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"Just Passin' Through" Radio Show On WHFS
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"Just Passin' Through" Radio Show On WHFS
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On August 25, 1999, Tori taped the "Just Passin Through" program for radio station WHFS 99.1FM
in Washington D.C.. (This was the same day as her Merriweather concert for the 5 1/2 Weeks Tour.) She performed several songs for a small audience who won tickets to be there. Her set included Lust, Concertina, Jackie's Strength and 1,000 Oceans alone at the piano. They aired the Tori "Just Passin' Through" for the first time on Sunday, August 29 at 7:30PM ET on WHFS in Washington D.C. They plan to rebroadcast the show on Sunday, September 19, 1999 at 7:30PM ET. Thanks to Valerie (aka GlttrGrrl).
Thanks to Alan Salisbury for this transcript!
Transcribed by
Reverend Doctor Alan Salisbury BEGIN TRANSCRIPT
Bob Waugh: 99-1 HFS. I'm Bob Waugh. Good evening and welcome to
[much applause and cheering]
BW: Belated happy birthday first of all.
Tori: OK.
BW: Was it a good one? Tori's birthday was Sunday.
TA: Well, I stayed up with the rhythm section all night. They
BW: Thanks God for Mark. Many margaritas consumed?
TA: Oh, no no. Uh, a really wonderful Montrache[sp?]
BW: How's your summer been; in general? I know obviously you've
TA: Well, I had a really great weekend with my girlfriends in the
BW: We should explain to people the new album is gonna to be a
TA" Yeah, there's definitely two disks. And one is - they're
BW: OK, So, How do you feel about the live material? Because
TA: It's like the shows last time. So, it's pretty much how a
BW: So, it's kinda like March Madness.
TA: [little laugh] Yes.
BW: Um, how is this dynamic between you and Alanis Morrisette?
TA: Yeah, first time.
TA: We get on really well. Really really well. I know - I have
BW: Well, let's take it the other way. And you don't have to
TA: Well, you know sometimes I think I do get into trouble
BW: A shared experience.
TA: Shared experience and- I don't like to be tacky, but there
BW: There was an interview I read and I don't remember where it
TA: Yes. [audience giggling, Tori sighs] I'm on his bus now.
BW: Tori Amos is our guest tonight on Just Passin Thru at 99-1
TA: Yeah.
BW: -that happened? So, couple of questions. How did you find
TA: No. Uh-
BW: -and secondly, what was the reaction like from the British
TA: Well... OK, here we go. See, the thing is, I found out from
BW: Well this would seem like a pretty good place to segue into-
TA: Yeah, time for me to do my stuff.
BW: Tori Amos on Just Passin Thru tonight. 99-1 HFS.
[Jackie's Strength, quite a beautiful performance]
BW: 99-1 HFS. Tori Amos on Just Passin Thru. Do you envision
TA: [in a deep voice] No. [laughter] No, the thing is, right,
BW: Yeah.
TA: And that's just- But you don't forget. You don't forget. I
BW: I bet you won't forget the lawn people tonight.
TA: Not tonight.
BW: What shows do remember seeing at Merriweather growing up?
TA: James Taylor, strangely enough, but yeah. I wanted to go see
BW: yeah.
TA: Cuz I was gonna go find Robert and ask him to marry me. I
BW: I'm sure he would have-
TA: He would've gone for it.
BW: That would have panned out. Sure.
TA: I'm a bit too old for him now. Anyway. What should I do?
[Lust]
BW: We're live at Omega Studios in Rockville. You're listening
TA: Well, I think you get a sense of, um- [?] there are a lot
BW: So you might go check that out, too.
TA: You might go check that out. Plus, our bands are really,
BW: OK, that's what you meant by bootied out.
TA: Uh, yeah.
[laughter]
BW: I got it. OK. I was going somewhere completely different.
TA: OK, I'll do this thing. This is, um, again, these are the
[Concertina]
BW: That was really beautiful. Constantina?
