About the artist: Tori Amos (1963) is an American singer-songwriter and pianist, and one of the most successful women in her genre. To date she has released 15 studio albums, many of which have received high praise. Tori Amos currently has eight songs in my list of about 200 best pop/rock songs of all time.
About the song: in 1992, Tori Amos released the album Little Earthquakes, a shattering debut following the footsteps of Joni Mitchell, Carole King and especially Kate Bush. This is truly a landmark album, one of my top ten CD's of all time. One of the albums highlights is China, a tender song which deals with the difficulties of commitment in a starting relationship ("Sometimes I think you want me to touch you... how can I when you build a great wall around you - In your eyes I saw a future together, you just look away in the distance"). The melody is probably the best she has ever written and the instrumentation is fantastic, sensitive and melancholic. The piano almost seems to cry, whilst the strings ebb and flow rising to a crescendo during the chorus before returning to the background. Run time 5:00.
