Early years
Amos was born (and nicknamed Ellen) to Dr. Rev. Edison & Mary Ellen Amos on August 22, 1963, during a trip from their home in Georgetown to North Carolina, at the Old Catawba Hospital in Newton, North Carolina. When Amos was 2A, her family moved to Baltimore, Maryland where she began to play the piano and attend her father's church every week. By age 5, she had written her first song. During these years, she spent formative time with her maternal grandfather, who was part Eastern Cherokee (an Eastern Cherokee with some European ancestry). An early image of Tori Amos from VH1's ''Behind the Music'']]In 1968, she won a full scholarship to the Peabody Conservatory of Music; she was the youngest person ever to attend the school. At age 11, her scholarship was discontinued; Amos has asserted that her interest in rock and popular music coupled with her dislike for playing from sheet music was the cause for this. Two years later, she began studying at Montgomery College and began playing at piano bars (many of them gay), chaperoned by her father. Reverend Amos began sending tapes of the songs she had written to record companies at this time. She first came to local notice by winning a county Teen Talent contest, and her picture was published in a local paper. The song she sang was called ''More Than Just a Friend.'' By the time she reached high school, she was well known in the Washington, D.C. area. During her years at Richard Montgomery High School, she was elected Homecoming Queen, Most Likely to Succeed (female), Most Talented (female), and Best All-Around (female) and became involved with the drama group. As a high school senior, Amos co-wrote ''Baltimore'' with her brother Mike for a competition involving the Baltimore Orioles. This song won the contest and became her first single, released as a 7" single pressed for family and friends. At around this time she adopted the name "Tori", after a friend of a friend told her that she looked more like a Tori than a Myra Ellen. (Other statements made by Amos throughout her career found her claiming that she had named herself after a type of tree (the Torrey Pine), or that she had taken on the name because she was "no-TORI-ous" for wearing leather pants to teach Sunday school at her father's church.)
''Y Kant Tori Read'' (1985-88)
At age 21, Amos moved to Los Angeles to pursue her music career. While there she managed to get several acting jobs, including a Kellogg's Just Right cereal commercial (for which role she beat out a then-unknown Sarah Jessica Parker). (Amos says that she got the job because she could actually play the piano, whereas Parker could not.) After playing a bar one night, she gave a ride home to a patron, who sexually assaulted her—an experience that would feed into her emotionally-charged song "Me and a Gun". She also met Steve Caton, who played guitars on her albums through ''To Venus and Back'' (1999). In 1985, Amos formed a music group, Y Kant Tori Read. The band's name is a reference to Amos' facility with playing by ear at Peabody and her difficulty with playing from sheet music. Besides Tori herself, the group was comprised of Caton, Matt Sorum (later of The Cult and Guns N' Roses), and Brad Cobb. A year later, Atlantic Records gave Amos a 6 record contract. In 1988, her debut album ''Y Kant Tori Read'' was released and was panned by critics. Amos was devastated, and started working with other artists (including Stan Ridgway of Wall of Voodoo, Sandra Bernhard, and Al Stewart) as a backup vocalist. She also recorded a song called "Distant Storm" for the film ''China O'Brien''; in the credits, the song is attributed to a band called "Tess Makes Good" with "additional vocals by Ellen Amos".
