|
Charlie Rose Charlie: Her latest project “To Venus And Back” is a two disc set
consisting of both studio and live performances. I am very pleased to have this
native of North Carolina on this program. Welcome. Tori: Thank you. Charlie: Boy, you are hot. Look
it, this is Rolling Stone for what, I don’t know what year this is or when this
was but there it is and here is Spin and here is Jon Pareles with a piece
called “Disclosing Intimacies: Enjoying The Shock Value.” All writing about
you. You’ve just come off this tour with you and Alanis Morrissette? Tori: Yes. Charlie: Sold out. 5 ½ weeks.
What’s going on in music where there’s more audience demand to see women than
there is men? Tori: Well, I think that it’s… Charlie: Coming of age? Tori: It’s, it’s... Yeah. If you
think about for a long time we haven’t really talked about the female composers
until this century. It’s not that there haven’t been any. I’m sure Mozart had a
sister and she was very talented but nobody cares about her. And it’s always
been this, I don’t know.... In the past that the artists were the men and the
muses were the women and now I, um, have many muses actually. Charlie: Do you really? Tori: Yeah, I do. Charlie: Like who? Tori: Well, sometimes they’re
strangers and they walk past and I sort of weave them into a tale. Sometimes
they’re people that I know quite well and so I have to... It’s a bit tricky
because you don’t want to expose them too much but if the material’s too good
then I have to write about them. [both laugh] Charlie: You know there are
certain things about writers. The highest obedience they have is to putting
something on paper. I doesn’t matter whose story it is. It doesn’t matter whose
conversation they’re recording - in their head. The idea of what they write is
the most significant imperative in their life. Tori: There’s a tradition of
musicians that if you really.... I think, if music is first for you, more than,
um, I guess we could say.... Sometimes I think people qualify their work by how
many records they’ve sold or their chart position and yet that’s not part of
being a tradition of musicians. A tradition of musicians is when there’s a
sacredness to the music and that you have your little toolbox and you know
that, in a sense, you’re co-creating with this force that can kind of look at
you at any point ans say, “I’m finished with you.” So it’s quite important, I
think, for composers to just really.... Put the muse first. Charlie: Listen to you: “If we
could express ourselves another way, we wouldn’t be songwriters. I don’t think
you write songs because in your everyday living you express yourself exactly in
the way you want.” [slightly long pause from both of them, this always get a
laugh out of me, Charlie continues:] So you write songs because it’s the only way for you to express who you are
and what you feel? Whether it’s a personal tragedy of seeing consequence or
whether it’s a celebration of father and son or whatever - of father and
daughter or whatever it might be. Tori: Or a tornado - Charlie: Or a tornado - Tori: of father and daughter. Charlie: or yes, you’re right. Or
not a celebration, but a tornado. I’m gonna come back to your life cause it’s
interesting. I mean, you’ve ended up from Newton, North Carolina to the Peabody
Conservatory in Baltimore and then hung around the Maryland area. It’s
interesting cause you, when you were at the Peabody, you were clearly the
youngest person ever there, weren’t you? Tori: Well, that’s what they tell
me. Charlie: Well, you were like 11? Tori: No, I was 5 ½ when I was
accepted and I got kicked out when I was 11. Charlie: So you made it for 5
years? Tori: I finished at 11. Yeah. It
was over for me. Charlie: It was? Ok. We’ll find
out what you found out about yourself. Now, this tour with Alanis Morrissette,
tell me about her. Do you like her? Do you admire her? Is she good? Tori: She’s a lovely person, good
heart. She’s good at what she does. Charlie: That’s it? Tori: That’s good! Charlie: I mean... well, was there
conflict, was there tension? Or was it just a lovefest? Tori: No tension because... I
think honestly, she approached me and she did it in a way that was like, “Hey,
lets be creative and put two shows together, two separate shows and um... I had
to bring my own production. I didn’t want to do anything where I couldn’t bring
my own production because that’s not how I work. I have a pirate ship, I have a
captain… Charlie: yes Tori: I’m the ship (giggle) Charlie: yes Tori: I have loads of chefs Charlie: yes Tori: And all sorts of people
floating around. Thieves, fantastic. A few harlots. Charlie: yes Tori: All on my ship Charlie: yes Tori: And we all had to come and
be respected that, you know, no compromise on any level. and, she has her
captain, she is her ship, and of course that’s how it had to be approached.
And, because of that mutual respect it worked out really well. Charlie: This business of being
of being a rock star demands… I’ve never seen such attention to every aspect of
it... which seems like just fun. There is this obsession. Tori: You know what they call me?
Charlie: What do they call you? Tori: They call me an ant fucker.