TA: Concertina.
BW: OK.
TA: It's like a squeezebox.
BW: Tori Amos. And her new album will be out September 21; Venus
TA: Well... this, this is going to the woodshed, ya know. Like
BW: So, this kind of thing keeps you grounded to a degree?
TA: Very grounded, yeah.
BW: So is that what you're saying, yeah. Do you get to do this
TA: Well, Europe is a bit of a whole 'nother thing. Um, you're
BW: Different vibe.
TA: It's a different vibe, yeah. It's - the States are pretty BW: Something's.. [laughter] Are you saying something is lost
in the translation.
TA: Yeah.
BW: Could you do one more song for us, do you think?
TA: Yeah, I'll do the one you asked me to do. 'Kay?
BW: Yeah, OK.
TA: It's Tori Amos on Just Passin Thru on HFS.
[1,000 Oceans]
[applause]
END TRANSCRIPT
Minister of Music; Ambassador Universal Life Church
another edition of Just Passin Thru. We are at Omega Studios in
Rockville, Maryland. And very pleased, very happy to have our
dear friend back once again. Would you please welcome Tori Amos.
helped me to become 36, cuz now I'm closer to 40 than 30. So,
um, the human loop, Matt Chamberlain and John Evans the bass
player. Always the groove guys; they'll stay up with you. So we
were up til 7:30 in the morning. And, uh, it was painful the
next day. But my husband threw me in the steam. [snort] He
said, 'Go. Thou shalt go to a steam; for two hours.'
[Mon-tra-shay]. Many Montraches. [laughs]. 1990.
been working on, on the record and now you're out on this tour
with Alanis.
Tropics. And that was all going really well. And I was like
dabbling at some songs thinking I was gonna do the live album and
the b-side record; I wasn't gonna tour. I was just gonna put out
a little something for Christmas of 99. You know, just, not much
work. Well, all of a sudden, um, things started to shift and I
ended up in England playing all these songs to Mark and Marcel.
[Mark Hawley, Tori's husband and sound engineer, and Marcel van
Limbeek, sound engineer] And they looked at me and said, 'You
can't really put these with the b-sides because they live in a,
in a shape by themselves. And they said, 'You're gonna be making
a random record. You can't really do that.' Theoretically, it
won't work. So, I had no idea I was doing a double record. The
band was booked. They were coming to record three songs and I
said, 'You're gonna do thirteen. [laugh] Only eleven made the
record. But, um, they were busy.
double album. It's called To Venus and Back. It's gonna be in
stores on September 21. One half of it live material and one
half all new material if they divide albums into sides these
days.
both disks of the planet Venus. And one is Venus Live (Still
Orbiting) and the other is Venus Orbiting and that's the studio
record.
anybody who's been to a Tori Amos show knows that the Tori
experience is the live experience and - Is this material that is
with the band for the most part? Or does some of it -
show would run with this thing called Secret Time in the middle.
We just call it that because it's shorter to do that than When
Tori Plays By Herself. [laughs] So, um, we compiled out of 120
shows. WE had like the NBA playoffs going on. So, everything
had a ranking system; one being the worst, four being the best.
I think that's a Dutch thing, Marcel. I have no idea why four is
the best and one is the worst. But, in our records, one was not
good. So, by the end of it, we had um, fifteen songs that had
made the semi-finals. And then we had to cut em down.
It's really the first time you've gone out on a co-headlining
kinda tour. Correct?
BW: Yeah.
really good manners when I meet my contemporaries. But some of
them, you just wanna sit down with. Why?? I don't know. And
she's one of those people that you just feel like- this is
somebody I've known for a long long time and I have no idea where.
name names. But how often have you been in a situation where
you're meeting your contemporaries and you're walking away just
thinking, 'What an asshole.'
[laughs]
because- I mean Maynard and I get on very well; from Tool. And I
think, we have a good gossip. He loves a good dish, you know.
