Under The Pink

Stunning, beautiful, and sad; this album continues to be a great listen.

I say this as someone who never particularly connected with Tori Amos, but I really liked this one. It's so much better than the Tori album we got on the original list, possibly her best. Musically elegant, creative and idiosyncratic without ever feeling overwrought. Flashes of brilliance throughout. Apropos of nothing, I think my new motto is "I believe in peace, bitch." Amazing. Fave Songs: God, Cornflake Girl, The Waitress, Bells for Her, Past the Mission, Icicle

Another worthy addition missed by the original list. Amos has a fantastic voice, it's just the occasional song that serves up whiplash so hard that takes away from the record as a whole, in my opinion. "Cornflake Girl" to "Space Dog" is just hit after hit after hit after hit. Love the huge focal point on piano, too. Adds an epicness. Favorite tracks: "Cornflake Girl", "Cloud On My Tongue", "Past The Mission"

I love her first album (we're not counting Y Kant Tori Read, c'mon, it was the '80s) and this one is even better.

This is an album that defines me, along w NIN that year - those 2 albums are the core of my existence even to this day. Shout out to Trent on Past the Mission it doesn't get any better. Longtime Tori fan, this got to me b4 Little Earthquakes did, it would have been my choice for her representation too.

This should absolutely have been on the 1001 list. I was so glad to listen to some Tori Amos here. Awesome stuff.

Oh hell yes. There was not enough Tori Amos in the main list. While I would probably have to say that Liite Earthquakes is a better album, this has the benefit of better production - the piano sounds genuinely incredible here. I firmly believe that Boys for Pele should also be listed - could easily remove half a dozen David Bowie albums to make way. Enough about Amos' other stuff though - this is meant to be about Under the Pink. As a 14 year old boy, who'd just gotten his hands on a sound sampler, Cornflake Girl would have been one of the songs I sampled, I loved it. So unlike any the in the charts at the time, and loaded to the earballs with glorious, sumptuous piano. Sure, there's synths too, and a somewhat pedestrian drum going on, but the star of it is her keys. Clean, forefront and delicious to hear. It makes me wonder, when Professional Widow from her next album got a dance remix, why Cornflake Girl didn't get a wonderful Tribeca loft bar house take done. If anything could be said about Amos' vocals is that she is less powerfully vulnerable here than the preceding album - there's an edge and an anger that didn't really come through in Earthquakes.which kinda contrasts with the delicacy and easy confidence of her piano. Still has the ability, thirty years later, to make me want to immerse myself in the sound, wrap myself up in it and live it completely for nearly an hour - and that makes me happy.

She's pretty weird, and some of her songs border on inane (Icicle, Icicle, where are you going?) but I like Tori Amos a lot, especially her first couple of albums. 4 stars.

Little Earthquakes is already on the main list, and personally I prefer that album, but I thoroughly enjoyed Under the Pink as well.

She sucks so much. So much. She fucking sucks. Everything I've ever heard of hers from any album sucks total ass. She fucking SUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCKS.

Alternates between pretty piano ballads elevated by Amos' brilliant voice and messier, livelier numbers. Very cool and very interesting. Rating: 4.5 Playlist track: Cornflake Girl Date listened: 03/03/25

I love Tori Amos’ albums and this one was an interesting follow up to Little Earthquakes. While that albums still slightly supersedes this in my mind, it is a close second for me. Great addition!

