News: Lumino Magazine Chicago Concert Review (November 25, 2007)

Lukas Szymanek’s review of the 6th of November 2007 Chicago concert, was published online on the 25th of November 2007 on the Lumino Magazine website. The review comes with some pictures of the warrior Pip. Thank you Kimberly for sending this in!

Tori and a Gun
Contributed by Lukas Szymanek
Sunday, 25 November 2007

“When I heard it was a possibility, I said, ‘Please, please, please, let’s play the Vic’” said Tori Amos smiling broadly to a tight crowd at this relatively small Chicago North side venue, as an apology for general admission, which forced the fans to wait in line in the cold for over two hours. Amos’ act has long ago grown too popular for smaller more intimate venues. Still over the years, she has never hid her surprising fondness of the Windy City, so the word had been she’s got something extraordinary up her sleeve for the second Chicago show.

Amos is clearly on a mission to bring the glory of the LP back, by continuing her trend of delivering ambitious if at times pretentious concept albums. In May of this year she released American Doll Posse, a 23-tracked chunk of a record that challenges the listener to immerse in it like a book, rather than rip off selected tracks from the net. After 2002’s mellow sounding Scarlet’s Walk and 2005’s The Beekeeper, the new disc sees Amos purposely turning up the volume on electric guitars and heavy drums to accent her cultural preachings. Not to mention, she’s created five different female personas based on Greek mythological archetypes (as seen in the LP’s art and in this review) to tell her stories. In true unique Tori style, she’s also taken all the wigs and costumes from the photo shoot on tour, a different “doll” opens each show.

So as the band filled the walls of the Vic Theatre with their soaring intro, Pip appeared stage left. Black painfully tight leather pants, dark glittering top and raven wig representing dark energy, Tori, fully in character, ominously strutted towards the piano, without giving the screaming audience a single glance. Amos had commented on the “Doll” characters giving her a new channel of interpretation for her own songs, and here she was using Pip’s “dark energy” to bring out some unexpectedly gritty subtexts in known classics.

“Cruel,” a song originally about Amos’ mood swings after a miscarriage, as sung by Pip became a violent expression of feminist anger, with enough improvised swearing on Amos’ behalf, to make any man in the audience go instantly impotent. Throughout new tracks “Fat Slut,” and “Teenage Hustling,” as well as redefined classics “Bliss” and “Waitress,” Amos stretched, posed, touched herself, and did everything short of actually exposing herself to express the character’s uneasy point of view.

Pip closed the first set with a shocking choice of “Me and a Gun,” that left the audience dumbfounded with the artist’s genius, power and slight madness. This originally quiet a cappella account of Amos’ rape experience from the 80’s, as reenacted by Pip, and backed by a band for the first time ever, became a boiling post-traumatic manifesto of hurt and rage. Using a knife and a gun, which she unexpectedly pulled out of her piano midway through the song, she delivered the most powerful and arguably best live single performance of her career, for the few lucky Chicagoans’ uncomfortable enjoyment.

One might argue Amos’ performance art piece as Pip was too explicit and literal. But while using black bangs, tight leather, and lethal props may not be the most creative way to visually express latent anger, Amos’ motivation and guts in doing so are nothing short of applause worthy. Madonna can hang on a cross on stage all she wants with no believable honesty in trying to get any real message across. Amos has long ago become an artist of her own league, at times frustrating with her philosophies, but always fascinating to try to predict. After sadly venturing into adult contemporary music territory with that embarrassing Adrien Brody starring video a few years back, and boring her fans with The Beekeeper in 2005, it’s good to see Tori, in her 40’s now, still has blood boiling in her veins due to her own demons and international policies.

After a quick costume change, Amos came rushing back on stage as herself, in an odd gold animal printed jumpsuit. She seemed in great spirits as she fluidly went through a solid selection of the new and the old, which after the explosiveness of Pip’s set seemed almost redundant. Not to say it didn’t have highlights; her emotional rendition of “Winter,” and a surprise choice of a forgotten comic gem “Happy Phantom” delighted. But one couldn’t wait to get back home and reflect on standing a few feet away from Amos, as she pointed a gun into the audience with a final note of Pip’s set.