Mopping Up The NPR Webcast

Update: Audio of last night’s webcast is now streaming at NPR Music. There’s also a nice slideshow of photographs by Ebru Yildiz and an article by Ann Powers to introduce performance.

Just got back home from (le) poisson rouge where Tori performed with a string octet this evening. The concert was webcast by NPR Music so, on the assumption that folks would be able to listen in live, we didn’t tweet the show — although Ann Powers, who introduced the performance and also interviewed Tori before the show, did. However, word is that many people had choppy audio/video so it is fortunate that NPR will be archiving this webcast, presumably along with that interview, in their Live in Concert in the next few days.

Jump the cut if you want to see the setlist — or hold off if you want to be surprised once the archive is available. It’s all about you, baby.

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Gawker's (Sort Of) Gold Dust Review

Over at Gawker, Rich Juzwiak reviews Gold Dust along with the full-length version of Tim Burton’s Frankenweenie in one fell swoop, calling both Tori and Tim, perhaps unfairly, “relics of ‘90s alternaculture.” He doesn’t hate the album, but he doesn’t love it either, saying “there are few surprises to be found.”

Soundi's Gold Dust Review

Finnish magazine Soundi reviews Gold Dust in its new issue. The bad news is, the whole review is in Finnish, and most of us don’t speak or read Finnish. The good news is, an anonymous birdie translated it for us. Click through the jump to read Petri Silas’ critical look at the collection.

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Royal Albert Hall Review Roundup

The reviews are in on Tori’s Royal Albert Hall show in London last night, and the often-reserved British press seemed to have nothing but glowing remarks for the gig. The Guardian’s Caroline Sullivan calls it “little short of wonderful.” The Evening Standard’s André Paine says Tori’s “girls sounded better than ever.” Over at Londonist, Doron Davidson-Vidavski attempts to describe it with “a superlative not yet invented for just how good last night was.” Thanks to everyone who sent in these links — there were a bunch of you!

EDIT: This one slipped in late, a review from The Independent (scroll to the bottom).

The Quietus Interviews Tori

Well, there were songs that were considered but I didn’t even try. Something like ‘Cornflake Girl’ would lend itself for a big band approach, but if it were not that set-up, I didn’t think it would work because her roots are reggae.

Erin Lyndal Martin interviews Tori for The Quietus, talking about the song choices for Gold Dust as well as Tori’s collaborations with arranger John Phillip Shenale and Metropole Orkest conductor Jules Buckley. Click on over to check out the full Q&A.

Stereoboard's Gold Dust Review

Stereoboard offers its review of Gold Dust, finding it “a surprisingly conservative affair that on the one hand gives so much, but on the other could have been so much more.”

Slant Magazine's Gold Dust Review

Slant Magazine’s Jonathan Keefe chimes in on Gold Dust, giving it 3 (out of 5) stars. He says the orchestra works on some songs — particularly “Flavor” — and not on others, such as “Precious Things.” Swing on over to see his in-depth take on the retrospective.

The Sonic Reverie's Gold Dust Review

The Sonic Reverie takes on Gold Dust in a new review that praises the album’s strengths while pointing out that the orchestra often plays a secondary role — and that the album might not be the best way to introduce new listeners to Tori’s music. (There’s also a pretty spiffy photo of Tori I haven’t seen anywhere else.)

Montreal Gazette's Gold Dust Review

The Montreal Gazette has a review of Gold Dust. Although they give it 3 stars (out of how many?), they question the need for the record, pointing out that many of the songs were backed by strings the first time around.

London: Rising From A Shell Running Through Spring

The curtain has fallen on Tori and The Metropole Orkest at the Royal Albert Hall in London tonight, bringing the first half of the Gold Dust Orchestral Tour to an end. The two set performance followed the same script as the previous nights, with “Ribbons Undone” as the single solo “fairy song” during the first half — probably a nod to her daughter who was in the audience this evening. It was preceeded by an improvisation centered on the phrase “when she calls my name.”

The full setlist, with thanks to @AnnabelJameson and @icingboy, has been posted in the Tour section. If you were at the show, we’d love to hear what you thought of it! If you’d like to share your thoughts, please use the comment form there. And make sure to keep an eye on that page for pictures and video and ponies. Yup, ponies.

The Orchestral Tour takes a short break as Tori heads back to the States for the NPR webcast on Friday and the Infinity Hall Live taping on Monday before picking back up in Warsaw on Saturday, October 13th. We’ll probably hang out on Twitter to chat with folks on Friday during the webcast and I’ll be at Infinity Hall so I will try to live-tweet the taping myself — barring roving bands of bouncers patrolling the Infinity Hall aisles, confiscating cell phones, of course. (Hmmm…Monday sure would be a good time for that telepathic Twitter client to go into beta…)