Joni Mitchell: "The Hissing of Summer Lawns" Song by Song Thread

Thank you so much for the excellent discussion and large amount of participation on the Court and Spark song by song thread! Today we continue our journey through Joni Mitchell's discography with the album with which she followed up that mega-seller: 1975's The Hissing of Summer Lawns.

Previous threads in this series
Joni Mitchell: "Court and Spark" Song by Song Thread
Joni Mitchell: "For the Roses" Song by Song Thread
Joni Mitchell: "Blue" Song by Song Thread
Joni Mitchell: "Ladies of the Canyon" Song by Song Thread
Joni Mitchell: "Clouds" Song by Song Thread
Joni Mitchell: "Song to a Seagull" Song by Song Thread

The Hissing of Summer Lawns


Album Notes
Released November 1975

(Players on individual songs will be listed with each track.)

Notes by Joni:
This record is a total work conceived graphically, musically, lyrically and accidentally - as a whole. The performances were guided by the given compositional structures and the audibly inspired beauty of every player. The whole unfolded like a mystery. It is not my intention to unravel that mystery for anyone, but rather to offer some additional clues:

"Centerpiece" is a Johnny Mandel-Jon Hendricks tune. John Guerin and I collaborated on "The Hissing Of Summer Lawns." "The Boho Dance" is a Tom Wolfe-ism from the book, "The Painted Word." The poem, "Don't Interrupt The Sorrow" was born around 4 a.m. in a New York loft. Larry Poons seeded it and Bobby Neuwirth was midwife here, but the child filtered thru Genesis at Jackson Lake, Saskatchewan, is rebellious and mystical and insists that its conception was immaculate.

Henry - more than an engineer - Lewy and his assistant Ellis Sorkin, piloted these tapes to their destination; Henry and I mixed them; and Bernie Grundman mastered them at A&M studios in Hollywood.

I drew the cover and designed the package with research help and guidance from Glen Christensen, Electra/Asylum Art Director. The photo is Norman Seeff's.

I would especially like to thank Myrt and Bill Anderson, North Battleford, New York, Saskatoon, Bel-Air, Burbank, Burundi, Orange County, the deep, deep heart of Dixie, Blue, National Geographic Magazine, Helpful Henry The Housewife's Delight - and John Guerin for showing me the root of the chord and where 1 was.

She could see the blue pools in the squinting sun and hear the hissing of summer lawns...

All songs written and composed by Joni Mitchell copyright 1975 by Crazy Crow Music BMI, except "Centerpiece," written and composed by Johnny Mandel and Jon Hendricks and published by Caphryl Music ASCAP copyright 1958 and "The Hissing Of Summer Lawns," written and composed by John Guerin and Joni Mitchell and published by Crazy Crow Music BMI and Man Man's Drum Music ASCAP. All Lyrics reprinted with permission of the publishers. All Rights reserved.

Max Bennett, Robben Ford, Victor Feldman and John Guerin - Courtesy of The L.A. Express - Caribou Records. Larry Carlton, Wilton Felder and Joe Sample - Courtesy of the Jazz Crusaders-ABC-Blue Thumb Records. Graham Nash, Dave Crosby - Courtesy of ABC Records. James Taylor - Courtesy of Warner Bros. Records.



The Hissing of Summer Lawns is the seventh studio album by the Canadian singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell, released in 1975.

The first track, "In France They Kiss on Main Street", is a jazz-rock song about coming of age in a small town in the 1950s rock & roll era. (The song was released as the single from the album and reached number 66 on the Billboard charts.) "The Jungle Line" uses a field recording from Africa of the Drummers of Burundi (called 'warrior drums' in the credits), onto which are dubbed guitar, Moog synthesizer and the vocal line. The lyrics pay homage to the works of the French Post-Impressionist painter Henri Rousseau. Mitchell blends details of his works with imagery of modern city life, the music industry and the underground drug culture.