So, it's nice to sometimes have somebody that, you know, you can
say, 'God, when this happened--' and he's like 'You are tellin
me--' And it's kinda nice. Because it's-
are times when you meet people and go, 'God, you have a great
press agent. Cuz you are NOT like your press.' [laughs] But I
just say see ya and move on. I don't hang at the parties. I
don't go- I find most of my friends aren't, um, in the
spotlight, but they're fascinating people. I'm just drawn to -
to a good party. But content, not glitz, you know.
was now, but it seems like you had a great rapport with Dave
Matthews.
And my problem is, every time- he looks at me and goes, 'Hi,
Tori. I am potty.' And I just- I have such a hard time. He's
such a potty mouth. That's all he did for four hours. But he
knows it drives me nuts. So we got on. We shared French fries.
But I'm on his bus. So every time I pass that part of the bus
all I can think- he's standing there going [in a cute voice]
'Hi, Tori. I'm a potty mouth.' [laughter] Drives me nuts.
Ehh!
WHFS. I'm Bob Waugh. And I had an experience this summer like a
lot of people around the world, Tori, where I woke up on a
Saturday morning, went down, turned on the TV to learn about JFK,
Jr's flight going down. And the first thought I had, honestly,
was, 'Wow! Next time I talk to Tori I gotta ask her about this.'
Because I- I just immediately thought about Jackie's Strength
and the story about how your mom laid you down on the blanket an
the inspiration for that song. Now, were you in England when-
out? Did your mom call you? Or-
perspective?
Natalie, who works with us. Her father had called; west coast
time. And he'd been staying up all night. They're eight hours
behind. So, he had heard it really early on cuz he stays up.
He's like an insomniac. So he called and let us know. And we
started to turn on, um, European CNN. And there was coverage
before a lot of America had woken up yet. And I actually called
my mother and told her; woke her up. And, um, she was in
absolute shock; my mother. Because, in Georgetown when my father
was Methodist minister of Dumbarton, they lived on O Street, I
think, next to one of the Kennedy sisters. So I think there's a
strange tie that people have with them. Um, metaphorically,
emotionally. And my mother wept on the phone and it was just
that- she reminded me in 1963, when she put me down because she
couldn't, you know, her heart had stopped.
[applause, cheers]
coming back to live here. I mean now that you're an ole married
gal and you really have, um, I guess even more reason to keep
your residence in England. Uh, What do you say, Tori, you ever
think about maybe coming back and living in the States again?
like playing Merriweather tonight. It's- I'm a bit excited and
nervous because I used to go and make out on the lawn. We could
afford the lawn seats. And uh, it'd be raining; like tonight.
I'd get wet, like, people are going to get wet tonight; probably.
And it's just one of those weird, um, it's not so far from being
thirteen. I mean, I'm thirty-six, but those memories of getting
ready to go to the concert. It's strange now going. I'm going
in a different entrance tonight.
had Kissing Potion (Wild Cherry) in my pocket, hoping things
would go well for me; all that kind of stuff. The performance
was this big. I was like, 'They're ants up there.' And they
always ignored us up on the lawn. So-
Zeppelin of course years before. But my father was a bit, really
ruthless on that one.
was ten.
What are you set up for, Marcel? OK. Doing Lust. That's what
we're doing.
to Just Passin Thru on HFS with Tori Amos. And that's called
Lust from the new album that'll be out September 21. Tori, have
you noticed on this tour with Alanis any sense of some fans that
maybe are there that aren't your audience. Or in other words, I
think there might be a perception among most people that there
isn't a great degree of difference between a Tori Amos fan and an
Alanis Morrisette fan. Uh, have you noticed that there actually
is separate camps at all?
of people and you hope they're coming for an event; that they're
seeing it as: this is a few hours of two people really, um- Two
pirate ships. Coming into a cove for a party. That's how you
hope they see it. And you know, you're gonna toodle onto one
ship because you're more comfortable with that first. But you
know that they're serving good hors d'oeurvres on the other ship
so you'll go cruise. [laughter]
um, bootied out. [laughter] So, you know, they're very, on both
sides, they're strong musicians. I think if you just like
watching players-
Tori Amos on Just Passin Thru at HFS. You wanna do another song
from the new album.
