Customer Reviews

Abnormally Attracted to Sin

5 star:		(32)
4 star:		(25)
3 star:		(23)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

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.

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.

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.

Whenever a new Tori Amos album is released, it is a first-day purchase for me. I eagerly listen to it, hoping that this will be the album that makes me feel the way I did when I first heard Little Earthquakes, Under the Pink, Boys for Pele or To Venus and Back. Well, Abnormally Attracted to Sin is certainly a worthy contender as one of Tori's better albums, but only when compared to her more recent offerings. Since Scarlet's Walk, she's had this habit of releasing very long albums where the songs tend to blur into one another. Sin is such a record, featuring only slight differences from her past efforts. In this case, the songs have a dark, progressive sound to them which is *almost* brilliant. But while this new instrumentation carries the music to a certain point, Tori fails to carry it the rest of the way. The album begins very strongly with the wonderful "Give" and ends just as strongly with "Lady in Blue", but in between it just falls apart.

All in all, it's not the worst Tori Amos album, but it's still missing the magic that made her first few releases so compelling.

I'm a huge Tori Amos fan, and so I tend to think her music is like pizza. Even when it's not that great, it's still pretty good.

The majority of the CD is good music, but there were a few that just could have been left out. They were boring and detracted from the rest of the music. This CD was the opposite of Little Earthquakes which left me craving more. Here, a basic 12 track CD would have sufficed. I've always liked that she would put so many songs on an album but that was when they all fit together cohesively and none of them were filler or felt like a silly little ditty she came up with in two minutes time while playing on the piano and then perhaps later fluffed up into some semblance of a song. That makes for fun B Sides, but not for a regular album. Her voice and pronunciation on CD lately has been different than live. Really, in her live shows she doesn't sound that much different from the older music. But in the studio she's really playing around with the sound of her voice and her pronunciations and the whispery and hissing sounds aren't doing a thing for me. She has a powerful voice, but I feel like she's not using it. She has always pronounced things strangely, and it was always an asset to most of her fans who liked her strange ways. To this fan, it's starting to become a liability. It's just a little.. "ex-tray" as should would say.

While far less important than the music, I thought the pictures in the booklet were very cool looking, but a bit overdone on the Photoshop. She's naturally pretty and well shaped, so I don't understand the need to make herself look like a wax figurine.

Few things in this world would stop me from being a Tori Amos fan, but overall I'm left wondering where she's going with her music. And though I want to follow alongside her into all the detours and byways she's taking in her music, I secretly hope she returns back to her roots one day and makes that Bosendorfer bleed! I don't expect every CD to be Little Earthquakes or Boys for Pele, but she has departed from the music that originally drew in so many of her long time fans, both sonically and in her lyrics. I enjoy this album for what it is, I think it is her best in the last 5 years -- but as an avid fan of 15 years, something still feels amiss. The raw piano and stark lyrics has been replaced by overproduction and a softer orchestral feel with the occasional one-liner that reminds you what she could be capable of. Or, in other words, she went from alternative experimental rock to adult contemporary that dabbles in rock.

For Tori fans put off by the fact that Abnormally Attracted to Sin didn't sound enough like Tori's earlier works, give this disc a few listens and I think you'll be surprised at how Sin sets roots and grows on you. One of the things I've admired about Tori Amos since the beginning is her ability to paint audio landscapes and create layered, evocative moods using sound; and she is true to form on Sin. Standouts for me are the gritty, slithering, ink-black haze of "Give," the smoky, palpably mournful lament of "Lady in Blue," the sneering, muscular rock of "Strong Black Vine," and the tender, earnest hope of "Maybe California." As someone who never quite warmed up to "She's Your Cocaine" or "Muhammed My Friend," I can understand people who feel the need to trim a few tracks from their playlist, but on the whole this is a strong effort from Tori on par with some of her best work. It might take a repeated listen or two to fully embrace Sin, but for me, it was well worth it.
As far as the bonus material, I didn't watch the DVD until after I played the audio disc about 20 times, so I already had my own mental imagery associated with each song. I wasn't quite sure what to make of the "visualettes" at first - but it's always fun to get bonus goodies!
On a side note, the sound quality of this disc is absolutely stunning. Even through my cheap earbuds plugged into my Dell PC, the layers of sound were almost 3 dimensional; very clear and textured.

I've been a fan since Little Earthquakes, and I've listened and read every high and mighty review of her work since then. I don't expect every album to bowl me over, or to be the next big thing....I don't want Little Earthquakes--the next wave or Under the Pink part two, I want lush background music and amazing, indescribable Tori lyrics. Abnormally Attracted to Sin hits that. Give is a lovely, lyrical view of a night dweller, Welcome to England is goregous, true Tori. Mission accomplished, and welcome back.

I recently went back to The Dent and read my online review of the first Tori concert I attended in 1998. The last three albums have found me drifting increasingly further from Tori Amos. I experience this with an inexplicable and overwhelming sense of mourning. The only traces of the woman who moved me so profoundly at that show eleven years ago are found within a paucity of tracks including "Give," "Starling," and "Flavor." There are some other tracks that work individually, but not as part of the tapestry assembled here.