Charlie: Do they really? Tori: yeah Charlie: why? Tori: because um... every cell… Charlie: yeah Tori: every shape Charlie: yeah Tori: we spend time tweaking and
tweaking. Charlie: here’s the question: why
are you so obsessed with every cell? Tori: Because it makes a
difference. Charlie: In quality or sales? Tori: Oh, in quality. I mean you
know. I see myself sort of as a small to medium vineyard. And… they usually
don’t sell as much as the screw-top wine down in Safeway. But, I don’t make
wine for Safeway. God bless Safeway. Safeway is a necessary um.. .thing. But,
that’s not why I… if I’m a winemaker, I’m not going to make screw-top wine. Charlie: So here’s what you are.
First of all, you’re classically trained. You know that whole little experience
at Peabody served you well. Tori: Classically failed. yeah. Charlie: Classically failed,
right. But... you picked up something there, didn’t you? Tori: A bit Charlie: All right, I want to
come back to this passion you have with the piano. But what did you pick up
there, when you were hanging out at the conservatory? Tori: Playing with structure and
form and understanding that um... You see, they were stuck in what was the
structure and form of what they were studying instead of trying to push the
parameters of what was structure and form in 1968. And, I brought in one of the
Beatles’ records, I’m not quite sure what it was... Charlie: Sgt. Pepper? Tori: It could’ve been that. I
did love that record, but I might’ve brought in Revolver and said, you know
there’s something going on here... where these guys are pushing something that
I think we should really study. And, they really um… Charlie: they didn’t like that
idea at all? Tori: no… They just they couldn’t
conceive of it. And, I said, yeah but this is the Bartok of this time, and they
really... because it was in a different shape… then they couldn’t understand
it. Charlie: so when you left there.
I mean at the tender age of 10 or eleven what was it you set out to do and
become? Tori: To prove them wrong. Charlie: To prove them wrong? Tori: Sure. Charlie: To show that you could
do what? Tori: To show them there has to
be a vitality in… composers hmm… not just about... we go back to what gets
played or what gets heard, because there’s always been polkas, and stuff that
people have been singing through the ages, you know. There’s always been that “entertainment”
side but then. I think we go back to being musicians and composers. A lot of
times, it’s in front of us, it’s happening, and people aren’t embracing it
until you look back ten years later, and then all of a sudden you go, “oh my
god.” Charlie: Pretty good Tori: They were onto something. Charlie: Yeah, well that’s the
nature of… Tori: Hm…yeah. Charlie: um...But so you set out
to find your own... place, set out to find your own sound Tori: Carved, carve my own place.
Charlie: to carve your own place,
huh? Tori: yeah. Charlie: This... has so much to
do with your (review?) but I want to hear so much, and it takes time to get it
out here. To Venus and Back, this new CD. Did you write all these songs? Tori: Sure. Charlie: Bliss... is about...
“Father, I killed my monkey.” This is about what? Tori: uh… Actually it’s about my
relationship with the Christian god. Instead of “Father who art in heaven”, its
“Father, I killed my monkey” and because my father um… Charlie: Methodist minister Tori: Methodist minister… my
grandparents church of god ministers. They’re gone now. But it was very much
about the Marys, the two Marys were divided, the Magdalene and the Mother Mary…
divided in the psyche. So, the Mother Mary um… the way I see it and the way I
think a lot of mythology people that I respect see it is that she was severed
from her sexuality, the Mother Mary, and the Mary Magdalene was severed from
her spirituality and her wisdom. So, there’s a division here… of almost this
circumcision of women, Christian women have had to work through for the last
2000 years, and I feel the control that’s really gone on. You know this whole
thing of divide and conquer, it’s a joke really. Divide and conquer what a
village? No, divide and conquer a person with themselves, that’s control. Then,
you think you have to go through these people for some kind of soul
purification some kind of acceptance and forgiveness, and I’m like no, no. The
Christian god can sit over there, and we can have a chat, and he can do stuff i
can’t do, I’m only a woman. But no, there’s gotta be respect that I’m a woman,
he’s multi-dimensional. But, I don’t see the Christian god for me as the divine
being. I think there are a lot of gods in a lot of cultures that have things to
say, and some of them I disagree with, and some of them I think have a lot of
deep truth. But in Bliss, it was very much… I’m part of you, I’m made of you,
and there’s gotta be a point where I don’t have to keep being something in your
eyes. Now, this is the Christian teaching, we’re not walking into, you know,
Cherokee teaching. We’re talking about the Christian teaching that I was
brought up with, and this is my line in the sand really saying, wow, we’ve got
this groovy relationship, don’t we? Christian woman, Christian god. So, I’m
marrying the two Marys in my own being, in my psyche. Charlie: If I walk out of this
studio, and someone comes up to me and says, “Who’s on today?” and I say, Tori
Amos. They say, “Who is she?” I say what? Tori: She’s the one that you sent
the letter to and wanted to blow her up (giggle) probably. Charlie: Really? Tori: Well, you know… sometimes I
