“Child with a child pretending
Weary of lies you are sending home
So you sign all the papers in the family name
You’re sad and you’re sorry, but you’re not ashamed
Little green, have a happy ending…”

-Joni Mitchell – “Little Green”

I’ve been listening to far more Joni Mitchell lately than a man in his mid-30s should. This is especially notable as I’ve never been a huge fan of that class of very odd female singer-songwriters that Mitchell spawned (Tori Amos, Kate Bush and Joanna Newsom to name a few). But there’s something about Joni’s fabulous 1971 album “Blue” combined with the holidays that has had it featuring heavy in my musical rotation for the past month or so.

Let me make something very clear, I don’t really like Joni Mitchell beyond this album. I find her voice a little on the shrill side and the melodrama that goes along with her career a bit much for an artist that has, to date, produced only one excellent record. A couple of tracks here and there “Big Yellow Taxi” and “Both Sides Now” have caught my fancy along the way, but inevitably when I find the full length album that corresponds to the singles, I am disappointed. Here’s an example of my Joni Mitchell problem. I read an apologists positive review of Joni’s jazz period somewhere – would have had to have been a media outlet that I respect. I said to myself – self, you like jazz and you like Joni Mitchell’s “Blue” why not check out something from this period. I’m here to tell you that was a really bad idea – “Shadows and Light” is one of the worst albums I’ve ever heard. This is my problem with Mitchell, she’s just a difficult artist to enjoy.

But “Blue” is something special, one of those albums that just stands apart. It is melancholy, spare, fragile and beautiful. The songwriting is nothing special – ballads of love and loss – it’s all in the delivery. For one magical moment, Mitchell’s biting soprano, her odd guitar tuning, striving poetic songwriting and general weirdness come together perfectly. The first thing you note as a listener is the theme of loss throughout the record. I first connected with “Blue” at the end of a relationship – don’t remember which one, so it wasn’t that important of one but it seemed so at the time. Mitchell’s writing on songs like “A Case of You” and “All I Want” are perfect breakup songs. But there’s just so much more to the record and it gets better with every listen. I’ve written about “River” and Christmas. “California” is a wonderful testament of homecoming to the wanderlust expat. It was “Carey”, for various reasons, that inspired this post:

“The wind is in from Africa
Last night I couldn’t sleep
Oh, you know it sure is hard to leave here Carey
But its really not my home…”

And yesterday, “Blue” kept me sane. Frequent visitors to this site may know that we were having trouble getting Z to take the bottle. That’s gotten much better, but he still throws the occasional fit when I try to bottle feed him. Yesterday was one of those with much red-faced screaming (by Z) and grinding of teeth (by me). Music often soothes him a bit so I hit play on the iPod and what I got was the opening warbles of “All I Want”. I had my finger poised above the fast forward button as I thought that Mitchell’s vivid soprano might be a bit much for Z in his mood – but he quieted almost immediately. I rapidly found and played him the rest of “Blue” and he was as happy as could be. I would like to say that he quietly drank the rest of his bottle, but that was beyond the power of this record and to be quite honest, I was happy with an end to the screaming.

“Blue” was an album that was going to definitely feature in Z’s musical journey, I just thought it would be a bit later. It’s kind of a mature album – both lyrically and musically, at least for a not quite four month old. I suppose that I should get used to being surprised by my son’s musical taste – here’s to many more surprises. And, after our bottle battle yesterday, perhaps Z thinks – like Mitchell of her Carey – that:

“Oh you’re a mean old daddy,
But I like you fine…”

If you don’t own “Blue” then you really should. It is available from Joni Mitchell - Blue and Amazon or your local independent record store.

 
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