Joni Mitchell: "Don Juan's Reckless Daughter" Song by Song Thread

I'd heard that before. Thanks for the reminder. It could also just be a very intense dependency that kicked-in extremely quickly during her teenage years when neurons are in a great state of flux as they are. Might be a chicken and egg question here.

 

Great white wonder is a boxing reference more than anything I think. Wasn't it coined in the era when black heavyweights like Jack Johnson had to continually prove themselves against inferior white hopefuls? 'The Tar baby' is from the Uncle Remus stories see below:
I'm assuming is a racial slur from the same mouths that hoped for the 'white wonder'. That's how it always struck me anyhow.
https://www.google.de/url?sa=t&sour...Vaw32Nr4Yvb8XUl1eSHMRv1B-&cshid=1540533728044

 

I also suspect that it has something to do with the fact that at that time smoking was seen as a very masculine thing to do. Doing things, as a woman, that are traditionally seen as male seems to be something that Joni likes.

 

The term that I used to hear was "The Great White Hope".

 

I agree that “The Tenth World” really has to be heard as a preamble to “Dreamland”: yes, it's too long to be justified just for that but one of the benefits of recording a double album is that you get the space to stretch out like this. (I'm always surprised when people attack double albums for being woolly or padded; in 80% of cases that “wasted” space is actually the point of the exercise!)

“Dreamland” is fun: it's just there, grooving away to itself in this corner of the album when you want to hear it.

Of course we didn't need Joni Mitchell to record either of these tracks: I understand those who feel it's a waste of labour for someone that we see very much as a consumate singer-songwriter. But I think it's all part of the journey that she wanted to make rather than the journey we wanted her to take us on, which will also be relevant to Mingus when we get there.

 

Of course you are right. I misremembered.

 

I don't think of smoking as a masculine activity at all, especially not in the early 20th century when everyone did it. Audrey Hepburn, for instance, is an entirely feminine icon who is strongly associated with a cigarette in a cigarette holder. I don't think anything Joni did was traditionally masculine either. Being a singer-songwriter has always been something for both genders right from the beginning of the genre.

Now we move on to the final side:

Track 8: "Don Juan's Reckless Daughter"


DON JUAN'S RECKLESS DAUGHTER
Guitar and Vocal: Joni Mitchell
The Split Tongued Spirit: El Boyd
Bass: Jaco Pastorius
Ankle Bells: Alejandro Acuna
Shaker: Don Alias
(In Spirit) Bobbye Hall and Manolo Badrena

Lyrical Excerpt:
I'm Don Juan's reckless daughter
I came out two days on your tail
Those two bald-headed days in November
Before the first snowflakes sail
Out on the vast and subtle plains of mystery
A split tongue spirit talks
Noble as a nickel chief
Striking up an old juke box
And he says:
"Snakes along the railroad tracks"
He says, "Eagles in jet trails"
He says, "Coils around feathers and talons on scales
Gravel under the belly plates"
He says, "Wind in the Wings"
He says, "Big bird dragging its tail in the dust
Snake kite flying on a string"

Complete Lyrics at Joni Mitchell's Official Site

 

Don Juan's Reckless Daughter
The title track is another of the older compositions on the album, which Joni wrote back during the Rolling Thunder days. In fact, the first verse very clearly makes reference to Sam Shepard (he of 'Coyote'). She sings, "I came out two days on your trail / Those two bald-headed days in November." Shepard was born on November 5, 1943. Joni on November 7, two days later. In some ways, this song feels like a Hejira era composition funneled through the lens of what Joni was doing on DJRD (that's kind of what it is, after all!) It could have fit onto Hejira, but I think the arrangement would have been much different on that album and probably wouldn't include ankle bells, shakers or two men credited for being on the song 'in spirit'. It's a long, rambly kind of song with a lot of words, but I really love it. It's another highlight of the album for me and leads us easily out of the dream state of the second and third sides and into some more autobiographical and down-to-earth compositions to close things out. I love the thump of Jaco on this track and I'm glad to hear Joni on guitar again--the only time she plays guitar on the middle two sides is on 'Otis and Marlena.'

