She’ll be down

when the mountain lets her go

I cannot believe it’s been five years since this life-changing Swiss Bliss experience—in a way, it was what really started my touring hobby, and it remains one of my favorite shows I’ve ever seen her play. It predates my Tour Diaries, so this was written now, five years after the fact, and will probably read a little different than my other Tori write-ups.

Going to this show wasn’t a last-minute, but rather a very impulsive first minute decision. The line-up was announced sometime in December, just two months after the Gold Dust tour and the first time I’d met Tori—I’d made some friends in the fandom at those shows, and all those things combined to truly make me catch the touring bug. Long story short, I was in a lecture at Uni at the time, saw the announcement shared in one of the fan groups, immediately bought a ticket on my phone, and only much later checked where I’d be going (to be fair, I’d caught on to the Switzerland part, haha). The closest large city to Crans-Montana is Geneva, and I was lucky; a friend of mine was doing her Erasmus semester there, so I made an extended weekend out of it and stayed at her place. Direct flights were much too expensive, so I ended up having ridiculous layovers in Düsseldorf and Cologne. From Geneva, it was a two hour train ride to Sierre, and from there, a pretty scary funicular ride (the longest in Europe) to get to Crans-Montana at over 1500m asl, but the scenery was so worth it:

This was long before free roaming within the EU, so, having no way to get in touch with other people, I ended up waiting on the wrong side of the venue like an idiot. I eventually got a little suspicious at being the only one (…some hours later), and decided to circle the premises, where I found the tour bus and everyone else waiting. This was a pretty secluded place to get to (let’s be honest, it was bumfuck nowhere), so there weren’t a lot of the usual suspects there – perhaps a dozen or so. Despite it being a festival, we all just assumed that there would be a m&g, which seems ludicrous, looking back – but we never doubted it for a second. She sound-checked an entire set and, despite there being power generators that made it really hard to hear her clearly, we caught most of it. She played The Power of Orange Knickers, Putting the Damage On, Lovesong, Little Earthquakes, Smells Like Teen Spirit, Bells For Her, Secret Spell, Precious Things, Caught a Lite Sneeze, Crucify, Bouncing off Clouds, and Mountain, at which point we all died. She sound-checked five more songs, which she didn’t end up playing: Famous Blue Raincoat, A Sorta Fairytale, Curtain Call, Father’s Son, and Barons of Suburbia (which I still haven’t heard live to this day!). We got word from the crew that a m&g was supposed to happen any minute, and my group of friends collectively decided to not request anything and just let her do her thing, because we were thrilled with the soundcheck choices.

She met people in a little backstage area, and you couldn’t see her until you went up to her—I gasped when I saw her, her outfit was adorable, and the first thing I blurted out (mind you, this was my third time meeting her and I had a 50:50 track record of making a fool out of myself, so I was still pretty nervous then) was “you’re cute as a button!“. She was super lovely and really made me feel at ease, and gave me lots of hugs. We talked of my studies, I mentioned that I’d just gotten back from a West Coast roadtrip and that I’d loved the Grand Canyon and felt really connected to the Land, and I can’t remember what else.

As I gave her my A Piano booklet to sign, I told her that we’d overheard the soundcheck and that I wasn’t going to request anything because we’re pretty sure we heard Mountain, which was a thing that needed to happen, and that this would be the show everyone will wish they had gone to, and she just laughed, went “oh yeah!” and gave me my booklet back. I hurried back to the line for the festival (doors would open in less than half an hour by this point), and only then looked at what she’d written… it’s still my favorite signature to-date, despite the heart looking more like a pretzel 🙂

When the doors finally opened, it was pandemonium. There was this older lady who was there for Roger Hodgson, formerly of Supertramp, and she was determined to get to the front. It also didn’t help that the scanners refused to read our e-tickets (I jumped over the stiles and ran for it) and that the inside of the tent was a maze and we had to turn a few corners and run quite the distance to get to the stage, but I made it to the front row, keyboard side. As I recall, the stage was ridiculously high, to the point that I had a kink in the neck after the show, and there were some really badly placed amps right in my line of sight to the Bösey keys, which was a bit of a bummer, since I like watching her hands.

Other than Roger Hodgson, Israeli singer Noa was on the bill as well. I enjoyed both of their sets despite being unfamiliar with their stuff – although Noa sang some traditional Hebrew songs that I knew and loved because I grew up on Ofra Haza’s Fifty Gates of Wisdom, so there was that. The internet tells me there were other acts, but I assume they were on a different stage, because I can’t remember seeing anyone else for the life of me.

Since Tori was headlining, she was last on stage, at 11:30 PM—it was going to be a full 90 minute set! It was my first time seeing her solo, and almost the entire setlist consisted of songs I’d never heard live before. Bouncing off Clouds was a good opener given where we were, and had a few improvised lines, such as “wrapped in my love” and “about what you said—has it come to this?“. She usually drags it out to over 6 minutes whenever she plays it solo, but of course I had no way of knowing that then—this was a tight performance, under five minutes. I remember thinking that she probably chose it as the opener because it’s a song that showcases her playing two pianos at once—good to show off for the pit photographers!

Little Earthquakes was so good and the high notes so spot-on and crystal clear, it made me weak in the knees. Before going into (an apparently requested) Caught A Lite Sneeze, she thanked us all for coming to this “magical, incredible place”, and said she’d never played in the Alps before. CaLS was another tight, powerful performance, different to the versions I’d get used to on later tours! She threw in a line from Ellie Goulding’s Lights, too—”’cause they’re calling me home“, which was nice.