''Little Earthquakes'' (1990-92)
"Silent All These Years" CD cover]]
Atlantic Records told Amos that she had to produce another record by March 1990. When she presented them with her initial recordings, they were rejected on the grounds that the "girl and a piano thing" was not going to sell. Extensively re-worked and expanded with the help of Steve Caton, Eric Rosse, Will MacGregor, Carlo Nuccio, and Dan Nebenzal, the record ended up full of raw, emotive songs recounting her religious upbringing, sexual awakening, struggle to establish her identity, and her rape. The Atlantic executives changed their minds upon hearing the edited version, and relocated Tori to England to launch the "new" album, which was released under the title ''Little Earthquakes''. Atlantic's European counterpart, East West, worked hard to promote the record. It was trailed by a promotional single featuring "Me and a Gun", which received considerable critical attention. When the album was released in the UK, it went straight to #14. A month later, it was released in the USA to breakthrough critical success. The accompanying singles were "Me and a Gun", "Silent All These Years", "China", "Winter" and "Crucify". During this time, Tori recorded the song "Happy Workers" for the ''Toys'' movie soundtrack. A remix of the song is also included on the soundtrack.During these early tours Amos befriended author Neil Gaiman who became a fan. It is often said that the character Delirium from Gaiman's ''The Sandman'' series is based on her; Gaiman has stated that "they steal shamelessly from each other" (the character was actually created before the two met).
''Under The Pink'' (1993-94)
After touring throughout 1992 in support of ''Little Earthquakes'', Amos went to New Mexico to write her second solo record, ''Under the Pink''. It debuted at #1 in the UK and #12 in the US charts on its release in January 1994. It disappointed some critics, however, who considered it a step sideways rather than forwards from ''Little Earthquakes'' (but was voted among the greatest albums of the 1990s by Rolling Stone magazine some years later). In February, she began the "Under the Pink" tour. Four tracks were released as singles: "God", "Cornflake Girl" (a #4 single in the UK), "Pretty Good Year" and "Past the Mission", which featured the vocal contribution of Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails. A limited edition release of the album commemorating the Australian tour included a second disc entitled "More Pink", a collection of B-Sides.Around this time an Australian tabloid managed to take "upskirt" photographs of Amos during a live performance at which she was not wearing panties. Amos did not comment on this until eleven years later, citing it as her impetus to not return to Australia during a tour between 1995 and 2005.Amos also contributed the song "Butterfly" to the soundtrack for the 1994 movie ''Higher Learning'' as well as a cover of the R.E.M song "Losing My Religion".In June, 1994, Amos co-founded RAINN, The Rape Abuse and Incest National Network. RAINN is a toll-free help line in the US which connects callers with their local rape crisis center. In 1995, Amos, duetting with Robert Plant, contributed the song "Down by the Seaside" to the Led Zeppelin tribute album ''Encomium''.
''Boys For Pele'' (1995-96)
"Professional Widow" was a dance hit for Amos]]
Soon after the "Under the Pink" tour ended, Amos released her third solo album, ''Boys for Pele''. Substantially longer than the first two albums, it garnered mixed reviews, and was first in a style of which Amos seems to work, with albums either being comprised of twelve or eleven tracks, or eighteen or nineteen. The erratic lyrical content of its songs seemed unduly indecipherable to some fans, and the instrumentation, including church bells, bagpipes, and a gospel choir, kept it away from the mainstream scene. The accompanying tour was known as the "Dew Drop Inn" tour; as on the album, Tori performed on harpsichord in addition to piano. The single "Caught a Lite Sneeze" was a hit in the UK, and the Armand Van Helden remix of "Professional Widow" became a massive club hit so much so that that version of the song was included in her later anthology "Tales of a Librarian". ''Boys for Pele'' is Amos' most successful transatlantic chart release, reaching UK #2 and US #2 upon its release in January 1996. As with her first four solo albums, it has been certified platinum for sales of more than a million US copies.The movie ''Twister'' released in 1996 included a remix of one of Amos' songs, "Talula" also found on the ''Boys for Pele'' album.Also in 1996, Tori began her own vanity label called Igloo, internal to Atlantic Records. Her first signing (which she co-produced) was the band "Pet" headed by lead singer Lisa Papineau. Their self-titled debut album included the song "Lil Boots" which was also featured on the soundtrack for ''The Crow: City of Angels''. Record sales were meager and the subsidiary label was quickly folded.Amos performed a highly publicized television concert called "The Concert for RAINN" in late 1996. This coincided with "National RAINN Day", and during the concert all cable and network television stations aired Amos' public service announcement about the organization. During this concert Amos performed her song "Muhammed my friend" with her friend Maynard James Keenan of the band Tool. During this year she also co-wrote/performed a song called "It Might Hurt a Little Bit" with singer Michael Stipe of the band R.E.M.. It was intended for the soundtrack to the film Don Juan DeMarco but was not used and has never been released.Amos has spoken about her experiences with hallucinogenic drugs, particularly in relation to the ''Boys For Pele'' album. She claims that she had "tea with the devil" during one of these experiences and this lead her to write the track ''Father Lucifer''.
