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| American Doll Posse | 
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| Artist: Tori Amos
Label: Sony
Category: Music
List Price: $24.98
Buy New: $10.95
You Save: $14.03 (56%)
New (39) Used (18) from $8.72
Avg. Customer Rating:  73 reviews
Sales Rank: 48688
Format: Special Edition
Media: Audio CD
Discs: 2
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 5.4 x 5 x 0.5
MPN: D708725D
UPC: 886970872522
EAN: 0886970872522
ASIN: B000OCZ9XM
Release Date: May 1, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 Yay! Tori's Edgy Again! May 6, 2007
11 out of 14 found this review helpful
Yay! She's back! American Doll Posse reassures Tori Amos's audience that she hasn't given up edge for easy listening.
I was afraid after The Beekeeper and more recently hearing "Big Wheel." However, there is no saccharine "Ribbons Undone" here, nor Tori gone country. Also absent are the choir singers, heavy Wurlitzer, and harpsichord on this one. Instead, the spotlight is on the piano, guitar, and drums, as well as Tori's voice. It's both a compilation of past styles and also a depart from them. This album is instead as interesting and varying in style as Tori's shoes. Its style harkens most closely back to Under the Pink mixed with Scarlet's Walk, which are my two favorite Tori albums. And although Beekeeper had a few awesome tracks like "Marys of the Sea," "Parasol," and "Hoochie Woman," it was overall not as distinguished as past albums, or as this album here.
Although Posse is supposed to be Tori's political statement against the war in Iraq and is pro-feminist (which is a given with all her albums), as far as politics goes, I personally felt that The Beekeeper had a far more obvious and sometimes off-putting political tinge to it ("General Joy" and "Mother Revolution," for instance) than this album does-the only track that I have to skip is "Yo George." It's strange, I know, to be kind of a conservative libertarian and a Tori fan these days, but I truly do enjoy these tunes and they aren't all scathing disses on our president. There is a lot of ground covered here, and the main theme is a person's character as an individual and all the aspects of that within, including the binaries of good vs. evil, light vs. dark. A person doesn't have to be just one dimension. We may not name all our different sides to ourselves "Pip," "Cyde," "Isabel," "Santa," or "Tori", but that doesn't mean they don't exist for us to, in our own ways. This album pushes this message very thoroughly and hopefully it registers with younger audiences.
Now, for the run down on each song (I apologize this is so long, but it's a long album, to be fair):
1. Yo George-tired of everyone ripping on the president. It's been said a million times already.
2. Big Wheel-catchy, bouncy tune-I picture Tori and Posse in 1800s western saloon. I think it would have made for a better video, but oh well.
3. Bouncing Off Clouds-LOVE this song. This would be great to listen to while driving on a rural highway somewhere. This would be a terrific single for radio.
4. Teenage Hustling-a rockin' roarin' track heavy with guitar that makes me think of late 80s hair bands, but in a good way (like Lita Ford). It's really catchy and really relistenable.
5. Digital Ghost-this one takes a few listens to sink in, but I like the line "the you I knew is fading away" and you can almost see that moonlight glow of the computer screen.
6. You Can Bring Your Dog-a fun boppy tune with sharp-as-a-stiletto lyrics. It makes me think, in tone, of songs like "The Waitress" and "The Wrong Band."
7. Mr. Bad Man-not sure what to think of this track yet, but it is one of the quieter tracks and her vocals remind me of "Agent Orange" and "Mr. Zebra."
8. Fat Slut-an angry little intermission song whose vocals reminds me of how Tori sings "I ordered you a pancake" from (shocking, I know) "Pancake."
9. Girl Disappearing-another song that takes several listens to absorb, and another quieter one.
10. Secret Spell-LOVE this song. It's piano-heavy, bouncy, and the lyrics seem to be speaking of Tori's early decisions in her career and changing them to be the artist she is today. This could easily be a hit single.
11. Devils and Gods-don't know yet about this one. I kind of tune it out in anticipation of the next track.
12. Body And Soul-parts of this song actually remind me of Garbage-who knew that would ever happen with a Tori song? It's another rockin', heavy guitar, heavy gritty voice song and I really like it. It's kind of sexy in its own way.
