Seventeen years after Jagged Little Pill, Alanis Morissette has shaken off the title of pop's queen of angst. Her new album, Havoc and Bright Lights, is a thing of joy, writes Mark Sutherland.
"I remember touring America in a van and I’d be fielding all these calls," Alanis Morissette says. "'They want you on the MTV Music Awards'; 'You’re nominated for whatever amount of Grammys'. I felt like when I was awake I was dreaming, and I would will myself to sleep to try to get back to reality. I just needed to get out of this surreal existence."
It was 1995 and everyone wanted a piece of the young Canadian singer. Her breakthrough record, Jagged Little Pill, was well on the way to becoming the second-biggest-selling album ever in the US by a female artist, and to shifting 33 million copies worldwide. Only Adele’s 21, released last year, has come close to that figure in recent years.