5 1/2 Weeks Tour
Cleveland, OH
September 8, 1999
Updated December 1, 2000
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5 1/2 Weeks Tour
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Check Out The Reviews And Set Lists Page Tori performed in Cleveland/Cuyahoga Falls, OH on September 8, 1999 at the Blosson Music Center during the Tori & Alanis Morissette 5 1/2 Weeks Tour.  Set ListGod Encore: |
PhotosClick to see a page full of concert photos from this show. They were sent to me by Lily Matini. ReviewsLatest additions are added after my own review below. From MikewhySeptember 9, 1999 - Well, tonight's show was deeply marred for me by the crowd, which at least in the area where I was sitting was the rudest I have ever experienced at any concert ever. We arrived in the Akron area around 3:10PM. (The Blossom Music Center is located closer to Akron than Cleveland.) The meet & greet was at 3:30 and only had about 40 people. It was the smallest and most tranquil meet & greet I have seen in years. It reminded me of the old days! But the rest of the day was destined to be frustrating. The show was great from the standpoint of Tori. She was in a great mood and was playing and singing really well. But it was the crowd that made this show a living hell for me and the Toriphiles around me. People were talking loudly throughout the show. During secret time the conversation was so loud that I expected Tori to say something. There were a lot of partiers and people who seemed consumed with waving to Tori over and over and with shouting at the worse moments. There were two women behind me who yacked and yacked continuously throughout Tori's set. I will not do as some did and blame this on Alanis fans because I don't think that is really accurate or fair. (Previous shows I have attended were not like this.) I think there were a lot of people here who were casual music listeners and not serious music listeners. My guess is those people were equally rude during Alanis as well. People were there to party and so on and did not care about music. It was so sad and I was so upset after the show that I left. While I prefer to stay for Alanis, I was not about to endure that crowd for one moment longer. Yuck! Anyway, here is the set list: God Tori introduced the band and said she and Alanis could not believe the tour was going by so fast. She also blew a kiss to the audience. Cornflake Girl Case of You (solo) - God was this beautiful. It is a shame most of the people in my area decided to have a conversation during this. Yes, Anastasia (solo) - What a treat! Tori began with the "Thought I been through this in 1919." Father Lucifer - Love this new version of Lucifer better than all previous versions. Love Tori's gestures and the "Lucy Girl" part. The song seems almost sensual in a way. Professional Widow Black-Dove (January)- I about died when I heard this one. It was a special request for someone and was so beautiful. During this song Tori had trouble with her microphone, and it started to droop. A tech guy ran on stage and fixed it, but while he was doing that, the mike fell all the way down and Tori just smiled. It was so cute! Waitress Encore: I hope someone else posts Alanis' set because I would like to know. Tori was great but the crowd was the worst I ever saw. I hope things are better in Pittsburgh on Friday. At least I did meet a few wonderful Toriphiles at the show. :) I have since talked to others who really enjoyed the show. It was a super performance on Tori's part. If I had not had all the horrible people around me, it may have been one of my favorite shows! I know there are many cool Toriphiles in Cleveland and I met some of them at the show. :) From The Cleveland Free TimesAdded February 29, 2000 - Lily Matini sent me the following Tori and Alanis concert review from Michael Seese, which appeared in the Cleveland Free Times in the September 15-21, 1999 issue. She also scanned the photos which were included with the review. Tori Amos, Alanis Morisette No offense to the Spice Girls, but this is what Girl Power is all about.
Forget the posing, pouting, and platform shoes. To paraphrase the Clinton
campaign: It's the music, stupid. And fans were treated to two and a half
hours of it last Wednesday as pop muses Tori Amos and Alanis Morrisette
co-headlined and served up an uneven, yet potent, evening of song.
Amos began offstage, singing the first verse of "God" a cappella, before
emerging to the roar of the crowd and the wash of her three-piece band.
Next came a funky rendition of "Crucify," the opening track from her 1991
debut, Little Earthquakes (in Italics). "Crucify" underscored both the good
and bad sides of Amos' 75-minute set. On the one hand, it was good to hear
a new take on some of her older, more sparsely arranged songs. The downside
was that the mix -especially the over-flanged bass - muddied the sound,
obscuring Amos' delicate voice and intricate piano work. In fact, the
highlight had to be when the band took a breather, leaving just Amos and
her emotions to carry the set.
