Alanis Morissette
Alanis Nadine Morissette (/əˈlɑːnɪs ˌmɒrɪˈsɛt/ ə-LAH-niss MORR-iss-ET; born June 1, 1974) is a Canadian and American[2] singer, songwriter and musician. She is known for her mezzo-soprano voice and songwriting. Morissette began her music career in Canada in the early 1990s with two dance-pop albums.[3][4][5] In 1995, she released Jagged Little Pill, an alternative rock-oriented album with elements of post-grunge. This album sold more than 33 million copies globally, propelling her to become a cultural phenomenon.[6][7][8] It earned her the Grammy Award for Album of the Year in 1996 and was adapted into a rock musical of the same name in 2017. The musical earned fifteen Tony Award nominations, including Best Musical. Additionally, the album was listed in Rolling Stone's 2003 and 2020 editions of the "500 Greatest Albums of All Time" guide.[9] The lead single, "You Oughta Know", was also included at #103 in their "500 Greatest Songs of All Time".[10]
"Alanis" redirects here. For other uses, see Alanis (disambiguation).
Alanis Morissette
- Canadian
- American (from 2005)
- Singer
- songwriter
- musician
- actress
1986–present
3
- Wade Morissette (brother)
- Vocals
- guitar
- Flute
- Harmonica
- Piano
- MCA Canada
- Maverick
- Reprise
- Warner Bros.
- Collective Sounds
- Rough Trade
Morissette followed up with a highly anticipated, more experimental, critically acclaimed album Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie, which was released in 1998. Under Rug Swept (2002) marked the first time Morissette being the sole producer of the whole album. Her first three internationally released studio albums topped the Billboard 200 albums chart and the rest of her albums peaked within Top 20.[11] Taking further creative control and production duties, Morissette continued her career with subsequent studio albums, including So-Called Chaos (2004), Flavors of Entanglement (2008), Havoc and Bright Lights (2012), and Such Pretty Forks in the Road (2020). Her latest album, The Storm Before the Calm, featuring ambient music, was released in 2022.
Morissette's singles, including "You Oughta Know", "Hand in My Pocket", "Ironic", "You Learn", "Head Over Feet", "Uninvited", "Thank U", and "Hands Clean", reached top 40 in the major charts around the world. She boasts ten top-40 songs in the UK, three top-10 hits in the US and Australia, and twelve top-10 tracks in her native Canada. Morissette also holds the record for the most No. 1s on the weekly Billboard Alternative Songs chart among female soloists, group leaders, or duo members.[12] She is ranked number 53 on VH1's 1999 "100 Greatest Women of Rock and Roll".[13]
With seven Grammy Awards, fourteen Juno Awards, one Brit Award, two Golden Globe nominations, and more than 75 million records sold worldwide,[14][15] Morissette was once referred to as the "Queen of Alt-Rock Angst" by Rolling Stone.[16]
Early life[edit]
Morissette was born on June 1, 1974, at Riverside Hospital in Ottawa, Ontario,[17][18] to teacher Georgia Mary Ann (née Feuerstein) and high school principal and French teacher Alan Richard Morissette.[19] She has two brothers: her older brother Chad is a business entrepreneur,[20] and her twin brother (12 minutes older) Wade Morissette is a musician.[21][22] Her father is of French and Irish descent, and her mother has Hungarian and Jewish ancestry.[23][24] On an episode of Finding Your Roots in 2024, she learned for the first time that her maternal grandfather had escaped the Holocaust in Hungary and had spent years trying to find his two brothers. Morissette didn't learn of her Jewish heritage until her late 20s. Her parents had never shared her maternal Jewish heritage because of the generational trauma.[25] Her parents were teachers in a military school and due to their work often had to move. Between the ages of three and six she lived with her parents in Lahr (Black Forest), West Germany.[26]
When she was six years old, she returned to Ottawa and started to play the piano. In 1981, at the age of seven, she began taking dance lessons.[27][28][29] Morissette had a Catholic upbringing.[30] She attended Holy Family Catholic School for elementary school[31] and Immaculata High School for Grades 7 and 8[32] before graduating from high school at Glebe Collegiate Institute.[33] She appeared on the children's television sketch comedy You Can't Do That on Television for five episodes when she was in junior high school.[34] Alanis composed her first song at the age of 10.[35]
Music career[edit]
1987–1992: Alanis and Now Is the Time[edit]
Morissette recorded her first demo called "Fate Stay with Me", produced by Lindsay Thomas Morgan at Marigold Studios in Toronto, and engineered by Rich Dodson of Canadian classic rock band The Stampeders.[36] A second demo tape was recorded on cassette in August 1989 and sent to Geffen Records, but the tape has never been heard as it was stolen, among other records, in a burglary of the label's headquarters in October 1989.
