Editing Scarlet's Walk (section)

==Music and lyrics==

[[File:Wurlitzer 200a.png|thumb|upright=0.8|alt=Wurlitzer electric piano|In addition to Amos' trademark [[Bösendorfer]] piano, ''Scarlet's Walk'' featured extensive use of the [[Wurlitzer electronic piano|Wurlitzer electric piano.]]]]
''Scarlet's Walk'' follows the journey of the titular character across America after September 11, 2001, and the songs describe her encounters with various characters and facets of American life after the attacks. At the time, Amos' recent releases experimented heavily with electronic elements, with extensive use of synthesizers in place of her piano on many songs. ''Scarlet's Walk'' was a conscious return to a stripped-down sound, with Amos saying in an interview with ''Keyboard Magazine'': {{cquote|Scarlet came at a time when I had experimented with all forms of keyboards, from harpsichord to synthesizers to sampled things, and each album that I’ve done, I think has taught me something about a different facet of the keyboard world. With Scarlet’s Walk, it wasn’t about sampled sounds. I needed to capture the authenticity of the land, so I used instruments that weren’t a sample of themselves. And I was also trying to tap into that ‘great American road trip’. And the Wurly and the Rhodes lent themselves to that. But we were going for more of that classic songwriting, sonically nostalgic feeling.<ref name="Popmatters 20">{{cite web |url=https://www.popmatters.com/tori-amo-scarlets-walk-atr20 |website=PopMatters |title=Tori Amos' 'Scarlet's Walk' travels across land and time |last=Earp |first=Michael |date=1 November 2022 |access-date=30 November 2022}}</ref>}}

Additionally, she looked to 1970s-era albums as references for the songs' overall structures and sound, with [[Fleetwood Mac]]'s ''[[Rumours (album)|Rumours]]'' and [[Neil Young]]'s ''[[Harvest (Neil Young album)|Harvest]]'' being listed as particularly significant influences.<ref name="The Music Room">{{cite web |url= https://www.cnn.com/2003/SHOWBIZ/Music/02/05/mroom.amos/ |website=CNN |title=Tori Amos' musical journey across America |access-date=26 November 2022 |date=13 February 2003}}</ref>

"Amber Waves", the album's opening track, describes Scarlet's encounter with a porn star of the same name. The name "Amber Waves" is both a reference to a character from the film ''[[Boogie Nights]]'', as well as the lyric "amber waves of grain" from "[[America the Beautiful]]".<ref>''Rolling Stone'' (Germany), Oct 2002</ref> The song describes the toll the character's work has taken on her and how her dreams of becoming a successful actress have gone awry ("From ballet class to lap dance and straight to video").<ref name="Scarlet's Walk bio">{{cite press release |title='Scarlet's Walk' bio |date=2002 |last=Amos |first=Tori |publisher=Epic Records}}</ref> On certain occasions, Amos has integrated portions of "America the Beautiful" into "Amber Waves" in live performances. "A Sorta Fairytale", the album's first single, tells the story of the melancholy of Scarlet's experience taking a drive up the Pacific Coast Highway with someone whom she is in a failing relationship with. As Amos described in the "''Scarlet's Walk'' bio", a [[press release]] for the album, "They take the big trip in the classic car up the Pacific Coast highway and across the desert. But as they go on, the masks drop away and they discover the fantasy they have of each other isn't who they really are."<ref name="Scarlet's Walk bio" /> The Southern boogie-style "Wednesday" contains multiple short movements with varying instrumentation, including sections featuring a full band arrangement and [[wah-wah pedal|wah-wah guitar]], to solo piano-and-vocal sections. Amos described the song as depicting Scarlet's relationship with "a man who harbours secrets", extending the song's meaning to the peoples' trust in the ideals of America and how that trust is broken.<ref name="Scarlet's Walk bio" />

