Blueberry Girl Reading & Video

Neil Gaiman announced on his Twitter feed this morning that HarperKids has put together a video promoting Blueberry Girl. It includes Neil reading the poem he originally wrote for Tori’s daughter, Tash, along with previews of Charles Vess’ art from the book, which will be released March 10.

Check it out:

Oh Yeah, There's a New Mailing List...

Back in January, a link to subscribe to a new official e-mail newsletter appeared on the Tori Amos Myspace, Facebook and, eventually, the Universal Republic site.

The first missive from it just appeared in inboxes across the Intertube. If you didn’t receive it, you’re not missing much — it’s just the press release announcing the new album’s title and the SXSW showcase — but it serves as a good opportunity to point out the new mailing list’s existence in case anyone missed it. They promise “exclusive info, news, contests, free stuff and more” and, really, who wouldn’t want that?

You can subscribe here.

NOT New Album Artwork

Late last night, we started getting reports that possible new album artwork was floating around in the cyberether. Undoubtedly this is where Perez Hilton also got the pic (featured today with the caption “A visual preview of Tori Amos’ new album”).

Don’t get too excited. We have confirmation from the Tori camp that this photo is absolutely NOT related to Tori or the new album in any way and was not done by anyone associated with Tori.

So Perez, you may want to change that caption to “A cute and clever fan interpretation of Tori Amos’ new album.”

Tori's New Album Title Revealed

Rudy Ramirez and Melissa wrote in just now to let us know some juicy details about Tori’s upcoming SXSW performance, including a) that her new album, due in spring, will be called “Abnormally Attracted to Sin,” b) that she’ll be playing some new songs off the album when she performs next month in Austin, and c) each song will be accompanied by a “visualette,” whatever that is. For the full lowdown, see the press release behind the cut.

read more...

SXSW '09: It's Official

It’s official. Tori will play La Zona Rosa on Thursday, March 19, 2009 as part of the Universal Republic Records showcase.

Once again, we want to remind people that this is a showcase, entrance is extremely limited (we cannot stress this enough), and scrambling to get tickets will most likely be in vain. If you aren’t already in, chances are, you won’t be. Please do not call the venue and pester them; they won’t be able to help you.

If all goes well, we hope to provide a setlist and reviews on the day.

Thanks to Darrell for the link and a li’l tip of the hat to ash blaize for keeping hope alive.

Tori Not To Play SXSW?

And just like that, Tori has been removed from the SXSW schedule on my.SXSW. What does that mean? Who really knows? Doesn’t mean that it’s not happening but then, we never really knew if it was happening since early SXSW lineups do tend to go through a lot of shifts and changes. If we were to guess though, it probably wasn’t meant to be public knowledge yet…or even semi-public knowledge for registered conference attendees. We’re sure it’ll all be made clear eventually. Just like Exit 75.

Best of Legs and Boots?

Several of you noticed music news website Direct Current and music blog Wears The Trousers both mention that Epic Records will be releasing a Legs and Boots best-of collection in March. We caught that too and have been trying to track down anything concrete about it.

While we were off doing that, Wears The Trousers indicated that the information came from a trusted source and, as a reputable publication, they wouldn’t post that sort of thing without good reason. Additionally, the Canadian outfit Future Shop has listed this as an upcoming release available March 17th in at least one of their bricks and mortar stores (though it’s not yet on their website’s upcoming releases list).

We’ve since been able to confirm that the compilation is, in fact, in the works. However, our Magic 8-Ball doesn’t reveal much more beyond that at this point so we’ll have to sit tight and wait for more details to emerge.

Tori To Play SXSW?

In the media and music world, March Madness does not mean college basketball. It means the annual South by Southwest conference in Austin, TX. Today, SXSW launched my.SXSW, a social networking and scheduling tool for registered attendees. Among other things, my.SXSW includes a more complete listing of performers than what is publically posted and several people, including Jessie Frye, wrote in to let us know that Tori is on that list.

While this is far from a confirmed performance by any means as SXSW showcase schedules are as fluid as water, Tori is currently slated to be playing at La Zona Rosa on Thursday, March 19th.

Before you go buy a plane ticket to Austin, be advised that this is an official SXSW showcase and those with conference badges and wristbands will have preferential entry to the venue. If past showcases by premiere artists is any indication (i.e., R.E.M. last year), few if any walk-ups will be able to purchase a ticket to get in.

Of course, if you’re one of the lucky ones already going to SXSW and Tori does play, we’ll be counting on you to let everyone know what happens!

The Scoop on AOL's All-Tori Radio Station

We have received clarification from deep within the AOL hive about the situation with their All-Tori radio station and wanted to pass it on to all of you.

We’re told that the station is temporarily unavailable while their legal department seeks permission from all the labels Tori has worked with to allow AOL to continue streaming all her songs on the station. As the music once available there spans the breadth and width of Tori’s career, it’s certainly not a trivial task but they are working to make the interruption of the stream as short as possible and are sincerely sorry for this turn of events. Soon as they have the go-ahead, they’ll be restoring the station.

We wish AOL luck with this endeavor! Hopefully the hub-bub about Internet radio does not foreshadow an unhappy resolution….

Little Blue World's Samuel Adamson Interview

Alex Ramon interviewed playwright Samuel Adamson, who (as most of you know) is collaborating with Tori on “The Light Princess” musical, for the Fall 2008 issue of the Little Blue World fanzine. With his editor’s blessing, Alex has posted an abbreviated version of the interview on his blog, Boycotting Trends. Many thanks to him for letting us know, to Little Blue World for allowing this portion of the interview to be more widely distributed, and to JG for the gentle reminder about it.

Needless to say, if you like what you’ve read, there’s much much more for the dedicated Toriphile to find in the pages of the Little Blue World. While the final issue was just published, there are many back issues still available for purchase and any one of them would make a fine addition to a Tori collection — and I say that as a subscriber since the first issue, not as someone who eventually inherited the position of News Editor!