I Heart Berlin Hearts Night Of Hunters

It looks like the music press began receiving their copies of Night of Hunters this week, which means we can expect reviews to begin trickling in soon. The first comes from Frank at iheartherlin.de, who calls it “the most impressive album [Tori] has done in a long time.” He also calls attention to Tash’s performances, saying, “this girl can sing and her voice already has a lot of character.” Click on over to see the full review. Many thanks to the bunch of folks who sent this in, most notably Frank himself.

Sometimes You're Nothing But Meat

Once upon a time (okay, it was 1996) Tori included a photo of herself breastfeeding a piglet in the booklet for Boys for Pele. This taboo-tackling photo stuck in a lot of people’s minds for a long time after the hullabaloo died down. Heck, some people are still thinking about it, 15 years later. Lucas de Lima offers his take on the porcine photograph, saying, “As a disorientation of the ‘Madonna and Child,’ the image achieves its sacred glow precisely through profanation. In the piglet figured as Jesus, we see an improperly Christian separation of life–an unthinkable and unnamable cross-species encounter that awes us because of the nonhuman infant it exalts.” Click on over to read the whole essay for yourself. Thanks to Erin for sending us this!

Guardian Sings Choirgirl's Praises

Sometimes when musicians have a new album on the way, it’s fun to go back and revisit their older work, just to see how far they’ve come. The UK newspaper Guardian is running a series of articles by its music critics, asking them to write about their favorite albums. Today, Alex Macpherson unveiled My favourite album: Tori Amos – From the Choirgirl Hotel. Reading his treatment of the album might put you in a nostalgic mood, particularly for songs like “Playboy Mommy” and “Hotel.” Cheers to Mario, Stoff, and Brian for this tip.

Night of Hunters Vinyl Release

Amazon.com has added a listing for a vinyl edition of Night of Hunters, to be released on Tuesday, September 20th. As with the regular CD and deluxe CD/DVD editions of the album, they are taking pre-orders, though it certainly doesn’t hurt to shop around as one might find a better deal elsewhere — either online or, once the release date comes, in a local record store.

Also, it’s worth noting that September 20th is clearly shaping up to the release date for the album in the United States and Canada. Between retailers such as Amazon listing that and the official confirmation of a September 19th release date in the United Kingdom in the release sent to UK press last week, the 20th looks to be the day over on this side of the pond.

Thanks to ToriAmosjp for the tip about the vinyl edition!

Tori Comes "Out" On Night of Hunters

It’s crazy right now and people’s lives are changing in a day. With what happened in Oslo? I’ve been to Oslo many times and you would never think that carnage would be coming out of that city. If you had made me list 100 cities [where that could happen], Oslo wouldn’t have been on it. It’s hard to predict where the next tragedy is going to happen, but there’s another side to when these things happen — there’s a place of looking at your own life and how you want to make changes and what changes you want to make if you’re still alive. If you have another day, would you still be doing the exact same things tomorrow as today?

A brand-new interview with Tori is online today at Out magazine, and it’s full of juicy tidbits about Night of Hunters, the upcoming tour, her family (including her dad’s new musical venture), and her continued avoidance of the Internet. Click past the cut to read the interview, or go on over to Out’s site to follow all the links embedded in their copy.

Thanks to Shannon, Eric, and Whirljack for sending this in!

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Appollon Musagete To Tour With Tori

According to the concert itinerary on The Appollon Musagete’s website, they will be accompanying Tori for all of the dates on the European and North American legs of the Night of Hunters tour. Given their involvement in the album and the fact that they’re just a quartet makes for a natural fit though what, exactly, this means for the concerts on this tour remains to be seen. Hopefully, there’ll be more details surfacing about the tour soon.

Not Too Lousy For A Calendar Girl

Yesterday, The Taos News reported on artist Tera Muskrat and her exhibition “New Mexico Calendar Girls,” a collection of paintings of women of New Mexico done in the style of the 1940s Mexican calendar art.

While, as we all know, Tori Amos is not from New Mexico, she did live in Taos while recording Under The Pink and Muskrat elected to include her portrait of Tori in the collection on the basis of that link.

The exhibition is on display at Caffe Tazza in Taos though the end of August and will also be shown at Mary Barnes’ studio in Talpa during the Fall Arts Tour. If you’re in the area, check it out! And do read the full article as the ideas and thoughts behind the project are quite interesting.

Thanks to Richard for the tip and to yessaid for the image!

Taylor Swift Covers Tori

Back on Thursday, TomCruel was the first to let us know that the word was Taylor Swift had played “a sorta fairytale” during her concert the night before at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC. Before too long, a YouTube of the performance appeared and, since then, a few others have popped up as well.

Turns out she sang a portion of the song while accompanying herself on acoustic guitar during a part of the concert where she plays a few songs by musicians and bands from the area of that night’s stop on the tour. So, while on the short side, she does it justice and we wouldn’t mind hearing the whole thing!

Check it out below — she plays it right after Lisa Leob’s “Stay”.

Thanks to hemisphere for the video link!

Win a TORI Camera From Stereogum

If, like me, you are photographically-challenged and aren’t entering Lomography’s tour book contest, you can still win a TORI camera through a contest at Stereogum.

They’re giving away a TORI camera set as well as a copy of Night of Hunters (once, presumably, it’s released) to one lucky person who comments on that article, stating what their favorite Tori Amos song is.

You have to leave your comment by 5:30 PM Eastern on August 17th. The only catch is that you have to be a fan of Stereogum on Facebook and must leave the comment via Facebook Connect. They’ll pick a winner at random after the deadline.

Thanks to lushvalley for the tip!

Austin Presale on Thursday

ToriAmos.com has noted on the Night of Hunters tour listing that there will be a pre-sale for the Austin concert starting Thursday, August 4th at 10:00 AM Central. The password to access the pre-sale is HUNTERS.

Good luck!