''From The Choirgirl Hotel'' (1997-98)
Amos' fourth solo album, ''From the Choirgirl Hotel'', was released in May 1998. Some of the songs on this album (e.g. Playboy Mommy and Spark) dealt with her recent miscarriage. A departure from earlier records, it was much more lavishly produced and featured arrangements which expanded considerably on her core piano sound, including elements of dance music, electronica, and jazz. Again reviews were mixed but mostly positive (voted among the best albums of the year by Q magazine), and the album was generally feted by Amos fans. The lead single "Spark" became a substantial hit in the spring of 1998, and was followed by "Jackie's Strength" and "Raspberry Swirl". "Jackie's Strength" was subsequently remixed and hit number one on the dance charts. The album itself followed the commercially successful trend of its predecessors by reaching UK #6 and US #5 upon its release and selling more than a million copies in the US alone.The accompanying tour, Amos' first with a full band, was known as the "Plugged '98" tour. Another tour followed in 1999, the "Five and a Half Weeks" tour which Amos co-headlined with Alanis Morissette prior to the release of her ''To Venus and Back'' double album. Many referred to Amos as the "opening act" for Morissette because she always performed first; however, this was due only to the logistics of setting up a grand piano for performance.
''To Venus And Back'' (1999)
Next, Amos planned to release a live album - a document of her first band tour from 1998. She decided to write a small amount of new material to be included as a bonus disc on some releases; ultimately, however, she produced a double album's worth of material which was released in September 1999 under the title ''To Venus and Back''. The album included a live disc (subtitled ''Live: Still Orbiting'') as well as a disc of new studio material (subtitled ''Venus Orbiting''). This was sparser both in production and arrangement than ''From the Choirgirl Hotel'', but like that album featured overt dance music and electronica influences and a relatively subdued piano sound. One of the topics covered on the album was a massacre on the U.S.-Mexico border in Ciudad JuArez. The closing track, "1000 Oceans", was much closer in spirit to her early songs and, along with the more experimental "Bliss", "Glory of the '80s", and "Concertina", became a radio and chart hit. The album itself, on account of increased price due to its double-disc format, reached UK #22 and US #12, making it transatlantically the worst-charting original album of her career.
''Strange Little Girls'' (2000-01)
Amos took a break from both touring and writing in 2000 and that September gave birth to her daughter, Natashya, after suffering three miscarriages. She returned in September 2001 with ''Strange Little Girls'', an album of cover versions of songs written by men about women. Despite her break, the album was still a commercial success, reaching UK #16 and US #4, her best position there for almost six years. This time, the reviews were quite uniform: most critics saw the album as a mixed bag, praising the unlikely reworkings of Eminem's "97' Bonnie and Clyde" and Slayer's "Raining Blood", but panning the versions of John Lennon's cryptic "Happiness is a Warm Gun" and of Neil Young's "Heart of Gold". The accompanying "StrangeLittleTour", Amos' first entirely solo tour since 1994, was acclaimed particularly for its solo renditions of ''Boys for Pele'', ''From the Choirgirl Hotel'' and ''To Venus and Back'' material.
