why do her albums send me to sleep now?.....her first album was brilliant....her second album was great.....then she started going up her own ass with the third one and since then, apart from the odd song "1000 oceans" "your cloud" and a few others...her albums have been devoid of any real inspiration.
....
....i suppose it happens to almost all artists, prince being a prime example, but i think that tori is releasing albums when she doesnt have enough really good material ready.
...
...yes she has a wonderful voice but she had some wonderful melodys in the first two albums that she seems to struggle to come up with now.
...
...anyone else feel this or am i talking out my ass.

1992 - '99.

Cloudbuster said:

I love U

meanwhile, here's a list of what I consider to be pretty good
to very good tracks from her "not-so-good period". post 1999:

Snow Cherries From France
Time
After All
Strange
Pancake
Through the Looking Glass
Taxi Ride
Seaside
Parasol
Hoochie Woman
Toast
Bug a Martini
Tombigbee
Power of Orange Knickers


I haven't fully absorbed "The Beekeeper" yet since I find it a
very hard album to crack. Either it's going to be a favorite of
mine or it's going to be the first album of Tori's that I'm not
going to like at all.
But I had the same feeling with "Scarlet's Walk" at first and
now I can easily sit through it, although I don't like all the
songs as much as I might want to.

blackboab said:

its all a matter of taste. i think boys for pele (that album with which you say she climbed up her own ass) is her best, closely followed by the beekeeper. taken individually, most of the tracks on strange little girls are great; maybe they just shouldn't be one one record of covers. scarlet's walk, admittedly, is a weak record but they hardly send me to sleep. i've taken a bunch of tracks and made my own version of the record (amber waves, a sorta fairytale, wednesday, taxi ride, don't make me come to vegas, wampum prayer, gold dust, your cloud, i can't see ny, virginia, scarlet's walk, bug a martini, ruby through the looking glass, mountains, apollo's frock, seaside). some of her records definitely required patience on my part - i only just recently began thoroughly enjoying choirgirl hotel. the beekeeper, though, i think is one of her best records. i didn't feel it at first but after a week or so of having it on as background sound and slowly "getting it" it kind of grabbed pele's hand and the two of them hang out a bunch now.

IstenSzek said:

SassyBritches said:

Pretty much EXACTLY what he said.

Her first two albums admittedly had the biggest impact and might be the most striking content-wise, but I enjoy at least 4 of her other albums more, Pele, Choirgirl, Venus and Beekeeper. She's just growing and maturing. She has a richer band sound now. Her subject matter is more universal and not so much about individual pain. Scarlet's Walk is a very subtle and spiritual work. Give it time and experience it on the right day, and you might connect with it more. Sure, it's sleepy by Tori standards, but the effect it has definitely conveys the message she was trying to send. I had a hard time with Choirgirl at first too, but I think it was mostly that she was just evolving faster than I could keep up. It really is one of the most pained, haunted and gorgeous things ever made.

blackboab said:

i've hated her last two albums. i put up a similar post a few months ago bemoaning the state of her latest work. i don't feel exactly the same. i loved boys for pele (besides the filler) and choir girl hotel. i think those are just really mature albums, i'm just starting to get into to venus and back. i dunno. maybe it's the marrage and the kids. maybe it's the new label. i hate to wish bad fortune on anyone but...maybe she needs something to shake her up. it's almost like she doesn't have anything left to say.

isobelfq said:

I think The Beekeeper has more to say than any of her other albums.

Cloudbuster said:

once again

www.getadamnroomyoutwo.com

GangstaFam said:

Lyrically, maybe. But the songs do sound fairly bland in comparison to her earlier work. They're not really poor, they're just not as memorable or as passionate.

sosgemini said:

Only if you join us.

Cloudbuster said:

When I read the lyrics I said to myself: this might turn out
to be one of her best records. But the melodies just aren't
memorable or distinct enough to keep my attention.
Her sound seems to have become so much of a mixbag of sounds,
nicely glossed over so that nothing sticks out above or dives
down beneath the rest.
It sounds like she had a bag full of interesting ideas and
then decided to dress up all the songs in the same clothes to
fit them all in the same pretty pink dollie wollie dollhouse.

And what's with tracks like "Ireland"?!



:shudder:

IstenSzek said:

That bit really turned me on.

GangstaFam said:

Cloudbuster said:

~putsIrelandonrepeatandtiespinkribbonsinhishair~

IstenSzek said:

Ok, I'm deflated now.

Cloudbuster said:

SassyBritches said:

We know what's up.

GangstaFam said:

i just kinda think that when someone's talking about religion, death, lovers, business partners, family, and the betrayal of all of the above, you can say its anything but lacking something to say!

SassyBritches said:

And I can honestly say that I really like, if not love every song on that album now. It was a case of right artist, right album, right time for me. Everything about it lined up perfectly with where I was at all through February - April. It wasn't even until the New Order show at the beginning of May that I even listened to ANYONE else. The cool thing is that having some new Tori out made me go back and revisit the albums I wasn't crazy about before, and now I've made friends with SLG and Scarlet and really enjoy those albums. It's all good.

The Beekeeper is the finest record she has made, in my mind - with the possible exception of Boys For Pele. She is getting stronger and stronger as a writer and a producer. I can't wait to hear what she comes up with next

JonSnow said:

And her band is tight!

GangstaFam said:

i hate her band. i wish they would go away. she's so much more without them.

Listened to the beekeeper for an hour today as I cleaned my room
and I have to say, I'm starting to warm up to it again.
I don't know what it was. Just after it was released I liked it
a lot and then all of a sudden I thought "yuck".
Now I'm back to thinking it's probably a great album, if I just
give it some time to sink in, because it's a lot of tunes.

It's the same thing that happened to Prince. They ran out of the good stuff, so now we get the remains.

isobelfq said:

Well, she is touring without them for this album. And before she had a band, it was just hired studio musicians on her album. I'd much rather hear the synergy that happens between musicians that know, love and respect eachother than just having the spaces filled in.

IstenSzek said:

It's a great album for Spring. Immerse yourself in the DVD and the toriphoria website to get familiar with what the songs are about. You'll grow with the album by leaps and bounds. By the time of the show you're going to, you'll be in full blown Beekeeper mode.