Word: hotel
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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However, the release of Amos' fourth album, from the choirgirl hotel, may have been greeted with some hesitation by many fans. Under the Pink, her sophomore album, rang with much of the same poignant energy that shot Little Earthquakes into stardom, but carried less fire and more contemplation. Amos' last album, Boys for Pele, took a completely different turn from the path so unabashedly carved out by her two previous release. Fraught with musical experimentation on Amos' new harpsichord and lyrics so bizarre that they must have been in code, "Pele" may have impressed avant-garde musical connoisseurs but left...
...With hotel, fortunately, Amos has most definitely returned to the land of the reachable, though she's still not necessarily listed in the phone book. At points, some songs bear a hint of panic hidden in their almost predictable musical passages, almost as if Amos frightened herself with the inaccessibility of "Pele" and is holding back to be accepted by the mainstream music scene again. But for the most part, the album stands up as listenable (think "Tori Amos Lite"), with passages that are doomed to be caught in one's head for hours at a time--which is definitely...
...into from the choirgirl hotel, unfortunately, similar trends begin to appear in different songs. The bass line found in "Cruel" catches the listener's ear once again in "iieee," giving the album a disappointing aura of deja vu before it is even halfway listened to. "Black Dove (January)," the first of the album's quiet numbers, bears short chorus that immediately brings to mind the song "Past the Mission" from Under the Pink...
Luckily, though many pleasant (and original) discoveries remain in choirgirl hotel. As one of the few ballad-type songs on the entire album. "Jackie's Strength" carries a genuinely moving note of admiration to the late Jacqueline Kennedy-Onassis. Although the song may border on sappiness, Amos' poignant passion streams through the delicate piano music to create a sincere cry against the double-standards women must face--always a favorite song subject of hers. "If you love enough, you'll lie a lot," she powerfully sings, her voice standing strong enough to support the weaker lyrics...
...with a soft lisp and a gift for gab, Alexie is an enrolled member of the Spokane tribe, though he also speaks proudly of his father's Coeur d'Alene heritage. Chatting in a plush Beverly Hills, Calif., hotel lobby a week before the movie's release, he's clearly stoked at the prospect that it might crack open doors for other budding Native auteurs. "Right away, we've given the whole idea of Indian filmmakers credibility," he says, beaming at the notion that Smoke Signals could do for his people what Spike Lee's She's Gotta Have...