13. Father's Son-this could easily have been a track left off of Pink as far as the sound goes, it's a quiet song that subtly grows louder toward the end and has a lot of soft piano and cymbals. It gets stuck in my head in a hypnotic way.
14. Programmable Soda-this is a cute song that's bubbly and fizzy like its title, and way too short. I want to hear more of it, but it cuts off too quickly. It's this albums equivalent of Scarlet's Walk's "Wednesday."
15. Code Red-melodic and entrancing deep piano is what stands out to me most.
16. Roosterspur Bridge-pretty, lovely lyrics, and quiet piano-this album's answer to "Northern Lad."
17. Beauty of Speed-a quiet but fast paced track with wonderful lyrics. This would be another perfect track for your iTunes Road Trip playlist.
18. Almost Rosey-a quiet song with terrific lyrics that cut to the heart, with two personalities: one is depressed and one is trying to cheer up the other. Many people like me can appreciate this war within an individual-part of you is wanting to "curl up and die" and the other part is "chin up."
19. Velvet Revolution-I like it as an intermission song, but glad it's not longer than that
20. Dark Side of the Sun-not sure what to make of this one yet
21. Posse Bonus-I like this song! It's unbelievable catchy. I just wish it had more lyrics.
22. Smokey Joe-soft and gritty like chocolate toffee
23. Dragon-soft and pretty, you don't want the album to end, but "just stay awhile/stay awhile/stay a-while."
And if you have the iTunes version, you also get:
24. My Posse Can Do-sort of like a "Posse Bonus: Part Two" and very catchy.
25. Miracle-good, but does sound like an upbeat B-side, like the long-lost sister of "Secret Spell."
It's a long album, but goes by quickly. Highly enjoyable and recommended.
 The Return of Tori Amos : "Boys for Pele" Part 2 May 2, 2007
10 out of 19 found this review helpful
First - Forget about the packaging, the marketing, the 'five different personalities', and Tori's interviews about this new album.
Two - Keep it simple, and concentrate ONLY on the music contained on this CD.
I believe that is the way to approach "American Doll Posse".
I must state here that Tori's 'concept album' stretch was getting tiring. Of her last few releases, only "Scarlet's Walk" can be called a masterpiece. Her logic on "The Beekeeper" was vague and nonsensical at best - and when I saw three different interviews where she contradicted herself, I knew that Tori herself didn't know what "The Beekeeper" was all about.
That said, this new CD is a return to form (of sorts) for Tori. Its her most 1990s sounding album since 1999, and thats a good thing. In fact, it makes you realize even more just what an abomination her last album was, and what she is capable of.
Let me start with the positives, and the best songs.
There is "Big Wheel", the lead single and one of the three greatest tracks off the album. "Beauty of Speed" and "Girl Disappearing" come in second - they both have a very distinctive verse and catchy chorus, so this is a good thing. I would also count "My Posse Can Do", "Mr. Bad Man" and "Roosterspur Bridge" in this category.
But if I had to choose between songs and name the `best song on the CD', I would say it has to be "Girl Disappearing" followed very closely by the vastly underrated "Mr. Bad Man". The latter sounds like a Simon and Garfunkel meets The Beatles track, in terms of melody, and I just loved it upon first listen. The great thing about this new album is that there are actual TUNES and MELODY, which Tori had utterly abandoned on "The Beekeeper".
That said, there are certain drawbacks to this CD. The first negative is the inclusion of endless interludes (it actually brought to mind Janet Jackson's irritating habit of interludes on her CDs - but at least Janet used to call these `interludes' instead of parading them as full-blown tracks). The worst is perhaps "Yo George" which incidentally is Track 1 on the CD. This was a poor way of opening this amazing album, as "Yo George" is actually the weakest song on the entire album!
The second negative was the `five character' thing. It didn't work for me when I heard of the concept first, and it doesn't work for me now. In fact, it distracts from the actual music. So, I'm not concerning myself with it. I'm just listening to the music.
