes," and "Time" are all beautiful songs, even if Amos' implications of sex are beyond my meager brain.

I wouldn't say I'm disappointed, mainly because I wasn't even sure what to expect. I like this album, even if I must concede to not entirely understanding it. Artistically, she probably knows what she's doing. Even so, I'm eager for another release of original material.


Cover Your Idols.   October 5, 2001
 20 out of 30 found this review helpful

Typically, if an artist decides to do an entire cd of cover songs it implies that she/he has run out of original material and is now treading water for new ideas. That theory may be partially true for Tori Amos's new cd "Strange Little Girls". Half of the disc contains some truly inspired moments and the other half might have better been left on the cutting room floor. It's going to come down to a matter of taste for the Tori Amos fan as to which songs she covers best, but this is my review so I'll give my opinion of what I think she does best. Lou Reed's "New Age" is a good start, though I've never heard the original. Amos strips it down and makes it hers. "'97 Bonnie & Clyde" is very good, with a haunting string section in the background and Amos's hushed voice throughout, even Eminem must be proud. I was not familiar with "Strange Little Girl" but Amos makes a fine song out of it. I still feel mixed about Amos's take on Depeche Mode's "Enjoy The Silence" and 10cc's "I'm Not In Love". I liked the originals a great deal and it's difficult to hear them Amosized. Though, to her credit, she lays them bare. "Rattlesnakes", a cover of a Lloyd Cole song that I have never heard was well done, however, Tom Waits's "Time" was not. Neil Young's "Heart Of Gold" was likeable but nothing great. I really didn't like how Amos remade The Boomtown Rats "I Don't Like Mondays" completely deconstructing Bob Geldof's bitterness in the original. It ends up sounding bland and flat. Same can be said of John Lennon's "Happiness Is A Warm Gun"--although it was an eerie touch to have the soundbites from John Lennon's murder from 1980. A dark foreshadowing. I'm not familiar with "Raining Blood" but it certainly isn't a standout track which cannot be said of Joe Jackson's "Real Men", which, I think, is Amos's best performance, but then it's not that different from what Jackson intended. Overall, "Strange Little Girls" offers some interesting moments but I would have preferred a new entry for a new millenium from Tori.


Tori's Garish Sarcophagus   June 10, 2002
 17 out of 27 found this review helpful

Anyone even casually reading the dozens of interviews and articles with or about Tori Amos made available on the internet previous to this album's release will not be surprised to find these songs not strange, but dull, undernourished and impoverished instead. Amos, whose own albums fairly teem with artistically credible, violent scenarios directed against both men and women, should be questioning her own disgruntled suppositions and overly-generalized thinking. Instead, here she chooses to cover twelve songs by men, many of which portray women darkly or in violent fashion, while she comfortably looks away from the hundreds of songs from the rock era alone in which men have portrayed women not only as equals but as human creatures of power, beauty, allure, and intelligence.

During the last five shaky years of her recording career, Amos has managed to satisfy neither her fans or the critics, as she moves further and further away from the confessional, idiosyncratic songs that are, for better or worse, her real claim to songwriting genius. Since Boys For Pele, the once-deep water has gotten shallower with each recording, bringing us now to Strange Little Girls, which finds Amos almost dead and already embalmed on the shore.

This project would be easier to embrace and appreciate if Amos had chosen songs which were musically and lyrically challenging; instead she seems to have largely chosen songs (only moderately interesting in themselves) that lyrically support her present gutted and half-baked ideologies, with predictable results. Where are Gimme Shelter, Leopard Skin Pill-Box Hat, It's All Over Now, Baby Blue, or You're Lost, Little Girl? In its effort to sound current, the album is musically dead in the water, though songs New Age, Strange Little Girls, All I Ever Wanted, Heart Of Gold and Raining Blood are limited successes. Amos' cover of Eminem's 97 Bonnie & Clyde does succeed in casting bright light on his brilliantly clever, horrific lyrics-but one play yields the entire payload. Amos seems to fail to understand that the original of 10cc's I'm Not In Love was intended ironically, thus making her ironic, lyrically-deprived cover superfluous. Tom Waits' saccharine Time is the kind of confection Amos could sing prettily in a catatonic state, so why is it included here?

