PHOTOS: STEVE THRASHER | Alanis Morissette has been through a lot. Part of her power as an artist is never being afraid to use her life experiences as fuel for her art. While in the past that was mostly music and lyrics, Morissette has now taken it even further with a multimedia production that she describes as “Traumedy.” The seven-time Grammy winner has made history throughout her career, and now she does it again with a historic four-night residency (the venue’s first ever) at the YouTube Theater in Los Angeles.
Thursday, November 5, was the opening of “Butterfly With a Machete: A Rock Traumedy,” and the show was more than just a career-spanning experience. It traces Morissette’s life, going all the way back to her childhood in Ottawa, Canada, with parents who were teachers, and how being Canadian usually means not speaking unless someone asks you a question first. Which is why she said she didn’t talk to anyone for six months after moving to Los Angeles.
Part concert, part biography, part Broadway-style production, part on-stage therapy session, the evening featured a 25-song set complete with an intermission. While some songs were played in their entirety, rock concert-style, she used her deep catalog to set the tone for different stages of her life, sometimes playing the full tune as if it were a concert, and other times performing as if it were part of a Broadway musical. “Hands Clean” helped to illustrate an adult who obviously shouldn’t be with a young girl. During a segment in which she discusses her weight, she sang “Mary Jane” into a bedroom vanity mirror while seated, as different-aged images of Alanis were displayed in the mirror.
Through an arresting use of big-screen graphics, recreated recorded phone messages, videos with a young Alanis teaching her stuffed animals about life, interacting with actors depicting important moments in her life, and an old-school white marker board rolled out on stage, Alanis used her life lessons and life traumas to reflect on her growth, not just as a performer, but as a human being.
Morissette was supported on stage by her powerful band, six dancers, actors who played parents, doctors, therapists, ignorant music industry executives, sleazy record producers, controlling exes, and, fortunately, supportive collaborators. (Thank goodness, otherwise she might have pulled the f-bomb from “You Outta Know.”) But they weren’t all actors. The gentleman sitting on her couch as Alanis quizzed him to determine whether he was partner-worthy was her real-life husband, Mario “Souleye” Treadway. Popping up behind the couch were the couple’s children, Ever, 15, Onyx, 10, and Winter, 7. Morissette then segued into “So Pure.”
There was pathos, passion, humor, and a sense of community, as the audience sang, laughed, and connected with Alanis. While there were plenty of funny moments making fun of people from Morissette’s past, like getting called “Atlantis” early in her career, she may have saved the most humorous for the take on her megahit “Ironic.” Playing multiple characters on video and discussing the long-standing criticism of the song’s misuse of irony, Morissette poked fun at herself and the overblown backlash that still goes on, having the crowd howling with laughter.
Alanis Morissette is now 52. Having gone through sexual harassment, lawsuits, music industry issues, multiple relationship problems, postpartum depression, and most recently, menopause, Morissette feels she’s come out of everything even stronger. For her, menopause wasn’t a point in a woman’s life where she’s just a little cranky. For Alanis Morissette, menopause is a beautiful metamorphosis, like the one that transforms a caterpillar into a butterfly. But that metamorphosis came with a directness that allows her to cut through life’s challenges with a machete in hand.