In 1991, MCA Records Canada released Morissette's debut album, Alanis, in Canada only. Morissette co-wrote every track on the album with its producer, Leslie Howe. The dance-pop album went platinum,[37] and its first single, "Too Hot", reached the top 20 on the RPM singles chart. Subsequent singles "Walk Away" and "Feel Your Love" reached the top 40. Morissette's popularity, style of music and appearance, particularly that of her hair, led her to become known as the Debbie Gibson of Canada;[38] comparisons to Tiffany were also common. During the same period, she was a concert opening act for rapper Vanilla Ice.[39] Morissette was nominated for three 1992 Juno Awards: Most Promising Female Vocalist of the Year (which she won),[40] Single of the Year and Best Dance Recording (both for "Too Hot").[41]
In 1992, she released her second album, Now Is the Time, a ballad-driven record that featured less glitzy production than Alanis and contained more thoughtful lyrics.[38] Morissette wrote the songs with the album's producer, Leslie Howe, and Serge Côté. She said of the album, "People could go, 'Boo, hiss, hiss, this girl's like another Tiffany or whatever.' But the way I look at it... people will like your next album if it's a kick-ass one."[39] As with Alanis, Now Is the Time was released only in Canada and produced three top 40 singles—"An Emotion Away", the minor adult contemporary hit "No Apologies" as well as "(Change Is) Never a Waste of Time". The industry considered it a commercial failure since it sold only a little more than half the copies of her first album.[38][42] With her two-album deal with MCA Records Canada complete, Morissette was left without a major label contract.
1993–1997: Jagged Little Pill[edit]
In 1993, Morissette's publisher Leeds Levy at MCA Music Publishing introduced her to manager Scott Welch.[43] Welch told HitQuarters he was impressed by her "spectacular voice", her character and her lyrics. At the time she was still living at home with her parents. Together they decided it would be best for her career to move to Toronto and start writing with other people.[43] After graduating from high school, Morissette moved from Ottawa to Toronto.[38] Her publisher funded part of her development and when she met producer and songwriter Glen Ballard, he believed in her talent enough to let her use his studio.[38][43] The two wrote and recorded Morissette's first internationally released album, Jagged Little Pill, and by the spring of 1995, she had signed a deal with Maverick Records. In the same year she learned how to play guitar. According to manager Welch, every label they approached, apart from Maverick, declined to sign Morissette.[43]
Maverick Records released Jagged Little Pill internationally in June 1995. The album was expected only to sell enough for Morissette to make a follow-up, but the situation improved quickly when KROQ-FM, an influential Los Angeles modern rock radio station, began playing "You Oughta Know", the album's first single, featuring Flea and Dave Navarro from the Red Hot Chili Peppers.[44] The song instantly garnered attention for its scathing, explicit lyrics,[38] and a subsequent music video went into heavy rotation on MTV and MuchMusic.
After the success of "You Oughta Know", the album's other hits helped send Jagged Little Pill to the top of the charts. "All I Really Want" and "Hand in My Pocket" followed, and the fourth U.S. single, "Ironic", became Morissette's biggest hit. "You Learn" and "Head over Feet", the fifth and sixth singles, kept Jagged Little Pill (1995) in the top 20 on the Billboard 200 albums chart for more than a year. Jagged Little Pill sold more than 16 million copies in the U.S.; it sold 33 million worldwide,[45] making it the second biggest-selling album by a female artist (behind Shania Twain's Come On Over).[46][47]
Morissette's popularity grew significantly in Canada, where the album was certified twelve times platinum[37] and produced four RPM chart-toppers: "Hand in My Pocket", "Ironic", "You Learn", and "Head over Feet". The album was also a bestseller in Australia and the United Kingdom.[48][49]
Morissette's success with Jagged Little Pill (1995) was credited with opening doors for female singers such as Meredith Brooks, Tracy Bonham and Patti Rothberg, and later Avril Lavigne and Pink.[50] She was criticized for collaborating with producer and supposed image-maker Ballard, and her previous disco pop albums also proved a hindrance for her respectability.[38][51] Morissette and the album won six Juno Awards in 1996: Album of the Year, Single of the Year ("You Oughta Know"), Female Vocalist of the Year, Songwriter of the Year and Best Rock Album.[52] At the 16th Brit Awards she won Brit Award for International Breakthrough Act. At the 38th Annual Grammy Awards in 1996, she won Best Female Rock Vocal Performance, Best Rock Song (both for "You Oughta Know"), Best Rock Album and Album of the Year.[53]
"Ironic" got the instant success, though the lyrics were heavily criticized for its malapropism, and the music video received 6 nominations at the 1996 MTV Video Music Awards, where it won Best New Artist in a Video, Best Female Video and Best Editing in a Video (won by Scott Gray, Editor), and was also nominated for Viewer's Choice, Best Direction in a Video and Video of the Year. Rather than perform that song at the ceremony, she performed Your House instead, which is homage to Joni Mitchell.[54][55] The song was also nominated for two 1997 Grammy Awards—Record of the Year and Best Music Video, Short Form[56]—and won Single of the Year at the 1997 Juno Awards, where Morissette also won Songwriter of the Year and the International Achievement Award.[57]
