Pinkpop Festival, Netherlands
Tori played from 4:20 to 5:20PM in the Roskilde tent, which holds 16,000 people.
Tori Amos interview and live performance
part 1
part 2
part 3
The complete concert was broadcast on the radio and webcast in RealVideo.
VPRO broadcast:
Cornflake Girl
interview 1
Precious Things
interview 2
Tear in Your Hand
interview 3
Spark
partial transcript
["Cornflake Girl" from the Pinkpop Festival]
Q: You worked with a band on this record and also on stage today.
Tori: Oh yeah.
Q: Does that changed the way you play the piano?
Tori: Oh yeah, yeah you can't just go off half-cocked on your own and say, "Well, I'm gonna make up, you know, 24 bars here of whatever 'cause I can't breath," so, you know, the audience doesn't have know I'm like, ready to have a cardiac. And now I can't really do that, again we go back to, it's not just about me anymore. I have to be aware of where it's going and you have to work as a team. Again, it's not, they're just supporting me, it's very much about a conversation between four people.
Q: Why did you chose to bring in the band?
Tori: I think I was lonely. I think I've done the world tour by myself for so long. I mean, I've done it. I've taken the piano all over the place, and together... we made a pact when I was a little girl, and I honored that pact. And now, as a musician, I really needed to grow and play with other people.
Q: In the past you talked about your relationship you have with your piano, and now you say it's a pact. Did that relationship or that pact change because of working with the band?
Tori: It's changing. I mean, I think she's feeling -- and I -- more comfortable about our relationship. And, you know, we trust that we'll be okay. I think we maybe were afraid of intimacy with other players, I don't know, but that's changed.
["Precious Things" from the Pinkpop Festival]
Tori: At the end of the last tour I was pregnant and it was a surprise. We were overjoyed when it happened and I got really, I felt very connected to the spirit that was coming in. Three months later, I miscarried. And it was right at Christmas 1996. And I think, that time, you know, there was nothing that was within my power to make it okay. One minute, you know, you hold life and then the next minute it's just completely gone, and I found myself in a no man's land, really, because you can't go back to being the woman you were before you held life and you can't, you know, you're not mother, either. But you're still connected to something, a being, that isn't in the physical. The songs started to come soon after that, as I was trying to pick myself up.
Q: Did the songs just come like that?
Tori: They do. They tend to show up when... I mean, I can't contrive them coming. You know, all of a sudden I'm walking down produce and putting it in my little basket and they're hiding behind the bananas. I mean, I can't force them to come.
I think that this experience sort of shook me to the core because it wasn't just about me. I know that sounds very selfish, but when it does involve another being and another life... I just started to, I think, you know, I saw sorrow in a different way, I spent a lot of time with her. And as I started to learn about Sorrow, the energy-force, I found that she goes to raves, she has a fantastic shoe collection, she loves margaritas and very good red wine, and she tells really dirty jokes. And as I opened myself up to Sorrow, I didn't, you know, drown in it, as I have in the past before, been defeated by it. I found her so multi-dimensional that it wasn't just like, "Oh, we lost a baby and we shall never speak of this again." It had to be us going through, diving underneath that tidal wave. And, you know, once that happened, there were other gifts that began to come out of it, like the songs.
["Tear in Your Hand" from the Pinkpop Festival]
Q: Can you tell me about the title of the album "From The Choirgirl Hotel", what is the Choirgirl Hotel for a place?
Tori: Well, having been a choirgirl since I was this big, tiny, tiny, tiny, I really saw these girls in a place that was their own. You know, where they could have room service or they could have a disco by reception or whatever they wanted to do.
Q: Why the girls?
Tori: I see the songs very much as a singing group. This album is different than the last one. Whereas that was sort of like a journey and they were very interconnected. And this one I saw very much like, you know, a singing troupe. And they hang out together, but they have their own worlds, separate from each other, but they know each other really well, so I put them in a hotel.
Q: And what's your relationship with those girls?
Tori: I'm just learning it, like, as I'm on tour, because I'm beginning to play them. Sometimes, you know, they are very open to me, and sometimes I don't think I'm invited at all to the hotel. It's like, "See ya, Tori." No access.
Q: So all the songs have different characters?
Tori: Oh yeah, different characters even within them. They are not just, you know, a lot of people come in and out of each song.
Q: So what character would "Spark" have?
Tori: Well, there are a few that live in that song. I think, more than anything, that girl is having a really bad day. And she doesn't know how or if she's going to see the end of that day. But there is this, you know, sort of action girl that comes out of her, refusing to not strive, and stay on the planet. I think she realizes that she really doesn't want to leave the planet. That she will take her problems with her if she leaves the planet.
["Spark" from the Pinkpop Festival]
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