Joni Mitchell's Biography

Author David Yaffe is an unabashed Joni Mitchell fan, and his admiration oozes in nearly every paragraph of his 376-page biography, Reckless Daughter: A Portrait of Joni Mitchell. As a reader who knew little about Mitchell aside from her musical output from 1970 through the early 90s, I found this book to be an enlightening read that offered a glimpse into how Mitchell developed creatively, broke down barriers, explored new terrain, and how the difficulties she experienced in her personal life fed her art. Still, at times Yaffe’s love becomes overbearing, his writing devolving into a fawning fit of approbation.

Yaffe certainly knows his subject, and the book is buoyed by direct quotes from Mitchell herself, as well as many of her ex-lovers, fellow artists and friends, not to mention concert and album reviews from publications as Mitchell’s career unfolded. Fortunately, Yaffe doesn’t gloss over Mitchell’s less admirable qualities, allowing her cantankerous personality to barge through as she blasts the likes of Thomas Dolby, Joan Baez, ex-husband Larry Klein, and even her daughter, with whom she reunited thirty-three years after placing her up for adoption. The most revealing remark in the book may be from Klein, who concludes, “I think that the seed of the angry, narcissistic element of her personality was always there, but I think that it was a gradual process of that part of her growing, and the curious and joyful part gradually receding.”

Too many biographies are too thin on the creative process and too robust on private life (Daniel Lanois’s autobiography being Exhibit A), but Yaffe may be the first author I critique whose summary of an artist’s output becomes too much at times, especially as he describes Mitchell’s career of the late 70s that delved deeper and deeper into jazz influences and esoteric lyrics. When a subject’s lyrics are obscure, more grounded prose would be helpful, but some of Yaffe’s detailed analyses of Mitchell’s lyrics are as hazy as the source. Consider the following description of the final verse of “Paprika Plains” off of Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter:

“Changing weather becomes changing rhythms. Now the disco ball is shining on the dancers, illuminated by an artificial globe. It’s a continuum. She’s still as ‘wide-eyed open to it all’ as she was when she was ‘three feet tall.’ Everywhere she looks, she sees patterns and makes poetic images out of them. Like a medicine ball, the mirrored ball is moving, yet it is also a center, like coming back to middle C. That mirrored ball shines on everyone.”

This kind of writing bogs the book down.

But there are other moments when Yaffe hits the nail on the head. When describing the effect that Mitchell’s reimagining of her classic song “Both Sides Now” in 2003 had on the orchestra and conductor Vince Mendoza, Yaffe writes:

“The arranger and the musicians were losing it, but Joni was smiling. She had them exactly where she wanted them. She knew she had achieved spectacular theater just by getting older and going back to a song people thought they knew.”

Simple and straight forward, but effective. 

The coolest tidbit I learned was that the line from Led Zeppelin’s ”Going to California” – “to find a queen without a king/they say she plays guitars and cries and sings” – is a reference to Joni and her first track off her first album, “I Had a King.” I wish I’d known this when I was a 12 year-old putz claiming Zeppelin to be the greatest band of all-time.

It’s funny that certain words stand out when reading a book, and in Reckless Daughter Yaffe’s love for the word ebullient is almost as apparent as his love for Mitchell. If I had a digital copy of the book, I’d do a quick count. And he refers to Mitchell on several occasions as a “goddess,” which – to me – reads over the top, as if he’s projecting his own fantasies with the younger Mitchell. That’s quibbling on my part, but there are meatier grievances, particularly those pages where Yaffe reveals his own prejudices. His blanket statement about 80s music being “the aural equivalent of fluorescent lighting” is, of course, ridiculous. Let’s not forget that in the 80s many of Mitchell’s peers released some of their best work: James Taylor, Paul Simon and Jackson Browne among them. Mitchell didn’t. It was her choice to follow trends, but there was nothing inherently bleak about the 80s music scene. Great music was there for the taking. Mitchell didn’t create much, if any. 

