I Love Joni
Funny thing is, I once hated Joni Mitchell. Back in 1974, when Court and Spark was released, and Help Me found its way to the play-lists, I didn’t understand the song. I was 16. Didn’t understand the sax part. Didn’t understand the lyrics, the production, nothing. The first few notes of that song would send me into one of my juvenile classic rants of incoherent profanity and anti-whomever-was-my-target-at-the-time invective.
That all changed when in 1976 Hejira was released. The stations started playing Song For Sharon, which was amazing when you consider that it clocked in at 8:30! People can say what they want about every generation bathing in the nostalgia of their youth, but very obviously radio was better when I was a kid. In 1974, I was still in high school and hadn’t yet dabbled in marijuana. That all changed in 1976. That was the year that I gave in and decided to find out what it was that everyone was going on about.
I found out.
How can I ever know if the over all affects of an illegal drug were positive? When you take the left fork, you can’t go back and take the right one and have it be the same as if you’ve never taken the left. You now have the experience of the left, and the passage of time. So I can’t ever know. I do know that everything changed for me, and I believe it was for the better. I was able to see myself in a completely different light. I stepped outside of myself and looked in, and saw an angry, self-righteous idealist and no longer wanted to be him. I am what I am, and some might say I haven’t changed since then, but at least I saw it inside of me, and have tried to temper and mitigate those tendencies.
My best friend had bought himself a Camaro shortly after graduation. It boasted a pretty decent stereo for the time. My mind was now an open book when it came to music. I realized that I could like anything if I thought it was good based on the intrinsic musicality and artistry of the piece, regardless of my prejudices and preconceived notions.
It was one night in ’76 or ’77. We were on the ride which was what we called cruising the back roads of Nassau county in his Camaro after having burned one, talking about life and listening to music. Song For Sharon came on, and I must have told him to turn it off. He turned it UP, saying, “this is a great song.†As I did then, as I do now, I listened to the music first. Lyrics on initial auditions are ignored. I listened to the instrumentation and the melody, and I was swept away by the sound, the majesty of that record.
I learned perhaps a year later that the lyrics of that song seem to be about what many of her songs seem to be about, which is her personal struggle of being a free-spirited artist who longs for the intimacy of long-term relationships, but also fears them and finds herself doing things to sabotage them. Sad.
Over the years, Joni has become one of my very favorite artists. Her music is unique, and over time went from folk, to pop, and then to blues, world-music (some say she was the first to incorporate African music with western popular songs) and jazz. She is a creative and accomplished guitarist, a respectable pianist, and sings like canary. Her lyrics are literate, poetic, deeply personal and conjure up vivid images in the mind of the listener. Her songs are often melodically complex, and sometimes require repeated listens before their beauty can be completely appreciated. One song in particular that comes to mind is the title track from Hejira. It took a few years before I “got itâ€Â, but now it remains of my favorites.
She lost some of her creative spark after the release of Hejira, but taken as a whole, her work ranks with the best that the 20th century had to offer.
***
Originally posted 13-Oct-2005 over at my place.
Some after-thoughts 2 years later.
1) Joni’s early version of Both Sides Now (just her and the guitar) is one of the most beautiful pieces of music that I have ever heard. Lyrically mature, melodically gorgeous, and performed flawlessly - it is an early masterpiece. Listening to it is an organic experience. Apparently she didn’t share that opinion, so it was agreed to let Judy Collins take a whack at it. Listening to that record today leads me to believe that Miss Collins had not a clue as to the meaning or the sentiment of the song. Still, her version reached #8 on the charts.
2) As I’ve grown older, I’ve become more and more ambivalent toward the recreational use of marijuana. The last time I smoked it was about 6 years ago. It had become quite unpleasant. I’ve heard that happens to people sometimes. One day I woke up and asked myself, “why am I still doing this?” It made me feel very anxious and depressed. I ended up dwelling on my problems instead of getting a respite from them. While I don’t think it is a good idea to abuse any drug, (and for many years I did just that!) I can’t deny that there was some benefit (outside of the usual juvenile antics that one experiences, like laughing for a half-hour at your own stupidity of believing that you and your friend could actually pick up the illegally parked volkswagen beetle that boxed your mother’s car in its space and move it out of the way so you can get the car home by the promised time) from that abuse.
Age, kids, and cops will do that to you I guess.