Tori, I'm going to give you a little tough love here. You need to try something else. Take some time off and hopefully you will find new themes that inspire you. We don't need another album about the spiritual/sensual dichotomy. We get it! We get it! We get it! Move on. It's out there. We've been around this block three times on a tricycle. Teach us something else. Enough with the concept albums. We're still listening, but we're bored. How about focusing on a collection of cohesive and strikingly original music?

Collaborate with new producers. You might be surprised by the genius that emerges if you surrender some control and inject new blood into the system. Give Nellie McKay or Joanna Newsom a call. Get in that studio with some new faces. Maynard, Imogen Heap, Bjork, SOMEONE! Kick off your producer shoes for once. You continue to fall short on your own.

Cut it down. The Beekeeper couldn't be saved even if you did edit, but this one would certainly be strengthened by whittling down the number of tracks.

I love you. I really do. But I can't seem to find you from the other side.

I've given AATS many listens now. It has finally gained the repeated plays while driving that I hoped it would. I think a lot of the initial reviews were premature. I was doubtful before purchasing - having read many trade magazine reviews mostly complaining that Tori didn't have an 'edit' function to her production. Of the 17 songs, she could have had a much more solid record with a fraction of those songs.

I'm happy to disagree - although it did take some time to really embrace these songs.

I don't think Tori has sacrificed anything in regards to her songwriting or performances. If anything, she keeps evolving with her instrumentation and orchestration and constantly constantly constantly plays with her syncopations and timings which has ALWAYS keeps me listening attentively.

Regarding the instrumentation - AATS recalls (for me) a lot of Venus (which alongside Scarlet, is one of my favorite recordings). It's daring with much of its production. I think Posse touched on some of this but AATS brings it much further. She incorporates so much on this release. I'm still absorbing many little intricacies with each listen.

'Give' opens nicely with plenty of mystery from its steely production. 'England' recalls several first off singles of late from Tori (Fairytale, Butterflies, etc...) but is solid on its own. Again, syncopation is key here. She can take a 2 syllable word and nearly create a sentence out of it. Maybe some would think that's trite or a bit annoying. I see it as fresh.

'Police Me' is one of my favorites here - definitely recalling Venus. At once, completely creepy leading to a hopeful melodic altogether different chorus. Again, song craft has not been sacrificed at all here.

'Fire', 'Dying' & '500' are strong pop entries to Tori's elaborate catalogue.

'Black Vine' recalls 'Witness' and again, plays with timing while slamming some religion that only she can.

'Fast Horse' for me, reminds me of 'Virginia' & 'Marys of the Sea' being one of the final songs on the album that is quite strong and appealing.

No one should underestimate Jon Evans and Matt Chamberlain. They really fill out Tori's sound with each album. I look forward to countless more collaborations with these guys. They've really developed her sound just as much as she has herself.

I love the packaging this time too. It's quite grim with its hotel scenes. Very European and cold. At first I was a little skeptical that she'd have all these new characters to cloud the music - but at this point, I guess we should really be grateful for that. No other artist around is doing what she's doing - on her level anyway. No one else is quite as prolific as she either. Each release is so far different from the previous too. I never feel like I'm treading over the same ground with her. So I say - bring on the wigs. Bring on the characters. As long as she stays true to her creative vision - and she certainly has one of the most colorful creative visions I've ever had the pleasure of investing my money in.

Since 2005's The Beekeeper, Tori Amos has asserted that she puts a great deal more thought into songwriting than in the past. In terms of her own personal satisfaction and that of her closely held production and management teams, I'm sure the work has more than paid off.
It would, however, seem that her talent, both musical and lyrical, truly lies in instinct and her innate ability to translate the ether through symbolism and sound, rather than recent efforts to condense what could surely be a novel's worth of creative storytelling into exacting, four minute pop-rock tunes that often fall flat in tireless attempts to appeal to a broader sensibility.
Amos has always been protective of her private life, as well anyone in the public eye should be if they wish to have one. In her early work, she used abstract symbolism and the sheer power of her instrument to tell her stories and those of the characters she encountered in various trance states.
Beginning with From the Choirgirl Hotel in 1997, Tori slowly turned towards a more realist, novelistic approach that initially served her well but over the course of a decade which held motherhood, personal tragedies, and some hard battles fought with various corporate, and more recently, governmental entities, this approach and the forms it has taken, culminating in 2007's uneven high concept, rock-oriented American Doll Posse, has steadily lost fire and focus, as perhaps has Amos herself.
Abnormally Attracted to Sin is no less an overly long, overly produced and generally unfocused product of Amos' own neurosis, vanity and inability to view her own work objectively than its two immediate predecessors. Even her theological and political ideals seem to have lost meaning through constant repitition and uninspired lyrics.
This, being Amos' first album as an indepent artist it is an important one and could signal the beginning of a slow return to her artistic roots but this reviewer has a strong feeling it will take a serious depletion in financial backing and fan support to turn this ship around.