Nothing underscores Amos' present anemic political and artistic sensibilities than her 10-minute plus version of The Beatles' Happiness Is A Warm Gun, with its entirely obvious and embarrassing sound bites (from presidents George and George W. Bush) about gun laws, while the song rambles hopelessly on, looking for a home and struggling to anchor the album somehow. Wasn't that Amos herself posing proudly and happily with a warm gun on the cover of Boys For Pele? Does a gun become a safe tool in a woman's hands? Curiously, the one included song about violence perpetrated by a woman---I Don't Like Mondays--gets what amounts to an apologist's reading. Oh, the awful men, the poor women. Perhaps being present in Manhattan--with her young daughter--on September 11th will give her cause to think again about aggression and defense. What Amos needs is a full, head-under-the water, week-long immersion in the Camille Paglia hot tub.

Violence is enacted by men and women and children--by people---against other men and women--against other people. Why is this larger truth impossible for Amos to understand and address comprehensively without taking sides and throwing stones from not an ivory but a glass tower? Unable to grasp the acute realities of violence, and without new bearings within herself with which to move forward, we get, instead of vision, honesty, or revelation, Strange Little Girls. If Amos had spend as much time thinking about these difficult issues as she had on the record's marketing and booklet photography (the idea lifted, anyway, from Natalie Merchant's Ophelia), which resembles nothing so much as an endless Feria ad, we might be listening to quite another product. And Product Strange Little Girls surely is.

In my review of Boys For Pele, I noted that, since Pele's release, Amos had moved away from sincere connection to her own material and strictly into roles, poses, and masks, which, as an individual and an artist, she has every right to do. However, with Strange Little Girls, this process of self-calcification seems sadly complete. With Strange Little Girls Amos has created her own glittering, garish sarcophagus, complete with mummified remains.


A bliss of another kind....   October 10, 2001
 16 out of 16 found this review helpful

I wasn't planning on reviewing this CD. However, after reading all the negative reviews and various harpings on Ms. Amos's creative abilities I felt I had an obligation to share what I think of this CD to the world.

Simply stated, I think it's brilliant.

It's not particularly creative in concept (Liz Phair had particular success with her answer to the Rolling Stone's Exhile on Main Street with the album Exhile in Guyville). It's not even like this is Tori's first time with reworking covers. The Crucify ep back in the early nineties featured a great cover of 'Angie' and 'Smells Like Teen Spirit'.

However, "Strange Little Girls"'s strength lies in the delicate way that Amos has reimagined the songs themselves. She's added a new slant to every tune, giving new light and shade over the tune and lyrics with simple inflections of her voice. With a different tone she can make a love song into a threat, and this ability keeps each song interesting in its own way. Here is my song by song review of "Strange Little Girls".

New Age: This is a great opener. At times thoughtful, at others hysterical. Very catchy and very assertive: Right up front Tori lets you know that "It's the beginning of a new age" in her music. (A)

'97 Bonnie and Clyde: This is a very disturbing song, told in relentless whispers. It's difficult to listen to and has a tendency to be a bit overly dramatic upon multiple sessions, but it makes its point and makes it well. (B)

Strange Little Girl: This song has a sound similar to Bliss off of To Venus and Back. It's radio friendly, but is subtle enough so that it doesn't grate on the nerves. (A-)

Enjoy the Silence: This is one of my favorites. It's quiet and bare, completly the opposite of the original. Bitter and ironic, it sums up the entire album with a few words, "Words like violence break the silence". Indeed, Tori's whole point in the inclusion of this song is that one IS responsible for one's own words. (A+)

I'm Not in Love: Cold, bare, and not cuddly. Tori's tone is sneering, and arrogant. It's a song that is about layers - She emphasizes the lyrics: "It hides a nasty stain thats lying there", and her voice makes you wonder: Where exactly did that nasty stain come from? (A)

Rattlesnakes: I know a lot of people that love this song; it's their favorite song. I find it a bit bland and a bit similar in style to some of Madonna's recent hits. I'll give it a (B+).

