Tortured Alanis opens up to fun

Birmingham's Carling Academy seemed a small venue to host a seven time Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter.

Alanis Morissette sprung on stage dressed very simply in a striped sweater top with black jeans and her trademark wavy long hair, which flowed and glistened on a bare stage.

Her persona was that of the tortured young woman we all recall from You Oughta Know video, jumping and spinning around on stage. But I sensed she had lost some of that original bitterness she once portrayed, replaced now by confidence.

She began her set to rapturous applause with movie soundtrack single Uninvited, featured on box office hit City of Angels starring Nicholas Cage and Meg Ryan.

For a lady of few words and hardly stringing more than a sentence together during songs, she captivated and charmed her audience who were appreciative in their response.

The Canadian singer-songwriter who won international status with her debut album, Jagged Little Pill in 1995, becoming one of the most successful albums of all time with total worldwide sales estimated at 30 million copies, rocked her way through hits; All I Really Want, Hand In My Pocket, You Oughta Know, You Learn, Head Over Feet, and Ironic.

She continued with singles That Particular Time, Eight Easy Steps, A Man, all various hits taken from her other four studio albums, Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie, Under Rug Swept, Feast on Scraps and So-Called Chaos. She sang several songs from her recently released album, Flavors of Entanglement, including dark and moody track, Citizen of The Planet and new single Underneath.

She appeared comfortable and confident on stage with her band and more importantly, seemed to be having fun for the 90-minute set.

The packed crowd were thankful to see her back performing and were appreciative of her performance – showing her how much she had been missed.

Review by Nicky Butler.