''Scarlet's Walk'' (2002-03)
In 2002 Amos released her eighth major label release, ''Scarlet's Walk''. Described as a "sonic novel", the 18 track album proved to be a landmark for a variety of reasons. Stylistically, Amos put drums and bass guitar at the forefront, using her piano playing as an accent rather than a highlight. Thematically, the album explored Amos' alter ego Scarlet and her cross-America trip post-September 11, 2001. Through the songs, Amos explores the history of America, the American people, Native American history, pornography, masochism, homophobia and misogyny. The first single, "A Sorta Fairytale", was a top 10 hit in the US. It was also released as a single in the UK with a B-side entitled "Operation Peter Pan".The second single, "Taxi Ride", was an ''homage'' to the late make-up artist Kevyn Aucoin, a friend of Amos. A contest was held online to create a music video for the song, and it reached the top 40 in the US. The third single, "Strange", was remixed with a country and western feel and almost became a radio staple. Neither of the latter two singles were released commercially.In an attempt to prevent Internet trading of the album, Amos, in conjunction with her husband and crew, invented a special kind of glue to bind closed portable CD players containing the album. These were then distributed to the press on the understanding that they would be returned within forty-eight hours. If an attempt was made to open the player, both it and the disc inside would shatter. The success of this attempt was so great that the record industry began to follow suit. As an additional incentive to buy the album rather than download its contents illicitly, the CD also served as a key to access "Scarlet's Web", a web site which featured several songs ("Tombigbee", "Seaside", "Mountain") as well as various photographs and journal entries that were not available elsewhere. Tori was nominated for a Grammy for the packaging of the limited edition version of the album. It included a bonus DVD as well as collectible items such as charms, stickers, a map, and mock Polaroid postcards. Once again, the album was a commercial success for Amos, reaching UK #26 and US #7 and becoming her biggest-selling album for five years.
''Tales of a Librarian'' (2003)
''Tales of a Librarian'' album cover]]
In 2003 Amos released ''Tales of a Librarian'', which she called a "sonic autobiography" (she does not believe in the term "greatest hits"). Rather than compiling hit singles and tossing them into a generic hits package, Amos instead chose to revisit the mixing of many of her own favourite songs from her career, focusing on those she thought were not fully realised in their original recordings. Recording under the premise that a librarian is a "chronicler", Amos pieced together the album, adding two new songs and two re-recorded b-sides: "Angels" and "Snow Cherries from France", and "Sweet Dreams" and "Mary", respectively. Though the album charted #40 in the US and #74 in the UK, making it her weakest-charting album to date, sales have evened out in the long-term.
''Welcome to Sunny Florida'' (2003-04)
In 2004 Amos released a DVD/CD set called ''Welcome to Sunny Florida''. The DVD featured a full-length live performance from her 2003 "On Scarlet's Walk" tour. The CD compiled several previously Internet-exclusive B-sides from ''Scarlet's Walk'', with some new tracks on a bonus disc entitled "Scarlet's Hidden Treasures". The set reached UK #1 on the Music Videos and DVDs Chart, and #2 on the US equivalent, qualifying it as a commercial success.In 2004 a pier on Amos' property was destroyed by a boat which landed on it during a 2004 hurricane. She wrote a letter to the local newspaper stating that it might be "cut into parts" if the owner did not come to claim it; he eventually did. In November of that year she lost her brother Michael Amos in a car accident.
