track 27: silent all these years

Another morning getting ready for school, in the spring of 1992, I catch a music video and am struck by how different it is; Different sort of song, different sort of video, different sort of girl. Not as conventionally pretty as the usual MTV girl. Pale, with red curly hair and singing a song accompanied only by piano called “Silent all these years.” That was my first taste of Tori Amos.



Soon I picked up the cassette single on an outing with my dad. Oddly enough, I also picked up the single for “hit” by the Sugarcubes that day, my first taste of Björk! I liked Tori more. At the time I probably identified somewhat with the song. I had a stepfather that I didn't like, who could be kind of a dick (I got the antichrist in the kitchen yelling at me again), so in a way I think I spent a lot of my time on tiptoe trying to avoid any interaction with him and keeping my frustrations to myself (my scream got lost in a paper cup/think there's a heaven where some screams have gone?) and so I spent a lot of time writing and discovering ways to express my thoughts on paper rather than out loud (sometimes i hear my voice and it's been here/silent all these years). So one day rode the bus(es) down to South Beach to visit a record store I’d gone to once with Raul and Michelle. It was called Uncle Sam’s Music Café. Music store/café? Cool. I went there hoping to find Little Earthquakes and succeeded.



I remember playing it when I got home. It felt amazing. It felt the way I did when I discovered Sinéad O’Connor and later on, Joni Mitchell’s Blue. It seemed as thought this singer/songwriter had actually gone further than any of the ones I knew, bared even more of her soul. I connected with her music so immediately and became devoted to her at once. Her next two albums, Under the Pink and Boys for Pele are the sort of albums I impatiently rushed out to buy on the days of their release. As time went on, Tori’s music has gotten a bit loopier and I’ve found myself being a fan more of her individual songs than complete albums. However the first three discs are a part of me forever.