"Edith and the Kingpin" marks a return to jazz in a story of a gangster's new moll arriving in his home town. "Don't Interrupt the Sorrow" is an acoustic guitar–based song with stream-of-consciousness lyrics, focused on women standing up to male dominance and proclaiming their own existence as individuals. "Shades of Scarlett Conquering" is an orchestral-based piece about a modern southern belle basing her life and self-image on the stereotypes of the Scarlett O'Hara character from Gone with the Wind.

The second side begins with the title track, "The Hissing of Summer Lawns", which is about a woman who chooses to stay in a marriage where she is treated as part of her husband's portfolio. "The Boho Dance" comments on people who feel that artists betray their artistic integrity for commercial success, with an ironic glance at those who said this of Mitchell herself and parallels Tom Wolfe's The Painted Word.[9][6] "Harry's House/Centerpiece" concerns failing marriage as example of the loneliness of modern life and frames the jazz standard "Centerpiece" by Harry "Sweets" Edison and Jon Hendricks. "Sweet Bird" is a sparser acoustic track that is a slight return to Mitchell's so-called 'confessional' singer-songwriter style and addresses the loss of beauty power with ageing. Its lyrics indicate that it may also be a reference to Tennessee Williams's Sweet Bird of Youth. The final track is "Shadows and Light", consisting of many overdubs of her voice and an ARP String Machine (credited as an ARP-Farfisa on the album sleeve).

The African theme of "The Jungle Line" also features on the album sleeve, with an image of dark-skinned people carrying a large snake (both were embossed on the original vinyl album cover). Both men and snake are superimposed on the Beverly Hills suburbs, with Mitchell's own house marked in blue (green for the UK issue) on the back cover.

Reception
The album initially received harsh criticism. In Rolling Stone, Stephen Holden wrote that the album's lyrics were impressive but the music was a failure. "If The Hissing of Summer Lawns offers substantial literature, it is set to insubstantial music... Four members of Tom Scott's L.A. Express are featured on Hissing, but their uninspired jazz-rock style completely opposes Mitchell's romantic style... The Hissing of Summer Lawns is ultimately a great collection of pop poems with a distracting soundtrack. Read it first. Then play it."[6]

However, the record's reputation has grown in stature over the years. Music writer Howard Sounes has called The Hissing of Summer Lawns Mitchell's masterpiece, "an LP to stand alongside Blood on the Tracks".[10] Prince, a lifelong fan of Mitchell, had loved the album, praising it in interviews.[11]

In 1977, at the 19th Grammy Awards, Mitchell was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance for the album.

The album was included in Robert Dimery's 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.[12]

Contemporary Reviews
"On The Hissing Of Summer Lawns (Asylum 7E-1051), Joni Mitchell takes an ambitious and perceptive look at the type of life American society offers to a free-spirited artist like herself. While she does not totally reject or condemn the American Dream, she yearns for something more.
"Conceived graphically, musically, lyrically and accidentally - as a whole," this package is the first major collection of new material to be released by Joni in two years. Hissing shows a creative mind working in full gear on a thematic song cycle that is the most challenging effort of her illustrious career.

Superficially, the record is an extension of the electronic, jazz-influenced compositions she initiated on Court and Spark and, most recently, Miles of Aisles. But there are striking differences in the mood and the attitude she is adopting on the new album. She is less the lovesick lady mourning the end of an affair and more the woman of the world observing the changing scene."
Michigan Daily, December 1975

"In Mitchell’s case, even her wonderfully evocative album title manages to suggest Los Angeles. The dog days of August have arrived, the sprinklers whir on without respite and from a ranch house somewhere up in the hills, one can "see the blue pools in the squinting sun and hear the hissing of summer lawns" – a sound that actually can be heard throughout the song that lends its name to Michell’s first album of new material since 1973’s "Court and Spark".

If you think the circumstances suggested here sound comfortable, you’re right. Nobody in THOSL is hurting for money. Mitchell’s people vacation in Paris, shop at Bloomingdale’s when they are in New York, party at night in the slickest discos. Some of them can even claim to have a "room full of Chippendale that nobody sits in."

