WALKER: Your new album's called "From The Choirgirl Hotel," and I was wondering, where is the choirgirl hotel for you? What does it mean, what's the symbolism?
TORI AMOS: In the album art, there's a map. The choirgirl hotel, in my brain, is very near this map, and you can see in the right-hand corner, it says, "last stop before the CGH," which is the choirgirl hotel, of course. The choirgirl hotel is metaphorical. It's the idea that these girls, the song girls, live in this space and sometimes they let me come and visit and sometimes they don't. They're real persnickety. I feel like they're very independent. Whereas each record has it's own little story and family tree, this one was very much about... I swear to God, I could see some of these girls having margaritas together out by the pool, just saying hi to me as I walked by, you know? It's like, oh yeah, there's "Jackie's Strength," hanging out by the pool side (laughs). So I saw them as very independent, but I saw them as a singing group, and that's why I put them in a space that lives nowhere that I've ever been.
JAMES: What was it like writing for a band this time after you've written other albums mainly for piano?
TORI: The songs, structurally, when they started coming to me, had more in-depth rhythm than the others, initially. Even though, like on "God," the loops developed and things would happen, a lot of times they developed more from the melody's sense, whereas "Cruel" was very much about me -- well actually, lathering up in the shower and I was eating so many nachos at the time that, you know... you get extra space to find different cells.
JOHN NORRIS: So when you began writing for this record, did you know it was going to be a band record or did it sort of develop as such as the songs developed?
TORI: I knew the girl and the piano thing was as far as I could take it. At this point in time, I needed to interact with other musicians. I was really ready. You feel it revving up inside you, you know when you're ready to collaborate with other players. I was starving to work with other musicians, and obviously, I worked with other musicians on all the other records, but here's how it would work. They would come after I had done my piano
and vocals, and it worked. I'm not saying it wasn't the right thing to do, because it's what "Little Earthquakes," "Under The Pink," and "Boys for Pele" especially, were about. But the drums would come on to the track after the song was down. With this record, the piano and drums were recorded live, together, at the same time.
JOHN: What was it like to rehearse with them for the tour?
TORI: These guys have only had two and a half weeks to learn loads of material from all the records and it was interesting, the songs that decided to come first. "Crucify" was very much like "No, no, no, I'll sit and watch what happens to the other girls before you get a chance at me." So the other ones came forth. "Horses" was so cute, she just came forth and said, "You know, I'd really like some drums on me."
SAROA: There's so much electronica you've introduced into the new album. What inspired that?
TORI: Last time, I went to the harpsichord, which was really like the bloodline of the piano. For this record, I walked into the control room, and I said to the engineers, "All those little knobs, like over there" -- which is this whole wall -- I said, "do they do stuff?" And they looked at me and they said, "(huff), they do stuff."
SAROA: Tell us about the cover art for your new album.
TORI: It's all done on photocopier, so it's this thing about having relationships with machines, where flesh and blood and machines doesn't have to be so cold. There can be this integration.
intro | the album | the tour | inspiration | tori fans | favorite concert moments |
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