Amos taking advantage of the church's acoustics. For this album, Amos used the harpsichord, harmonium, and clavichord as well as the piano. The album garnered mixed reviews upon its release, with some critics praising its intensity and uniqueness while others bemoaned its comparative impenetrability. Despite the album's erratic lyrical content and instrumentation, the latter of which kept it away from mainstream audiences, Boys for Pele is Amos' most successful simultaneous transatlantic release, reaching No. 2 on the UK Top 40 and No. 2 on the Billboard 200 upon its release. Fueled by the desire to have her own recording studio to distance herself from record company executives, Amos had the barn of her home in Cornwall converted into the state-of-the-art recording studio of Martian Engineering Studios. From the Choirgirl Hotel and To Venus and Back, released in May 1998 and September 1999, respectively, differ greatly from previous albums. Amos' trademark acoustic, piano-based sound is largely replaced with arrangements that include elements of electronica and dance music with vocal washes. The underlying themes of both albums deal with womanhood and Amos' own miscarriages and marriage. Reviews for From the Choirgirl Hotel were mostly favorable and praised Amos' continued artistic originality. Debut sales for From the Choirgirl Hotel are Amos' best to date, selling 153,000 copies in its first week. To Venus and Back, a two-disc release of original studio material and live material recorded from the previous world tour, received mostly positive reviews and included the first major-label single available for sale as a digital download. 2001–2004: Strange Little Girls and Scarlet's Walk Shortly after giving birth to her daughter, Amos decided to record a cover album, taking songs written by men about women and reversing the gender roles to reflect a woman's perspective. That became Strange Little Girls, released in September 2001. The album is Amos' first concept album, with artwork featuring Amos photographed in character of the women portrayed in each song. Amos would later reveal that a stimulus for the album was to end her contract with Atlantic without giving them original songs; Amos felt that since 1998, the label had not been properly promoting her and had trapped her in a contract by refusing to sell her to another label. With her Atlantic contract fulfilled after a 15-year stint, Amos signed to Epic in late 2001. In October 2002, Amos released Scarlet's Walk, another concept album. Described