Unfortunately, in delineating the ennui and emptiness that lie behind this brave material front – and if that idea seems familiar, if you think you’ve read it in a book before or seen it in a film somewhere, you’re right again – Mitchell takes a tone that is smug, sometimes so smug that it is down right irritating."
Detroit News, December 1975

"In one song in Joni Mitchell's new album, The Hissing Of Summer Lawns, certainly the most radical record she has ever released, there's a line that describes "a lady in a Paris dress with runs in her nylons."

Is this the singer describing herself? She plays such a peek-a-boo game here, peering out briefly through the luxuriant growth of her imagery, then running away frightened, back into the tangles beyond. One can never be sure if this is the real Joni Mitchell, or only a part she wants us to see, or whether there's such a person.

It's not that she's playing a game - at least not the way Lennon and McCartney used to do by providing answers for questions not yet asked. If anything, if there is a game, she's part of it. She's looking for herself, too.

And the operative word here is "looking." This is one of the most visually oriented albums ever recorded by a musician (the singer's design of her own cover art has the same subtle care for nuance as photographer Arthur Elgort's work for Vogue)...

This is a major album, and an unsettling one, too."
Toronto Star, December 1975

 

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All are welcome!

Today, let us please discuss the album as a whole and the first track on it:

Track 1: "In France They Kiss on Main Street"


Background voices - G. Nash, D. Crosby, J. Taylor, and Joni Mitchell
Electric guitar - Robben Ford and Jeff Baxter
Acoustic guitar - Joni Mitchell
Electric piano - Victor Feldman
Drums - John Guerin
Bass - Max Bennett

Lyrical Excerpt:
Downtown
My darling dime store thief
In the War of Independence
Rock 'n' roll rang sweet as victory
Under neon signs
A girl was in bloom
And a woman was fading
In a suburban room
I said take me to the dance
Do you want to dance?
I love to dance
And I told him They don't take chances
They seem so removed from romance
They've been broken in churches and schools
And molded to middle class circumstance
And we were rolling rolling rock 'n' rolling

Complete Lyrics at Joni Mitchell's Official Site

 

Not really an album I've ever bonded with, although I know for some it's the best of all. I'll be hoping to listen along with the thread.

 

I was just listening to this album yesterday, for the first time.
I was actually surprised that it came out before Hejira, as for some reason I had always thought that it followed it ...
To my ears, and I am no expert by any means, this album moves the progression made over the previous two albums forward. This wonderful musician and songwriter was growing enormously and soaking in musical styles and sounds like many of the greats before her.
She has a special way with words and was able to get her musicians (it seems to me at least) to feel what she was trying to do, and do it well.
I'm not going to bother saying more than that, because I am really very fresh to this material, and one listen isn't nearly enough to have decent input.

 

I love this song. I was familiar with this song from somewhere, but I am not sure where.
I had to look at the musicians, because I had assumed it was Jaco, but obviously Max Bennett is a great bass player also.
Excellent guitar also

 

I much prefer the live recording of In France... with Pat Metheny on guitar.

 

A great new Joni thread; in a wonderful series of them!
Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to immerse myself into them as much as I’d like to, and especially with the knowledge that there’s a vast number of perspectives, angles, viewpoints, insights, and historical ways to absorb Joni Mitchell’s music, there’s truly a wealth of information to gather.

Looking forward to following this.

 

The Hissing of Summer Lawns
I love this record (as I do everything from this period by Joni), but I believe I love it in a slightly different way from the others. I have always viewed and appreciated this album like a work of art--literally, like a piece of visual art hanging on the wall. One of the contemporary reviews I quoted in the OP (from the Toronto Star) makes note of the fact that this is one of the most visually oriented albums the writer had heard, and I completely agree. Joni rarely writes about herself on this record (this opening track is an exception rather than a rule). Instead, she crafts incredibly detailed portraits of various people and characters living their lives in the suburban sprawl in the hills of Los Angeles. She paints pictures, essentially, and thematically the album is linked together by a strong sense of commentary upon "middle-class circumstance," as well as an incredibly vivid "summer" feeling--with something "other" and sinister lurking under the surface. I often associate various records with different times of year, and The Hissing of Summer Lawns is one of the most deeply "summer" albums I've got. The sound and arrangements, that jazz-rock style, perfectly pairs with the lyrics (and the artwork Joni created for the album) to create a sense of swimming pools, sprinkler systems, long lazy yards of green grass, air conditioning... This album smells like citronella, chlorine, cigarette smoke on the outside patio... As such, I don't have the really personal connections I have to other albums in Joni's catalog, and view the album more like a novel I enjoy reading. Masterful lyrics, wonderful arrangement and composition and a lot of experimentation and oddness from Joni. I love how she is really stretching herself out on this record. She could have easily made a similar follow-up to Court and Spark to cash-in on that album's success, but instead she made one of the most daring and challenging albums in her catalog thus far. And it turned some people off. But others loved it all the more. I think it is an essential work for Joni and a brilliant piece of art.

