Joni Mitchell: Classic or Dud

Just noticed that both Joni and Neil are back on Spotify.

Yep. After Neil Young saw that Joe Rogan and his misinformation podcast was now available from multiple outlets and he didn’t want to boycott them all, he decided to go back on Spotify. Then Joni did the same.

'joni back on streaming' status update:

"sex kills" back in regular rotation, as the natural of things should be.

ps-
hi alfred. you defend "sex kills" for your reasons stated above (all of which are good) , but also because we all know it's some of her best work. ♡i heart complainy joni♡

What's bad from this era are a lot of finger-pointing songs about societal ills and the media. She'd written songs like this throughout her career, but at this point they became scolding and self-righteous.

total banger.

I don't mind scolding and self-righteousness when the groove is food.

And good food.

Is justice

Just.. ice?

Are notifications

Not if I cat ions?

I dislike "Sex Kills", me, but it does seem to me to be a rejoinder to/echo of Prince's "Sign O The Times", throwing some mutual respect back at the guy, which I like

Welp, Joni Mitchell appears to have changed the cover art to Don Juan's Reckless Daughter for the new reissue. pic.twitter.com/FejENxOJAw

— all_ages (@all_ages) April 30, 2024

Just surprised that a hand in a dog’s mouth was the culmination of 45 years of stewing on what must have been regret over the original cover

I imagine it is less regret and more her people went to her and said we can't put out a cover with you in blackface in 2024.

Wait, that’s her? I even own a copy but I guess I never really looked all that closely, just figured it was some guy.

The album jacket is a photomontage and includes three photographs of Mitchell. In the foreground she is in blackface as her "reputed alter ego, a black hipster named Art Nouveau".

The David Yaffe and forthcoming Ann Powers book go at lengths to describe wtf was on her mind (the Powers book best).

https://static.cambridge.org/binary/version/id/urn:cambridge.org:id:binary:20171016100701055-0366:9781316569207:68091fig18_1.png

tastelessness takes many forms. the new cover art is horrendous

I would've suggested an outtake from her "Skating on Lake Mendota, WI" photo session, but she already used one for the Songs of a Prairie Girl compilation. (Granted so did Hejira, but mostly for the inner sleeve.)

Kind of like this one the most though, with Joni mysteriously in the distance I'd buy that as 'Don Juan's Reckless Daughter.'

I might be wrong but the photo of Joni with the wolf/dog they superimposed on the original blue/orange background is actually from the mid-80s and not from the 70s? I think it's from a photoshoot she did with Norman Seeff (who also did the one of her skating on Lake Mendota btw) for Dog Eat Dog, almost a decade after DJRD? Such a weird choice. I mean, I'm glad they didn't use the original artwork but surely she must have some painting from that era lying around in the attic they could use instead? Or just have some nice simple typography over the original background?

Great, underrated album; deserves a better cover than the two it got.