Angry Alanis

At the request of the missus, I recently got hold of Alanis Morissette's "Jagged Little Pill" album. Now I'm not really a fan of Alanis, but I do know most of the songs on that album. I first heard the whole album from my sister who bought a cassette some years back. I never really paid attention to it since my musical tastes back then were more of The Eraserheads and Yano. So, just a round of listening to JLP (I think I didn't even finished it), and I never really quite liked it back then.

Well, years passed and "cassette technology" can be said as a has-been. One of my conversations with the missus led to the JLP album topic again, and she sounded like she'd really like to hear JLP real bad. Scouring for a copy of the album on the record shops was difficult, and no way I'm gonna buy from E-Bay (some E-bay sellers, those b*stards, mark-up the shipping/postage costs as additional profit). This forced me to look into the great big beyond called The Internet.

Thanks to the Internet I was able to download the whole album. I have to say that I got blown away immediately right after the "All I Really Want" intro ---especially with the crisp guitars blasting thru my earphones. "You Oughta Know," Hand In My Pocket," "You Learn," "Head Over Feet," "Mary Jane," "Ironic" ---Alanis' songs, as you may well know, are full of angst but the lyrics are so personal and real. Lyrics like "I heard your losing weight again, Mary Jane. I wonder who you're losing it for" makes you think, "Now how the hell did she came up with that line? And how in John Lennon's name did she insert it so delicately in that song?"

Pure genius, don't you agree?

I think when I'm in Manila next month I'll look for that cassette on my sister's drawer. I hope it's still there, and in good working condition. I've burned the songs to a CD but the cassette has the original album cover ---this makes it a keeper, like those mint-condition comic books that a college-buddy of mine named Eduard used to collect.

This album is a pure work of art: angst plus honesty plus melody. I think it's up there on my Top-10 albums of all time.

"...And everything's gonna be fine fine fine..."