If you're the same generation as I am. Alanis Morisette was one of the brightest, young female stars of the 90s.
Crossing genre boundaries of pop, alt rock, indie and post grunge to touch the ears of people from all camps.
Her third studio album "Jagged Little Pill" made her a household name, with tracks like Ironic, Hand in my Pocket and You outta know getting as much airplay on international radio stations as they did in underground indie clubs. It went on to sell 33 million copies worldwide and featured in movie soundtracks and break-up tapes/CDs/mp3s everywhere.
Then as quickly as she had found mainstream success, she seemed to fade from the public eye.
So what happened?
Born in Ottawa Canada on June 1st she was youngest, by 12 minutes, of twins. She started to play piano at age 6 and had written her first song at 10.
She recorded a demo , "Fate stay with me" in 1987 aged 13 and was finally signed, 4 years later, by MCA records. Her debut self titled album was released in Canada in 1991. Her second album "Now is the time" was released in 1992, also only in Canada, despite her first album going platinum.
From 1993 to 1996 Morisette moved to Toronto and wrote Jagged Little Pill, which was released internationally by Maverick records.
There followed an 18 month your to promote the release, (for which the late Taylor Hawkins of Foo Fighters fame was the drummer).
Burned out from extensive touring, Morisette took a pilgrimage of sorts to India to pursue her new found interest in Iyengar Yoga. In much the same way as the Beatles where influenced (white album), her time in India had a great Impact on her song writing that culminated in "Supposed former infatuation junkie" released in '98.
Infatuation Junkie underperformed massively compared to her more mainstream Jagged Little Pill and fans began to drift away, unhappy by her new musical direction.
Undeterred she went on to release a further 6 studio albums (7 if you include the 10 year anniversary celebratory acoustic version of Jagged Little Pill).
Her latest studio album "The Storm before the calm" was released by Epiphany and RCA June 2022 and is an electro meditation/ambient project.
It wasn't all music and plain sailing over the last 30 years for Alanis Morisette though.
Breakups were said to have fueled both "Jagged little pill" and "Flavours of Entanglement". The former rumoured to be after braking up with Dave Coulier, while the latter after ending a 3 year engagement with Ryan Reynolds.
She suffered from eating disorders and depression in her teenage years, triggered by among other things, instances of statutory rape that occurred within the music business.
She eventually found happiness and married rapper Souleye Treadway in 2010 and the couple have two sons and a daughter.
Even during this time she was combatting post partum depression for almost a decade; and her then manager was sentenced to 6 years in prison for stealing $5 million from her.
However she seems pretty resilient and is currently still on a " 25 years of Jagged Little Pill" world tour with Garbage.
So despite being true to herself and following her drive and musical direction, she hasn't forgotten the fans, where it all started and what pays the bills!
Comments