Morissette, in contrast, had no trouble being heard over her band. The
lanky Canadian wandered back and forth across the stage, spun in circles so
much it made me (in Italics) dizzy and tried her hand at flute, guitar and
harmonica. She literally alternated between songs from her two "serious"
albums, Jagged Little Pill (in Italics) and Supposed Former Infatuation
Junkie (in Italics). Morisette also rearranged some of the tunes, most
notably "You Oughta Know," which she presented as a straight-ahead rock
numbr, minus the smoldering funk of the album cut.
Aside from the barest minimum of stage banter - thanking the crowd,
introducing the band and saying what fun they were having - neither artists
interacted much with the auidence, or even their own bands. It didn't
matter, though. The predominatly twentysomething female crowd seemed to be
completely in tune with Morissette, and more so Amos, and hung on every
syllable they sang. Girl Power, indeed. - Michael Seese
All Reviews Below Were Originally Posted On The Dent ForumSpecial thanks to Laurie Daniels for her invaluable assitance in getting the reviews transferred to the Dent! From SteveEwf:
Sorry about your crowd experience MikeWhy. Sounds kinda like the first half of Tori's set at Columbus for me. At the concert I was around mostly all EWF and everyone but 2 folks were standing and jamming. I really enjoyed hearing Little Earthquakes and Yes, Anastasia was wonderful The hand gesture during Precious Things, was just to cool. She flipped off the crowd while running her hand down the front of the piano over the keyboard. This occurred right after the lyric "just because you make me cum that doesn't make you Jesus". Well this is my last concert for the year. Thank you, to all that I have met. I look forward to reading other EWF reviews.
From CurtCoker:
Alison and I were in row K, center section. Pretty good seats. The sound was very muddy for the first five tunes, at least for the people up front. Tori needed more volume on the piano almost all the way through the concert. The acoustics inside the pavillion at Blossom are normally good, so the sound engineer obviously didn't do enough checks or the speakers weren't arranged properly. Also, the people around us seemed like they were either making noise and having a good time (a distraction but completely excusable) or not really into the concert but willing to scream obscenities at the people making noise (inexcusable). It seemed like a lot of jocks were dragged to the concert by their prissy girlfriends. Waaah. Alanis was a pleasant surprise. Because of all of the air time that You Oughta Know got, it seemed like she would be kind of, you know, beligerent. Turns out that she is a smiling little waif of a person who strides around and doesn't know what to do with her hands while she is singing. She seems like a genuinely sweet human being. I've noticed a bit of Eastern mysticism in her music -- and her set design and stage presence also give the impression of Hindu or Buddhist influence. A big tree of life and huge batik banners as decorations. What a cool person. Oh, yeah, and we really enjoyed the music, too. The piano introduction to Uninvited was nice, as someone else commented in a review of another concert. Partial out-of-order set list: All I Really Want (I missed the crunchy guitar part on this one), You Oughta Know (mellow synth version), Hand In My Pocket, You Learn, Ironic, Uninvited, Baba(?), Thank U, Sympathetic Character, That I Would Be Good, Would Not Come(?). Alanis let the audience sing a lot of Ironic without her, which was sort of funny.
From MstEscher: mike! im so sorry you had a bad experience! all clevelanders are not like that! i had a grea time! First tori concert ever and i had a blast. Drunk as well sorry if thats noticealbel.e. Mike, seriously though, i really hope you dont think all of the fans that were rude were alanis fans because we really are nice i swear! better luck in pittsburgh. As for me i loved the show!! yes anastasia and a case of you rocked me!
From jupiters_angel:
*still reeling from last night* First off, the M&G was simply wonderful. *waves to all the members of the lollipop gestapo* I wish all M&G's were like this one. There weren't that many people and everyone was civil and nice. And somehow I ended up right against the barricade! Tori's tour bus comes around after we were all corralled and mr. puppethead pokes out of the window and bounces around. It was to cute. Tori was super kewl hugged me, signed my photo and even took a photo with me. This was my first time getting close enough to really talk to her. It was nice as always to see how truly caring she is for all of her fans. PS. - for those on fashion/shoe patrol - Tori was wearing this amazing flip flops with little flowers on the straps & her toes were painted brilliantly red. I met so many sweeties at this show (Hi jen, kristina, and the rest of my front row kids ) both at the meet and greet and inside the venue. And I have found this makes all the difference in how much I enjoy a show. The Show: Tori put on a great show, the acoustics inside the pavilion were amazing. I was so close to the stage I could hear the piano really well and caught all of Tori's faces. I can not believe she played "A Case of You" -- my most fave cover. Right before the show an old Joni Mitchell song came on the radio and I was like "Wouldn't it be amazing if Tori would play Joni tonight? Nah she never plays it" and then she played the opening bars of the song and I was gone, "crying like a baby" I will see you all in Chicago and Detroit, although after Indy and Cleveland, I can't see it getting any better....