''The Beekeeper'' and ''Piece by Piece'' (2004-05)
In late February of 2005, Amos returned to superstardom with a new concept album, ''The Beekeeper''. The album deals with topics like death, adultery and romantic conflict, and makes brief reference to ancient Gnostic mysticism. It was leaked to the Internet over a month before its release. Early reviews described it as her most lyrically accessible, and reminiscent of her first album. The music is perhaps Amos' most melodic, and sees a move towards a more groove-based sound, evidenced by the appearance of the London Community Gospel Choir on four songs and Amos' whirring B-3 Hammond organ which Amos says was a gift from her husband. "Sleeps with Butterflies" was the first single released from the album, with "Sweet the Sting" following in the summer. Neither was released commercially. The album itself reached UK #24 and US #5, making Amos one of an elite group of women to have secured five or more US Top 10 album debuts. Despite this feat, however, "The Beekeeper" remains Tori's weakest selling album to date (233,000 copies, even less than the 1992 and 1996 EP's "Crucify" and "Hey Jupiter".) It is, however, her highest charting album in Germany (#8). Amos' general disconcern with the commercial side of the music industry was showcased when on the "Original Sinsuality" tour she did not bother performing the first single from the album in many cities. It is usually expected by record companies of a modern musician that they perform their singles or hits regularly. The accompanying tour, dubbed the 'Original Sinsuality Tour,' began April 1, 2005 and was Amos' first solo tour since 2001, bringing out piano and organ. The tour also encompassed Australia, Amos' first trip there to perform since 1994. The tour received mixed reviews, but continued into the late summer of 2005 through Europe, including appearances in June 2005 at the Glastonbury Festival and Patti Smith's Meltdown festival in London. Several American tour dates following the tour overseas. The tour finished in the States as the 'Summer of Sin', which received much better reviews than the U.S. Spring Leg. A major feature of the tour was that fans could nominate cover songs on Amos' website which she would then choose from to play in a special section of the tour. One of the songs chosen was the Kylie Minogue hit "Can't Get You Out of My Head", which Amos dedicated to her the day after Minogue's breast cancer was announced to the public. Other songs performed by Amos include The Doors' "People are Strange", Joni Mitchell's "The Circle Game", and Led Zeppelin's "When the Levy Breaks". In conjunction with the album, Amos released an autobiography entitled ''Piece by Piece''; co-authored by rock music journalist Ann Powers, it delves deeply into Amos’ obsession with mythology and religion. It explores her songwriting process while telling the story of her progression into fame.
Official bootlegs/iTunes compilation
In July of 2005 Amos released an exclusive 45 track compilation in conjunction with the iTunes website called "iTunes Essentials". It consisted entirely of previously released material.Amos, a long outspoken adversary of live bootleg recordings, announced in late 2005 that she would be issuing a series of live "official bootlegs", all recorded during her "Original Sinsuality" tour. A website was established at Boutique where hard copies of the releases were made exclusively available. The packaging was minimal and featured butterfly/insect artwork following the theme of her The Beekeeper album. They were sold for $13.98 each and featured full concerts from her 2005 tour. Soon after the hard copies were released online retailers began offering the entire albums for paid download.
CD singles, B-sides and non-album contributions
Early in her career Amos garnered a reputation for releasing an extensive catalogue of CD singles in conjunction with her albums. This catalogue of music collectables is so vast that a book was actually published titled "Tori Amos Collectables" which served as a partial (to that date) photographic journal detailing the variety of world-wide releases. One of Amos' best selling early releases was a five track E.P. for her song "Crucify" which was sold at regular album prices. Amos' penchant for including non-album B-sides on each of her singles played a major factor in her initial popularity. In particular her cover of the Nirvana song "Smells Like Teen Spirit" from the "Crucify" E.P. garnered major press attention and critical lauds. Though in recent years the production of CD-singles has become less common, Amos continues to release non-album B-sides through the Internet. Amos also established herself early-on as a willing contributor to film soundtracks (including ''Mission Impossible 2'' and ''Great Expectations'') as well as to compilation projects and projects by other artists (including Al Stewart, Tom Jones, and Sandra Bernhard). As such she has, to date, accumulated a catalogue of over 100 non-album tracks (not including live versions of album tracks or remixes.)