The album artwork is some of my favorite that Joni created, as well. I love the image of the "otherness" of the snake and natives coming into the sprawl of suburbia. The gatefold of Joni floating in the swimming pool is a stunning image to pair that with.

In France They Kiss on Main Street
This is one of Joni's most evocative snapshots of her own teenage years. After recovering from polio, she fell in love with dancing ('making up for lost time') and going out to move to rock 'n roll music. She touched on this subject on 'Let the Wind Carry Me,' but here we get an entire song that celebrates those days of kissing, dancing, rock 'n roll and all the joys of youth. She also begins to work in some of the major themes of The Hissing of Summer Lawns. While the youth are out partying, their parents have been "broken by churches and schools and middle class circumstance" and given up these kinds of youthful pursuits in favor of stability. The lyrics are a wonder ("Kisses like bright flags hung on holidays"-- wow!) and the arrangement feels jazzy and joyous all at once--sophisticated and in keeping with the rest of the album, but also a nice tribute to the uptempo, fun music she's discussing in the song. There is even a snippet of an Everly Brothers classic. It's a wonderful opener and a song that glows and moves.

Here's the live version from Shadows and Light, with Pat Metheny, Jaco Pastorius, Don Alias, Lyle Mays and Michael Brecker:

 

In France They Kiss On Main Street:

1987, I was 15, the final edition of BBC's Old Grey Whistle Test and Bob Harris came back to show old clips. I had my VHS recorder ready and taped as much of the show as I could. This video was shown again, as it was in 1976. This song blew me away, the video for it too. This is where I came aboard for Joni. Love this track still, not my favourite on the album but it comes close.

 

I haven't listened listened to Joni in quite a while, but when this album came out it started a period where her releases became regular weekly listening. I listened to her early acoustic material for lyrical inspiration (and admiration). Hissing of Summer Lawns is one of my favorite albums of hers. I'd be hard pressed to choose between it, Hejira and Don Juan's Reckless Daughter. I love how Joni redefined herself with this LP, breaking out of the standard image of a girl/singer/songwriter with an acoustic guitar and lyrics form her diary. At the time, I was also listening to a lot of Steely Dan and I thought that Fagen and Becker wrote from a similar place, though Joni had them beat as a wordsmith. I also feel Rolling Stone was yet again completely off the mark in their criticism of the LP.

 

My impression of the music reviews for this album, at the time, were either harsh, or indifferent.

It’s too bad many critics seemed myopic - apparently not understanding that Joni Mitchell was on the forefront of expanding the musical, lyrical, cultural, textural, intellectual, and visually boundaries of music, and pop music.

The musical leaps and bounds she took from her folk-singing years is amazing. “The Hissing Of Summer Lawns” is a quantum leap from “Blue”, just a short FOUR years earlier.
That’s a whirlwind self-taught musical education in her development.

I guess one major critical barometer weighed against it was whether the album had a “hit potential”, which as we know, is not a major concern of the artist herself.

Just a few thoughts...

 

When Hissing first came out I didn’t think much of it. Played it thru last night and was pleasantly surprised how much I enjoyed it.

Joni was always several steps ahead of me on the musical curve. Listening to her albums the first few times usually made me feel like Bart Simpson in a class full of genius kids. I’d be like, “Huh?”

I get it a lot better now.

That said, I agree with what one of the contemporary reviewers said about there being a certain “smugness” to the whole Hissing theme. The dull, dreary lives of the suburban masses is a cheap target, and, as much as I love Joni, it’s even harder to swallow coming from a multi-millionaire artist lounging in her Bel Air pool.