And Yaffe inexplicably critiques artists of that decade: “If Nietzsche was disgusted by Wagner, what would he have made of Hall and Oates, or Phil Collins? The sickness of the decade even plagued music that might have otherwise been good. The standards, in other words, were low, and the people were sheep.”

Ouch. Okay, Yaffe, you got your licks in, but I confess without shame: I would rather listen to 1980s Phil Collins – and hell, even 1980s Hall and Oates – over 1980s Joni Mitchell any day of any week of any year. Don’t blame these guys on Joni’s poor output that decade

Still, Reckless Daughter is a good read and it educated me on several blind spots I had regarding Mitchell’s discography. One habit I employ that I would recommend to anyone reading a book about music: have your streaming app handy. It took me a while to finish Mitchell’s biography because every other page led me to listen to another song on Napster, and there are some gems I hadn’t heard before, or at least hadn’t paid much attention to: most notably, “I Had a King” and my new favorite, “Roses Blue.”

Yep, those are old songs. What can I say? I’m a melody guy, and when it comes to heartfelt lyrics and melody, you can’t do much better than Joni Mitchell’s first decade of recordings.

Lovett and Hiatt in Waukegan

The mutual admiration and banter between Lyle Lovett and John Hiatt at their duo acoustic show in Waukegan’s Genesee Theatre on Friday night was almost as much fun hearing as the music itself. Both sporting stylish sportscoats and ties, Lovett and Hiatt sat down in their respective chairs and stayed there for the entire evening, trading songs back and forth and occasionally adding an accompanying guitar or backup vocal to each other’s performances, but always adding witty repartee between songs. Of the 160 minute performance, I’d guess that a full third of that time was Lovett and Hiatt chatting with each other in their slow, dry delivery, much like a James Taylor or Randy Newman.

I am more familiar with Lovett’s songs than Hiatt’s, but had always admired the latter’s soulful, swampy voice and his uncanny ability to stay under the radar yet command respect from musicians whom I admire. But if a newbie to Hiatt’s music were to base his opinion solely on Friday’s performance, he would likely be at a loss as to why or how Hiatt managed to attract attention. Opening with “Master of Disaster,” Hiatt immediately pushed his range to its limits, screeching out vocals that barely resembled notes, and while some of the rough edges smoothed out over the course of the evening, it was clear that he was either having a bad night or was no longer able to hit the notes in their original keys. There is no shame in this, but there is an expectation for musicians to adjust the keys or the melodies to adapt to their aging voices. Hiatt played most of his tunes with a capo, so lowering the songs by a half step or two would have been an incredibly easy thing to do. Unfortunately, he grinded it out for the evening, and his performance suffered as a result.

The contrast between Hiatt’s opening performance and Lovett’s “Creeps Like Me” couldn’t have been wider, as Lovett’s smooth tenor sounded strong and unstrained and remained so for the rest of the show, and the contrast wasn’t limited to each other’s vocal abilities. Hiatt talked about having to solo regularly with Ry Cooder’s band back in the early 80s when Lovett first saw his friend perform, and how terrifying that had been. Lovett responded that he always found soloing terrifying. As such, Hiatt took all the leads of the evening, but I found his guitar playing clunky and sloppy. I’ve played with some excellent guitarists in my life, and Hiatt wouldn’t rank among any of them. As is often the case with live acoustic guitar, the sound when strumming was overpowering and mid-rangy, often masking the lyrics of the songs, and Lovett’s picking went over better, allowing his vocals to shine through.

As for the songs, both performers are excellent craftsmen, particularly when it comes to funny, witty tunes, though I would have loved to have heard some of Lovett’s more heartbreaking compositions such as “Road to Ensenada” or a more up-tempo song like “It Ought To Be Easier.” Instead, he stuck largely to blues-based or funny songs, the most effective being “Her First Mistake,” a gem from 1996. Glancing at the set lists from this tour, the songs between performances vary significantly, so it looks like each show is one of a kind, much like these artists.

