From: les@jmdl.com (onlyJMDL Digest) To: onlyjoni-digest@smoe.org Subject: onlyJMDL Digest V1 #276 Reply-To: joni@smoe.org Sender: les@jmdl.com Errors-To: les@jmdl.com Precedence: bulk onlyJMDL Digest Saturday, November 27 1999 Volume 01 : Number 276 The Official Joni Mitchell Homepage is maintained by Wally Breese at http://www.jonimitchell.com and contains the latest news, a detailed bio, original interviews and essays, lyrics, and much more. ------- The JMDL website can be found at http://www.jmdl.com and contains interviews, articles, the member gallery, archives, and much more. ========== TOPICS and authors in this Digest: -------- Re: Joni's VIVID story from PWWAM - VERY LOOOONG ["Raffaele Malanga" ] Today in Joni History - November 25 [Today in Joni History ] Re Thank You JMDL [Julian51469@aol.com] Re: Joni's VIVID story from PWWAM - VERY LOOOONG ["Catherine McKay" ] Re: Joni's VIVID story from PWWAM - VERY LOOOONG [Martin Giles ] Joni on the cover of RStone [Randy Remote ] and another [Randy Remote ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 26 Nov 1999 02:05:42 PST From: "Raffaele Malanga" Subject: Re: Joni's VIVID story from PWWAM - VERY LOOOONG Catherine, thank you very much for transcribing the Vivid story! I love the way Joni tells it, so much that now "Dull, dull, dull dear" (with *that* accent) has become my joke. As English is not my first language, there were parts that I really couldn't understand, but now thanks to you everything's clear! ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 Nov 1999 05:15:01 PST From: "Raffaele Malanga" Subject: Jarrett and other suggetsions Dear all, yesterday I was browsing in a second-hand record shop when I spotted a tape by Keith Jarrett. It was "My song" and I remembered having read something on this recording on the list. I bought it and I must say that it's great. Thank you for the advice, whoever and wherever you are. I though that I might give something in turn. If you got the chance, listen to a CD by Lhasa called "La llorona". It's the only CD she's done so far, and all my friends love it after I played some of the songs. As far as I know, Lhasa is a Canadian/Mexican singer (you might have heard of her through the Lilith Fair gigs), her voice is astonishing and full of passion, she sings in Spanish (with a very weird and nice accent) traditional songs as well as her compositions. Musically, the album is made of just acoustic guitars, percussions, voice and odd sounds (rain, etc.); the songs are sad, almost desperate at times, but they convey a good load of emotions. When I got the CD (more than a year ago) I just couldn't stop playing it and I still enjoy it a lot. Warning: It's contagious! Raffaele (in London) ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 24 Nov 1999 12:14:00 -0600 From: Today in Joni History Subject: Today in Joni History - November 25 1970: The Alberta Herald publishes a review of Joni recent concert at Royal Festival Hall, saying "Joni, 26, uses a guitar, piano and dulcimer, an ancient instrument, as accompaniments for her original songs which, The Financial Times says, express "the rather tarnished hippie dream in conventional words and music." Read the full article at http://www.jonimitchell.com/Herald69.html 1976: Joni joins The Band's "Last Waltz" at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. She sings backup to Neil Young on "Helpless" and with The Band on "Acadian Driftwood", performs "Coyote", "Shadows And Light", and "Furry Sings The Blues", and joins Bob Dylan, Van Morrison, Neil Diamond, Dr John, and others for the grand finale "I Shall Be Released." Photos and more information: http://www.jonimitchell.com/LastWaltz.html 1982: Rolling Stone publishes an article today in which Joni is quoted as saying "...when we started in this business, we were the ones who said you can't trust people over thirty. It was inevitable that we would eat a lot of what we said, because you have to turn thirty unless you wanna James Dean out. Now I'm finally hearing some good things about middle age. We need that. If all the war babies turn forty and get depressed at the same time, the world will not be pleasant." Read the rest at: http://www.jmdl.com/articles/rs821125.htm 1994: Joni makes the cover of this week's LA Weekly. Joni is quoted "My music is not designed to grab instantly. It's designed to wear for a lifetime, to hold up like a fine cloth. If