“In France They Kiss on Main Street” is straight up jazz-pop. It’s a good song but doesn’t really break any new ground. It would’ve been right at home on a Steely Dan album. But Fagen and Becker no doubt would’ve added some dark twist to make it more interesting.

 

I was just thinking about this a bit last night. I was watching and reading a variety of album reviews of a new 2018 release (I won't say what, this is just to illustrate my point). Time and time again, the reviewers would dismiss obvious flaws with the songs (shallow lyrics, silly themes, crowded production) with a hand-wave and a, "But it's so catchy!" "Catchiness" seemed to be the end-all, be-all determining factor as to whether the songs were any good. And, to my mind, "catchy" doesn't just mean that the music is melodic. It's a different kind of melodicism--continually repeating, memorable hooks that get stuck in the brain.

An artist like Joni Mitchell created music that I think was always incredibly and interestingly melodic, but rarely did she record songs that were "catchy." And this became even more true as we moved deeper into the '70s and her songs often entirely lacked refrains. She was doing a different kind of songwriting and this obviously isn't for everyone--especially critics who loved her for 'Big Yellow Taxi' and 'Both Sides Now' and didn't understand where that girl had gone.

I personally don't really care if music is 'catchy' (and one of my major musical pet peeves are songs that fill out the last two minutes of the running time by repeating the chorus ad nauseum) but I know many music listeners do. That's fine, it is their own opinion and taste!, but it does mean that an album like The Hissing of Summer Lawns may not appeal to them.

 

On the last thread I called this the greatest album of all time, but I will also completely contradict myself by declaring that the very idea of there being a solitary "greatest" anything is utterly ridiculous.

It's just that whenever I put it on for the umpteenth time it still feels like nothing could ever be better, so ingrained has it become into my musical sense of being. It's kinda like saying my right arm is the greatest right arm ever - I wouldn't be the same without it.

I discovered it (the album, not my arm) right out of high school in summer 1982. Flat broke in a small town with no prospects (for both me and the town), I spent many of my days at the library.

That library had a rather healthy selection of LPs to check out, and one day this gray and green cover caught my eye as I flipped through. Now, my total experience with Joni Mitchell to that point had been the two Court and Spark hits, "The Circle Game", "Big Yellow Taxi" and the hit covers of "Both Sides Now" and "Woodstock".

Since "Help Me" had so entranced me, and I was vaguely aware this album was from the same time, I took it home. I don't have any strong memories of a first impression but I liked it enough to record it on one side of a cheap Certron tape using my cheap Montgomery Wards all in one record / cassette / 8-track / tuner unit.

And over the next year, I fell in love with it and have never fallen out. The next album in our series has long been a strong rival for my affections but the heart wants what it wants yadda yadda yadda.

 

When people always threw the catchy line at me, I would just say "well herpes is catchy too, doesn't mean I want it"

 

Apart from the second track and the last track, this album sounds to me much like a logical evolution from Court & Spark. That is, there are stylistic similarities, but also subtle differences which you notice on repeated listening. Mostly those differences take the form of sounding more and more like jazz, or jazz fusion, call it what you will, and less and less like folk.

Now here's the funny thing. I am not a fan of jazz at all. Nor am I a big devotee of jazz fusion. I enjoy it in small doses. I have (and enjoy) the "Wichita Falls" album by Pat Metheny, and my jazz interest does not go much beyond that. I have tried and failed to get into Weather Report, for example. Yet, of all the different musical faces of Joni Mitchell, my favourite is her middle jazzy period, and Hissing of Summer Lawns may be my favourite album of them all.

I have come to the conclusion that the reason is that I love the jazz influence in rock, but I still need that rock foundation to provide the necessary degree of accessibility for my ears. Not jazz as such, not jazz with a rock influence, but rock with a jazz influence, that's what I like.

This album to me is a themed album, and the theme proper does not really begin until the third song. That theme, obviously, is dysfunctional relationships between men and women - hardly new territory for Joni, but here she is sounding less like a broken-hearted schoolgirl and more like a woman who has been through the romance mill and emerged somewhat cynical.

