Alanis Morissette: Sudden Fame at 21 Was 'Rough'

Alanis Morissette is reflecting on the challenges she faced as a young woman thrust into the spotlight after the success of "Jagged Little Pill" in the mid-ʼ90s.

The singer-songwriter was 21-years old when her breakthrough album was released. Now, three decades later, she has opened up about the predatory nature of the industry at the time, telling The Guardian that it was "a rough time."

"There was no one to hide behind," Morissette said. "What I found in terms of the lovely patriarchy, was that at that time, if men couldn't [expletive] me, they didn't know what to do with me."

"Jagged Little Pill" was Morissette's third album, but it was the one that gained widespread recognition and four Grammy wins. Despite this, the experience was far from easy. Speaking with The Guardian, she described herself as a "highly-sensitive" empath, which made navigating the industry difficult. The '90s were defined by the culture of hypersexualizing women, and it compounded her struggles.

"I have an anxious, depressive tendency. Those who are sensitive are much more susceptible to their environmental information," she said. "If you put a highly sensitive person in an environment where they're browbeaten or reduced, they'll basically want to kill themselves. It's the worst. If you put a highly sensitive person in an environment where they're supported, championed and listened to, they thrive."

Commenting on her peers, like Courtney Love, they seemed "secure in their loudness."

"That seemed to be valued. I was like, 'OK, I'm going to pretend to be an extrovert for the next 25 years.' So, tequila — anything that allowed me to be the life of the party — or if I was doing a talk, Xanax. Anything that would help me pretend I'm not me," she said.

Morissette has spoken candidly in the past about facing abuse early in her career, revealing in her 2021 documentary "Jagged" that she experienced multiple instances of statutory rape as a teenager in the music industry.

"I just thought it was my fault because almost every single person that I would work with, there'd be some turning point where the camera would go Dutch angle," she said in the documentary, according to Entertainment Weekly. "I'd just wait for it, like, OK, this won't happen in the first week for this one, but it'll happen. Sure enough, it would, and it would either end the relationship or then there'd be some big secret that we'd keep forever."

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