you're in the right place, these records are waiting to go off in your life, you know. But if you're in the wrong space, which, luck of the draw, for the last 20 years I seem to have had reviewers in the wrong space...and I've been trashed for too long. The final insult is to watch my imitators elevated while I'm still being trashed. So if I don't get my just dues soon, I'm going into hermitdom. Fuck you all. (Laughing.) I'm going to take up my brushes. I don't care." How can you not read the rest? http://www.jmdl.com/articles/law941125.htm - -------- Know a date or month specific Joni tidbit? Send it off to JoniFact@jmdl.com and we'll add it to the list. - -------- ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 Nov 1999 11:38:40 EST From: Julian51469@aol.com Subject: Re Thank You JMDL In a message dated 11/26/99 3:03:04 AM Eastern Standard Time Vince writes: << all the JMDLers who have become my cyber family and my second home, a place that I go to daily for something worthwhile and meaningful....one turn of the kaleidoscope will happen when suddenly you see the pattern that has been hidden! And then you say, I see it, this is what we share, this is where we connect! >> Thank you for saying this so perfectly. Thank you for all of the wonderful words and priceless recordings that I receive from this family of mine. Thanks for being a home within a home, my brothers and sisters. Julian ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 Nov 1999 19:05:23 GMT From: "Catherine McKay" Subject: Re: Joni's VIVID story from PWWAM - VERY LOOOONG Mark says: >I'm guessing there may have been a flood in North Dakota, but I don't know >of any rivers that flow through it. Sandbags are used as an embankment to >stop flood waters. And there may have been the war (as in the Civil War), >so >this woman would to have been at least 100. About the 'negroes': maybe they >were trying to destroy the embankment or something??? My first thought was sandbags - flood. Then I thought it was possibly a Civil War reenactment of some kind? (Was ND involved in the Civil War? Did it exist as a state at the time? Maybe it was a 4th of July kind of thing and the woman thought it was for real?) I think the woman was older, but not that old (like over 100). On the other hand, maybe she was just nutty! All other evidence seems to suggest that she was a bit, uh, different. Catherine (in Toronto) cateri@hotmail.com ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 Nov 1999 19:08:34 GMT From: "Catherine McKay" Subject: Re: VIVID - Minot, North Dakota Brett says: >I think the town in N.D. is Minot. I was there once as a boy. An >old >classmate of my father lived there. You're probably right. The way Joni pronounced it, it sound like Mi-NOOT. Like minute with the acCENT on the wrong sylLABble. >It was fun - ended up joining in a big neighbourhood crab apple >fight. Don't ask me why, but the kids there loved to have crab >apple >fights in the fall. They do it here too - they do it because the crabapples are *there*. If there are no crabapples, then any old berry will do. It used to drive my mother nuts when neighbourhood kids threw mountain ash berries all over the place. Catherine (in Toronto) cateri@hotmail.com ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 Nov 1999 19:33:41 +0000 From: Martin Giles Subject: Re: Joni's VIVID story from PWWAM - VERY LOOOONG When the visitor refered to 'Minute' North Dakota, was she having a Canadian/American dig? Was she saying North Dakota is tiny compared to Sakatchewan or Manitoba or something? Also, I assumed that she was indeed refering to a war, with the sandbags and the bayonets - the second world war. Did they have 'all black' battalions close-combat training before shipping out to Europe? atb, Martin. Catherine transcribed from PWWAM: > ......“Well, we went to the States once. We went to Minute [sp? Minoot? > Maynooth?] North Dakota. Oh, it was terrible, dear – it was terrible! You > know, the bayonets were out. You could see all the Negroes were huddled > together and the sandbags were all piled in one corner. And they were > sticking bayonets into the bales of sand. Well, YOU KNOW why they were > doing that… Oh, we got out of there in a hell of a hurry, eh?"...... ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 Nov 1999 19:49:31 GMT From: "Catherine McKay" Subject: Re: Joni's VIVID story from PWWAM - VERY LOOOONG Raffaele says: >I love the way Joni >tells it, so much that now "Dull, dull, dull dear" (with *that* accent) has >become my joke. Part of me thinks the lady with orange hair is actually my mother. Except my mother really did have orange (auburn) hair, no black roots. And she didn't have "English" teeth. Nor did she ever go to Vancouver. And she didn't walk around with a glass of gin in her hand (scotch maybe). But she did make a similar complaint about the "dullness" of the colours we wore as teenagers (if we weren't wearing our school uniforms, it was blue jeans and T-shirts). She'd tell us to get clothes with bright colours, her logic being that you can't wear those kinds of colours when you get older (I have no idea why not, but that's the way many in her generation seemed to think.) Catherine (in Toronto) cateri@hotmail.com ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 Nov 1999 21:11:08 GMT From: "Catherine McKay" Subject: Re: Joni's VIVID story from PWWAM - VERY LOOOONG Martin asks: >When the visitor refered to 'Minute' North Dakota, was she having a >Canadian/American dig? Was she saying North Dakota is tiny compared >to >Sakatchewan or Manitoba or something? It is a Canadian/American dig, but not for the reason you say. I've since found out there's a town named Minot in North Dakota (the way Joni says it, it sounds like MinOOT). It's pretty typical of Canadians to make those kind of remarks, especially the one about Niagara Falls - we've got the GOOD falls, they get the crappy side with the rocks all falling down. Actually, I took my kids there in the summer and they made the same comment - "HaHa. The good falls are in Canada, the Americans get the lousy ones". I told them to watch what they say - actually the American side is pretty too in its own way, even though it is smaller and yes, it's falling down, but that's beautiful too. If you ever go there, take the "Maid of the Mist" boat tour that takes you right up close to the falls. You'll get soaking wet and the roar of the water is deafening - you can shriek like an idiot and no one hears you. > >Also, I assumed that she was indeed refering to a war, with the sandbags >and the bayonets - the second world war. Did they have 'all black' >battalions close-combat training before shipping out to Europe? > You may have a point there. They may indeed have had army training going on there. The woman doesn't talk about when they went to ND, so maybe there was some training going on there either for WWII, Korea or even VietNam. If she's typical of Canadians of that generation at that time, and especially in that part of Canada, she probably wouldn't have seen many black people, so she may have just thought they were *all* black. Catherine (in Toronto) cateri@hotmail.com ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 27 Nov 1999 00:25:43 +0000 From: catman Subject: Re: Joni's VIVID story from PWWAM - VERY LOOOONG I drove to Niagra Falls in 97. My first thought was how small it was! I expected something much bigger. I had got it confused with victoria Falls in Africa. Niagra sounds African to me. Anyway, the Candaian falls were stunning in their power. I stood mesmerised by it and said the the woman next to me, an american lawyer, 'it makes you want to go with it doesn't it?' To which she repplied'thank God you said that-I thought there was something wrong with me!' I knew just what she meant. niether of us wanted to die but both of us wanted to jump into the water and go over the falls. It was winter and there was still huge lumps of ice beneath the falls. I got loads of wonderful photos. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 Nov 1999 20:21:13 -0500 From: Vince Lavieri Subject: Toshi Reagon and Joni In the 15 November 1999 New Yorker there is a photo of singer Toshi Reagon (daughter of Bernice Johnson Reagon of Sweet Honey in the Rock) who just released a album, 'The Righteous Ones." Asked to name three artists whose music she'd want if stranded on a desert island, she replied, her mother's, and Bob Marley, and Joni Mitchell. Check out pages 76-77. I am not sure how I missed this earlier (cathcing up on my reading today) and if this has already been posted, I apologise for the repititon. (the Rev) Vince ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 Nov 1999 18:47:11 -0800 From: Randy Remote Subject: Joni on the cover of RStone The new Rolling Stone 12-16-99 is a special