------------------------------------------------

The first track, "In France They Kiss on Main Street" seems largely unrelated to the album's main theme, though maybe others can find some link here that I missed. It's just another great song. More of those rapid musical phrases and chord changes that she does so well, the lyrics giving the impression that she had so much to say here that she had trouble finding enough notes to accommodate the words. This song is a little like "Free man In Paris" part 2, and not only because of the France reference. Is she singing about an experience she had herself? One related to her? Or perhaps one imagined, contrasting the perception of the free and easy culture of Western Europe with the stifling small town upbringing that was her experience?

Anyway, this song is one to listen to and smile at, because after the VERY strange second track, the whole album seems to take on a much more sombre tone.

 

Where's the Everly Brothers reference?

 

The Hissing Of Summer Lawns

Some comments about the album as a whole. (I wrote most of this yesterday.)

It seems like this album, and comparisons to Court And Spark, spark passionate opinions. I’m in the camp that loves it. (Well, most of it). To me it kicked off a whole new world of Joni music. And to me it felt right from the start (mostly), and is still very exciting.

Court And Spark is fantastic. I totally enjoyed listening to it all over again and analyzing the songs with everyone here the last two weeks. But…oh my gosh…when I first played this album, it was almost life changing. To me, The Hissing Of Summer Lawns has a lot more meat on its bones, and is more interesting and adventurous musically. It’s more of a desert island album for me, though strictly speaking, if I was stranded on a desert island I’d probably need some cheering up, and this album might not be ideal. (If I ever go on a long sailing trip, I’d better take both of them along.)

Compared to Court And Spark, the songs are much more observational, less personal. I had some free time and wanted to quantify this somehow, so I performed a little exercise. I re-read all the lyrics on both albums, and counted all the I’s, me’s, and my’s. (I didn’t include I’s that are spoken by another character, like in Free Man In Paris and Raised On Robbery. And I didn’t include 'I-bars' in The Jungle Line. ) Anyway, the totals:

Court And Spark: 80 I’s, 10 me’s and my’s. The Hissing Of Summer Lawns: 9 I’s, 2 me’s and my’s. (Like many here, I tend to get carried away with lists and numbers!)

But you don't need a mathematician to see which way the wind blows. Bottom line, I’d say that Court And Spark has 7 songs that are self-referential. (That includes Twisted, and Trouble Child which I think we decided is about her, but not Down To You. The rest are pretty obvious.)

But Hissing only has 3 — In France They Kiss On Main Street, Don’t Interrupt The Sorrow, and The Boho Zone. (Possibly Sweet Bird, but that's a tough read.)

So I’d say C&S is mostly inward-observational, and Hissing is mostly outward-observational. But Hissing also feels much more chilly, detached, and critical. There’s not much love or warmth in it. Several songs allude to suburban angst. They remind me of Roy Lichtenstein’s comic panel art, which seems to mock white suburbia, and those Dark Heart of the American Dream essays from Hunter S. Thompson and Ralph Steadman. (The Last Time I Saw Richard had a little bit of this—He bought her a dishwasher and a coffee percolator.) A lot of this album feels like a take down of the American Dream.

Interestingly, most of the time, the brunt of her criticism is directed towards a woman.

Strangely though, despite the coldness and distance, this album feels more personally affecting, hard hitting, and visceral to me than any others so far, except maybe for Blue. Most of the songs really get my attention and after 43 years I still find myself thinking about the characters in it, still discovering new lyrical nuances.

I’m also very fond of the melodies, textures and arrangements on this album (well, most of it). Compared to C&S, the instrumentation seems more mature and complete…much more musically sophisticated. There are some bold experiments and for sure, some of them don’t work for me. Some of the songs here have more rough edges than either C&S or Hejira, so maybe to an extent this was an experiment that she attempted and then pulled back from.

I’d venture to guess that no one here likes all the songs on this album. I don't. I wonder if there will be more negativity about the music, or the lyrics. I’m not sure. It’ll be interesting.

