Abnormally Attracted to Sin [Deluxe Edition]

Tori Amos | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (May 19, 2009)
• Original Release Date: 2009
• Number of Discs: 2
• Format: Deluxe Edition
• Label: Universal Republic
• ASIN: B001Y44EY4
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (92 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #63,423 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. GIVE

2. WELCOME TO ENGLAND

3. STRONG BLACK VINE

4. FLAVOR

5. NOT DYING TODAY

6. MAYBE CALIFORNIA

7. CURTAIN CALL

8. FIRE TO YOUR PLAIN

9. POLICE ME

10. THAT GUY

11. ABNORMALLY ATTRACTED TO SIN

12. 500 MILES

13. MARY JANE

14. STARLING

15. FAST HORSE

16. OPHELIA

17. LADY IN BLUE

Editorial Reviews

About the Artist

ABNORMALLY ATTRACTED TO SIN, Tori's tenth studio album, is another innovative chapter in the artist's trailblazing story. Every track on the album will be accompanied by a corresponding `visualette,' featuring footage that has been captured over the past year. Shot in HD and Super 8, the visualettes will incorporate a documentary style. Tori's most recent album, AMERICAN DOLL POSSE, which has been hailed by Rolling Stone magazine as `her best album in years,' was released in 2007 to a chorus of rave reviews. The captivating album, like many of her previous efforts, adhered to a strong conceptual theme, with Tori inhabiting multiple archetypal female personae, a testament to her willingness to continue to push the boundaries of the female singer/songwriter. Regarded as one of the most emotionally fearless live artists in music today, her most recent world tour, launched in the summer of 2007, saw her soar with her first full-fledged rock band in nearly a decade. Media platforms such as the BBC lauded both her live show and album as `returning Tori Amos back to the forefront of a genre she defined...still pushing her own boundaries.' With more than 12 million albums sold, and commanding a significant and uniquely loyal audience from the rock, pop, alternative, and under-the-radar regions of the music world, Ms. Amos has influenced a new generation of artists in a myriad of platforms. Most recently, she was the catalyst for a one-of-a-kind anthology chronicling her career, the 500 page Graphic Novel, Comic Book Tattoo, featuring stunning visual interpretations of her songs by more than 80 artists, (including an introduction by friend and creative influence artist Neil Gaiman, creator of the Sandman series). Her genre-shattering breakthrough in the early 1990s, including 1991's `Me And A Gun' EP, and 1992's masterwork, Little Earthquakes, single-handedly revived the piano-andsinger motif in rock music. Little Earthquakes went on to sell more than 3 million albums worldwide, with subsequent Grammy® nominated albums such as Under The Pink (1994), 1996's Boys For Pele, 2001's Strange Little Girls and 2002's Scarlet's Walk continuing to explore broader themes. Nominated for multiple awards, including ten Grammys®, Ms. Amos has been working on a musical for London's British National Theatre called The Light Princess tentatively scheduled to debut in 2010.

Product Description

This Deluxe version of "Abnormally Attracted To Sin" will include a bonus fan DVD that include 17 visualettes (special music videos) for songs on the album.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

155 of 175 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars The third time's not the charm here, May 24, 2009

By 

Damien (Miami, FL USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Abnormally Attracted to Sin (Audio CD)

I personally have not been impressed with Tori's recorded output since Scarlet's Walk, which I felt was the last great album she released with beautiful songs and captivating lyrics. Since The Beekeeper, her last three albums have been filled with the same production problems, poor lyrics, or uninspired and generic music. The Beekeeper had some promising songs that were lost in over or bad production and dry vocals. American Doll Posse's production was no improvement with flat mixing and her husband's less than great electric guitar. With Abnormally Attracted to Sin we find an improvement in overall production but still nothing that sonically creative besides some tracks such as Starling, Lady in Blue, and Abnormally Attracted to Sin. The electric guitar is still there from American Doll Posse, and instead of adding ambiance, adding cheesy 80's riffs that drown everything else in the song. In addition, the length of the album is excessive and once again Tori is need of desperate editing. In terms of vocals, there are some good moments as in Give, but she has increasingly relied on this weird accent that no one can understand what she is saying, and it sounds childish and just bad. Another negative is that the lyrics are not anything special and sometimes quite bad. I don't know what happened to the days when she would craft thought provoking, wonderful lyrics, but on this album we are faced with some of the most cringe worthy lines of Tori's career.

