|
Baltimore was co-written by Tori's brother Michael in 1980 in response to a Baltimore city contest to come up with a theme song for the city. Tori was awarded a Citation from the Mayor of Baltimore for "the splendid quality of public service you have rendered" for her tribute to the Orioles baseball team.
Tori has performed two lines of this song live, in-concert before Talula during the Dew Drop Inn Tour in Amsterdam, Holland on March 16, 1996. "Not Baltimore, you can't be serious. Are you serious? (plays two lines from song) For all the musicians out there, if you think you've done something fucking horrible, disgusting, that you never want heard..believe me, it will get heard."
"I'd have to hear it to know if it really was the Baltimore sessions. I did a song called Baltimore, I did one called Walking With You, and then I did a couple of other things around that period that were separate from that session. They were done in a church. Michael, my brother, was there - he's almost ten years older than I am - and I was about 14. Those were called, All I Have To Give, More Than Just A Friend, there was a song called Just Ellen and I can't remember the other one. I can hear it. The point is that I recorded a lot of things at that time. The "Baltimore Sessions" CD, I don't know if that's a tape that I did that day, or if it's an amalgamation of things done around that time. The thing I did at a wedding was something completely different - I was just being paid ten bucks to sing. The big requests then were Evergreen, We've Only Just Begun, The Wedding Song, you know. I did Baltimore in a studio, you know and I did the wedding things at a real wedding that somebody taped, probably with a terrible little tape recorder, and not just because of me, just taping the service. So it could've been a few years apart."
-- Tori; Record Collector Magazine, Nov 99
Amos, who has played the piano since the age of 3 and read music before she could read words, cut her first single this fall, Walking With You on one side and Baltimore on the other.
-- The Washington Post, Dec 1980
Q: Will the Baltimore single ever be re-released on a compilation album in the future?
T: The Baltimore single will not be re-released, of course not.
-- Tori, Prodigy Q&A, Sep 1994
I: Record Collector magazine in England listed a single that you did before Y Kant Tori Read, called Baltimore, which is changing hands for similar prices...
T: Ah. Ah. Yeah, I was 14 years old when I did that. I wasn�t even in puberty yet.
I: I�m sure the City Of Baltimore appreciated it...
T: Well they did, actually - they gave me a little award.
I: Have you still got it?
T: My mom has it somewhere. You know moms have that stuff. My mom�s so excellent. She is the coolest, she�s great.
-- Tori, Beat magazine, Jul 1994
Video stills from the Baltimore recording can be seen at The Dent.
|
BACK