Conflict with the music industry
(The majority of the allegations made here surfaced in Amos' biography "Piece by Piece". They can neither be proven or disproven, and are simply assertions made by Amos; however, they have not been contested by her former record label.)Conflict between Tori and the music industry has surfaced on various occasions. Her first label, Atlantic Records, wanted her 1994 album ''Under the Pink'' to be changed significantly before its release. She told them that it was not going to happen, and that if they brought it up again she would burn the masters.After the release of her album ''From the Choirgirl Hotel'' in 1998, she had a meeting with the heads of the label. Amos questioned why her work was not being promoted properly. Atlantic revealed that they preferred to spend their capital trying to break newer artists, who they felt would make them more money. Amos demanded to be freed from her contract, but the label refused. Instead, they chose to exercise their option to keep Amos on board until she had released an additional three albums, as stipulated in her contract. According to Amos, they felt their power had been challenged and intentionally would do as little as they could do (legally speaking) to promote the works so that her career would be decimated by the time she had a chance to switch to a new label.The label fully followed through on their threat. For example: artists usually provide the label with a section of seats to each of their concerts that can be given to local radio honchos in exchange for the promise that the artist's new work would be heavily played. Atlantic Records gave Amos' tickets while requesting that other artists on the label be played as a return favor. As a result, Amos' album sales steadily declined.Amos, however, managed to beat the label at its own game. She experienced a sudden burst of creativity which formed into the 11 new songs on the first disc of her fifth album, ''To Venus and Back''. In place of a previously planned album of B-sides, Amos released a double disc (including a disc of live material from her "Plugged '98" tour) thereby fulfilling two of her three remaining albums in a single release.Ultimately in 2001, Atlantic records released a widely distributed press release listing the acts that they were "dropping from the label" due to alleged poor album sales. Among them were singer Poe and Amos. Amos claimed her contractual obligations had simply been fulfilled and that neither side was interested in renewing the contract.If Amos’s reputation suffered from her dealings with Atlantic, it did not do so for long. After establishing a new deal with Epic Records, she achieved her most successful American radio single to date, "a sorta fairytale" (2002/3). Despite this, however, Epic has used a similar "promotion" Tori was receiving from Atlantic.
Acting
Amos' acting has been limited to fringe performances. She performed in a variety of musical theater productions during high school; notably footage of her performance in "Gypsy" has been shown in television specials about her career. She has long been asked to audition for roles, notably the female lead in ''The Crow: City of Angels''. She appeared in the telesoap ''Trial by Jury'' in 1987 as a woman who was accused of killing her married lover. Also in the late 1980s she appeared in a television commercial for Kellogg's Just Right, a breakfast cereal. Amos has commented on a variety of roles from this era that she auditioned for but did not receive; notably she was offered the role played by Lea Thompson in the notorious flop Howard the Duck, but the offer was retracted when Thompson expressed interest. (Amos was later offered the role of the keyboardist in Thompson's character's band but had other commitments.) She was also offered the role played by Andie McDowell in the film Groundhog Day. Most of her contributions to cinema have been musical. In 1998 she coordinated the soundtrack of the film version of ''Great Expectations'', weaving breathy, ethereal vocals through the film's background. She made her first character appearance in the 2003 film ''Mona Lisa Smile'' as a sexy big-band singer.
Fans
Amos' fan base remains one of the most devoted of any artist. Many persons outside of Amos' fanbase perceive her fans to be overwhelmingly devoted to her, something that has been commented on by the media and towards which Amos has responded alternately with ire or acknowledgment. In particular, there is an infamous interview with an Australian radio station during which Amos turns hostile towards her interviewer when he refers to her fans as zealots.Tori refers to her fans as "ears with feet", and has been quoted as saying "don't ever call yourself fans; you're ears with feet". 1. Amos coined this term circa 1996 and has since abandoned it, consistently referring to fans as simply "fans" during press in 2005; said fans still hold onto the term devoutly, however.
Tours
Year
Title
Label
Info
1992
''Little Earthquakes''
WEA/Atlantic Records
VHS only
March 17, 1998
''Tori Amos: Live from New York''
PID Video
VHS only
November 17, 1998
''Tori Amos: Complete Videos 1991-1998''
Atlantic Records/WEA
VHS only
April 8, 2003
''A Sorta Fairytale''
Sony Music Video
DVD only, in jewel case or DVD case
May 18, 2004
''Welcome to Sunny Florida/Scarlet's Hidden Treasures''
Sony Music Video
DVD only, in jewel case or DVD case; DVD/CD Set