Alanis Morissette - Feast On Scraps [D1 Music]

Soon after the release of Under Rug Swept, Alanis Morissette followed up with a DVD/CD set, Feast On Scraps. The CD itself is a collection of songs that didn’t quite make it onto previous works, but they are all easily of exceptional quality.

“Bent for You” is the second song, and is probably one of my favorite songs currently of Alanis Morissette’s. The track has a vague Indian style beat, and the lyrics are typical Alanis quality. The title comes from the repetitious “I’ve bent for you and I am done.” Alanis is done with molding herself to meet the expectations of others, and done with trying to make herself fit into a relationship that wasn’t natural. She’s done with attempting to force a relationship, and she’s done beating herself up in the process.

“Sorry to Myself” runs on much of the same themes as “Bent for You”, with the key line of “To whom do I owe the biggest apology? No one’s been crueler than I’ve been to me. I’m sorry to myself. My apologies begin here before everybody else. I’m sorry to myself, for treating me worse than I would anybody else.” Alanis never ceases to amaze me with the depth of her lyrics, and “Sorry to Myself” was no exception. Alanis speaks of how she got so caught up in trying to take care of everyone else, that she denied herself in the process. She realized that she held herself to higher standards than she would to others, and is apologizing and forgiving herself for demanding a type of detrimental perfection.

“Sister Blister” is the feminist olive branch of peace. Many times Alanis captures the very honest and personal world and mindset of womanhood, and her music can be an inspiration and a fight for women’s rights and women’s esteem. In “Sister Blister”, Alanis touches on the sometimes all too true reality of women attempting to make it in a man’s world, but stepping on each other as well in their pursuits of success. “Sister blister we fight to please the brothers, we think their acceptance is how we win. They’re happy we’re climbing over each other to beg the club of boys to let us in.”

The idea of having a compilation CD of songs that didn’t make it on to previous albums might be scary for some, but I really do find this CD to be top quality. It doesn’t quite have the overall flow or thematic qualities that her other CDs do, but the songs themselves are top quality, and very much worth listening to.

The DVD is also a ‘feast on scraps’ as it’s a video scrap book containing home video clips, backstage footage, and live recordings all melded together fairly seamlessly. The audio is a little messy in some places, but they mentioned that on the case when I bought it, so I can’t complain. It’s pretty typical of a DVD with live concert footage, but still very good, and very interesting if, like me, you haven’t been to an Alanis concert. I haven’t been able to watch the DVD all the way through (you definitely get your money’s worth out of this one, because the disk is virtually completely filled) but what I have watched has been completely engrossing.

I think I paid a little under 20$ for the set, so it’s definitely a bit more pricey than your average CD, but with the amount and quality of material, I’d say the purchase is well worth it if you’ve got the extra change.

Suggested Listening:

Bent For You
Offer
Simple Together
Sister Blister
Sorry to Myself