This was the first time I saw either of these musicians perform, but it was the second time I purchased tickets to see Lovett. Back in July of 2001, my wife and I were to see him perform at Ravinia on a sweltering weeknight. We had lawn seats, and I was kind of dreading the insane traffic, having to find a place to sit and sweating my ass off only to fight the traffic again on the way home. To add a little wrinkle to the evening, my wife was three months pregnant and not feeling all that great. As we were about to walk out the door, she mentioned something about not having to find a good seat because at Ravinia lawn seats aren’t in view of the stage.  I did a double take. “What?” “If you’re in the lawn seats you just hear the music. You can’t actually see the stage.” I contended then, and I contend now, that that is the stupidest setup for a concert venue in the history of mankind.

I pulled the plug. We stayed home. Sixteen years later we sat in the twelfth row of a small theater, and in addition to hearing an honest, uncluttered performance, we actually got to see the human marionette’s smile stretching out wide and strong in response to his buddy’s goofy remarks. It was worth the wait.

Ben Folds in Los Angeles

When I first heard Ben Folds Five while driving in 1995 I nearly crashed my car in excitement. I’d never heard anything like it before. A funny, smart, musical piano-based trio sang “Underground” on the radio, a week later I overpaid for the album at CD World, a few years later I sang their songs to my twin daughters, and in 2012 the brainwashing culminated in a Ben Folds Five reunion performance with all three of my children in attendance.

At the Ace Hotel in Los Angeles on Sunday night, my daughter and I took in a solo Ben Folds show of his “Paper Airplane Request Tour” and enjoyed an impressive and somewhat unpredictable performance, as Folds took audience recommendations for the last half of the evening (via paper airplanes thrown onto the stage). My other daughter had attended his Louisville performance last April and was somewhat disappointed with the song selection, as Folds leaned too heavily on familiar territory. The paper airplane tour has helped to alleviate this tendency, and a quick glance at the shows thus far confirms that the second halves of have been completely different, and the loose nature of the programs have also allowed Ben to improv songs on the spot for comedic effect. At Sunday’s concert he performed two ad-libbed songs – one for a man in the audience who was being a dick and another for the theater where he was performing – and both were hilarious.

Folds is an exceptional piano player, something I don’t think I fully realized until this performance. When I watched Folds and Rufus Wainwright perform back in 2004 at Ravinia in Chicago the latter’s piano skills stood out to me, but Folds is right up there, exhibiting not only his own unique style and sound (something very difficult to achieve on the piano) but also very technical runs and hand independence that far surpass anything Elton John or Billy Joel are capable of at the piano. Because of this, an entire evening of piano never got old; Folds has enough tricks up his sleeve to make the last song sound as engaging as the first.

Aside from skipping the repertoire of the last Ben Folds Five release and his collaboration with Nick Hornby, each of his albums were well represented on Sunday, including his most recent effort, So There, whose songs were much more vibrant and effective as a solo performance than on the album that highlighted an accompanying sextet.

Like James Taylor, Folds is able to introduce a song as if it’s the first time he’s ever done so, with an engagingly dry wit and timing. The most compelling may have been his prelude to “Not a Fan,” during which he recounted a moment after a Cincinnati concert when a boyfriend of a fan pulled a knife on him. Apparently some people can really get worked up over music.

The last song of the first set included a short drum duet and piano duet with singer Josh Groban (who knew?) and then the airplanes flew and littered the stage, resulting in some deep cuts that had Folds slightly stumped. “Redneck Past” required a cheat sheet and Folds stumbled in the middle section of “Kyle from Connecticut,” but the rest of set was more familiar.  A 17 year-old aspiring actress who sat in front of me went crazy when Folds began “Emaline,” and my daughter and I high-fived during “Cologne,” an example of one of the singer’s biggest talents – composing beautifully heart-wrenching songs. That fans actually threw airplanes onstage to request “The Luckiest” and “Gracie” was a disappointment (that’s what you wanted him to play out of his entire repertoire?) but “Narcolepsy” and “Where’s Summer B.” helped redeem that audience in my eyes.

