Re: ToriBusting

[jeffy@syrinx.umd.edu (Jeffrey C. Burka)]

Gerald Hough writes

>In article <67893@apple.Apple.COM> jessica@maurolycus.rutgers.edu (jessica) writes:
>>lycaon@mace.cc.purdue.edu (Gerald Hough) writes:
>>>Okay, I just saw the Tori Amos video: Silent All These Years.
>>[...]
>>>And her in the crate I see as plagiarism of Kate's "Kick Inside" cover...
>>
>>plagiarism!?!? I don't think so.
>
>
>Kate comes out with a certain sound, very unique
>Tori comes out with a similar sound... okay, I accept that

EXCUSE ME?  What the hell is Tori's "similar sound"?  Other than the facts that
she uses a piano (oh gee, what an uncommon instrument) and she sings with
a woman's voice (god forbid a woman should sound like a woman), Tori Amos
sounds nothing like Kate Bush.  Open your ears and use your brain.  When I
first got _Little Earthquakes_ (right when it was released in the US), I
was expecting something very Kate-like, due to all the European reviews
we'd had here in r.m.g.  I was surprised to find that she sounded nothing like
KaTe.


>Kate's first album has, for promotional purposes, pictures of herself
> sprawled inside a crate.

a) don't forget that _only in the US_ does TKI have the "KaTe in a crate"
picture on the cover

b) was this KaTe's idea or her photographer's?

>Poof!  Tori's first "album"- in the sense that it's her first big album-
> video has her sprawled inside a crate.  It's just too close to be by
> chance.  If not plagiarism, then call it following too closely the steps
> taken by our beloved Kate.

Tori has said at least twice, as has been reported here, that the cover
of _Little Earthquakes_ (Tori in a box) was _not_ inspired by TKI.
The second time she said this, she stated that the original concept 
belonged to the photographer, not to her.


In any event, why do you feel the need to call this plagiarism and not an
homage?  Tori has very little to gain, at least in this country, from
using a Kate-like image on her cover--most of the people buying that record
have never even heard of _The Kick Inside_, and if they've any idea who
Kate Bush is, it's because of HoL, TWS, and TSW.

Jeff