Decca
Alternative Rock, 2021

It’s been ages since I’ve listened to new music by Tori Amos, although I still give her first few albums a spin now and then. The reason is simple: she’s stopped making interesting music in the last decade or so.

Still, I decide to give Ocean to Ocean a try, as perhaps it may rekindle our previously beautiful relationship.

Alas, no, the magic still isn’t there.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I didn’t stop caring because Ms Amos has decided to evolve. I stop caring because she evolves into a something that stops captivating me: a purveyor of dull pop songs.

This is especially evident in this one, an album of music that was made because Ms Amos was suffering from the trauma of being stuck in lockdown. Well, I’m not discounting her mental anguish during those years, but considering that she’s likely spent her lockdown in a far more luxurious environment than most people, without being plagued as fears such as the loss of jobs and the financial ruination that follows, something tells me the anguish may not resonate with me as much in her music.

Sadly, I’m right. The tracks here are very MOR-ish tracks that is such a stark departure from her Cornflake Girl days. Stark isn’t bad, but starkly boring is. These songs lack hooks that will sink into the brain and won’t let go, and most just see her singing-slurring her way in a one-note manner while backed by an anonymous track composed of vague, forgettable drums, keyboards and what not.

Things get mildly interesting in Speaking With Trees, mostly because it reminds me so much of Kate Bush, as if she had finally metamorphosed into Ms Bush as her final form. Other than that, the songs here are either super-sleepy tunes that remind me of her much better songs in the past or just plain musical embodiment of somnambulism.

There are still some good stories to be had from these songs. The aforementioned Speaking With Trees, for example, is a painful tale of being unable to let go of the grief for a dearly departed.

I’ve been hiding your ashes
Under the tree house
Don’t be surprised
I cannot let you go

However, Ms Amos had presented powerful, evocative stories wrapped up in music that accentuates the feels of these stories. Remember Little Earthquakes and how every note resonates with the rising pitch of her cold anger? How about the raw anguish of Playboy Mommy and the haunting melancholia of Josephine? Ah, those were the days, and sigh, these are the days.

Ah well, the title of this album may as well be a reference to the distance between me and Tori Amos at the moment. It’s okay, people change, things move apart. It’s still sad, though, the realization of this distance between us. It’s never easy to accept that something good may be over for real, much less say goodbye and move on.