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Many thanks to Lucy
for this review!
TORI AMOS
Scarlet's Walk (Epic
508782 2/9)
Scarlet's Walk is
less an album than a Dantean journey through the underworld of
modern-day America, an attempt at the Great American Novel in CD
form. Taking in lapdancers, misguided Mexican revolutionaries, 9/11,
Native American massacres, gurus and dark tempters called Crazy, it
is a work of vaulting ambition. But despite a payload of 18 tracks,
there aren't all that many songs on it. Wordy, sprawling,
seven-minute piano-driven flights of fancy abound. Few really take
off. Most affecting is Amos's unadorned, 43-second a capella, 'Wampum
Prayer', mourning the loss of a continent to European greed.
'Pancake', too, holds together, lambasting a lecherous cult leader
for his false dawns. A tune is just discernible in the distance.
Mostly, though, Amos can only pirouette her Kate Bush-goes-Kerouac songs
around genuine feeling, obscuring real meaning with lyric sheets as
long as your arm.
Kitty Empire
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