From: owner-joni-digest@smoe.org (JMDL Digest) To: joni-digest@smoe.org Subject: JMDL Digest V2014 #1449 Reply-To: joni@smoe.org Sender: owner-joni-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-joni-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk Unsubscribe:mailto:joni-digest-request@smoe.org?body=unsubscribe Website:http://jonimitchell.com JMDL Digest Monday, November 24 2014 Volume 2014 : Number 1449 ========== TOPICS and authors in this Digest: -------- Re: JMDL Digest V2014 #1448 [M Jones ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 24 Nov 2014 01:06:14 -0500 From: M Jones Subject: Re: JMDL Digest V2014 #1448 Joni always composes or paints with one hand while erasing with the other. She's at a point in her life, I gather from these interviews and this project, to assess the long arc of her career. You've pulled some quotes out of songs, but one could just as easily pull quotes out in which she's quite harsh on the music industry (Taming the Tiger, most of Dog Eat Dog, Free Man in Paris, For the Roses, most folks are familiar with this line of critique in her music) and songs that question the trappings of fame. In situations like this, I always have to remind myself to be a responsible cultural critic. JM is under no obligation to be honest, self-reflective, or consistent in her own assessment of her work. In fact, I think she (like Dylan) is sometimes masterfully and intentionally contrary with her own previous comments. "Nobody ever asked Van Gogh to paint 'A Starry Night' again, man." She's constructing her own mythology, and I find the things she says intriguing, infuriating, and perplexing most of the time. But the net gain of these interviews is a portrait of an artist whose relationship with her own fame is very complex. A woman who can claim to be anti-feminist (based on a very narrow experience of one type of second wave feminism it seems) and at the same time claim her place alongside men in the musical pantheon on grounds that her music is "raceless and genderless" is someone whose views ought to spur us to plumb deeper depths in her work. But, again, I think it's a mistake to read too close to the autobiographical bone. In doing so, you miss the best parts of the musical meat. The more interesting questions to ask are something like "What work does her music accomplish?" "What do these varied and contradictory stances on fame/fortune/the industry mean within the economy of popular music in the 20th/21st century? The other thing to keep in mind is that JM singing in the first person isn't necessarily Joni Mitchell. She has pretty consistently described her songs as dramatic roles or personae, and I think it's actually unfair to expect any artist to be the autobiographical "I" of their works in any easy, one-to-one way. It'd be like accusing Randy Newman of racism for singing the n-word in "Rednecks" or "Christmas in Capetown" or assuming the "I" in "It's Money That I Love" isn't meant to be ironic. We seek truth in JM's biography from the songs, but as she has wisely advised, it's better (and ultimately more interesting) to look for the ways the songs illuminate something about your own experience or our own experiences collectively.... This is all part of why we all love her music so much On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 3:00 AM, JMDL Digest wrote: > > JMDL Digest Sunday, November 23 2014 Volume 2014 : Number > 1448 > > > > ========== > > TOPICS and authors in this Digest: > -------- > re: The Interview [c Karma < > ckarma@hotmail.com>] > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Date: Sun, 23 Nov 2014 03:36:48 +0000 > From: c Karma > Subject: re: The Interview > > assumptions > and speculation toward interpretation that her work may have offered, even > some long held ones. I'm beginning to distrust whether I understand the > English language. > > Q: The poem has a line about "the gilded bait" of fame that so many of > these > stars desired. Did you ever feel like you took the bait?A: No. I've never > been > very ambitious. I never felt like I had any talent. I was a painter but the > musical and writing gift hadn't come in - even though that poem is pretty > precocious > Example 1:"I slept last > night in a good hotel. I want shopping today for jewels. Now me I play > for > fortunes and those velvet curtain calls. I've got a black limousine and > two > gentlemen escorting me to the halls." -- For FreeExample 2:"Up the charts, > off > to the airport. You're name's in the news, everything's first class. The > lights go down and it's just you up there making them feel like that....I > guess I seem ungrateful with my teeth sunk