INTERVIEW – Tori Amos Meets the Muses in Quarantine: Musician talks new book “Resistance”, bad days and wearing your big boy boots

In her second book, Resistance: A Songwriter’s Story of Hope, Change, and Courage, flaming piano queen Tori Amos shares her personal stories against a world-in-crisis backdrop and discusses how they’ve shaped songs from her three-decade career. She ruminates on personal and collective grief and traces her social and political activism as an outspoken LGBTQ activist, feminist and democrat back to Washington D.C. There, as a teenager, with a seat on the stage of a seedy political underworld, Amos played for immoral, powerful political officials; these men, she writes, were "laying the groundwork for a compromised future."
Recently, I spoke with Amos on the phone from her home in Cornwall, England, where she is quarantining with her producer-husband, Mark Hawley, and their daughter, Tash. On this afternoon, Amos was comforting and jovial as she talked about bad days, how the Muses (capital M, in Tori’s world) showed up one recent morning, where she falls on the Winnie the Pooh pantheon, and the healing power of licorice.
GayCalgary: Tori, I had a bad day yesterday and, to be honest, I didn’t think I was in the right headspace to do this interview. That feeling brought me to a part of Resistance, when you write, "I have looked up and out desperately talking to anyone saying, Help, please help – I am not prepared for what is in front of me." So, I put on my big boy boots today; you taught me how to do that.
Tori Amos: I’m so proud of you. It’s not easy for anybody. And yeah, I think everybody, Chris, in different ways because of different circumstances are being challenged.
GC: How are you being challenged?
TA: The unknowns. There are so many unknowns. One of the main things I’ve been doing since I can remember is playing live for people, whether that was as a little girl at church, then weddings and funerals, and then turning pro at 13.
First, gosh, and you know this story: first place that gave me a professional chance, a venue, was a gay bar (Mr. Henry’s in D.C.). And then from then on playing all kinds of different establishments. So not...