Prior to this performance I admit that Folds had grown a little stale in my eyes. His past four albums haven’t excited me nearly as much as his past efforts (the last one to grab me was Way to Normal), but this performance convinced me that he’s still a force to be reckoned with. A more motivated version of me would spend the next year dissecting his songs and piano playing to really get a better handle on his craft. For now, I’ll have to settle for recording my own piano-based trio sometime this winter for my next album, hopefully with a unique result, but undoubtedly owing a great deal to the man that paved the way.

Danny Green Trio: Jazz Plus

When I attended Berklee College of Music in the 80s, students engaged in an adolescent turf war, a sort of whimpified version of West Side Story sans knives or anything else involving danger. Instead of the Sharks and the Jets, it was the Rockheads and the Jazzheads, the former perceived as buffoons by the latter, and the latter perceived as smug elitists by the former. I was somewhere in the middle, having been raised on rock and roll though very open to learning about jazz, but the jazz tradition at Berklee made it hard not to side with my rock brethren. So smug were the Jazzheads that they gleefully rode the coattails of Wynton Marsalis’s criticism of his brother Branford for his joining Sting’s band, and they were downright incredulous at how Sting ruined his otherwise legitimate song “Englishman In New York” with a rock beat breakdown (right after a swing section, which the Jazzheads natural approved of).

I may still be a rock guy at heart, but my favorite musical discovery of 2016 came not from one of the dozen rock stations of Chicago but from the jazz frequencies of 90.9 WDCB.  While driving in my car, I heard a piano jazz trio playing an odd-metered song with a stellar melody backed by – of all things – a string quartet. It blew me away. I rushed home, went on-line to check the name of the song – “Porcupine Dreams” – and purchased the Danny Green Trio album, Altered Narratives. It’s a gem.

Altered Narratives showcases a wide spectrum of jazz styles, and with Green’s flair for odd rhythms and the addition of strings on a handful of tunes, the album offers a listening experience that’s far more interesting, varied and fulfilling than any other jazz album I’ve heard in a long, long time. The addition of strings is a stroke of genius as it completely changes the musical palate.  As much as I love the sound of a traditional piano-bass-drums combo, the strings fill out the sound when the band plays percussively, and offers accents at other times, each unit balancing the other to lift the song to an entirely new level.

Some songs stand out in a big way. After a few more traditional pieces to open the album (still original and still excellent), the trio dives into the haunting “October Ballad,” a tune in three-four whose tensions and changing tonal center keep the song moving forward and avoid getting too settled. In addition to his piano chops, Green’s gift is melody, and this song is exhibit A. 

After a solid Latin-based “6 A.M.” the band switches gears yet again with “Second Chance,” opening as a sort of romantic piano piece with the first string accompaniment on the album and reminiscent of some of the cinematic themes of Ennio Morricone. It’s a lovely piece that seemingly concludes, pauses, and then begins again with the full band in a different key and a different time signature, now with the reprised melody offering a compelling 4 on 3 motif that gives the piece its momentum. The next tune, “Katabasis” also sounds cinematic, and its 12/8 rhythm would feel right at home in a tension filled montage of a mystery film. Once again, the feel changes a third of the way through the song, becoming a more staccato piece and giving the song a welcome lift.

Next on the CD is the piece that started it all for me, the wonderful “Porcupine Dreams,” offering another haunting melody with strings punctuating the 7/8 rhythm before the band breaks with a frantic conclusion that alternates between 7/8 and 4/4 and keeps the listener desperate to find the down beat, like a thrill rider’s anticipation of the next stomach-churning drop.

The short piano solo “Benji’s Song” once again stresses Green’s mastery of melody, and the chromatic changes would fit right in with a Randy Newman instrumental album.

Here ends the more experimental side of the album, with the last three songs completing things on a more traditional jazz-trio note, though “Friday At the Thursday Club” offers yet again some very interesting chord changes beneath a melody whose accents are unfamiliar in a 6/8 time signature (a 4 on 3 is once again employed – wonderful!). But for me, tracks 3-8 are among the best six I’ve ever heard on a jazz recording. If the bookends are a bit more on the traditional side, they’re still excellent.