Following the album release in 1995, Morissette embarked on an 18-month world tour in support of Jagged Little Pill, beginning in small clubs and ending in large venues. Taylor Hawkins, who later joined the Foo Fighters, was the tour's drummer and Radiohead joined as the opening act in the summer of 1996.[58] The video Jagged Little Pill, Live, which was co-directed by Morissette and is about the bulk of her tour won a 1998 Grammy Award for Best Music Video, Long Form.[59]
Following the tour, Morissette began practicing Iyengar Yoga for balance. After the last December 1996 show, she went to India for six weeks, accompanied by her mother, two aunts and two friends.[60] The trip left her with an indelible impression and set the cornerstone for the concept of her next album.[61]
Acting career[edit]
In 1986, Morissette had her first stint as an actress in five episodes of the children's television show You Can't Do That on Television. She appeared on stage with the Orpheus Musical Theatre Society in 1985 and 1988.[122] In 1999, Morissette delved into acting again, for the first time since 1993, appearing as God in the Kevin Smith comedy Dogma and contributing the song "Still" to its soundtrack. Morissette reprised her role as God for a post-credits scene in Smith's next film, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, to literally close the book on the View Askewniverse. She also appeared in the hit HBO comedies Sex and the City and Curb Your Enthusiasm, appeared in the play The Vagina Monologues, and had brief cameos playing herself in the Brazilian hit soap operas Celebridade and Malhação.
In late 2003, Morissette appeared in the Off-Broadway play The Exonerated as Sunny Jacobs, a death row inmate freed after proof surfaced that she was innocent. In April 2006, MTV News reported that Morissette would reprise her role in The Exonerated in London from May 23 until May 28.[123] She expanded her acting credentials with the July 2004 release of the Cole Porter biographical film De-Lovely, in which she performed the song "Let's Do It (Let's Fall in Love)" and had a brief role as an anonymous stage performer. In February 2005, she made a guest appearance on the Canadian television show Degrassi: The Next Generation with Dogma co-star Jason Mewes and director Kevin Smith. Also in 2005, Morissette, then engaged to Ryan Reynolds, made a cameo appearance as "herself" as a former client of Reynolds' character in the film Just Friends. This scene was deleted from the theatrical release, and is only available on the DVD.
In 2006, she guest-starred in an episode of Lifetime's Lovespring International as a homeless woman named Lucinda, three episodes of FX's Nip/Tuck, playing a lesbian named Poppy, and the mockumentary-documentary Pittsburgh as herself. Morissette appeared in eight episodes of Weeds, playing Dr. Audra Kitson, a "no-nonsense obstetrician" who treats pregnant main character Nancy Botwin.[124] Her first episode aired in July 2009. In early 2010, Morissette returned to the stage, performing a one-night engagement in An Oak Tree, an experimental play in Los Angeles. The performance was a sell-out. In April 2010, Morissette was confirmed to be in the cast of season six of Weeds again portraying Dr. Audra Kitson.[125]
Morissette also starred in a film adaptation of Philip K. Dick's novel Radio Free Albemuth. Morissette plays Sylvia, an ordinary woman in unexpected remission from lymphoma. Morissette stated that she is "...a big fan of Philip K. Dick's poetic and expansively imaginative books" and that she "feel[s] blessed to portray Sylvia, and to be part of this story being told in film".[126] She appeared as Amanda, a former bandmate of main character Ava Alexander (played by Maya Rudolph), in one episode of NBC's Up All Night[127] on February 16, 2012. Rudolph officiated as minister for Morissette's wedding with both performing the explicit version of their hit hip hop song "Back It Up (Beep Beep)". In 2014, Morissette played the role of Marisa Damia, the lover of architect and designer Eileen Gray, in the film The Price of Desire, directed by Mary McGuckian.[128] In 2021, Morissette was featured as a recurring character on adult-animation show The Great North.
Other work[edit]
In October 2015, Conversation with Alanis Morissette features conversations with different individuals from different schools and walks of life discussing everything from psychology to art to spirituality to design to health and well-being, to relationships (whether they be romantic or colleagueship or parent with children relationships).[129] The monthly podcast is currently available to download on iTunes and free to listen to on YouTube.
In January 2016, she began a short-lived advice column in The Guardian newspaper.[130]
In May 2018, the American Repertory Theater (Cambridge, Massachusetts) premiered Jagged Little Pill, a musical with music by Morissette and Glen Ballard, lyrics by Morissette, book by Diablo Cody, and directed by Diane Paulus.[131]
Jagged, a documentary film about Morissette and Jagged Little Pill by filmmaker Alison Klayman, premiered at the 2021 Toronto International Film Festival before airing on HBO as part of the Music Box series of documentary films about music history.[132]
Opening act
Headlining
Co-headlining
