As a big Joni fan, I obviously welcome this news. Let's face it, Joni's days as a public performer are done, and who knows how many years she has left with her own mortal coil, so it's nice that she can properly look back and re-evaluate whether archival stuff deserves a release. That said, I hope she and her camp exercise better critical judgement than Bob Dylan's. Some of those 'Bootleg-Series' that Dylan has let out are amazing... and some are very badly chosen. As an example of the latter, the 'Halloween 1964' show was issued and is now the official acoustic-Dylan on Columbia record for posterity... and it's not very good. But anyway, Joni has always exercised excellent taste and I'm sure she'll do the same with these, whatever they are!
The Dylan Bootleg Series and related live releases-66,Rolling Thunder,62-66- are the gold standard of archival releases.Jeff Rosen is close to my 21st century musical hero for his work on this. By the way I think Live 1964 is stunning.One of the best 2-3 solo live albums ever released by anyone.All IMHO of course. If the Joni camp aims at the Dylan archival standard I would be ecstatic.
That was during the 1973 "Tonight's The Night" rehearsals, apparently helped by plenty of tequila, Neil has mentioned it a few times and has attempted to get Joni to sanction the release of that session, story is she's always refused them to use her part.
I've got a couple of bootlegs of that 'For the roses" tour, pretty much her solo on guitar, dulcimer and piano, amazing versions of the songs, but sound quality on my copies is not very good. Jackson Browne was the support act, would make an impressive 2/3 CD release.
Vol. 1-3 is unbelievably great, of course. The '66 one they had to put out, since it was probably the world's most famous bootleg prior. I agree the Rolling Thunder one was well assembled (even if that isn't one of my favorite live periods -- yeah, I know everyone else loves it). Wow, really?? I can't understand why they wouldn't have issued the canceled 1963 Carnegie Hall show, which is superb, or one of the 1965 English shows (as seen in Dont Look Back). I find those way, way, musically superior to the 1964 show, where his voice sounds weird, he's clearly drunk, he forgets words, and the songs are played really, really slowly... to the point where I fall asleep.
I wonder if that stems from her bitterness over the Ladies of the Canyon/Planet Waves incident. Some of the folks Young played with in that era were reportedly among the ones in the room for that.
Stunning cover, one of my favorite performances ever. I can only hope there's more of this caliber in the vaults.
Just as Lou Reed ended up having the time to supervise the remastering of his catalog, I hope Joni is able to complete a journey through her archive, that we may be able to enjoy many volumes of unreleased material curated by herself. So excited about these releases. I just can't wait!
Considering that the Rhino LP of Blue done by Steve and Kevin is one of the best-sounding records ever made, if I were Joni I'd hire them to do the whole catalog on vinyl.
Listing for the box set has been taken down. I expect the others to be removed soon, too. Plans are still on though.
There are times when I think that 'Travelogue' is the best record Joni ever made... Hell, there are times when I think that 'Travelogue' is the best record anyone ever made...! - It's sublime and it absolutely never fails to make me cry. That's art, pure and simple.
I hope plans for this release don't fall through. I've been longing for unreleased Joni songs since I got into her music twenty years ago. I bet she has some undiscovered gems locked away in those dusty vaults.
Joni played the album for David Geffen and a few others. Bob was also there and they played Planet Waves first. Everyone was effusive about Bob's album but had nothing to say about Court and Spark. Bob pretended to fall asleep while it played! After C&S finished, everyone went back to talking about Planet Waves. Awful. Joni details the story in the liner notes of the Love Has Many Faces set. You can read them at her website here: Joni Mitchell - Love Has Many Faces: A Quartet, A Ballet, Waiting To Be Danced Lots of interesting stories told there.
WoW! Awesome News! Really excited. Probably old stuff to most here, but here’s Joni displaying her creativity, audience rapport and humor in her early days. Enjoy!
If we are going for magical special deluxe boxsets I would like Blue - with the smell of the Greek sea embossed on the the box Court and Spark - expanded solo piano versions of Down to You. A 73 concert video Hissing of Summer Lawns - any early piano only demos. Any live footage Hejira - many solo guitar demos - a Strange pillow of my wanderlust - Joni and Jaco isolated track - roadside photos and insights from Joni
