TO VENUS AND BACK

09/21/1999 3:00 AM, Yahoo! Music
Ken Micallef

Tori Amos has always sold us the goods, and we have always lapped them up. From Little Earthquakes to Choirgirl Hotel she has projected her world as one of a bewitching earth girl scorning heaven and hell for fairies, fantasies, and sex. So entranced are we that we may have missed the real Tori, and that is just how she has liked it. To Venus And Back is, in some ways, the first Tori Amos album, the most sincere one, the one most free of affectation and ego. Relying less on weird instrumentation and outlandish pronouncements than ever before, To Venus And Back is reflective, gripping, and seems to expose all.

A double CD set, one live and another of new studio material, the album evokes the power of Little Earthquakes and the confessional tone of Under The Pink. "Bliss" recalls her first hit "Crucify," with a haunting melody and the lyrics "Father, I killed my monkey, I let it out to taste the sweet of spring." Wailing like a newborn, this is Tori scalding the spirits.

The Beatle-ish "Concertina" and the winsome "Spring Haze" are delicate and enchanting, while three songs ("Lust," "Suede," "Riot Poof") encompass her fascination with sex, magic, and mysticism. "Datura" is the strangest of all, an eight-minute reading of voodoo herbs over a rock waltz and avant garde vocal squeals. "1,000 Oceans" concludes this odd rumination with a song to Tori's lost child. Darkly beautiful, here Tori sings "I will cry 1,000 more if that's what it takes to sail you home." It's a bittersweet closing note to an album that only increases the magic and mystery of Tori Amos.