Joni Mitchell: Classic or Dud

lol

drove past a morgantown this morning and thought of joni

glad to hear that she is on the mend!

I love that he says, "She used to be my old lady" -- this was literally a term that ceased being used in 1970 but Croz continues to deploy.

glad to hear that she is on the mend!

Yeah, so stop bumping this thread so I don't think she's dead!

Get better, JM.

http://i.imgur.com/4aZ3mbZ.gif

Attorney visits her at home, says "remarkable progress...expected to make full recovery":
http://www.tmz.com/2015/07/07/joni-mitchell-medical-condition-improving-aneurysm-conservatorship/

I love that he says, "She used to be my old lady" -- this was literally a term that ceased being used in 1970 but Croz continues to deploy.

― Naive Teen Idol, Monday, June 29, 2015 10:08 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

perhaps a reference to "my old man"

xp "The Commodore is fine"

Bought Mingus yesterday on vinyl and it's great cover is supplemented by a nice book/gatefold type packaging with liner notes and more paintings. It's lovely.

Thread bump reminded me that she's going to die this year

thanks for that comment, really adding value there

Thirty of my favorites.

no paprika plains, no credibility.

i am exaggerating, i know, great list.

when I play "Paprika Plains" it's pleasant. I may have to keep trying.

on Facebook Tim F mused that my Summer Lawns picks bore the biggest similarities w/C&S, which wasn't my intention.

my no. 1 would be "the boho dance" but what do i know

i love blue and it was the first joni record i heard but yea court and spark is what did it for me too. this resonated w/ me:

A vinyl copy of Court and Spark borrowed from the A/V library did it: ten perfect songs that like their creator couldn’t make up their minds about being narratives, autobiography, journal entries, or reasons to flaunt exquisite woodwind arrangements.

the opening minute of the song 'hissing of summer lawns' makes my jaw drop every time. the sort of cool funk of the opening bars and the flute-like sound of her voice over the first few lines

the song that really first really sold me on her though, that doesn't seem to get that much attention, is People's Patties. Something about those harmonies. So bold and stark.

yes, people's parties is an all-timer, brilliant chord changes and the most perfectly recorded acoustic guitar i have ever heard

Prince obv studied the outro "eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee"

People's Patties

haha just noticed that

Dan Chiasson is a poetry critic for the New Yorker, but/and here his often astute, deftly detailed clarity evokes the musical experience, incl. why artists and listeners bother, so much better than many full-time music writers can manage:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/10/09/joni-mitchells-openhearted-heroism (title and sub a bit much, but may not have been his choice).

Some great reading, I didn't know that "A Case of You" was about Leonard Cohen. Has anyone read that new biography "Reckless Daughter" by David Yaffe already?

drew a map of canada, ooooooh canadaaaaaaaaa

The piece in New Yorker is great. I'd also recommend two more recent ones:

Chords of Inquiry: http://www.bookforum.com/inprint/024_03/18474
The Unknowable Joni Mitchell: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/11/the-unknowable-joni-mitchell/540618/

By the way, the fact that she released a run of Blue > For the Roses > Court and Spark > The Hissing of Summer Lawns > Hejira in just five years never fails to amaze me. What an artist.

i know this comes up every time a 2001-era ilx thread gets bumped, but ilx really was gross and vile back then, wasn't it?

Do you mean the discussion of her hotness?

For the Roses is the one I'm most likely to put on nowadays, partly just because I completely overlooked it before. "Do you wanna con-tact somebody first?"

morning, morgantown
buy your dreams a dollar down

XP - Cold Blue Steel & Sweet Fire is so great, one of my favourites.

I listened to Night Ride Home this morning; album title otm. top shelf album imo

By the way, the fact that she released a run of Blue > For the Roses > Court and Spark > The Hissing of Summer Lawns > Hejira in just five years never fails to amaze me. What an artist.

― ˈʌglɪɪst preɪ, Saturday, October 14, 2017 10:27 AM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

otm

The statement that "A Case of You" is about Cohen is speculation. Mitchell has never said who it's about, and it could just as easily be Graham Nash.

yeah but who would YOU rather bed?

I don't know anything about Nash but the Skakespearean line "I am as constant as the northern star" alone points so much into the direction of Cohen that it hurts. The bitter tasting wine, Canada, the line about love touching souls, it all makes a lot of sense. Thinking about it, it must be Cohen she is singing about.

I thought "A Case of You" was about James Taylor

or maybe she was singing about dr. pepper

Maybe it's one of the great songs of all time and I'm not worried about backstory

thank u ^^^

NV otm

Gotta admit that my stomach flips whenever this thread gets revived.

I've been thinking lately that I feel like there's been a sea change in my lifetime where people finally stopped thinking of her as "great female artist" in that asterisked sort of way and more universally accepted her as just great artist period. Not sure if that's the culture or just the maturing of my own social circles.

Yes and no. We can't ignore what our simple male minds can just glimpse sometimes, like Chiasson squinting hard at some of the experiences she dealt with in her songs, incl. what it was like to be a woman on stage in The Age of Rock---a litte tyme trip here, brace yourselves (though that won't really work, I just tried it before re-reading this)
http://www.robertchristgau.com/xg/bk-aow/airplane.php

Agree with man alive - great artist period

great piece: https://www.theringer.com/music/2017/10/16/16476254/joni-mitchell-pop-music-canon

https://pitchfork.com/thepitch/joni-mitchell-rarities-are-just-that-rare-here-are-some-of-the-best/

digging this tyler

i had never heard "hunter" - so good!

and that acoustic "edith," wow