Under the pink you can find a woman, Tori Amos, whose distinctive sensibility makes her truly unique. She exemplifies a romantic ideal made flesh -- "romantic" in the sense of the sublime aesthetics of the 19th century -- and as usual with that type of romanticism, a bit of grotesque is sprinkled here and there. This conflation fuels the elated, sometimes exaggerated emotionality in her vocal performance, a clear yearning to be heard, paradoxically through the troubled (or troubling) soliloquies of a tortured soul. This is how Tori's lyrics make unforeseen left-turns from the nonsensical to the sensual, or from a deep-seated melancholy to scary spikes of furious anger. And the result is cinematic. Tori's main instrument, the piano, is just perfect for those romantic aesthetics. Its notes twirl and swirl, displaying a virtuosity which is always serving her songs' musicality. Opener "Pretty Good Year", with its cyclical main riff illustrating the passing of time and the nostalgia it induces -- as if watching old photographies of your circle of friends when they were younger -- is a perfect first statement in that regard. Of course, secrets hover above that circle, some of them innocuous, others of a far darker nature, maybe -- you can hear that darkness in that very short aggresive "alt-rock" bridge coming out of nowhere. But gentleness then resumes, and everything is forgiven. Who knows who slept with whom, who hurt whom, or who had some unacknowledged crush on whom? This is how bittersweet feelings are bound to seep in, under the surface, "under the pink". Romanticism also implies rebellion -- *feminine* rebellion, obviously, with a touch of "hysteria" which often acts as a subtle revelator of the constraints of patriarchal oppression. "God" needs a woman to look after the mess He makes, Tori's scathing comments emphasized by the rattle of atonal electric guitars uncomfortably wailing and wincing in the background. Delicate "Bells For Her" finds solace in a clandestine lesbian affair, even if prejudice and secrecy will soon doom the two lovers. The use of a "prepared piano", with its strings blocked and stifled to make them sound like the titular "bells", is pitch-perfect to describe the dysfunctional feelings and infinite sadness cursing the characters of the song. "Cornflake Girl" sees Tori sneer against the conformism of suburban lives at the lively beat of a catchy pop song presenting the whole thing like a classic western flick -- climactic showdown with the bad guy "with a golden gun" included. Why don't you look for the keys for yourself, Honcho? Tori's fight is the fight of all women. It's just that it's tailored for a big screen here. In fact, the ambitions displayed in this record never divert from its blunt manners. The production, soundscapes and compositions owe a lot to pop music, of course, but it's just that the latter is "perverted" enough to become interesting. Some of those pop songs tell harrowing tales about violence and sexual abuse at times, picking that thread from where "Me And A Gun" left it on debut *Little Earthquakes*. Under the pink, the wounded flesh. Trent Reznor, known for being a somewhat scary and troubled performer at this stage of his career, sings surprisingly soft background vocals on "Past The Mission", a song dealing with this particular topic. What we have here is a quite subversive form of pop music, where values are inverted, and confusion can reign supreme. "The Waitress" even allows Tori to express maddening rage at a fellow employee in a striking chorus enhanced by military percussion and a rambling electric guitar line, yelling seemingly gratuitous threats thrown at another woman (instead of a man). The subdued tone of the verses suggest the screams and rage and threats probably all happen in her head -- it's dangerous for girls to truly express their feelings in this world. You know where all the supposedly mad women went in the 19th century. Yet how is it that Tori can make the lunatic asylum sound so attractive, and even *fun* at times? "I believe in peace, bitch" is a hysterical line indeed, in all the senses of the word. Sometimes you're brought back to an age where conventions corset you into a ridiculous pantomime, as in "The Wrong Band", whose voluntary quaint arrangements seem to illustrate musicians playing together as the Titanic sinks into the frozen ocean. Sometimes a quiet ballad like "Baker Baker" soothes you like a balm. Sometimes you're lost in a winter landscape and you wait for the night to fall, as in "Icicle". And sometimes you're floating with a "Space Dog", and you think you can glimpse Kate Bush in the distance, somewhere among the twinkling stars. And it all ends with the nine-minute epic "Yes Anastasia", with only Tori, her piano, and a grand string orchestra plunging you into a surreal historical film which takes place in different time periods and seems to involve lookalike characters so as to tell another tale of woe and violence and hope that only women can tell you. The chorus of that closer is a thing of wonder, but really, the whole track, and how it constantly pulls the rug under your feet, is simply amazing. It's a tour de force, and if you've never heard this song, we'll see "how brave you are" indeed once you get those goosebumps, just as Tori's crazed falsetto goes sky-high in the last minute of this album. *Little Earthquake* was an excellent solo debut revealing an immensely talented artist. But there was still something relatively "formatted" in it. In comparison, *Under The Pink* is *pure* Tori Amos. Unhinged, uncut, unapologetic, and yet still cohesive and always accessible somehow. You want to know what it feels like to have all that pain and passion under your skin? Ask a fellow waitress. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 10 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 12 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 18

Beautifully sweeping around the boarders of insanity.

