From: owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org (precious-things-digest) To: precious-things-digest@smoe.org Subject: precious-things-digest V7 #58 Reply-To: precious-things@smoe.org Sender: owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk X-To-Unsubscribe: Send mail to "precious-things-digest-request@smoe.org" X-To-Unsubscribe: with "unsubscribe" as the body. precious-things-digest Thursday, March 14 2002 Volume 07 : Number 058 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: Tori and Marketing [JNe9027355@aol.com] Re: precious-things-digest V7 #57 [JNe9027355@aol.com] My intro to Tori (warning: long rambling) [ToriphileMaria@aol.com] Re: Threads That Are Golden --- [MadDrizzle@aol.com] At what cost? [Mysterilady2001@cs.com] Re: Tori marketing [violet@torithoughts.org] Re: At what cost? ["cdrv" ] Re: Tori and Marketing [Talula1982@aol.com] Re: Thread that are Golden [Jennifer Mitts Cypres ] Getting to know you ["Jon Haverman" ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 02:31:44 EST From: JNe9027355@aol.com Subject: Re: Tori and Marketing In a message dated 3/12/02 10:21:47 PM Pacific Standard Time, owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org writes: > Don't get me wrong, I love to share Tori's music w/ those that > appreciate her music, and my fecundity in the Tori-Boot community attests > to > this. However, I personally am uninterested in seeing Tori's popularity > grow. > In fact, it would seem that to do so, she would have to do a great deal of > > selling out; the fact that Tori has stayed true to herself (as much as she > can given the demands of Atlantic or any label she joins) is one of the > things I most respect about her and her music. So Im wondering, why some > of > you are proponents of increasing her markebility and widening her audience? > i think they're just doing it on a whim to see new perspectives...a big "what if" venture, just for the hell of it, not necessarily hoping that they are applied in actuality. yea, doubtlessly a huge factor in tori's appeal is her not being a cookie-cutter record label's dream marketing machine. AJ ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 02:33:52 EST From: JNe9027355@aol.com Subject: Re: precious-things-digest V7 #57 In a message dated 3/12/02 10:21:47 PM Pacific Standard Time, owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org writes: > I really don't care who else likes the music I like. However, it would be > a good thing if I heard Tori on Top 40 radio and saw her on MTV, because it > > would make Top 40 radio and MTV better. And you're sure of this? it would make things better? what's "better" is totally arbitrary. AJ ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 02:50:46 EST From: ToriphileMaria@aol.com Subject: My intro to Tori (warning: long rambling) In a message dated 03/13/2002 12:22:29 AM Central Standard Time, Mysterilady2001 saidwrites: > "How did everyone else come to know Tori's music? > This a fabulous question! My first encounter occured in the fall of 1995. I was listening to my atlanta alternative station (99x), when all of a sudden I heard, what I now to know to be, an accoustic live recording of Crucify. As soon as I heard the first few lines I was hooked... I remember stopping what I was doing, and just devoting all of my attention to that song which seemed to be speaking to *me* ... as it if was written about *me*... I had never heard her music before, but I knew a friend at school as what I thought then "crazily obessessed" w/ her (she wore the pyramid necklace religiously and wrote "Tori Amos" all over her notebooks). Naturally, I asked her to make a tape of her favorite Tori songs, and she eagerly accepted...she gave the tape the next day and I remember rushing to my car after school to listen to it... Silent All These Years was the first song... and though I had intended on fast-fwd the tape to that cool Crucify song I heard, I was just mesmirized by the depth of her lyrics and emotion. Needsless to say, this became the begining of a my long, beautiful, obessional, devoted relatioship w/ Tori's music. I quickly sought out her CDs, and information about her on the internet (which at the time was about 2% size of info on her available today on internet). The more I heard and read, the more ardent my passion... I eagerly awaited BFP release, as I have every other CD she has put out since then. I would say the pinnacle to my plateau was meeting her in 1996, which solidified (assumingly forever) my love affair w/ the music. =) As for the marketing thing: In a message dated 03/13/2002 12:22:29 AM Central Standard Time, Lauren DePhillips writes: > I think in her case it not an issue of reaching the largest possible > audience but reaching the right audience with more in-depth > interviews, articles, and things of that nature. Ok, if this is the case I can understand... otherwise, my previously stated selfish and snobish reasons stand. ;) Wanna Trade? http://www.auburn.edu/~aguirmg ******************************************************** "And right there, for a minute, I knew you so well." - Tori Amos ******************************************************** ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 03:35:40 EST From: MadDrizzle@aol.com Subject: Re: Threads That Are Golden --- Hello everyone :) I've enjoyed reading about how you guys discovered Tori's music. It's touching to read what an emotional experience it was for most of us. I believe her music makes that impact. It reaches down to the depths of our core. It's like one soul speaking to another soul. Her music simply is that personal and potent. So the way that I discovered Tori.........it was 1991 and I saw her video on Mtv. It was probably the first and last time they aired her video for "Silent All These Years." Needless to say I had never before heard anything like her music. At the time I was only 