It’s hard to get to grips with this one. Joined by guest artists
Billy Idol, Tom Petty, Don Henley and Willie Nelson, this is very much a
record of its era. And, like Dog Eat Dog, sounds unremarkable when
compared with her other work.
There are some things – such as Mitchell’s decision to jazzily segue
into the Righteous Brothers’ Unchained Melody – that will remain for
ever baffling. Is any Mitchell fan truly comfortable with her 80s output? That is a rhetorical question, of course – please don’t tweet me.
What begins promisingly (opening track Sunny Sunday is a reminder of
her 70s work) soon disappoints with rhymes as basic as “And the oil
spills / And sex kills.” That said, it won a Grammy for best pop album.
Make of that what you will.
A sumptuous concept album that lacks, perhaps, her supernatural edge.
There is a smoothness to Mitchell crooning standards that seems
slightly at odds with the artist we know and love. That said, it is a
pleasant listen and her reworking of the title track, which she first
recorded on 1968’s Clouds, is a sage reclamation of a classic.
14. Taming the Tiger (1998)
The meandering melodies and layered voiceovers can be
discombobulating. But there is enough lyrical reflection to keep the
mega fans happy.
13. Mingus (1979)
If jazz – and, in particular, Joni’s jazz – is a challenge,
this isn’t the album for you. Recorded in the months before Charles
Mingus’s death, Mitchell’s 10th studio album is a total submersion.
Pre-Mingus, Mitchell said she was just dipping her big toe into the lake
of jazz. When she met the jazz giant, he pushed her in.
12. Night Ride Home (1991)
It may not be as compelling as Hejira, but there is still a lot here
to admire. The percussive rhythms and jazz inflections are there – but
the melodies are softer and her vocals are tender. More self-assured and
at ease with where she is.
11. Shine (2007)
After the release of 2002’s Travelogue, https://www.theguardian.com/music/2002/nov/21/artsfeatures.popandrock" rel="nofollow - Mitchell announced her retirement ,
only to return five years later with what many perceived to be a return
to 70s form. Said to be inspired by environmental catastrophe and the
Iraq war, Blue-era piano on its opening track, One Week Last Summer,
gave fans exactly what they were waiting for.
10. Travelogue (2002)
Revisionist albums tend to fail miserably. Not this one – her
orchestral reworking of her earlier classics soar with ascending strings
and bittersweet tenderness. Stand-out tracks are Hejira and Amelia –
stirring, soulful retellings of introspection and exploration that wash
over you.
9. Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter (1977)
Even compared with Hejira from the year before, this double album is
a leap ahead in terms of abstraction and improvisation. And although
not everyone is a jazzed-up Joni fan, it is impossible to listen to the
epic Paprika Plains (all 16 minutes and 21 seconds of it) and not https://www.theguardian.com/music/2014/oct/26/joni-mitchell-blue-hissing-summer-lawns-court-spark-hejira-dylan" rel="nofollow - marvel at the breadth and scope of her ambitious transformation .
8. Song to a Seagull (1968)
Mitchell once remarked that her chords are depictions of emotions,
that there is always a question mark to be found within them. To
understand what she means, begin with her searing debut – a record that
questions far more than it answers. The opening track, I Had a King, is
an ethereal lament that depicts her disastrous marriage to Chuck
Mitchell with devastating lyrical honesty. “I can’t go back there any
more / You know my keys won’t fit the door,” she sings. “You know my
thoughts don’t fit the man / They never can.”
7. For the Roses (1972)
You Turn Me On I’m A Radio was meant to be a sarcastic joke for her
manager, David Geffen, who challenged her to write a hit. The joke was
on Mitchell – it became her first top 40 hit in the US. Which aptly sums
up this outing. It is a record that can’t quite let go of its classic
folk roots, but features enough experimental jazz flourishes to remind
us that this is a metamorphosing artist who won’t compromise. And she is
on the move.
6. The Hissing of Summer Lawns (1975)
Mitchell’s follow-up to Court and Spark might have received a bit of a
kicking from Rolling Stone at the time of its release, but is now
considered a classic. There is a reason why Prince referenced it as a
major influence in the 80s. You can’t pin it down. Rejecting the
traditional structure of her previous work, Mitchell continued to
embrace a fuller band sound, exploring a wild and roaming jazz score
that finally severed ties with her folk past. If you want a real
adventure, check out Mitchell’s jarring synths and tribal drums on The
Jungle Line. It doesn’t mess around.
5. Court and Spark (1974)
See-sawing between folk-rock and jazz experimentation, with a pop
sensibility that soars, there is a driving power and momentum to
Mitchell’s double platinum offering that sets it apart from her previous
work. It is a confident and celebratory break-out. Yet, despite the
melodic abandon, it is a record that still wrestles with core Mitchell
themes: alienation and isolation; transient relationships; the need for
love; the desire to escape. “We love our lovin’,” she sings on https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4oY8ojxp_8" rel="nofollow - Help Me . “But not like we love our freedom.”
4. Ladies of the Canyon (1970)
Like her masterpiece, Blue, Mitchell’s third offering shows just how
rich and luscious her piano-driven arrangements can be – mournfully
played, yet always seeking the light. Equal parts forlorn and hopeful
with Rainy Night House and For Free, its lilting title track is a
glorious – and unashamedly romantic – tribute to the magical hillside of
Hollywood’s Laurel Canyon. Oh, and there’s a little-known track called
Woodstock thrown in there, too.
3. Hejira (1976)
This
is definitely one for the road, evoking a hunger for movement, a sense
of yearning and restlessness, that permeates every track. According to
Mitchell, the album was written driving across the United States between
Maine and Los Angeles. Amelia reflects upon the juxtaposition of
concrete and skies after a break-up (an ode to the wild wings of Amelia
Earhart – the urge to belong, the impulse to break free), whereas the
album’s title track redirects us inwardly with the haunting,
spine-tingling work of jazz bassist https://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/jun/22/jaco-pastorius-truth-liberty-and-soul-review" rel="nofollow - Jaco Pastorius .
1. Blue (1971)
When Mitchell packed her bags and headed to Europe, she sent her
lover, Graham Nash, a letter that read: “If you hold sand too tightly in
your hands, it will run through your fingers.” A diaphanous line that
painfully encapsulates the record she released the following year – a
psychic masterpiece of melody, rhythm and lyricism that pulls us into
Mitchell’s interior world using the urgent pulsations of an Appalachian
dulcimer. Widely considered to be the greatest relationship record of
all time (if not the greatest record of all time), Blue
expresses a refined truthfulness that permanently etches itself on to
the listener, to quote Mitchell, like a tattoo. “Ink on a pin /
Underneath the skin,” she sings on the album’s title track. “An empty
space to fill in.”
from www.theguardian.com