Tori Amos's increased vanity is really exposed all throughout this project whether it's the fake posing and air-brushed beyond belief glamour shots of the album artwork or of the embarrassing visualettes - 'embarrassing' being the only word to describe the accompanying videos of the deluxe version. Instead of visually intriguing films, we are presented with Tori Amos playing more dress up in horrible thousand dollar designer outfits walking, driving around aimlessly.

I am a huge Tori Amos fan but these reoccurring bloated albums with unimpressive results have caused multiple disappointments. She desperately needs to hire a producer to help record an album that does not contain filler, but a cohesive collection of strong, unique, emotionally-captivating songs that show off her amazing abilities as a musician (that are still there evident from some of her live performances last tour) found in her other albums. She should stop letting her husband play electric guitar that does nothing but drown the rest of the music. She should take the time to write the amazing lyrics she was known for. And she should stop the increased phoniness in her image and reconnect with reality and her old artistic integrity.

When compared to all her other albums, it's about a 2.5/5 stars. In other words, if you were looking for the 'return to form' of Tori Amos, you'll probably have to wait a little longer.

30 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars What!!!????, May 22, 2009

By 

Kerri (Greenville, NC) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Abnormally Attracted to Sin (Audio CD)

Where's the piano, Tori? That's what keeps going through my mind as I listen to this. Some people criticized the electronic stuff in To Venus and Back... I liked it. Throughout that album, you still hear her signature piano style, which is what I fell in love when I first heard Boys for Pele. The past two albums have been dreadfully lacking in piano. I'm not saying it's not there, but it's become just another part of the background music. It almost seems I hear more guitar than piano! Now, in Doll Posse, there were some exceptions - Big Wheel and Almost Rosey come to mind. But overall I see this trend where she seems to be leaving that behind and focusing on other things such as concept.

I preordered this album. There are very few musicians whose albums I will buy before even hearing them, and Tori is at the top of the list. I also think that a musician's work SHOULD evolve and change through time. I'm not looking for an album that sounds like anything she did in the 90s. I AM looking for an album that speaks to me the way that Choirgirl and Scarlet's Walk did. Something I can relate to, like Little Earthquakes and Under the Pink. Piano music that blows me away like that in Boys for Pele. I don't get that in this album. It seems that her best work comes from her heart, often out of her own heartache. I by no means wish for her to suffer for her music, don't get me wrong. It seems she's gotten wrapped up in trying to get some deep message across to the point where it's becoming as cold, detached and pretentious as some of the photographs in this new album. (Is she supposed to have a 'come hither' look in the one where she's sitting on the bed all in black? Because it looks to me like she's bored.) She's starting to remind me of Madonna - trying too hard to say something profound and push boundaries and getting more and more eccentric with age. Alright, we KNOW sex isn't dirty. Move on.

And I have to say... What's with the way she's singing in the last few albums? What's with the squeaky voice? Some of it is starting to sound redundant. She's NOT a vocalist. Granted, she has a unique voice and she can carry a tune, but I always saw her as a pianist first, songwriter second, singer third. Is this supposed to be a new 'style'? I don't get it. It's starting to grate on my nerves. Her voice dominates the cd, again, more than the piano, when they used to go hand in hand as if the piano was an EXTENSION of her voice, not background noise. I don't buy Tori's cd's to listen to her voice and with this evolution in her singing voice, if I don't start hearing more piano, I'm going to stop buying them altogether.

The only reason I give this album 3 stars is that it's Tori, and I just can't bring myself to give her less. I'm also hoping that with a few more listens, I might grow fond of the music. But I'm finding myself skipping over quite a few tracks already. So many seem to have the same beat with very few that I can sing to. That being said, I still plan on seeing her in concert this summer because she puts on a great show and I'm sure that some of these songs will have more impact live than when listening to them in my car.

