TORI AMOS | UNDER THE PINK
Under The Pink is a piano-driven album dealing with religion, gender, and sexuality. Its lyrics are total confessional poetry and its music is specifically intricate. Though the piano is the main component, there are facets of reggae, rock, classical, and even big band influences. Trent Reznor shows up to offer his most subtle vocal of all time on “Past The Mission”, and she goes from a whimper to a freak-out in “The Waitress”, a blunt song about quite simply…wanting to kill a waitress.
The album launched a few singles, including “Cornflake Girl” and “God” both which paved the way for a new female movement of Alt rock musicians in the early nineties as she literally posed the still trendy question “God, sometimes you just don’t come through. Do you need a woman to look after you?”
It was this fearlessness that Amos painted her stories with for much of her career.
Production duties on the album were handled by Eric Rosse who was dating the singer at the time and they split the same year of its release. It’s hard not to sense the interaction between the two as there is a permeating vibe of what’s to come when she sings “cause things are gonna change so fast. “Pretty Good Year” and “Icicle” are simultaneously breathtaking and heartbreaking, while “Cloud On My Tongue” and “Space Dog” take a few listens to fully appreciate and showcase the eccentric red fire queen Tori has within. This is creativity at its peak form, which continued onto her follow-up “Boys For Pele.”
While the title mentions the colour pink, the album feels more grey as reflected in its artwork. It feels like a desolate music box plunking through memories of an emotional past. Picture the eerily comforting feelings of a deathly quiet snowfall, or the coziness of a soothing cup of tea that is the last comfort of the day after a self-reflective bath. Even when the album rocks harder, it’s still somehow contained in its own world, in a snow globe of magic. A world of elves and fairies, where we turn our pain into icicles to melt away forever.
CLOUD ON MY TONGUE
2 oz dry gin
3 oz chamomile tea
1/2 oz honey
3/4 oz lemon juice
4 dashes of toasted chamomile bitters
*Combine all the ingredients into a shaker with ice and shake vigorously. Strain into a coupe glass.