I certainly felt very familiar with this, which had to have been through various women in my life because she's not an artist I sought out. Not quite my thing, though her ability in composition, performance and lyrics is undeniable. I do feel she falls too much into a narrow vocal groove - that singsong lilt - and benefits greatly when she pushes out of that. Very strong ending to this which I always appreciate.

An omission from the main list

Wish they had put this one on the list instead of the other album. This one is a lot better. Saying that, still could have cut a couple of songs since it falls into that 90s long album trend. Cornflake Girl is such a good song. My personal rating: 4/5 My rating relative to the list: 4/5 Should this have been included on the original list? Prefer this one over the one already on the list.

I really like Tori Amos music : ) Singer-songwriter stuff is so much better when it's piano-based

April 15, 2025 HL: “Bells For Her”, “The Wrong Band”, “The Waitress”, “Cornflake Girl” A few recent listens have been releases from an artist already on the original list. And while I think this doesn’t quite leave the shadow of her previous album Little Earthquakes, Under the Pink is the best example yet of somebody who could have been better represented. This is grand and lush, while still being pretty idiosyncratic and off-kilter. I’m going to Google some lyrics now, and feel pretty dumb about not knowing what a cornflake girl is

Okay-ish.

Rating: 6/10 Best songs: Past the mission

This was largely fine and occasionally quite enjoyable. I like Tori's smoky voice, and any time the piano is given front-and-center status I really dug the melodies. But her singing style, overall, is not my cup of tea. These songs are not super memorable, sing-along-able, or affecting enough to get me out of bed in the morning.

Early 90s pop. It played, I listened, now it is done.

Nice album with (over)emotional pop songs. I like Little Earthquakes better. On this album the voice acrobatics tend to irritate me slightly.

I remember Cornflake Girl on rage in the 90s, it's ok. Listening to the rest of the album, it's... also ok. She really chews the scenery, it's all *very* theatrical and she obviously thinks very highly of herself. It's very catchy in places. Problem is it's also fucking silly more often than not. When it's good, it's good though. 3/5.

Very unmemorable to me. As in I can barely remember anything about it since I listened to it like a day ago.

Hmmm mm ehhhh

I'm more a fan of "God" than "Cornflake Girl". The other songs are pretty decent, but a little uneven.

Not really my thing, but it was quite nice

I've always thought Tori Amos had a very "Disney" voice, so that's not the reason she's for me. However, she has a very well-tuned voice, with a good level of interpretation... but that's all.

This was a very generic and bland female lead pop album and it really had nothing noteworthy to mention. To me this was an album that if you were younger when it came out it may have resonated with you but now it’s really nothing special. 3.9/10

My rating here is more a reflection of personal taste than anything objective. Amos has a great voice and hits some amazing highs on this LP, but at the end of the day it’s another vocal-driven album with not much to show instrumentally. You could write and deliver the most striking lyrics in the world, but at the end of the day it’s just noise without a beautiful melody to back it up.

Cantautora con piano. Me ha aburrido un tanto. Un 2.

It just didn't grab me. She's a talent, I was just a bit bored.

I really liked the Tori Amos album we got on the main list, but this one not as much. Didn't do much for me. Did we really need a second? If it's inferior to the first, I'd say no. 2.5/5

Never been an Amos fan but she’s alright. It was a fine 90’s singer songwriter type album.

A couple of good singles but overlong. Adding 1 nostalgia star (saw her on this album tour and it was...fine) but subtracting 1 star b/c she's already on the original list.

I'm not an old lady, I don't have cats, therefore I find this album very boring.

Na, miss me 2 1

Just awful