12 and although I thought I understood what her music was about through my 12 year old analysis, looking back on it I didn't so much "understand" as I did feel the music. It was the emotion backing her music that came across to me. I can't exactly explain it because I believe it's a kind of otherworldly force. Her ability to communicate these feelings is phenomenal. For me to know that we fans mean so much to her is kind of a "Thank You" from her for listening. I mean really listening. Listening with your heart, like so many of us do. Well, I'm off to bed now. goodnight, dove ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 04:50:59 EST From: Mysterilady2001@cs.com Subject: At what cost? Hi EWF ~ How do each of us measure success? In terms of having a big name, in terms of worldwide success - Madonna, The Beatles, Michael Jackson are the biggest fish in the pond. Tori is a small fish. But she is IN the same pond. Those three have proven themselves powerhouses, they are stars. Good for them. But at what cost? I must wonder if T would like that level of success? No privacy. Cameras, fans (some unstable), follow you wherever you go. They follow your children wherever they go. That's scary. At what cost do you achieve success? Tori has been happy playing her piano, writing her music and singing her songs; Is it enough to be able to do that AND have a peaceful private happy home life? I think so. In Cornwall T can come and go as she pleases, she and the clan are left alone. That sounds so much better to me than paparazzi hiding in trees hoping to catch Guy Ritchie taking baby Rocco for a walk in London. (People mag.) I am fiercely protective of my privacy. I've seen T play to 50 people and play to packed arenas. I enjoyed the intimacy of the small venue - but - I was also so proud of her filling those huge arenas that I was in tears. Do we really worry about what will happen success-wise? Hell, the Spice Girls were a big ticket name a few years ago, now they can't even get tickets to attend the Grammy's. However she is marketed all I care about is that she stays true to the Muse. Her true success is IN her music, not in the number of albums sold. Lots of fly-by-night shooting stars, like Britney, sell lots of records but will they be remembered for their craft? I don't think so. Tori will. She is revered by her peers. You can't get better than that. In the end it comes down to this - She puts out her music. Some get it, dig it, revel in it and some don't. That's how it is. What will be, will be. If T is a happy person in her personal life and in her career then I call her successful. The rest is Wavy Gravy Toodles~ MysT )O( The Ides of March )O( *** ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 06:18:01 -0800 From: violet@torithoughts.org Subject: Re: Tori marketing [Wrote this a few days ago, but never sent it. If the conversation has moved on, please forgive.] Richard wrote: >What, that's innovative and specifically attuned to Tori Amos's music and >persona, can be done to get her on the radio much more than it has been in >the past (a situation with which she has been clearly frustrated for a long >time)? Well, radio is, for the most part, mainstream. We know that Tori is not (and presumably does not want to be) mainstream. And this is where we hit the brick wall. The solution would seem to be either 1) for Tori to go against who she is and write more mainstream music so that she will fit into the formats more easily and get played more frequently, or 2) for Tori to not give a crap about radio and be content with a small fiercely devoted following and rely on word-of-mouth to spread the news to new people. Let's do the anchovies thing again... Some people like anchovies, but even the people who like them only like them in limited situations. Anchovies are basically only good on three things in the whole world and that's it. You just don't sit down to eat a can of anchovies; you have them maybe once in a blue moon on a pizza, and even then only if you're absolutely positively in the mood for anchovies at that precise moment. I don't know if radio stations want to serve a can of anchovies several times a day. I don't even know if they want to serve achovy pizza several times a day. Tori's music as it is right now just isn't commercial enough to garner a lot of radio airplay. It was more commercial when it was more accessible, back during LE and [slightly less so] during UtP. It got more enigmatic and hard to peg after that, and people [who aren't already fans] have a harder time understanding and connecting with it now. Even being the hardcore Toriphile that I am, if I were discovering Tori now, I don't think I'd be drawn to her the way I was when I first heard songs like "Crucify" and "Mother" ten years ago ... songs that really floored me, spoke to me, and made me feel such intense extremes of passion and anger and joy and sorrow. I enjoy her more recent songs just as much as (and in many cases, more than) I did the earlier ones, but I don't feel wrenched by them the way I did by the early songs. I'm not sure how much that has to do with the subject of commercialism or airplay. Maybe nothing ... or maybe everything. It would take us into the realm of "What does a song have to have to make it a hit?" and that's a very abstract thing. I don't know if the answer is as easy as, "Hey Tori, write a song that will make people cry" (or dance, or scream, or whatever). Maybe. Maybe it's something more. But then I guess that's the question record executives have been bashing their brains out over for decades. I wonder if any of them have any answers. Barry Gordy sure knew what he was doing (with 67% of Motown's singles charting between 1960 ad 1970 as compared to other record companies' average of 10%), but I don't think Tori has it in her to be that formulaic. And I don't think we'd like that much, either. Personally, I would