Re: tor-e

Okay, how long have you guys been Tori fans? I was just amazed at how many of you guys _are_. Call me naive, I guess. I've been a Tori fanatic since '91, and I also have too many Tori CDs. OTR/Tori crossovers shouldn't surprise me, I suppose. It's just more of that emotive music that paints the tribulation the spirit has with the sensual, yes? "The body is a book of matches," indeed.

Comparing--quite difficult, isn't it? In general, I notice that it's much more about my reactions to the music, rather than the music itself. I feel closer to my anger and passion with Tori, and closer to my sensuality and spiritual struggles when I listen to OTR.

Now, some could consider this off-topic, but Tori is something I really want to discuss with OTR fans, much more than Tori fans. I find, actually, that Tori fans usually blackball me for being a Christian. I have noticed some spiritual changes in Tori over these years. I used to look her in the eyes a lot at concerts (before these frigging arena shows; AARGH!), and notice some spooky things going on... After her Pele concert, I actually went home, fell on my knees shaking, and prayed for her soul! I mean, the woman was at the height of having lost it then, from what I can tell... Or, she could have been cultivating that image very proudly. Perhaps she was on heroin, into the occult (more than usual, that is)--who can say, really?

And, yes, Tori has cultivated herself to be quite the nutcase... A woman, in my opinion, who longs for spirtuality and has looked in all the wrong places--ALL OF THEM--for way too long. Not that I blame her, given her upbringing, but she seems to have made some very big choices.

As for lyrics, OTR's make more barebones sense, but, like T.S. Eliot, the magic of Tori is the adaptability of her poetry to the schemae of her listeners. I often hear--and COMPLETELY RELATE TO--her lyrics in quite a different way than anyone else, and feel that my interpretation was dead-on! I come to find all the "dead-on" interpretations, and am floored by them. Occasionally, OTR does that to me, too. "Go Down Easy," "If I'm Drowning," and "The Body," are examples.

Furthermore, I do believe Tori chooses lyrics sheerly for onomotopoetic reasons at times--the touch of their sound. But all good poets delve into that.

LE is tied with Choirgirl for me. LE is the innocent-victim Tori, while Pele is the fuck-the-world-back Tori. Choirgirl is the beginning of balance, and I like that... Musically, I believe Choirgirl flows just as well as LE. In my opinion, her passionate artistry requires a good strong male--that she occasionally makes peace with--to hem it in (Rosse, then Hawley, respectfully). She's a Dionysian evangelist who needs a good Hermes to bring the pieces of bloody flesh into the temple, and lay it on the altar in acceptable fashion.

By the way, what is "that China single for $5," precisely? I have an East-West one with Sugar, Flying Dutchman, and Humpty Dumpty on it... That isn't the one, is it?

If you want to hear me, listen to the live version of "Flying Dutchman" on her "Past the Mission" EP. I'm the big screamer at the beginning... Hey! It was my favorite song at the time! Sorry!

Sherry