***
Song For Sharon
By Joni Mitchell
I went to Staten Island, Sharon
To buy myself a mandolin
And I saw the long white dress of love
On a storefront mannequin
Big boat chuggin’ back with a belly full of cars…
All for something lacy
Some girl’s going to see that dress
And crave that day like crazy
Little Indian kids on a bridge up in Canada
They can balance and they can climb
Like their fathers before them
They’ll walk the girders of the Manhattan skyline
Shine your light on me Miss Liberty
Because as soon as this ferry boat docks
I’m headed to the church
To play Bingo
Fleece me with the gamblers’ flocks
I can keep my cool at poker
But I’m a fool when love’s at stake
Because I can’t conceal emotion
What I’m feeling’s always written on my face
There’s a gypsy down on Bleecker Street
I went in to see her as a kind of joke
And she lit a candle for my love luck
And eighteen bucks went up in smoke
Sharon, I left my man
At a North Dakota junction
And I came out to the “Big Apple” here
To face the dream’s malfunction
Love’s a repetitious danger
You’d think I’d be accustomed to
Well, I do accept the changes
At least better than I used to do
A woman I knew just drowned herself
The well was deep and muddy
She was just shaking off futility
Or punishing somebody
My friends were calling up all day yesterday
All emotions and abstractions
It seems we all live so close to that line
And so far from satisfaction
Dora says, “Have children!”
Mama and Betsy say-”Find yourself a charity.”
Help the needy and the crippled or put some time into Ecology.”
Well, there’s a wide wide world of noble causes
And lovely landscapes to discover
But all I really want right now
Is…find another lover
When we were kids in Maidstone, Sharon
I went to every wedding in that little town
To see the tears and the kisses
And the pretty lady in the white lace wedding gown
And walking home on the railroad tracks
Or swinging on the playground swing
Love stimulated my illusions
More than anything
And when I went skating after Golden Reggie
You know it was white lace I was chasing
Chasing dreams
Mama’s nylons underneath my cowgirl jeans
He showed me first you get the kisses
And then you get the tears
But the ceremony of the bells and lace
Still veils this reckless fool here
Now there are 29 skaters on Wolmann rink
Circling in singles and in pairs
In this vigorous anonymity
A blank face at the window stares and stares and stares and stares
And the power of reason
And the flowers of deep feeling
Seem to serve me
Only to deceive me
Sharon you’ve got a husband
And a family and a farm
I’ve got the apple of temptation
And a diamond snake around my arm
But you still have your music
And I’ve still got my eyes on the land and the sky
You sing for your friends and your family
I’ll walk green pastures by and by
Hejira
By Joni Mitchell
I’m traveling in some vehicle
I’m sitting in some cafe
A defector from the petty wars
That shell shock love away
There’s comfort in melancholy
When there’s no need to explain
It’s just as natural as the weather
In this moody sky today
In our possessive coupling
So much could not be expressed
So now I’m returning to myself
These things that you and I suppressed
I see something of myself in everyone
Just at this moment of the world
As snow gathers like bolts of lace
Waltzing on a ballroom girl
You know it never has been easy
Whether you do or you do not resign
Whether you travel the breadth of extremities
Or stick to some straighter line
Now here’s a man and a woman sitting on a rock
They’re either going to thaw out or freeze
Listen…
Strains of Benny Goodman
Coming thru’ the snow and the pinewood trees
I’m porous with travel fever
But you know I’m so glad to be on my own
Still somehow the slightest touch of a stranger
Can set up trembling in my bones
I know - no one’s going to show me everything
We all come and go unknown
Each so deep and superficial
Between the forceps and the stone
Well I looked at the granite markers
Those tribute to finality - to eternity
And then I looked at myself here
Chicken scratching for my immortality
In the church they light the candles
And the wax rolls down like tears
There’s the hope and the hopelessness
I’ve witnessed thirty years
We’re only particles of change I know, I know
Orbiting around the sun
But how can I have that point of view
When I’m always bound and tied to someone
White flags of winter chimneys
Waving truce against the moon
In the mirrors of a modern bank
From the window of a hotel room
I’m traveling in some vehicle
I’m sitting in some cafe
A defector from the petty wars
Until love sucks me back that way
Originally posted 13-Oct-2005 over at my place.
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December 29, 2007 at 6:31 pm
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