If I must categorize this album and compare it to Tori's earlier works, I would say that yes, it does bear a striking resemblance to her "Strange Little Girls" album (which is the most ill-conceived project in her catalog) - because all her `personalities' are playing dress-up, but in terms of sheer music and lyrics, this is a mirror-reflection of her 1996 masterpiece "Boys for Pele" (which I consider Toris' greatest album right after "Scarlets' Walk"). In fact, the instrumentation, pausing, lyrical content, vocal delivery, intonation and speech melody, all echo "Boys for Pele" so strongly, which is why I've named the review what I've named it.
I would encourage new listeners or even old fans of Tori, to put aside for a moment the marketing and the photos on the booklet, and concentrate on the music instead. What Tori has created here is for sure her strongest work in years, and some of the best production I've heard from her in a while (in fact, her "Girl Disappearing" has such amazing acoustic values that it blew me away upon first listen).
Listing Tori's greatest albums in a row would now look like this, to me :
5. From The Choirgirl Hotel
4. Y Kant Tori Read
3. American Doll Posse
2. Boys for Pele
1. Scarlet's Walk
Get this. You will not be disappointed. If you're a new Tori Amos fan or just curious, I would suggest buying this CD before checking the others out, because its got a little of all her albums in this as well.
Four Stars. Its good to see Tori making actual good music again.
Tori has returned! May 2, 2007
8 out of 19 found this review helpful
Tori is a commodity no doubt, but a genius artist. Her previous two albums had her meandering towards mediocrity, if you ask me. This album rocks and is as creative as she's ever been and has her voice as strong as ever.
She's back to writing songs AND music, with an energy and conviction not heard for awhile. Bouncing off clouds is gorgeous and emblematic of her return.
The rest is classic and musically as adventurous as she has ever been.
Tori rules once again!
 This Toriphile says Posse has mostly misses, few hits June 12, 2007
8 out of 9 found this review helpful
As a long-time ear with feet, I really wanted to like this CD, but the overall feeling for me is overwrought and disjointed. The arrangements and Tori's singing feels overly-earnest to me, a pleading "like me, please like me" quality to it.
However, I do give Tori an enormous amount of credit for expanding her musicality and trying different styles of music (spanish troubador, 70's glam rock) and adding guitar and strings. I think having a "musically full" sound is a good idea. But adding instruments and overdubs is kind of like frosting on top of a cake - a little bit is good, a whole lot is not. There was waaaay too much icing on this cake, and entire effect sounded overwrought, earnest and way overdone, especially the overdubs. I think this is going to hurt her, too, when she tours, as she'll be forced to do a lot of "karaoke" singing to taped background vocals.
Concept albums can be great; regretably, this one is middling. Tori has already channeled other people and created a cd from it - Strange Little Girls. This time with Posse, the results are actually worse, because for better or worse, it feels a bit like a re-tread of SLG.
In a way I feel sorry for Tori because she wants to be fresh, original, and cutting edge. I mean, who else creates characters on a cd and then gives them each blogs? At the end of the day, I could care less about the concept, it's the lyrics and music that will draw me in, and continue to make me play it again and again. And this is where the album failed me.
It does have some inspired moments - "Girl Disappearing" is beautiful, "Digital Ghost" music is excellent (although the lyrics are lame, lame, lame) and "Big Wheel" is bouncy and great - but most were disappointing.
Posse is like panning for gold - sometimes you find that nugget of gold, but most times you don't. And unless you're a major Tori fan, I can't recommend it.
VERY DEEP STUFF May 3, 2007
6 out of 13 found this review helpful
Not very often these days will you find an artist that is not out to just make a pretty song and make a quick buck but who actually puts them wholeself into the project like I think Tori has done in this cd.I love the concept that there are five different characters "Pip" (the warrior), "Clyde" (the vulnable character that works through darkness), "Isabel" (the historical character who sees different perspectives), "Santa" (the idea of sexuality), and of course the mother figure "Tori".Each song is credited to each of these characters as vocalists in the limited edition booklet.The cd is not something you can only play once and love or play only a song or two from and love..it requires a full listen and a couple of times at that and if you like Tori you'll love it like I do.It is VERY deep and you can tell she put her whole self into this project. Its worth the money! Pick it up!!
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