I count a number of possible references to past people and images and ideas from the past few years littered throughout 'Don Juan's Reckless Daughter.'

'Restless sweeps like fire and rain' (James Taylor)
'There are box cars down there on your snake' ('Just Like This Train')
'You're a coward against the altitude' ('Amelia')

And lots of references to Joni's own life: coming from the prairie, born in November, 'Puffed up and strutting when I think I win / Down and shaken when I think I lose'... There is so much of her in this song and I think it really captures a lot of what she was feeling in the late 1970s. After so many impressionistic songs, it's nice to hear her sing about herself and her life again. This song is an essential component of the album and of her career.

 

Another album, yet another spectacular title track.

And another dusty Southwestern vibe with more than a hint of "Coyote". (To add to the Sam Shepard sense PW mentioned). Maybe that's why Bobbye Hall is on it "in spirit".

Joni seems to particularly relish this set of lyrics, giving them some killer inflections ("swoooooop", "yessss, yessss, yessss")

Love how the guitar riff periodically ascends as she really digs in on her axe.

Jaco's finally back on bass but he's acting like he's still on percussion. Another speaker rattler supremo.

"El Bwyd", who's heard intoning the words of the split-tongued serpent in the background? That's painter Boyd Elder - aka the guy whose bird skull artwork adorns the cover of the first Eagles greatest hits album.

 

I love how hypnotic this is as she spits out 10,000 syllables
eagles in the sky you and I, snakes in the grass you and I ….BRUTAL

 

The album's title track almost qualifies for the adjective "epic" in the literal sense of the word, mean not merely good, but meaning long and full of content. Although it follows "Dreamland", and on the old vinyl format you had to change the disc to get to it, it sounds to me a bit like the finale of the dream sequence - a song you can just allow to drift into your consciousness if you choose to, or listen to every word if that's your mood.

It's awfully similar musically to Coyote, which is perhaps my only criticism of it.

 

Might as well toss in Robert Christgau's review at this point ...

This double album presents a real critic's dilemma--I'm sure it's boring, but I'm not sure how boring. Insofar as it isn't, Jaco Pastorius deserves as much credit as the artiste. Just the way it did on Hejira, his bass enables her to deal with the syntheses that obsess her--melody and rhythm, form and anima. But only on the title cut does he enable her to realize them. B-

 

I've only played 10 tracks more often in the last 18 months, Last.FM tells me (out of a total of >53,100 separate tracks)

It's fourth in my Joni list out of 480 separate tracks

Paprika Plains (original) & (remix)
Amelia
Judgement of the Moon and Stars
DJRD
Hejira
Refuge of the roads

 

I think he's a walking blind spot as regards unconventional or in his eyes pretentious female artists. By his skewed standards B- is an A.
Anyone with an aversion as great as his is toward Nina Simone for example, doesn't really have the sort of taste I can get anything out of.

 

DJRD the song always seemed like such a visual piece to me. My mind's eye always imagines what she's singing as I hear it.

Most videos are dreadful but I wonder if a full length DJRD (the album) film might have enhanced the experience (and explained some of it?)

 

It's genius pure and simple. Fresh each time I play it; which it seems is an average of once every three days.

 

I appreciate your efforts at fairness, but honestly, you could have stopped right there and still been accurate.

 

For me, this is the heart of the album... Which is maybe why it is the title track after all? There's a sense of urgency and intensity here that makes the song very compelling. And it's yet another of her story songs where images pile on top of images. Just brilliant and for me the piece that makes the album... Without DJRD the album loses it's beating heart. And you're left to wonder whether another comparable composition could have been added... As much as I like Cotton Avenue, Talk to Me, Jericho, and Dreamland, they don't seem like compositions that carry the album, but as more supporting players. And I guess that's what I find lacking about the double-album set as a whole; another composition or two of this breadth and stature.

 

“DJRD” is a stunning song on many levels. Iconic JM.

It’s “Coyote” flipped around. Now she’s got the lens pointed at herself. Same tuning, similar feel, but slightly different rhythm, different strum, different perspective. Possibly the most elaborate alternate take in the history of pop music.