in the hand that brings me > things I > really can't give up just yet.""Oh the power and the glory. Just when > you're > getting the taste for worship they start bringing out the hammers, and the > boards and the nails." -- For The RosesExample 3:"I looked at the granite > markers, those tributes to finality, to eternity. Then I looked at myself > here, chicken scratching for my immortality." -- HejiraExample 4:"I was a > hopeful in rooms like this when I was working cheap. It's an old romance, > the > Boho dance. It hasn't gone to sleep. But even on the scuffle, the > cleaner's > press was in my jeans. And any eye for detail caught a little lace along > the > seams." -- The Boho DanceExample 5:"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." -- Song For SharonExample 6:"W.C. Handy, I'm rich and I'm > fay. > Why should I expect that old guy to give it to me true. Fallen to hard > luck > and time and other thieves, while our limo is shining on his shanty > street." > - -- Furry Sings The BluesExample 7:"I spot you through the smoke with > your eyes > on fire from J&B and coke as I'm coming through the door. I'm coming back. > I'm coming back for more!" -- Paprika PlainsExample 8:"Once I was blessed; > I > was awaited like the rain, like eyes for the blind, like feet for the > lame.Kings heard my words, and they sought out my company. But now the > janitors of Shadowland flick their brooms at me." -- The Sire of Sorrow > (Job's Sad Song) Example 9:"Sophia says, 'it's hard to catch and harder > still > to ride. The time to watch the beast the best is when it's purring at your > side.' Accolades and honors. One false move and you're a goner. I'm so > sick of this game. It's hip, it's hot. Life's too short, the whole > thing's > gotten boring. The old man is snoring and I'm taming the tiger." -- Taming > The Tiger > some > punctuation? Is all her experience out of body? Is all the self > observation > rhetorical? I have to believe that the second part of that answer was > given > in a temporal context, that she was describing herself and her head space > at > 16 when she wrote the poem. I'm not sure I buy the first part of the > answer. > Joni certainly knows about fame and its perils, to claim otherwise is > disingenuous.> > A: The two [songs] that stand out that people just hated were Ethiopia and > Moon at the Window. I still can't see what is so eccentric about those > pieces. > I think that work was closer to jazz than I have ever gone but I was > working > harmonically outside the laws of jazz. > I > think the list here could give Joni a more objective list of songs that > people > hate via our friends and relatives, if she wants one.> > A: You know I did an interview with a CBC commentator. I exorcised the > house > after this guy left. I smudged it and opened all the windows. Now it comes > out > that he has been fired from CBC. People kept saying, "What a great > interviewer." I didn't think so. After about the 20th one, I said, "What > did > you think was great about it?" That he couldn't knock me over? They would > look > stunned when I said that. To me, his behaviour was overtly hostile. > convivial, at least initially. Maybe she was warning this Canadian Press > interviewer? I don't think I've read her response to her own interviews > without getting defensive except for two Tavis Smiley and Cameron Crowe.> > Q: Your song Two Grey Rooms was another ahead-of-its-time song. Was there > pushback from the record company recording a song about one man falling in > love with another? > A: They always pushed me back but I take as much liberty as I can get away > with. That's why I'm not a feminist. When I heard, "You can't do that, > you're > a girl," I went ahead and did it anyway. > relationship between two men, you must be clairvoyant. It's language is > profoundly humanistic and the use of pronouns completely neutral, > regardless > of the story that she said inspired it. I dislike and would disagree with > any > attempt to hijack the song on behalf of any sex or sexuality. I seriously > doubt anyone at Geffen Records would have raised any such objection. The > question is asinine.> > CC > > ------------------------------ > > End of JMDL Digest V2014 #1448 > ****************************** > > ------- > To post messages to the list,sendtojoni@smoe.org. > Unsubscribe by clicking here: > mailto:joni-digest-request@smoe.org?body=unsubscribe > ------- ------------------------------ End of JMDL Digest V2014 #1449 ****************************** ------- To post messages to the list,sendtojoni@smoe.org. Unsubscribe by clicking here: mailto:joni-digest-request@smoe.org?body=unsubscribe -------