'All those boys weren't enough to fill an emptiness inside of me.'

Tori Amos as dawning volcano

Former prodigy Tori Amos has a wild time behind her. I was being attracted by men who possessed the fire, the passion, of which I thought I didn't have it. With her new CD Boys for Pele, she tries to activate the fire in herself. An interview with the very remarkable singer who's coming to Holland for two concerts next month.

Interview by Kees Groenenboom

Dublin - The story is known: Tori Amos regards her songs as entities which already exist. When Blood Roses, one of the songs on her new CD announced itself, she got a terrible fright. 'I felt that passion and anger of that woman who fell in love with the devil. I felt how she wanted to cut her veins open and ask him: Why don't you want my blood? What's wrong with my blood, you son of a bitch? And I was sitting down, relaxing and eating my doughnut and I thought: 'I don't think this is my song'.

But it was her song. Blood Roses became one of the heaviest songs on her new album. Usually, she only uses the thin top of her voice, but now she almost shouts herself down on the accompaniment of a harpsichord. Amos shows on Boys for Pele a whole other side of herself. Pele, the volcano goddess Hawaï, who lets volcanoes erupt, is now her heroine.

That woman who wanted to open her veins for the vampire, was inside of me. But at that point, I didn't recognize her. I didn't want to look at my future self. Four months later, I started to understand the vampire. The desire to seduce the vampire, because I thought the vampire had some kind of power of which I thought I didn't have.

With her CD Little Earthquakes (not her first album, but her first one is regarded as some kind of jouth sin) she introduced in 1991 a very special style in pop music. A style wherein not many musicians will follow her, because she's a virtuoso on the piano. That makes her able to sing duets with her piano. She doesn't play accompanying chords, but an independent melody.

Influences of classical music -like Debussy and Satie- can be heard in her compositions. It's like an inheritance out of her years as a child prodigy. Because she had an amazing talent at a really young age, her parents wanted to cram little Myra Ellen (her real name) when she was only five years old. But Tori was an obstinate little girl. At the age of eleven, she got kicked out of the Peabody Conservatory, after which she went on with a carreer in gaybars in Washington and Baltimore.

Harpsichord

Remarkable on Boys for Pele is the use of the harpsichord instead of the piano (in some songs). During the sixties the instrument was often used in pop music and it gave the flower-power songs a sweet sound. But Amos uses the precursor of the piano almost as percussion, and that's why it sounds much more grim.

But Amos doesn't like talking about these subjects. She's full of big changes in her life, where she talks about with a lot of gestures and not always very coherent. 'Stealing fire', that's what Boys for Pele is about, she explains. Not from the gods, like in Greek mythology, but from the men in her life. She tells that half-way the Under the Pink Tour 'everything fell apart.'

'My relationship, which lasted for seven and a half years, broke. And that's what started the whole thing. After that, I had a few experiences with men, but I got from the frying pan into the fire. That time was not very glorious. All the fame, the money, all those boys in the locker room weren't enought to fill an emptiness inside of me. I was being attracted by men who possessed the fire, the passion, of which I thought I didn't have it. And I had something they wanted: my creativity, my power of creating. I was run by an engine. I had to learn that I had to create some kinda space inside myself where I could not only light my fire, but also let it burn, without needing the confirmation of the men in my life.'

'Tidal waves', that's how she describes the type of man she felt attracted to at that time. 'And I'm a real viking, so take your best shot'. But, isn't that a really good description of her own personality, a tidal wave? 'Well, I don't see myself as a tidal wave, but more as a dawning little volcano. Volcanoes usuallu come out of the water. A very wise woman once told me: if you want to know something about fire, then you must go to the water. I had told her, that I wanted to find my own fire, my own passion. So she meant I first had to learn calmness. Watch the waves, otherwise you'll burn yourself, you first have to develop your capabilities before lighting yout matches.'

And now she's found the fire in herself? 'That is starting to happen. I'm now able to be just myself. I don't have to take on all those different personalities anymore, for example when I come into a room full of people where I don't feel comfortable with. Than I just say: Alright, I don't feel comfortable here, I don't want to stay here, because there's some kinda energy that I don't like. I am becoming more and more aware, more than I've ever been, of different powers, of someone's energy, that they want to force upon me, or what I want to impose them. I'm beginning to see with my inner eye.'