Bassist Justin Grinnell and drummer Julien Cantelm hold down the rhythm fort nicely, particularly in the odd-metered moments. If there’s one criticism I’d make of the album, it’s the inclusion of so many bass solos. I suspect jazz purists will crucify me for saying so, but I never understood the allure of the bass solo. To me it’s an instrument that should stay in its supporting role and allow other instruments to handle the highlights.

Whatever. The Danny Green trio is a stunning group that’s willing to push the boundaries and explore interesting territory. That may be what’s expected of all jazz musicians, but this is a band that is equal to the task.

Movie Review: Captain Fantastic

With all the hoopla surrounding last Sunday's blunder at the Academy Awards, it’s easy to forget that the primary purpose of the ceremony isn’t to hand out prizes, but rather, to celebrate and promote movies. Tucked inside the glam of glistening dresses, monotonous speeches and coveted trophies is an opportunity to consider films that one might not have otherwise. For me, this year’s Best Picture nominees did just that, as I went out of my way to watch movies that normally wouldn’t have been on my radar (Moonlight and Hell or High Water, just to name two). But Jimmy Kimmel inspired me to take things further. During his monologue, he cracked the following joke aimed at actor Viggo Mortensen, the star of Captain Fantastic: “Too often the Academy only recognizes movies that people have seen.”

That inspired me to go beyond the Best Picture nominees, of which I’d seen eight of nine, and extend my viewing to other films that were up for awards. First for me was the aforementioned Captain Fantastic. In this film, Ben is raising his six children in the relative isolation of a Washington forest, where they grow and hunt food, learn self-defense as well as literature, science and math, and stick to a strict routine of exercise and chores. Ben is demanding, and his children are up for the challenge, exhibiting signs of impressive strength, intelligence and camaraderie. In short, the family is living a sort of Utopian existence in a wilderness paradise.

When the children’s mother kills herself after an extended mental illness and lengthy hospital stay, Ben takes his children into town to visit his sister’s family, and we get a unique opportunity to see the world through the eyes of kids who’ve been raised apart from our modern society. Suddenly, the endless stream of shopping malls, overweight people and fake food appear especially tragic, and teenage access to violent video games utterly preposterous. The message isn’t subtle, but it is illuminating.

Unfortunately, writer and director Matt Ross continues to paint in such broad brushstrokes that as enjoyable as the film may be, little of it is believable. Ben’s sister’s family is naturally a stereotype, with overly protective parents when it comes to real life tragedies (i.e., the suicide of Ben’s wife) but who allow ample access to violent video games and whose kids are bumbling idiots. Ben’s kids, of course, are the kind of angelic children any adult would be privileged to raise: strong, confident, intelligent, knowledgeable, loving, musical and kind, all brilliantly portrayed by talented young actors and all desperately two-dimensional, a modern day version of The Sound of Music’s Von Trapp family. But Captain Fantastic isn’t a musical. Our belief is suspended just enough to enjoy the film, but never enough to swallow it whole.

If Ben and his family show any dimensions at all, it appear to be in spite of Ross’s efforts, rather than because of them. Scenes apparently meant as comedic relief instead show an ugly side to Ben. He eschews his father-in-law’s wishes for them not to attend his daughter’s funeral. Fine. But they arrive late, making a grand entrance that would be disrespectful under any circumstances, and Ben wears a red suit that cries for attention, until he interrupts the pastor’s sermon and unilaterally demands attention. In this scene, and in another that has the family employing a ruse to steal food from a grocery store, the outcome isn’t comedic at all, but rather a glimpse into a very flawed human being.

Still, the movie shines when it concentrates on the family enjoying each other’s company. When Ben’s daughter describes a book she’s reading as “interesting,” he demands she try again, claiming the word has no meaning. She does, with success, and it reminds me of all the times I use words that come easily to me instead of searching for the correct ones. 

The conflict in this movie is minimal, and I applaud Ross for not taking the easy way out in this regard. It brings to mind Chef, a film that could have gone down so many Hollywood tropes, but stuck the its central purpose – the relationship between a father and son. Similarly, Captain Fantastic succeeds most when it allows us to watch this unusual family interact with each other. I found the last scene, as understated as it may be, as touchingly brilliant.