NOAH MICHELSON INTERVIEWS TORI AMOS
NOAH MICHELSON: Last night, before you played “Ribbons Undone,” you did a short improv about menopause.
TORI AMOS: A taboo subject.
NOAH: But one that you’re not afraid of?
TORI: No. Not anymore. That changed in the last year.
NOAH: What happened?
TORI: Women have been talking to me about aging and being different ages — and all ages have been talking to me about the stresses of their particular age. I was working with Paule Constable — one of the great lighting designers — and Rae Smith — they worked on “War Horse” — and they were talking about the fact that [menopause] isn’t discussed. I had long conversations with Rae, in stairwells, and with Paule, in the theater, and they would say to me, “You have to talk about it. You have to find a way to talk about it but in a way that makes it not about victimization.” Ageism is a real thing. I had to get my head around how am I going to — in the music industry, be in front of the camera at fifty; it’s not as if we — women — are seen as Johnny Depp and Brad Pitt where we’re just coming into our hotness. They’re leading men! There are leading women that are around my age, but it’s just starting to happen. You’re just starting to see that happen in the movie industry. But coming to a rock concert — [women] can’t be doing granny rock. We’re singing about emotions, we’re singing about sexuality, we’re singing about all these things. Whereas [there are] roles for Helen Mirren — who is the hottest thing I’ve ever seen — try and find her equivalent in rock and roll. We are having to carve that out for ourselves because you don’t go see some of my contemporaries, you don’t go see the Chilies [Red Hot Chili Peppers] and think They need to be doing grandpa rock. No! They’re virile men who are sensual and they can sing about anything. Our culture doesn’t see it that way [for women]. There are certain things, if you start singing about them — if you listen to the young girls, I hear them talk, “Oh! She looks desperate! That’s so desperate!” Whether you’re in your twenties looking desperate or you’re in your fifties looking desperate — desperate is desperate. But you don’t hear them say that about the guys! So, I needed to get my head around how I wanted to carve out the next fifty years. In order to grab it with both hands — to grab it! — I had to first go all the way into the projection from the culture.
NOAH: It felt like a part of the trajectory of what you’ve been involved in your entire life. [Your menopause improv] felt natural. The way you did it didn’t seem like you were doing it to shock. I was surprised by it, but it made sense to me.
TORI: There’s going to be more of that.
NOAH : There should be.
TORI: [laughs]
NOAH: But, because as you said, no one else is talking about this, do you feel an added pressure to take that on? Is this organic Tori Amos doing what she’s going to do or is this you saying “I’m going to lead the menopausal charge”?
TORI: No. You have to be organic. [That improv] wasn’t rehearsed. Not that something that’s rehearsed can’t be organic, I’m not saying that, but I think with the tour looming, I really don’t know what it’s going to be from night to night. There has to be a place where songs will come, conversations will happen.
NOAH: The thing that I loved about it was that you were making up this little song on the spot about needing your glasses and you didn’t just sing about getting older, you used that specific word — menopause. And I think that’s such a scary word for so many people and it conjures up very specific things: no longer being sexually virile, no longer being a woman — or at least being seen as useless in some ways in our culture. The fact that you went there—
TORI: In green leather pants... [laughs]
NOAH: In green leather pants no less! We don’t ever see something like that. I’m impressed.
TORI: It’s not an easy road. Menopause is a tough road and a tough teacher. Finding your own self-acceptance and sensuality within it is, well, sometimes it’s a real hunt. You have to dive in there because of the feelings that you’re having. All of the songs on this new record were written to deal with this stuff. There is a quiet, silent grieving that happens through menopause. It might happen in a way where you’re not aware of it but you can begin to lose memory for a minute — you can forget things — and you’re very aware that you’re going through a different process, a different phase of life. Until you feel it and you’re in it, you can’t imagine what it is. Trust me — until those chemicals are happening in you, you don’t know what that is. It’s easy to sit and feel quite confident about yourself, thinking about how you’re going to be in menopause, but that’s not how it hits you.
NOAH: I believe it. As a thirty-five-year-old gay man, there are twenty-something-year-old gay guys who are ready to help me pick out my casket.
TORI: Yes. So, it becomes about how do you find empowerment through [aging]? That’s been the reason I’m going out as a one-woman show. It’s not because I don’t love [my drummer and bass player] Matt [Chamberlin] and Jon [Evans], and it’s not because I don’t love the Polish quartet [that I toured with on my last tour], it’s because my [thirteen-year-old] daughter Tash looked at me and said, “Okay, I get it. I get the fifty thing. I get that the frontline record deals at fifty and up are given more to men than to female singer-songwriters. What are you going to do, Mom? Because if you don’t get your head around this, you’re telling me that I’ve got nothing to look forward to when I’m fifty. What are you telling me? That that’s it? Because the message is avoiding this at all costs and that’s what you’re telling me.” And she said, “That’s how you’re going to deal with it?” And I said, “No.” She said, “Go. Rock.” And the earth moved! And I looked in her eyes and it was real! There were tears in her eyes — “You’ve got to get this one, Mom, like you’ve never gotten anything else!” Because this is a demon. This is a fucking demon.
NOAH: That’s not just empowering for your daughter, it’s empowering for all of the people who have followed your work and who look to you as someone who is creating art that they find fulfilling and in some cases life changing. And I’m guessing the thought of you giving up that work is nothing short of devastating to a lot of people.
TORI: Menopause is a struggle. And it’s a pejorative. I’m not here to try and make menopause sexy — that’s not my message. My message is to feel empowered — and feel all these feelings while you happen to be going through menopause. It isn’t sexy but you can be sexy. So look it in the eye.
NOAH: And don’t let it defeat you.
TORI: That’s right. So, okay, if I’m playing a show, whatever I’m wearing that night, I might break out in a hot flash during the show and it’s not because of the lights. And what are we going to do? We’re going to have towels on the side of the stage and we’re going to fucking go with it. Because that’s all we’re going to do — there’s no other answer. If it’s going to be embarrassing, it’s going to be embarrassing. But to get to that point, you can’t think you’re going to defeat it — I will forget the lyrics. I will have the wrong glasses because I’m not losing my mind — it’s not early Alzheimer’s — but other people going through it will say, these are the symptoms. You find ways to get through it. I have to take fifty by the hand — hold hands and welcome it with every cell and say, “Show me fifty like I didn’t imagine.” Not that other people aren’t going through it, but show it to me in a way that I didn’t understand. It’s about asking fifty itself to open up my understanding, and then it’s about just being alive — being truly alive!