Well, those are my ruminations and random thoughts about this album, which holds a very special place in my record collection and my heart. I’m very interested to see what others have to say about it.

 

I forgot to mention that the album cover is probably my favourite Joni album cover, certainly out of those she designed herself. There is something very tasteful about the grey and green. The first time I saw the cover painting, with the title overlaid, I saw the men as garden workers carrying a large sprinkler hose to put in place and water those summer lawns, and even though a closer look reveals that it's obviously a snake, I still find myself thinking of it as a hose. Is there an intentional message here I wonder? Is it about the peace and smug serenity of First World suburbia being invaded/threatened by forces foreign to our experience? "Snake in the grass" is a popular metaphor for an unknown lurking danger.

 

Now that I know the entire catalog, "In France" feels to me a bit like Joni hitting the Reset button. All that stuff I shared with you in my twenties? Clean slate - here's me in my teens. That girl deserves recognition.

And she delivers it to us in much the same vehicle with which she entered her thirties - jazz pop with Max and John driving the rhythm section; Crosby, Mitchell and Nash (and Taylor!) on harmonies.

How awesome are those little "Do You Want To Dance?" and "Bye Bye Love" quotes?

On guitar instead of Larry, you've got Skunk, who puts in a good solo but (as noted above) nowhere near what Pat Metheny would make of it down the road.

Killer moment: "Downtown in a pinball arcade" stretches out, with a sublime Max bass line (and Robben Ford's guitar) beneath and then Victor Feldman adds those gorgeous electric piano fills to finish. Just wow.

I'll betcha Rickie Lee Jones took more than a little inspiration from this song - many of the characters that populate her lyrics would probably feel right at home with Gail, Louise, Chicky, Ron and Leadfoot Melvin.

With clean slate accomplished and nostalgic prelude complete, it's time to make a sharp left!

Hang on!

 

Regarding Hissing... Although I love the album, I guess I can't say I LOVE the album in the same way as Blue, C&S, & Hejira. Why? I'm not sure, it's certainly not the experimental touches like Jungle Line or Shadows and Light. Those to me seem ahead of their time and maybe the furthest she ever went in that direction... But I guess the writing at times touches on social commentary. And I have to wonder what does Joni really know about mob kingpins? I know it works for Bobby D, but it doesn't resonate the same way coming from Miss Mitchell. So in many ways I compare it to FTR, where part of the content is social observation and that's not something that strikes me as completely authentic. And like FTR, I regard it as a transitional album musically, like more of an extension of C&S, without reinventing her musical context in the way she did for Hejira.

By the way, for those interested there're Joni's song demos for this album floating around, and they give another take on the actual songs themselves.

Having said that, I think the lead song is a hoot! Talk about teenage defiance and Joni doing rock 'n roll! It's certainly not 'cheap display', is it? And to reference Bye Bye Love is a bit of a masterstroke. It was the Everly's first hit ('57). The sing writers (the Bryants) credit the inspiration to hearing their windshield wipers slap rhythmically on a drive, and Don Everly did the percussive acoustic guitar intro as an homage to Bo Diddley.

 

If we’re going to get philosophical, I’d say all music has to have some “catchy-ness” to it. Isn’t that the appeal? That’s what makes it music, what draws you in. Otherwise it’s just spoken word.

Defining “catchy” is what’s tough. Books have been written about it. It’s undoubtedly different for different people. Melody, rhythm, harmony - I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect a “song” to have at least one of those. Sometimes nothing more an interesting percussion click makes a song catchy. What’s familiar (and uninteresting) to one person may strike another as unusual and fascinating.

I’d venture to say Joni felt all of her music was catchy. Some of us just didn’t catch it.

 

It's more of a shout-out. "They were singing "Bye Bye Love" as he's racking up his free play / let those rock and roll choirboys carry us away".

The choirboys being Phil and Don.

 

I've listened to that line a thousand times, but never caught the EB reference before.

This must be an Americanism I am unfamiliar with - what does "racking up his free play" mean?

 

Wow, I couldn't possibly disagree more! Jeff Baxter's solo on the studio version is the best thing about the song. It gets in and gets out--unlike Metheny's never-ending one.