think the Christians really misunderstand. They think I don’t like them and…
it’s not that at all. It’s that there has to be a place where you don’t
dishonor my spirituality and I don’t dishonor yours. And, this need that a few
of the religions have had to no matter what take over, even if they kill. That
really isn’t “Love your neighbor as yourself “as far as I’m concerned. This is
what I say to the Christians, and they get really upset: Jesus would not be a
Christian right now, okay. You guys have gotta own what you did to the
indigenous people of America first. Big shadow. Charlie: Is this your Cherokee
part speaking? Tori: This is my woman speaking
and my Cherokee part speaking, yeah Charlie: The woman thing… did it
change a lot after you saw that movie Thelma and Louise? Tori: um… I was… Charlie: I mean, you could not
stay away from that movie. Tori: I couldn’t stay away from
that movie, and I was inspired to write Me and a Gun. Charlie: This had to be the most
the most seering the most… lyrics that you could ever write because it’s the
story your rape. Tori: It’s based on... it’s based
on my story… Charlie: And, because you could
write about it and sing about it... did what for you? Tori: Well, I think there were
different levels to it because, number one I’ve always said I co-write the
songs with the creative force, and she shows up, and we write the songs
together. I’m really a translator. And yet, it comes through my filter, so bits
of me are in there. And with Me and a Gun, at a certain point, I felt like
um... I had to get some distance from it because I was so under a microscope,
and um to the point where people were asking me details about... the incident
and… I had to...finally pull back and realize I had to keep something for the
internal person, the internal Tori, and that’s tricky when you write things
that are very… Charlie: personal? Tori: personal... and graphic Charlie: So, what do you hold
back? Tori: Well, sometimes it’s… it’s
a little intangible when I explain this to you because I don’t really see the
picture myself but um... my relationship with the song is private. I write it,
and I put it out there, and people have their relationships with different
songs but taking a walk with them… in big burly boots and holding hands with
them and crying with them or giggling with them ,you know it’s a very
different, it’s a very different, it’s a private relationship because I do have
relationships with.. Charlie: the audience too Tori: all the songs. Charlie: And, well, with all the
songs and with the audience, too. I mean, you make a big point of, from what
I’ve read about you, that this audience thing is... I mean, you are on the road
more than anybody I know. Your history is to be on the road… you know, true? Tori: Yeah, road dog. Charlie: You are a road dog. You,
and... Bruce was a road dog. Tori: Yeah Charlie: And, the connection… and
you think you couldn’t be where you are if you hadn’t done that. Tori: No… Charlie: You don’t? You could’ve
not… you could’ve avoided that and not be the person you are, the songwriter
you are, the artist you are? Tori: No, I had to do that.
There’s no way that I would make the music that I continue to make. I was
playing clubs since I was thirteen, so it’s really much a part of... I don’t
know, my um… my… I don’t know, what makes me up. My soup. Charlie: What does all this mean
to you? This life you have carved, sculptured… Tori: Hm...Well, it changes what
it means. I think it’s a really big test to, I think, value your work as an
artist and not be drawn into everybody’s opinion of your work and then everybody’s
opinion of your work being an opinion of me as a person. I know that the work
and I are very intrinsic. Because it’s not a job, it’s really not. Doing press
sometimes is a job, it can be... sometimes. It depends on the agenda of the
person walking into the room. Charlie: You mean the artist or
the person who’s writing the criticism or the person who’s writing about the
artist? Tori: The person writing about
the artist. Let’s face it, sometimes you have a few good chats with people, and
sometimes they’ve already written a story before they walk in the room. And,
I’m going, you know, why are we wasting time here? I’d much rather go see one
of my friend’s cartoon exhibits down the street than be a part of something
that’s already been decided. So, I think for me it’s changed, what I thought I
wanted to sculpt, and what was important to me. It’s changed over the years. Charlie: Where is it now? Tori: Um... a sense of humor is
very important um… I love chasing the dark, I have for a while. Charlie: Looking for what,
chasing the dark? Tori: Looking for… um… well, most
of our politicians will be there. Charlie: You, finally, make love
to a piano. Tori: Of course. What else are
you gonna do with a piano? It’s nine feet. Charlie: So... what’s going
through your head and the rest of you when you’re at the piano? Tori: Well, see. When music comes
through you, if you’re lucky, and the stars are aligned that day, then you
found the plug in to the 220 voltage, and you’re there, and it rolls through
you like an elixir. And, I’ve had different elixirs over the years, and there
isn’t anything that um… really um… takes hold um… demands and yet includes me
all at the same time. Religion never did that. It’s very much a subservient
thing, whereas this is very much a co-creating thing, and yet... you stand by
and watch the muse operate through you. Charlie: Thank you for being
here. Tori: Thanks. |