She was light years ahead of anything anyone was doing at the time - musically, rhythmically or lyrically.

People will study her - and this song - 100 years from now and still marvel. Mark my words.

 

That is a damn fine top six, Henry. All favorites of mine, as well. 'Judgement of the Moon and Stars' might have become my favorite of all of her songs in these last few months. I've been quite obsessed with it.

 

Don Juan
Lord Byron

(Fifth Canto vrs 24)
This was an awkward test, as Juan found,
But he was steel’d by sorrow, wrath, and pride:
With gentle force her white arms he unwound,
And seated her all drooping by his side,...…
And looking coldly in her face, he cried,
’The prison’d eagle will not pair, nor
serve a Sultana’s sensual phantasy



Behind my bolt locked door
The eagle and the serpent are at war in me


Coincidence?


This is my favourite part of the lyric:


I touched you on the central plains

It was plane to train my twin

It was just plane shadow to train shadow

But to me it was skin to skin

Byron couldn't have written that!
(Planes weren't around in 1830!)

 

Next:

Track 9: "Off Night Backstreet"


OFF NIGHT BACKSTREET
Vocals Joni Mitchell, J.D. Souther Glenn Frey
Bass Jaco Pastorius
Drums John Guerin
Orchestrator Michael Gibbs

Lyrical Excerpt:
I can feel your fingers
Feeling my face
There are some lines you put there
And some you erase
Maybe I'm just dramatizing
I don't care
It's home it can be heaven
When we play fair
But these sentimental journeys
Late at night
High in some back room you're calling me
To be your off night back street

Complete Lyrics at Joni Mitchell's Official Site

 

Off Night Backstreet
Brutal and rich, this is another of my favorites on the album. Easily a top five favorite. After Joni has been collaborating with so many world musicians, jazz musicians, etc., it's interesting to hear her singing with Glenn Frey and J.D. Souther--they are from such a completely different musical world from the rest of the folks she was working with at the time. This isn't a knock at all--I think they sound fantastic with her on those harmonies and it brings a different flavor to this song. I also love the orchestration that comes sweeping and swooping in. This is a strange comparison, but they kind of remind me of the string arrangements John Paul Jones did for Led Zeppelin on songs like 'The Rain Song' and 'Kashmir'--kind of that otherworldly swoop. 'Off Night Backstreet' actually sounds the most of any of the songs on this album like it could have been a hit on rock radio. It's adventurous, but very melodic and cool.

Lyrically, this is another song about John Guerin and the long, slow death march of the end of their relationship. The line 'You pimp--laughing and strutting her to my chartered seat' references a day when Guerin brought his new girlfriend on the tour plane and had her sit in Joni's seat. The last couple of lines of this song are harsh. 'Who left her long black hair in our bathroom drain?' Dirty, overexposed and intimate in a nearly uncomfortable way. She's out for blood on this one. I think this one's really great.

 

With the last two tracks I hear the same guitar intro, as she did on For the Roses with the piano intros to Banquet and Judgement. There it was probably coincidence; here not. They are two very different approaches to the emotional wrench of the Guerin endgame. One is literary and oblique and not exclusively centred on JG, 'Off Night Backstreet' is as direct as she last was about five albums back. It took me a little bit longer to love this one than the two tracks either side of it, but now I don't feel that much drop off in quality at all. A very unusual Joni Mitchell song this.

 

I'm not such a fan of the title track. The lyrics have a little too much of that Whitman/Ginsberg self-mythologising heroism about them, which is not as much to my taste as Mitchell's more customary confessional lyrical style. On the musical side, I'm not wild about Jaco's heavy emphasis on the four and I don't like the occasional contributions from the chorus of Jonis either.

“Off Night Backstreet” is more to my taste: very jazzy but with a nice solid refrain and a groove of its own. Unfortunately everything after “DJRD” sounds like an afterthought, which makes me wonder whether the album is quite sequenced right. It seems to me that “Off Night Backstreet” would hit a lot harder on Side One.