Nemi's At It Again

Nemi appears every weekday in daily UK newspaper, Metro. (Thanks to Gaelle and Paul.)

Survivor Digest Offers Special Tori Edition

Issue #3 of the Survivor Digest, a quarterly magazine for survivors of sexual abuse, is devoted to Tori tales, including letters, artwork and stories from writers who met our favorite red-haired RAINN founder. Haullie Free, thanks for letting us know!

Piglet Photo Sows More Mockery

Tori’s famous Pele piglet photo was recently spied hamming it up in the January issue of the UK’s Uncut magazine. Unfortunately, the “Rock Follies” item also included its fair share of hogwash, identifying Tori as Canadian and claiming that she “hasn’t much of a gap between thought and expression.”

Barbara, hogs and kisses for sending us this.

Musicians, Others Offer New Takes on Tori Songs

Musicians around the world seem to like covering Tori’s songs just as much as she likes performing others’ music!

In France, singer Domy Fidanza recorded a cover of Tori’s “Conflake Girl.” Fidanza, originally from Italy, came to France to launch her music career as a finalist on Star Academy, an American-Idol-esque French TV show. She recorded “Cornflake Girl” for a collection called Star Academy: Leurs Singles, but you can hear it on iTunes and at E-Compil. Thanks to Elizabeth and Stephane for the tip!

Meanwhile, Native American singer Pura Fe performed a unique cover of “Scarlet’s Walk” at a recent Tori tribute. You can check it out over on YouTube. Thanks, Dane, for letting us know!

Playwright Katie Kring created The Pearl, a musical loosely based on The Scarlet Letter that initially featured a version of “Winter.” Her production was recently featured in a Connecticut newspaper, The Day. In it, Kring explains:

“The assignment was to choose a pop song she thought would fit into that source material and write a scene around that song. Then, though, she would write her own song to sub in where the pop song was. Kring chose Tori Amos’ “Winter,” which is about searching for a father, and wrote a scene around it between Hester and Pearl. Then she wrote her own song, “Icicle Skies,” that could slip into “Winter’s” spot.

“It was at that point I realized you could do ‘The Scarlet Letter,’ and you could give it that sort of girl-piano-rock feel and it somehow works. I don’t know exactly why that is, but it does. At that point, it became clear to me that you could actually do this.”

Brazilian Singer Covers "Black-Dove (January)"

Brazilian singer, composer and violinist Badi Assad’s new album, “Wonderland,” includes a number of covers, including Tori’s “Black-Dove (January),” the Eurhythmics’ “Sweet Dreams,” and Asian Dub Foundation’s “1,000 Mirrors.” She doesn’t offer any samples of the Tori cover on her site, but you can head on over and learn more about her history and music. Jonathan, thanks for sending this in!

Courtney Sounds Off On Trent & Tori

We know some people can’t resist a bit of good gossip, so we thought we’d mention that Courtney Love has been posting recently at the Moonwashed Rose blog, a site that tracks Courtney-related news and rumors. And some of those recent comments have (somewhat belligerently) addressed the rumor that she somehow “ruined” a romance between Tori and Trent Reznor.

You can see Courtney’s full-on “explanation” in this thread, but for those of you who can’t decipher the Courtneyglyphs, here’s a few key quotes, transcribed into plain English:

“I haven’t a clue about Trent and Tori’s relationship. Maybe she got mad when she discovered his dinkle was playing away games. I don’t know. I don’t know her. Not my problem or my business.”

She also offers a critique of Tori’s music:

“I know ‘Cornflake Girl’ and ‘Professional Widow’ (Is that supposed to be about me? I’ve never figured it out.) are supposed to be big classics but it doesn’t resonate … Kurt thought her ‘Teen Spirit’ was HYSTERCAL in a joke song sort of way but now I see it as rather sad, and I guess mournful, which was the point, we just thought it was really funny.”

Thanks to CC for the tip!

Cate and Tori: Separated at Birth?

Some of us at Undented have long thought that Cate Blanchett sometimes looks like Tori (not that we’re naming any names). So we weren’t surprised when Marlina told us that Perez Hilton thinks so, too. It looks like most of Perez’s readers don’t agree (maybe it was the pictures they chose), but head on over there and offer them your own opinion on the matter.

Tori in Robert Plant Box Set, BT Interview, Margera's "Walk"

Two of Tori’s past collaborators, Robert Plant and BT, have recently emerged with tidbits that Toriphiles will want to hear.

Robert Plant has just released a new box set, “Nine Lives,” a nine-CD-and-DVD collection. According to Mod Lang (a cool record shop in Albany, CA—previously located in Berkeley—which has always been a top spot for finding Tori rarities), Tori is among the musicians featured on the DVD, along with Roy Harper, Roger Daltrey, Bobby Gillespie, and Atlantic Records co-founder Ahmet Ertegun.

Meanwhile, electronica artist BT recently namechecked Tori in a podcast interview called Dawn and Drew. She’s mentioned in the second part of the interview. Thanks to Noah for sending us the link.

And, while we’re nowhere near the subject, Bam Margera (of Jackass fame) was quoted in the November 2006 SPIN magazine as being a fan of Scarlet’s Walk: “I’m planning my wedding that’ll hopefully air on MTV and everybody expects [my brother’s band] CKY and HIM to play, but I’d like to tell everybody to go to hell and have Tori play, just to throw them for a loop,” he said. Christy and Ally were the sharp-eyed fans who spotted this for us—thanks!

Here a Tori, There a Tori, Everywhere a Tori Tori

Tori has been popping up in all sorts of fun places lately. In October, listeners of New York radio station WFUV 90.7 ranked “Little Earthquakes” as #72 among its top 90 essential albums. In Philadelphia, WXPN 88.5 ranked Tori #81 among 885 important musicians and played “Silent All These Years,” “Cornflake Girl,” and “Caught a Lite Sneeze” during the two-week-long countdown.

Fashion designers Viktor and Rolf mentioned Tori twice in an interview in the November issue of Elle (with Jessica Alba on the cover):

Elle: If you could have somebody else’s body, whose would it be?

V&R: Why not somebody else’s wit, intelligence or spirit, like Tori Amos, Rufus Wainwright or Tilda Swinton?

Elle: Your favorite song?

V&R: The one Tori Amos wrote for our fashion show and the one Rufus Wainwright composed for our soundtrack for our men’s perfume, Antidote.

And, last but definitely not least, Tori turns up in the new Dresden Dolls video, “Backstabber,” in which Dolls cohorts Brian Viglione and Amanda Palmer take each other’s clothes off and discover that each body part is tattooed with the name of a different famous musician. Tori’s name appears on Brian’s cheek. Some of the other names are … well, just see for yourself:

Many thanks to Heidi, Craig, Jamie, and all the others who let us know about Tori’s latest cultural invasions!

Tori Store Reissues "Recovering Christians" T-shirt

Those of you who have been fiending for a “Recovering Christians” shirt since the Boys for Pele tour will finally have your wishes come true: the Tori store has reissued the shirt and is offering it for sale alongside A Piano: The Collection. The front reads “Recovering Christian” and the back sports a figure of a nurse with the words “Tori Amos” and “Still Recovering.” Thanks to Marlina for spotting this one!