The next song was one of the highlights of the night – the conclave was going on at the time, and she threw a fantastic improv (or two) about it, starting with “there is a conclave close by / on the other side of us / somewhere / we have an old conclave here” as an intro to God, which was played to the tune of Tubular Bells. The next part of the improv was sandwiched between Running Up That Hill, and it was such a good mash-up, I got goosebumps: “so now / in this conclave / will they think about / a Pope who will not play around / with children / with children’s hearts and trust / and tell me now / that in this conclave / we may be honest about / the other men they’ve been close to before / will they be true / or will we have our own conclave here / amongst ourselves / our own personal Jesus here / Jesus is here“, while touching her heart on the last “here“. She was on fire, and this was the first elaborate improv I’d ever seen her do live—and it set the bar pretty damn high!!

It also started the God themed part of the set, since Crucify and Depeche Mode’s Personal Jesus were next. Crucify was the first Tori song I ever heard, the one that made me fall in love with her… and this was my first time hearing it live; I may have shed a tear or two! Personal Jesus was really fun and had a line of her own Body And Soul thrown in. Roosterspur Bridge was next—I suppose the Jesus lyric brought that connection on, because it otherwise didn’t really fit the set at this point. The keyboard sounded a little reminiscent of a harpsichord on it, too!

I was so thrilled when she started playing Take to the Sky next—that was the song I’d been planning on requesting before deciding to just let her do her thing after hearing that amazing soundcheck! It was powerful and a little playful, and I was thrilled that she included the Dātura bridge, I was really into that mash-up back then. I’d never really payed much attention to Twinkle before she played it at this show—it finally clicked for me on this evening, and it’s, in my opinion, the most perfect album closer she’s ever written, as far as reflecting back on the themes of the album goes (well, tied with Gold Dust). Concertina was an early favorite of mine when I got into To Venus and Back, and I was very happy to hear it—I definitely didn’t realize how much of a rarity it is – five years and 47 shows later, I’ve only heard it one other time.

The Power of Orange Knickers had a gorgeous extended piano intro and was beautiful… and then she forgot the lyrics and started improvising, but got completely sidetracked into a story about the time she found an iPhone on her drive home at night, which she meant to turn in the next day, except the police knocked on her door in the wee hours of the morning thinking she’d stolen it—it was absolutely hilarious (minus the gay KKK joke that I could’ve done without) and she looked positively mental while telling/singing it, it was glorious and one of my favorite moments in a show, ever… and the way she went back into Knickers still gives me goosebumps when I listen to it after all this time. Back then I really couldn’t stand Putting the Damage On, so this was the low-point of the show for me. I cannot believe I only just now picked up on the “you’re off to the mountain top” reference.

I’d never given Secret Spell a second thought, but much like what happened with Twinkle, this show made me see its beauty. American Doll Posse has some great songwriting that really suffers from the album’s bad production, but live those songs really shine. Bells For Her was was really pretty, I just wish the keyboard sounded more like the prepared upright piano, the sample always sounds kinda cheap to my ears. She seemed really into this one, singing a good chunk of it with her eyes closed, and she emphasized the “there’s nothing we cannot ever fix” line, first by whispering it, and then by repeating it where it wasn’t supposed to be sung at all. It was a touching performance.

Smells Like Teen Spirit was shorter than usual, but both delicate and raging, I really liked it. The piano intro to Precious Things was something completely different for a few seconds before it changed to the actual riff. It was a great performance until she changed the “girl“, which started out really strong and promising, into a screechy growl, which I’m not a fan of (although the crowd always goes crazy). That was the last song of the main set, and then when she came back for the encore, she thanked us for staying up this late and promised to wake us up now (it was close to 1AM!). She said that she’s never done it before, and it was the moment we’d all been waiting for—the solo live debut of Mountain, hands down the highlight of the night. It’s so obscure, she probably doesn’t have the lyrics written down anywhere… because I just refuse to believe that the correct first line is “bunny slippers“, haha. I always hear “run, he said“. It’s hilarious how the lyrics morphed though, and I loved it so much—the repetition had such a drive, and it really did get the crowd going, even though the only people who knew that song were probably all in the front row. She included the slow outro, and it was the first time she’d ever done the full song – and to this day, the only time. It was ethereal!

Lovesong is one of my top favorite covers of hers—I actually don’t think I was very familiar with it back then, but I remember loving it. In retrospect, I’m even happier to have heard it, because it’s eluded me ever since. I don’t think I knew who Running to Stand Still was by, either, but it blew me away, and was a really strong way to close the show, oddly enough. I’ve heard it an inordinate amount since, considering that it’s not a super common cover, but I think that this probably still remains my favorite version I’ve heard, although the one in Istanbul 2014 could hold a candle to it.

My after-show memories are fuzzy at best. I was both dazed and so full of adrenaline that I have faint memories of taking about 10 minutes to recover, and then chattering all the way back to the valley. We had to fight for a cab to take us back to the funicular, and I seem to recall that we barely made it in time before it stopped running for the night? The next morning, most of us took the same train back to Geneva and the airport together, and it was great bonding time—I met some of my best Tori buddies at this show, and it’s one we like to think back on often. It was one of those rare once-in-a-lifetime shows (the castle show in 2015 is another one that comes to mind), and is hands down one of my most cherished Tori memories ♡

Setlist Bouncing Off Clouds

Little Earthquakes

Caught A Lite Sneeze

God / Tubular Bells (Mike Oldfield) / Running Up That Hill (Kate Bush)

Crucify

Personal Jesus (Depeche Mode) / Body and Soul

Roosterspur Bridge

Take To The Sky / Dātura

Twinkle

Concertina

The Power of Orange Knickers

Putting The Damage On

Secret Spell

Bells For Her

Smells Like Teen Spirit (Nirvana)

Precious Things

Mountain

Lovesong (The Cure)

Running To Stand Still (U2)