Time: This song, although beautiful, does not hold my attention. Performed live, it captivates, but it's leaves one distracted at best in CD form. (B-)

Heart of Gold: This is perhaps the most controversial of all the covers, save Eminem's. Tori basically replaced simplicity with double voices and a heavy guitar riff... Purists will loathe this remake, I find it the most rockin' song on the album. (A+)

I Don't Like Mondays: Great. Soft as a lullaby until one listens to the violence in the lyrics. (A)

Happiness is a Warm Gun: A bit preachy and long, but also fun and funky in the vein of 'Datura' off of Venus. An interesting perspective on gun control (B)

Raining Blood: This one took some time to warm up to, but now I love it. It's menacing throughout, which is a fairly difficult mood to mantain considering its just Tori and a piano. (A)

Real Men: My favorite off the album. You'll have to hear it to understand. (A++++++++)

All in all, this is not a light album to play during a party. It's closest sister album is probably 'Boys for Pele' - both are dark and speak of unrestrained violence. "Strange Little Girls" will doubtless be misunderstood for many years - Perhaps we will learn to view these songs not as covers, but more as new works of art to be understood on their own terms.


The Problem With Tori Amos   December 29, 2002
 15 out of 25 found this review helpful

This album is a very good primer on what is wrong with Tori Amos. First off, it's a concept album--an idea that has not proven successful for just about anyone (though, I personally think The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway and Quadrophenia are quite good). But that fault merely illustrates her artiness. The real problem is that it is overwrought and hangs so heavily on the dramatic pretense of a woman singing songs by men.

Yet, the covers she has chosen are rarely good examples of songs sung by men that illustrate failings of men.

Take, for instance, I Don't Like Mondays. Originally written about the Brenda Spencer shooting spree, there is no male perspective. Unless one wants to consider that Bob Geldof is a male (arguably tenable) singing about a crime a woman committed. So, Tori Amos has taken this non-gender specific song, broken it down, and turned it into, well, a broken down version of a non-gender specific song.

Eminem's 97 Bonnie and Clyde fares better, but only because she retains and builds upon the original creepiness. However, only a ninny would think that Eminem was telling this story for face value. It was intended as a harrowing tale of depravity. Here her target is again a bit off. Tori Amos is obviously a smart person who would understand the original music. On top of this, I clearly imagine that she likes the original song. So, without a context change this performance is merely a creepy retelling of the original. If there is an irony to it then it is simply that she is female singing a song about a female being killed. This has as much irony as a small person performing Randy Newman's Short People. Were that to occur, the original poignance of the song would remain intact.

But what this is getting down to is that she has created an album of highly arty covers of songs with a highly arty reason behind it replete with severely emotionally overwrought performances. But the foundation of this is very unstable. Is she saying that the guy in 10cc's I'm Not In Love has troubles with committment or is insensitive by emphasizing the line "It hides a nasty stain that's lying there"? Well duh. Alert Godley and Creme--someone figured out the meaning of their song.

It's also worth noting that Heart of Gold and Enjoy the Silence are two other songs lacking a male perspective. Which begins to explain something else about this album that is not readily apparent, especially with all the yapping that this was a female singing blah blah blah: Tori Amos likes these songs.

Which gets right back to why this album is a primer on what's wrong with Tori Amos. She wanted to pay tribute to songs she likes, but ever the artiste she couldn't just go and redo them in her style--that would be beneath her. So, she had to mask the simple and honest act of enjoying music in a facade of wanting to lay them bare and expose the hideous underbelly of them. If she were going to take songs as examples of misogyny why the heck isn't "Baby Got Back" by Sir Mix-A-Lot included? Don't know about you, but I'd really find it entertaining to hear her pouring out tons of emotion on the line "My anaconda don't want none, unless you've got buns, hon."

On the other hand, this album does serve up a few very creepy performances, and in no way can the listener tune this music out. That the songs are compelling is to her credit. That they fail under her desire to make a statement without substance is typical.