issue dedicated to photographs. On the cover are a bunch of color slides, prominently our Joan. Inside is the same Norman Seeff photo circa HOSL with her popping up out of the water in her knit bikini, alongside a short commentary by JM herself on the shoot, and a couple lines from Seeff. Am I the only one to notice that you can see part of her nipple in this series of shots-especially the ones in the HOSL songbook? Here is the text accompanying the photo: "Norman always wanted to get me wet," Joni Mitchell says of this Norman Seeff shoot, outtakes of which accompanied a harsh "Rolling Stone" review of "The Hissing of Summer Lawns." "It was in that wet-T-shirt kind of time, I believe, so I thought, 'OK.' There were a lot of swimming pool images on the album, but I know the pool photos were offensive to fans. There was a prevailing attitude that I'd sold out, that I was showing off. The whole illustrative quality of what it was about was kind of missed." The mood at the session apparently wasn't as sunny as this photograph suggests. "It's at my house," Mitchell recalls. "I think that's the first session that we did out of Norman's studio. The best way to work with Norman was to have an idea, because if you didn't, he was very psychological-and most people never went to him twice, you know. He's got a whole film of every celebrity crying. The only way you could work with him was to have ideas up your sleeve and seduce him with play." Seeff explains that "Joni and I would kind of battle our way through it in a very positive way. There was always that very intense interaction with artists." As for this shoot, Seeff says, "I thought it was a very powerful cocreation between the two of us. It was a rather sensuous- not sensual, but a sensuous-shoot. To me they were just real beautiful images, rather than trying to go for the very in-depth personality type of stuff." For the record, Seeff passes along word that Mitchell was "a very good swimmer." "I haven't used the pool for a while." Mitchell says. "I guess when my daughter comes, we go in. It costs a lot to heat it." Joni's pic shares the page with a pre Rumours F Mac shot, and faces a shot of Bob Marley. RR ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 Nov 1999 19:09:33 -0800 From: Randy Remote Subject: and another four B&W head shots from 1969 to be exact, bangs and straight hair. The text: From both sides now, the subject's and the photographer's, recollections of these dramatic black-and-white portraits- one of which was used for a 1969 Joni Mitchell cover story- are vague. "That I don't remember." Mitchell says today. "I've seen it, and it's interesting, but I don't remember where it was. The eye has a bit of odd vulnerability. It is not quite haunted, but there's a bit of that poignancy there." "I feel the same way," says Baron Wolman. "I just remember it was up at her home in Laurel Canyon-I think. I did a color and black-and-white session. She was just very hospitable. Some people just want you out of there, you know. I remember we were sitting at a table, and I was using natural light. She had this really beautiful pink silk or silk-like blouse on. It was almost Edwardian-if it were a guy wearing it they would say it was Edwardian. She had a very expressive face and really nice long blond hair in those days." Today Mitchell says she was fairly oblivious to the fact that such images were making her an icon of the era, a folkie dream woman. "I think the only awareness that I had of it, perhaps, was from the ribbing," she says. "Like, David Crosby used to call me the Love Bandit, but that was it." Also on the page are pics of Bill Graham and Neil Young from the same year. ------------------------------ End of onlyJMDL Digest V1 #276 ****************************** The Song and Album Voting Booths are open! Cast your votes by clicking the links at http://www.jmdl.com/gallery username: jimdle password: siquomb ------- Don't forget about these ongoing projects: Glossary project: Send a blank message to for all the details. FAQ Project: Help compile the JMDL FAQ. Do you have mailing list-related questions? -send them to Trivia Project: Send your Joni trivia questions and/or answers to Today in History Project: Know of a date-specific Joni fact? - -send it to ------- Post messages to the list at Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe onlyjoni-digest" to ------- Siquomb, isn't she?