Please Enjoy my Travel, Music & Ancestry Books on Amazon – FREE on Kindle Unlimited https://bit.ly/bookneal

Blue –  Joni Mitchell

Blue is in my top three albums of all time. It was not always that way, in fact it was a slow burner to say the least. I bought this album quite early on in my collection compiling. I gave that first copy away at the local record exchange. I just could not get into this at all. Joni helped me get my English Literature exam pass as I used ‘Big Yellow Taxi’ as inspiration for my essay. This was not accessible in the same way. I could not connect with it on the level I could with Tapestry or James Taylors music. They were all singer songwriters, but Blue was just too deep for me the first time around. My experience of life out in the big wide world was still pretty sheltered. The girls I had known were from school and they had tended to mother me, I seemed to inspire that reaction as a relatively naïve, innocent young man. I had not got the faintest idea what Joni was on about. Musically it was quite complex, the melodies ever changing and fighting to keep up with the words. This was an adventurous album, and I was not yet ready for it.

I clearly needed a reality check. That came soon enough and the emotions I needed to feel when understanding Joni Mitchell songs started to come, if not hitting me like a sledgehammer. So, I bought another copy.

There is no real argument about the status this album has in the history of contemporary music (Rolling Stone rates it No:3 of all time – but whose quibbling?), although some felt at the time and still do that she bared her soul too much. Some singer/songwriters felt she was wrong to pile so much pressure on them to also reveal what was in their hearts and minds. I love the way she wrote this album. We would not criticise romantic poets of old for putting their feelings raw on the paper so let us be thankful for Joni putting blood on the tracks.

The importance and influence of this album I feel is displayed by two songs that were it is argued written by others about Joni Mitchell (allegedly of course before you all write in). ‘Our House’ by Graham Nash was written pre the Blue album. It is a paean to domestic bliss. It has not stood the test of time and seems almost cringeworthy in its portrayal of an unrealistic scene that couldn’t possibly last. By contrast ‘Fountain of Sorrow’ by Jackson Browne was written post Blue and is deep and gets to the soul of a complicated but irresistible woman. Blue divides the two songs, and the effect of this album is clear. Singer songwriters had to up their game – some do, others are left sprawling in her wake.

This album isn’t just blood on the tracks, it is body and soul – she leaves nothing for herself, no secrets to treasure. It is all here. The relationships may in retrospect be guessed at. There has been endless speculation and research these last fifty years. Which song is James Taylor? Which is Graham Nash? Where does Leonard Cohen fit in? Carey the ‘redneck on a Grecian Isle’ is in the public domain and a fascinating interview with Cary Raditz shows the friendship was a complicated and long lasting one. Having said that, ‘Blue’ really is all about gaining an insight into the mind, loves and losses of Joni Mitchell and how they can move us with regard to our life experiences. Really, we do not need to know exactly who the songs relate to. An album cannot be considered one of the greatest works of all time just on that level. Blue is so powerful because it reveals so much about the listener also. That is why it did not work for me first time around – I had nothing to reveal. If you have, if you have found just a fraction of the emotions that Joni works her way through, then the album takes on another dimension – it is about the listener also.

Listening to it 50 years on it has lost nothing – it will endure as surely as Shakespeare’s finest will endure. This album in many ways makes you feel that youthful age again, a pleasant dream through a time of loves, life and a sure feeling that you are glad you can still feel these emotions through this most beautifully written album.

Some of the emotions here are hidden in plain sight. ‘Little Green’ comes across as lightweight filler at first and can be skipped past by some.

Listen.

At the time not everyone was aware that Mitchell had put a child up for adoption. This is Little Green. Her sentiments in this seemingly innocent, gentle song are in fact heart wrenchingly powerful when you have the background. She reflects on the joys that her child will see and enjoy but reminds her out of reach child that there will be sorrow. She hopes her child has a happy ending. It is a contrasting emotion mixed in with her pouring out about her loves and where her life is now. She later returns to the now grown-up child in her song ‘Chinese Café’ which she pairs with the standard ‘Unchained Melody’. Her feelings of love for an ‘unknown’ child are still deep.

The album in the main deals with her romantic relationships. She commits fully and deeply and by her own admission a little too easily. Despite this theme there is also a thread, particularly in ‘All I Want’ and ‘Last Time I saw Richard’ where she also lets slip that maybe, just maybe, she really wants domestic stability. She wants to knit that sweater and maybe she is jealous of that bride of her former lover who has that dishwasher. It is extraordinary writing to convey a full range of emotions in so few words and do it so vividly. With ‘Last Time You saw Richard’ you are in a cinematic experience and fully absorbed.

These thoughts of potential long-term domestic love in ‘All I Want’ appear to be about her relationship with James Taylor. An unlikely possibility as Taylor was in the throes of a dangerous heroin addiction despite being in a most successful and creative high in his career. She was in deep though, her writing here is dreamy, unrealistic but it is how she is feeling, she cannot stop this pouring out. It was not to be but here she is writing more in the present or immediate future tense, love endures.

The same is true with ‘River’, one of her finest compositions. She wrenches all her emotions out in this one and you feel the pain, the loss, the regret, that she bleeds onto the vinyl. The simple, almost one finger piano intro leads to her spreading her heartbreak down this icy river. Her voice soars in that Joni way, conveying pain and a cry for help. What did she do to drive him away – why did he cry at her actions. Well, she was hard to deal with, selfish, moody. She tells us and she has lost her best man. She has got to Christmas but there is no one there. A great song but the vocal stretches the emotion further than mere words. A classic.

‘A Case of You’ may be about her relationship with Leonard Cohen. If it is then it was an impossible one, but she was going there even though the warning from his ‘female relative’ who had his features was to be prepared for the real dangers to her emotions. She would be hurt for sure but she was drawn and could not resist – trapped but happy to go there.

The song that stands out to many is ‘Carey’. Here as in the connected song ‘California’ there is pure joy about where she has been and loved. Gentle resentment also, she was not totally treated well, but she had found a contrast to her life in L.A. that appealed to her – she was herself here and not this emerging star in L.A.. The village of Matala, Crete, a chef in the local taverna, inspired this beautiful song. Again, it is cinematic, you can see it up there in the wide screen in your mind, the sun reflecting in the bay and Joni enjoying this fleeting release from her suffocating surroundings back home. Yes, he did have a cane, there was a Mermaid Café, he was a mean old daddy but he insists he was not a redneck. It is an experience that was unlikely and unexpected, she really should have been back in L.A. making music. Carey is an escape, maybe not a deep love, but he was an enduring part of her life, he came out of the cave and taverna and did not lose touch.  

And then there is ‘California’. Perhaps my favourite on the album. Simply because she passes through Paris and sits in that park, a city I love so much. I can see her on that chair. It is a final resonating moment on an album that takes you into her world, letting you go along for the ride, keeping those emotions on hand for future reference.

MORE OF MY VINYL COLLECTION CAN BE ENJOYED

Please Enjoy my Travel, Music & Ancestry Books on Amazon – FREE on Kindle Unlimited https://bit.ly/bookneal