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The ELLE Guide To Living In Europe (UK)
January 1992

INSIGHT

Tori Amos

With her beatun up Reeboks and lacerated jeans, Tori Amos has a languid, streetwise demeanour that belies the heart-piercing clarity of her singing voice.

"I'm currently working on my moose medicine," she smiles, knocking back weirdo tea. "Most people would rather be sheep and have company than stand out on their own with antlers on." It's a philosophy from the tribes of Native America, and one of the spiritual theories of a girl so cosmic she must become a star.

North Carolina-born Amos started playing piano for herself at two-and-a-half and in gay bars at 13. Today, at 28, she composes and writes introspective torch songs so emotionally powerful they're floodlit. "My songs mirror myself and I'd rather give a blow job to a stranger than sell my rights to them," she asserts.

Her Album Little Earthquakes (EastWest) is a collection of ostensibly softie-Walter tunes, packed with a sensitive rawness that'll have listeners nationwide lying on their backs at midnight swallowing lumps in their throats.

While she talks, a friend phones to say her debut single Silent All These Years has been made record of the week on Radio 1. With no TV and no radio, Amos asks, "Is that good?" - on Gary Davies' Sloppy Bit, who knows?

-TR

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