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Entertainment Weekly (US)
January 31, 1992

Faces to Watch: Music



TORI AMOS
With 'Earthquakes,' she both shocks and soothes

Were it not for the failure of a 1988 album called Y Kant Tori Read -- a misguided, hard-edged embarrassment that aimed at rock radio and missed -- Tori Amos might not have put her heart and soul into the very different Little Earthquakes. This time, Amos seems a superb singer, songwriter, and pianist -- and radio airplay has never mattered less. While her subjects aren't light -- the harrowing "Me & a Gun," for example, is an a cappella account of a rape -- Amos weaves a spell that is deeply affecting and oddly reassuring at the same time. Born in North Carolina, Amos, 28, last year took refuge in Britain, where critics regularly compare her to Laura Nyro, Kate Bush, and even Patti Smith. Does she mind? "You know when you feel like sometimes the fairy godmother has put her little dink on your hat, and you just feel like something magical is kind of happening at this moment, and you allow yourself to go with that?" she asks. "I think what people are just comparing is that dink on your head. I think those other women were dinked, too."
-- Dave DiMartino

[other featured musicians/bands: Cleve Francis, Sophie B. Hawkins, Shanice Wilson, Bryan Loren, L7, Pearl Jam, and Eye & I]

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