"But if you sexualise yourself and you're not making art, you are just sexualising yourself. Everyone's embarrassed. It's not very good, is it? You're just pooping on yourself."
Said Tori Amos, somewhere into the answer to The Guardian's question "Do men age more easily?" and right after saying "I won't talk about Miley Cyrus at the VMAs."
It's an interesting chain of thought, no? Here's how I visualize the thoughts of Tori Amos, in 11 steps:
1. To ask "Do men age more easily?" is to ask whether aging is more difficult for women.
2. Miley Cyrus — who's very young, but used to be younger and who's trying to gain credibility as woman and not a kid anymore — showed some awful awkwardness with that sexy dressing and dancing.
3. Sexuality can work, since obviously I've used sexuality well in my artistic performances.
4. I'm not going to get sidetracked into talking about Miley like everybody else, the topic here should be me, and when I think of self-sexualizing, I want the subject to be me, and this interview is PR from my artistic work product.
5. The most graceful way to retrack onto me and my excellent use of sexuality is to speak in the abstract.
6. Women have sexualized themselves and made great art which they may get flak for, but it's powerful.
7. The key is to unleash the power of self-sexualizing only when you can arrive at great art, which is what I have done and Miley has failed at.
8. All these artists, including me, have a powerful effect on young girls, who want to be like us, and this is a problem that I have a responsibility to solve.
9. If your self-sexualizing doesn't produce art, then the product is you — your body out there in the real world.
10. The self-sexualized woman out there in the world — not on the stage within the trappings of art — is bad... is shit.
11. Oh, my dear fans, do not poop on yourselves!
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13 comments:
If you want to end a Tori Amos interview quickly just say, "Kate Bush."
In any context at all. It's like Tori Amos kryptonite.
I used to listen to her way back when, then I made the mistake of seeing her live. For two hours, she masturbated on her piano bench. Yuk. Not art. I threw away all her cds and never listened to her again. From that day forward, my friend and I have referred to her as 'hoary anus'.
Do men age more easily?
The average life span for men is 7 years less than women.
The solipsism of women is a predictable source of humor. "Equality," to women, means "give me more."
Other than that thing about dying at a younger age, we men age so easily.
Anything else you little dears want?
And, what in the hell does it mean to "sexualize" oneself? Is she referring to "whoring?"
ST: The solipsism of women is a predictable source of humor.
Sayeth the #2 solipsist chez Althouse. (You'd have the gold if not for Inga.)
after reading the actual article, and seeing for myself the transition from "Women get lines on their faces and become rugged too, the Marlboro woman, which is fine but not an aphrodisiac," to "I won't talk about Miley Cyrus at the VMAs ..." i've developed a separate theory. in between the bolded questions that appear in the article, the interviewer was having a conversation with tori to elicit longer and more thoughtful responses. those parts of the conversation were probably edited out.
p.s. love tori's glasses in the picture.
I've never witnesses an artist who was so indulgent of her audience's need to emote and whine on a one-on-one basis.
It's a whole ritual, before or after her show.
I liked Cornflake Girl.
And she's always a great punchline as in Netflix's unbelievably good Orange Is the New Black.
Our 'hero' Piper says, "This is more depressing than a Tori Amos cover band.".
Honestly all her 2000s albums since the 90s have sucked. Now she's into classical music and it's a bit better.
Of course early Tori Amos ripped off Kate Bush's entire back catalogue for inspiration, but that's how it works right? I mean Kate Bush must have ripped somebody off back in the 70s right?
Tori piano bench humper Amos did NOT sexualize herself all that elegantly. There was just less competition. Courtney Love had a good defense of Miley and some blowback on Thicke.
If you watched the two hit vids of the summer, you can see what they were thinking. I thought thicke looked like a too-old-to-be-at-the-club, candy-striped doofus, but that's me.
When ppl pimp themselves hardcore, it cant last much past 20s - male or female. They have to change. Think of gay male twinks who max out at 22 or Robert Plant young v old.
I actually think Miley's phase is kinda innocent in a weird, dorky way...reminiscent of collegiate, inclusive environment of 18-22 rather than the more dark, hierarchical power version that comes after.
The sexual magnetism of men lasts a few extra years, but far more women than men have any kind of sexual magnetism at all. It's not a gift that is equitably distributed and, I would venture, the inequitable distribution of sex appeal causes far more bitter feelings than gradations of wealth........I think the problem with Miley Cyrus was not that she was too sexy, but that she tried too hard to be sexy. Her gestures were strenuous and overdone. I hope she does not dislocate her tongue and lose all sense of taste at such a young age.
The most awkward thing about Tori Amos humping the piano bench was when she kept doing it past the age of 40.
Short version: Sexuality used to get sublimated into art, and sometimes the art was great art.
But today we just have porn. Which gets right to the point, and thereby short circuits what used to be pathways to (sometimes great) art.
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