only times you'll hear 'em at the piano because, um, well the
band never lets me play them alone anyway cuz they like their
part. OK, this is Concertina.
and Back. Tori, you are one of the hardest working artists I
have had the pleasure of knowing over the last.. whatever, eight
years. Um, and it always amazes me that you make time, even at
this point in your career, to do things like your doing today.
as a carpenter, I think. When you play this close to people,
the lights can shield you in a strange way, even though there are
a lot of people and there's a strange, um, uh... almost
detachment even though you're trying to be close. When you're in
a small room with people, there's no, um, good lighting, sweetie.
[laughter] You know, you're very close. So I think you feel
more vulnerable and you constantly have to put yourself there as
a writer. I think a lot of songwriters forget. You're not gonna
get a lot of material backstage at the Grammies. Trust me.
[laughter]
kind of thing in Europe or is it mostly in the States where there
are radio stations and TV talk shows and there's just so much
media, um, after you all the time?
playing places like um, where Hitler gave one of his last
speeches. [laughter] It's pretty trippy.
casual. And I think, um, the language barrier in Europe is, uh,
always tricky because Crucified was always[neat euro voice],
'Tori, sacrifice me!' They thought I was singing 'sacrifice me.'
Said, 'No-no-no-no-no no, I'm not talking about sacrificing me.
But I would get in the car with a driver[euro voices]: 'I love
zhat song. Sacrifice me!' [laughter] No no.
Here is a report from Heather Dyan, who was at the taping:
my sister & i attended the taping of 'just passin thru' at omega studios in
rockville, md on wednesday, august 25 at noon.
the session began at 12 noon and lasted for about an hour. tori & bob waugh
(radio guy) talked for about 40 minutes, tori played for the other 20
minutes.
i was in the first row of the studio, no more than 4 feet from her piano :)
it was AMAZING. the session was completely acoustic, so it was just tori &
her piano.
she was dressed in dark blue jeans which were cuffed at the bottom. she had
open-toed high-heeled brown leather sandals, and a green blouse. her hair
was pulled back and curly.
the conversation began with general questions about the new album, touring
with alanis, her thoughts on living in england, her thoughts on the kennedy
tragedy, and her feelings about the merriweather concert.
about the tour... about the album... about merriweather... about england... about kennedy tragedy... onto the songs...
jackie's strength lust and concertina were AWESOME. she said the band won't let her play them
without her, so this would be the only time they were played acoustically.
WOW.
the whole experience was just amazing.
the show airs sunday night at 7:30 on 99.1 WHFS.
please listen... you don't want to miss this one.
heather
she said that she and alanis have a chemistry, and that they get along very
well together. she hopes that fans view the concert as two 'pirate ships'
meeting in a cove together. naturally, we're drawn to one of the ships
(tori's), but she said that, eventually, we might notice that the 'other
ship' had some nice h'ors d'ouvres and we might venture over there for a
while.
she talked about the 'ranking' system they used to select the live tracks.
all the recordings were listened to, and they rated every song 1-4 (1 being
bad, 4 being good). she said the rating was the 'dutch system.' 14 tracks
made the 'semi-finals' and the ones on the album were picked from those.
for the studio album, she said that the band got together thinking they were
recording 3 tracks, instead they recorded 13 (so two didn't make the final
cut).
she said that she's nervous to play merriweather because it makes her feel
like she's 13 again. she remembers 'making out' on the lawn with her love
potion lip gloss. she especially remembers seeing james taylor perform
there.
she said she didn't consider it 'home,' but she also said she wouldn't live
in the US again.
she found out about it from a friend in california. then she called her mom
in florida and broke the news to her. she said that her mother wept on the
phone.
LUST
CONCERTINA
1000 oceans
(cloverfield)
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