Jeska
From raspswirl6:
One of the best Tori shows for me ever - because I had front row and she was soooooo close to me! Joel gave her all the letters when she got back onto her golf cart and she began reading them right away! 4 songs were requested at the meet/greet - they were Black Dove, Yes Anastasia (she had a poster), A Case of You, and Flying Dutchman. Tori wrote on her hand "Anastasia," "B.D.," and "Dutchman." But I was surprised at how many requests she actually did! 3 of the 4!
I was so happy for Lily - she had lawn seats and then she was asked to work for mp3.com (giving out those tatoos) and in return she got front row center! She had such a great time and we talked between Tori and Alanis. During the Alanis performance, there was this little tiny girl next to me peeking over the front row barricade (she was with her dad) and Alanis must have thought it was cute because whenever she came over to us (she was 2 feet from me many times!) she smiled alot at the girl. During "Hand In My Pocket" where Alanis sings "one hand in my pocket and the other one's giving a peace sign" me and my friend Candace were the only ones in our area giving peace signs and Alanis was right next to us then and she blew us kisses! That little girl had been trying to hand Alanis a flower, but Alanis didn't take it. So Alanis' guitar player (Joel something?) gave the girl and her dad some of his guitar picks. All in all, though we couldn't hear Alanis at all, both shows were amazing experiences for me and my friends. Before the show I met Mike and must say (again) that he is a very nice person and I think we should all show some appreciation for what he does for us all! -Still dazed from meeting Tori and everything else- Brad
PS - Lily - e-mail me soon!
From Mikewhy: It seems like the crowd was bad where we were, but not all over the place. I have since talked to others who really enjoyed the show. It was a super performance on Tori's part. If I had not had all the horrible people around me, it may have been one of my favorite shows! I know there are many cool Toriphiles in Cleveland and I met some of them at the show. We tried to tell people around us to be quiet, but they ignored us. Plus there were too many people doing it. But we tried! But the show itself and Tori were great. I am truly happy that not everyone endured what we did!
From Xav:
(listening to ambient tori singles now)
The Meet and Greet -
The Show - As usual I couldn't keep from leaking like a firehose. I never get over her eloquence. Some of her songs express things I could never say aloud.
This was my first 5.5 wks show, and I'll be on the lawn at Pine Knob. Come say hi! *g*
Scott
From manwell: Well, I have to agree with everyone about the crowd, but for everything else that happened that day...I can forgive them. I live in Pittsburgh and hadn't planned on going to the Cleveland show, but that morning...I just decided to get crazy & decided to cut out of work early & have a good time.
We arrived at Blossom around 7pm and headed towards the box office. Just as we were about to step up to the window, some guy pulled us aside and gave us free lawn seats. Then the concert began, and I noticed there was no security and everyone started rushing the stage. We thought...why not. We ended up getting center stage about 20 rows back in one of the private boxes. For free tickets...theses seats were unreal. We stayed there until Professional Widow, when some little goodie-2-shoes ratted us out to an usher. Needless to say, it was a spontaneous trip I am glad I took. Manwell
From GlitterGrrrl: I must say this show was superb (besides for the few unfortunate people there)As always, I was balling my eyes out and shaking. Tori never fails to amaze me. She is better than any drug on this earth. Did anyone here happen to talk to the staff members here? They are the biggest asses. One guy even had the nerve to come up to me and tell me that Tori was the biggest bitch. I had to try realllly realllly hard not to kill him. And some other guy came up to me told me that i was really pretty and asked for my age and told me if I was closer to his age he would fuck me (excuse my language but I was quoting the bastard) And some other guy told my friend that he would love to get in her pants. Lots of people sporting wings (I was sporting my big ones as always, but took them off during Tori so this boy behind me could see) I still think that the prices are way to high. But still coughed up all my cash for shirts and a tour book. The set list was amazing! Brought back a lot of memories, both good and bad (memories of previous shows and memories of stuff in my past....i connect songs a lot of time to stuff that has happened to me) Played every song I had wished to hear except Here. in my head. Sorry to the boy sitting behind me if I was obstructing your view. I tried my best to keep seated so that you could see. And I even took my wings off. But sometimes you just gotta move. (specially during waitress and precious things. i tend to get, um, kind of aggresive)Hope everything is cool. Although I am not an Alanis fan, I stayed to hear some songs. Nice to hear stuff off of the old album. I heard the two songs that I had wanted to hear from her. (you oughta know and so pure) Was hoping for a more angry version of you oughtta know. Relate to that song really well. Lets just say there were certain "mistakes" that I could have done with out. Sorry your time was not so good Mike.