Anyway, I never thought I would write such a poor review of one of Tori's albums because she truly is my all time favorite. I think the negativity of this review has a LOT to do with the disappointment I have listening to an album I've been anticipating even since Doll Posse came out. If this were any other artist, I wouldn't have bought Abnormally Addicted after a listen. Am I looking forward to her next one? I don't know. Let's hope she starts stroking those keys and straddling that piano bench again. She doesn't have to make another Pele... but she does need to go back to writing music that sounds like it's coming from her heart.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best Production since Choirgirl, March 10, 2010

By 

Daniel Ting (Austin, TX USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Abnormally Attracted to Sin (Audio CD)

I thought Tori had lost it when I heard this album for the first time. But then again, that was what happened with American Doll Posse, and I've come to love most of ADP. Pretty much the same thing has happened with Abnormally Attracted to Sin. AATS is Tori's most intriguing album to date, conceptually speaking. Yes, even more than Strange Little Girls - everyone knows what Tori was going for with that album, even if it was a little tricky, musically speaking. With AATS I'm not really seeing any sort of direction - but then one could also say that about the significance of the gardens on the Beekeeper, or the choirgirls in From the Choirgirl Hotel, or what Tori was trying to do with referencing Venus on To Venus and Back. I have this nagging feeling Tori doesn't really know herself why all the albums come together the way they do.

According to Tori, the inspiration for this album was watching the noir-ish short films that Christian Lamb took on her ADP tour, which she calls "visualettes." Personally, I found them a little bit boring and pointless, except for the fact that I got to see the other dolls in the visualettes, which was kind of nice. For example, in the "500 Miles" visualette, you see all five of the dolls. That visualette and the "Curtain Call" visualette were my favorites. But I'll get to the music.

The album is confusing also because it goes through so many different styles of music. In this album, she's used the most synths and sampled sounds (on the forefront) to date. "Give" sounds like something from a trip-hop album, like something Portishead would do. "Strong Black Vine" starts to border onto classic rock - not as angry as "Teenage Hustling" but certainly a darker force. "Flavor" is the song Tori should have done instead of covering "I'm Not In Love" on Strange Little Girls - it reminds one of a Japanese tribal dance. Then you have "Fire To Your Plain," which is full of country-influenced 'saddle up, boys' drum kicks and guitar licks. You also have "That Guy," which sounds like a wistful cabaret song.

Personally, I think Tori finally got the producer part right. Not to say her past albums weren't well produced - I just think AATS is the most well-produced one so far, especially since FTCH. Venus was too overproduced and experimental, SLG was a little too bare and insular, Scarlet's Walk was too stylistically homogeneous, TBK was too raw and ran the risk of sounding lethargic, and ADP took the whole musical democracy idea too far and compromised her voice and piano. I know all the EWF are going to hate me now, but I'm only saying this in comparison to AATS; Tori is still a genius and her music is still the best--and despite my critiques on her past albums, they were all wonderful.

My favorites are:
Flavor
Lady In Blue
Fast Horse

I loved "Flavor" and "Fast Horse" (an uptempo song which almost has this Celtic feel, but in a sort of grunge-y way) from the very beginning, and still think they are the more outstanding tracks on the album. Lady In Blue took a while to sink in, but after watching the live performances of the song I grew to love it. "Curtain Call" is the only song where I feel like the production did it more harm than good, because the live performances of it are so much better.

There are also some really bizarre songs, like "Mary Jane," which I think is more appropriate for her to play during her shows, not in an album. I don't really want to hear the words "puberty" or "hydrocannabinolisomerdranabinol" (however you spell that) in a song, thank you. "Police Me" is a little weird, with its bubbly synths and clanging beats, but I've come to love it for that very same reason (typical of her music).

Despite the mystery shrouding Tori's intentions for this album, I think it deserves a listen for the curious. In some ways, it doesn't show you anything new about Tori - after all, it covers all the styles of music she's ever done (and more), but in some ways, it's another album by Tori to make you dig deeper into your soul than the last.