like to see Tori not give a crap about radio. I would rather she continue just doing what she does and not care about all that bullshit. If it comes, it comes, if not, oh well. But I realise that's easy for me to say. I don't know how much freedom she has to be that blase. It depends on whether her record contract is riding on how "popular" she can be and how fast. Violet xoxox ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 17:41:52 -0300 From: "cdrv" Subject: Re: At what cost? I totally agree, she is sooooo respected in the rock world. Others artists, big names, like her and respec her; and most of her albums gets fabulous reviews. I think that the big names, Michael Jackson, Madonna, with the exception of The Beatles; have the problem that they are constantly trying to prove themselves that their musical abilities are up to their fame. I think Tori has proven it beyond it, way beyond it. I would think that apart from Fame, and success, the biggest names in Rock history are: Elvis Presley, The Beatles, Barbra Streisand (Perhaps the only women in history of music to have an 40 year career without performing self-written material) and perhaps Madonna (Although what I previously said, some claimed that she has proven herself artistically and can be included here) I think it all ends up a matter of quality of the material and honesty, I think we have that combination on Tori since 1992; no matter how they will market her, it will always be there. I think we don4t have to worry to much, she will be always loyal to her musical and spiritual principles, and that4s why we love her so much. :) See Ya Daniel ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 19:57:24 EST From: Talula1982@aol.com Subject: Re: Tori and Marketing In a message dated 3/13/02 7:32:33 AM Pacific Standard Time, JNe9027355@aol.com writes: > In a message dated 3/12/02 10:21:47 PM Pacific Standard Time, > owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org writes: > > > > Don't get me wrong, I love to share Tori's music w/ those that > > appreciate her music, and my fecundity in the Tori-Boot community attests > > > to > > this. However, I personally am uninterested in seeing Tori's popularity > > grow. > > In fact, it would seem that to do so, she would have to do a great deal > of > > > > selling out; the fact that Tori has stayed true to herself (as much as > she > > can given the demands of Atlantic or any label she joins) is one of the > > things I most respect about her and her music. So Im wondering, why > some > > of > > you are proponents of increasing her markebility and widening her > audience? > > To go mainstream does not always mean a change in the way tori writes or performs her music. Many artists simply "catch on" with the general public without changing their tune. I cannot stand it when people automatically assume underground artists to be "sellouts" should they hit it big and get a #1 record, and it sounds like a few people on this list would be disgusted if Their Tori turned into Everyone's Tori. personsally, i think it would be great for tori to break into the mainstream and reach the minds of young girls (and young boys, let's not be sexist here) who are currently singing along to britany spears. ~~jb ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 19:06:23 -0800 (PST) From: Jennifer Mitts Cypres Subject: Re: Thread that are Golden How did I come to know Tori? I remember it so clearly. I was never a big MTV watcher... they don't play enough girly music. But I was flipping channels one day and when I got to MTV, "Silent All These Years" was about 30 seconds in. I was first taken in by the stark imagery and quietness. It was SO DIFFERENT than anything else I'd heard. I couldn't take my eyes off of Tori. I called my best friend in Chattanooga (it was towards the end of my junior year in college) and told her about the video. She said she's stake out MTV to see if she could see it. Finally she caught it. She was struck as well. We both ran out and grabbed Little Earthquakes. Played it all the time. Knew NOTHING about her at all. Just kept listening to the music. (At that time, I wasn't one of those fans who ever cared about the personal lives of musicians. I mean, who cares?) Then all of a sudden, we saw Tori concert ads popping up quietly. My friend went to the Chattanooga show. I went to the Knoxville show. The Chattanooga show was first. She told me all about it and described how Tori really dragged out the songs and made them twice as long. I was thinking, "Oh, darn. I really like the way she sounds on the CD. She's one of those who sucks in person and only sounds good on CD." But I went anyway and was BLOWN away. Since no one knew who Tori was, whenever I called in to get tickets, I got 4th row right. I had never been so hypnotized as I was at the first concert in that tiny little historic Bijou Theatre. I've been hooked ever since. And for the first time, I wanted to know everything there was to know about Tori. *sigh* ===== It's Yahweh or the highway! -JC It's not my way but Yah's way! -JB - ----- Need a photographer? Check out my hubby's website: http://www.jean-philippe-photo.com Yahoo! Sports - live college hoops coverage http://sports.yahoo.com/ ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 18:54:14 -0500 From: "Jon Haverman" Subject: Getting to know you >>What I believe > would be valuable is learning where/how current fans came to > know of Tori's music and focus on those areas. > > How did everyone else come to know Tori's music? Worked Security at the Peabody's Down Under show in the Flats of Cleveland-must have been August 1992? Hard to believe what has happened in the past ten years. I am from the 'Wow, almost like Kate Bush!' fold, whom I had experienced in England in the late 70's. haves ------------------------------ End of precious-things-digest V7 #58 ************************************