"Strange" is the first of many songs on the album to tackle the unjust treatment of [[Native Americans in the United States]]. The ''Scarlet's Walk'' bio describes this part of the character's journey as "[taking] her to the sites of some of the last stands of the native American people, including Little Big Horn. From there she journeys on through the Bad Lands."<ref name="Scarlet's Walk bio" /> The song was later released as a promotional single. "Carbon" describes Scarlet's meeting with a character sharing the song's name who suffers from [[bipolar disorder]].<ref name="The Journal News">{{cite web |website=The Dent |title=The Journal News - Searching for 'Scarlet' Through Letters |date=11 March 2003 |access-date=24 November 2022 |last=D'Giff |first=Ian |url=https://thedent.com/more.php?id=A234_0_1_0_M}}</ref> [[Skiing]] imagery is heavily present throughout the lyrics, with references to ski runs such as "bear's claw", "free fall", and "gunner's view"; both carbon and skiing are used as metaphors for the character's desire to partake in self-destructive behaviors ("carbon made only wants to be unmade"). The song experiments with [[time signature#Mixed meters|mixed meter]], frequently shifting between {{music|time|6|8}} and {{music|time|7|8}}.

{{quote box |quote=The CD's about America—it's a story that's also a journey, that begins in [[Los Angeles|LA]] and crosses the country, slowly heading east. America's in there, and specific places and things, [[Native American history]] and [[pornography]] and a girl on a plane who'll never get to [[New York City|New York]], and [[Oliver Stone]] and [[Andrew Jackson]] and madness and a lot more. Not to mention a girl called Scarlet who may be the land and may be a person and may be a trail of blood.<ref>{{cite news| url=https://www.usatoday.com/life/music/news/2002-10-30-tori-amos_x.htm | work=USA Today | first1=Elysa | last1=Gardner | title=Amos' 'Walk' goes in search of America's soul | date=2002-10-31}}</ref>|source=–[[Neil Gaiman]], author and friend of Amos |width=30%|align=left|style=padding:8px;}}

The [[a cappella]] "Wampum Prayer" also tackles the subject of the atrocities committed against Native Americans, with Scarlet hearing the voice and song of an old [[Apache]] woman, a survivor of a massacre whose site Scarlet has recently visited.<ref name="Scarlet's Walk bio"/> The song was used to open each night of the "On Scarlet's Walk" tour. Featuring prominent [[fretless bass]] playing from Evans, "Don't Make Me Come to Vegas" revolves around Scarlet struggling with a call from her niece who is being mistreated by a man she has committed to a relationship with. As Amos said in "Scarlet Stories", "it's one of those moments where, even if you have a resolve to not go to a place and do something, there's something that pulls at you, especially when you remember somebody as a little girl." The "Timo on Tori" remix of "Don't Make Me Come to Vegas" would become a dance hit for Amos after being released (along with other remixes of the song) as the album's third single in 2003. In "Sweet Sangria", Scarlet meets a "revolutionary-type character" fighting American intervention in Central and South America. While Scarlet supports the cause of the revolutionaries, she struggles to commit to violence against either side: "although she believes in the cause, she can't load the gun... It's about what you believe in and how far you're prepared to go."<ref name="Scarlet Stories">{{cite AV media |title=Scarlet Stories |type=commentary |last=Amos |first=Tori |date=2002 |publisher=Epic Records}}</ref><ref name="Scarlet's Walk bio"/> In "Your Cloud", Scarlet arrives at a monument mourning Cherokee Native Americans who were killed in the [[Trail of Tears]].<ref name="Scarlet Stories"/> The song revolves around the themes of separation: {{cquote|It's about separating that which you cannot separate, not really. There will be strands, there will be molecules. And taking those people from their land, the land of the ancestors. Taking a child away from its mother. That doesn't mean that there aren't pieces of that child still in that mother just because it's been, you know, delivered from her womb. Because a couple separates doesn't mean that there aren't pieces of him still in her.<ref name="Scarlet Stories"/>}} "Pancake" criticizes those who use their power to rally people for certain causes without fighting for said causes themselves.<ref name="Scarlet Stories"/> The song sees Scarlet encounter a "Messiah figure" who exploits his power and influence: "He doesn't uphold the values which he preaches. He's deaf to the real needs of the people and is becoming drunk on the kind of power which he once denounced."<ref name="Scarlet's Walk bio"/> Despite its apparent association with the September 11 attacks, "I Can't See New York" was written months earlier.<ref name="Can't See New York">{{cite web |url=https://thedent.com/more.php?id=A445_0_1_0_M |title=Travels with Tori |website=The Dallas Morning News |last=Clark |first=Rob |access-date=28 November 2022 |date=18 April 2003}}</ref> In the song, Scarlet witnesses a plane crash whilst on a plane herself, and experiences the fear and panic felt by a woman on the crashed plane before her death.<ref name="Scarlet Stories"/> "Mrs. Jesus" depicts Scarlet's encounter with a character of the same name; the song tackles the subject of religious fanatisicm and the effects of Christianity on America's history.<ref name="Scarlet Stories"/> "Taxi Ride" is a partial ''homage'' to the late make-up artist [[Kevyn Aucoin]], a friend of Amos's who died in May 2002, and served as the second single from the album. An on-line contest was held asking fans to direct and submit a music video for the song. Amos said of the song and its connection to Aucoin: {{cquote|I knew he was in a lot of pain, and he felt betrayed by people who weren't there when he was in need. Then everybody who shows up in his death can give a statement, but they weren't there in the trenches. His death brought up a lot of things in people -- some lovely and some despicable and disgusting. "Taxi" is for Kevyn.<ref name="Out 2002">{{cite magazine |magazine=Out Magazine |date=November 2002 |access-date=24 November 2022 |title=Scarlet Fever |url=https://thedent.com/out1102.html}}</ref>}}

