Tori Amos

Tori Amos (born Myra Ellen Amos; August 22, 1963) is an American pianist, singer-songwriter and composer.


 * "The drug which had a big effect on me was ayahuasca. It comes from a vine in the Amazon and you ingest it. You know that stuff they take in The Emerald Forest? It’s like that. I was hanging around with some medicine women and they suggested I try it. I was very lucid, but felt like I was walking around Fantasia, having a conversation with myself. It isn’t like acid. It’s more emotional, more mental. But it can grab you by the balls and just shove you up against the wall.


 * I’ve been in a room with a woman who was literally trying to bite her own arm off. And this lasted for 15 hours. I wasn’t scared - just scared that I’d make a fool of myself. The funny thing was, I kept laughing and laughing, rather than sitting in the corner being intense. Then every so often, I’d say, I’m in a really rough patch. And one of the medicine women would come over and reassure me that everything was going to be alright. But it would keep on getting deeper. In the end, though, it was an educational experience. I learned a lot about myself. I haven’t taken it in a couple of years now. You can only really do it once in a blue moon. But the wild thing is that sometimes I only have to smell something and I’m right back there again, high as a kite. It just happens.


 * I’m really into moderation. Too much of anything will harm you in the end. Too much sugar. Too much pasta. I’m into drugs as a teaching tool, which is why I only take hallucinogens. I mean, it’s not like I’ve never done cocaine, but, on the whole, if I can’t see dancing elephants then I’m not interested." Q - May 1995


 * "I have used hallucinogens and I do sometimes still use them to journey to another space. I don’t use them to escape, but as a tool. And they have been helpful, but only because I have been working with people who have been in the Amazon and learned how to have visionquest. It’s the idea of going into your psyche and knowing it more deeply. It’s a complete wealth of information in there." On the Street - January 29, 1996


 * "Um... the most influential journeys I have had have been with ayahuasca, the vine from the Amazon, the combination of that and mushrooms. It’s very much a medicine woman, medicine man’s journey drug, where you go inside. It’s not a social thing. It’s an internal experience. I experiment with things that are usually an internal experience, because that’s just what excites me. And yes, it does sometimes give me visions. But my intention when I am doing it is very different than recreational. I don’t do it recreationally. I do it to go do inner work, and I’m very clear before I do it what I’m searching for. That way, there’s no abuse suffered and I don’t rely on it. It’s just one more tool that I use sometimes." Michael Pearce interview 1994