Lipstick and Glitter Kisses
From GoneForMiles:
I'll have to agree with Mike on this one - the crowd was just plain obnoxious. This surprised me, because the crowd at last year's Akron concert was damn cool. Needless to say, during Alanis's set I didn't hear all the chatter I did during A Case Of You and Yes Anastasia (but maybe that's just because everyone was so riled up and screaming). Even after the concert people were horrible. Outside of the restroom was a crowd of drunken fools, and the driving of some of these people was just horrid. I was surprised, because Clevelanders are usually so friendly and calm. Oh well... Alanis was OK... it disappointed me that she kept all her songs exactly the same, if you don't count the intro to Uninvited (which was damn cool). I was enjoying myself up until the encore, where I was totally drained and wanted to just leave. Unfortunately, the 3 friends I was with are Alanis fans, so I had to stay around through it. One more thing... the merchandise kicked booty! I love the tourbook, and I bought the purple shirt with the black and white pic of Tori on the front. If it wasn't so expensive ($27!!!!), I would've bought all 3 t-shirts! But all in all it was a decent concert. It could've been better, but hell, it's TORI! I hope she comes back soon... just not to Blossom. I wonder when she'll play at Nautica... -Vic
From Velvetes1:
I really enjoyed Tori's performance at Blossom. But, like Mikewhy and a few others have said - some of the audience members were a bit loud and obnoxious. I had great seats (4th row), but during secret time these guys 2 rows behind me were laughing and drinking and just being stupid. This is the second time in a row that the audience at a Cleveland show was not all that great (the first time was Ani DiFranco at Nautica). I think I'm just gonna drive 2 hours to Columbus from now on. The audiences there rock! Alanis was good. And, again I was impressed w/ her performance. -Carol-
From gorfph: Hey everyone. I loved the show. I couldn't go to the meet and greet because I had school. I live in Pittsburgh so I didn't get to Blossom until like 6. I went with my friend Kirt, the REALLY tall guy with long black hair. We chilled outside the gate for a while and saw some other fans from other shows. I was going to go talk to them, but I'm kinda shy so I passed. I saw that guy with the black beard and the black beret. I've seen him at like every show. I also saw the girl who was blowing candy bubbles at Camden. I don't know their names, but if anyone does, let me know. So we went in and got our seats. We were 7th row pit, just in front of Mikewhy. Right before Tori came out, we moved to two empty seats in the front row and we were right against the barricade for the whole show. We were like 10 feet from Tori. That was so cool. The show itself rocked. I've been dying to hear something from FTCH, so when she played Black Dove, I died. I also loved a Case of You and I just can't get enough of Juarez. At the end of the show, Tori took my rose with my letter attatched to it. That had to have been one of the coolest moments of my life. Then after the show, Kirt managed to get one of Caton's guitar picks and the setlist, lucky bastard. It said she was going to play Cooling instead of A Case of You. Mikewhy, I'm really sorry that people were talking during the show. I hope you have a better time here in Pittsburgh, which will be my last show for this tour. I'll be in the 4th row pit wearing an American Eagle hat if anyone wants to say hi. Have fun, and I hope to see a lot of you there. Hot Rod
From TwinkliFaerie:
First of all, I just want to say that I am sorry for all of the people that did not have a good time at the show. Sometimes you just have to let things go. For example, I was standing along with everyone else in my section, and this girl behind me asks me to sit down. This just bothered me, because I paid the money for these seats, and I want to be able to see!! But, I politely sat down, to keep the Toriphile spirit strong. And when I was walking at intermission, people kept coming up to me and asking what my faerie wings were for. And in a way, I wanted to say, you know, if you don't know what the wings are for, then what are you doing here?!
From JupiTori:
I think that Tori put on a really awesome show. I meet so many nice people before the show, mostly just Tori fans, I met a girl named Laura before the show, my friend and I were waiting for the gates to open, we waited for over an hour but we met so many cool people. Anyway, Laura told me how she had asked Tori to play Yes Anastasia that night. During the show when Tori started playing it, I turned around to find Laura crying her eyes out, but she lost it at the end, because Tori said her name in the song "We'll see how brave you are Laura.." I was like whoa. Anyway, it was such a treat to hear Tori play A Case Of You, it was totally unexpected. Overall, it was a great show, my friend and I started out with lawn seats but ended up in the third row, we just kind
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