{{quote box |quote=…when I think being around all these women who have all these different kind of… perceptions of each other and, you could say, some of them are intimidated by each other and some of them are envious and some of them... really kind of like the other one, but are afraid of being rejected, so they don't know how to approach them.<ref name="Scarlet Stories"/> |source=–Tori Amos on "Another Girl's Paradise" |width=30% |align=right |style=padding:8px;}}
Scarlet makes her way into Florida in "Another Girl's Paradise", a song which relates to the different dimensions of relationships between women, and feelings of envy and intimidation. The title track took inspiration from stories told to Amos by her grandfather, who she claims was Cherokee.<ref name="Scarlet's Walk bio"/> The song depicts the climax of Scarlet's story, where after meeting other characters during her journey and seeing their path, she has decided on her own.<ref name="Scarlet Stories"/> Amos has also stated that the song was written to expose the [[Indian Removal Act]] in 1830 and its stealing of Native American land.<ref name=Elle>{{cite web |url= https://www.elle.com/culture/music/a41425/women-political-songs/ |website=Elle |title=8 Female Musicians Talk About the Power of Political Songs |date=15 December 2016 |access-date=29 November 2022}}</ref> "Virginia" tackles the hypocrisy of a nation built on notions of freedom denying it to the Native American population.<ref name="Scarlet's Walk bio"/> The song personifies America as a young girl, and explores the concept of being able to warn it about the troubles that will come in the future.<ref name="Scarlet Stories"/> The song features McIntosh playing a [[Dobro]] [[resonator guitar]]. In the heavily orchestrated closing track, "Gold Dust", Scarlet has given birth to her daughter and has the experience of having another life depending on her.<ref name="Scarlet's Walk bio"/> Additionally, Amos has stated that the song is about "being other people and feeling how they feel", and how one's own personal experiences stick with themselves and create their story (Amos uses the metaphor of a "body map" in the Scarlet Stories commentary).<ref name="Scarlet Stories"/> The song was later re-recorded on, and lent its name to, Amos' 2012 album ''[[Gold Dust (Tori Amos album)|Gold Dust]]'', featuring orchestrated re-recordings of songs from her back catalogue.