Joni Mitchell’s five hottest takes
Since the dawn of the 1970s, Joni Mitchell has been hailed as one of the greatest songwriters of her generation. Breaking through in the late 1960s as one of the numerous singer-songwriters of the counterculture, after releasing Ladies of the Canyon in 1970, Mitchell diverged from this well-worn and, quite frankly, overdone trope. Although early hits such as ‘Big Yellow Taxi’ positioned her as a generational talent, no one could have foreseen the ensuing artistic masterstrokes.
Her next album, Blue, is perhaps the ultimate break-up record, with the project followed by For the Roses and Court and Spark. After releasing this triptych of classics, Mitchell embarked on the odyssey of experimentation that she’d long teased. Now, she fused folk, jazz and other genres to create a compelling sonic palette that saw her carve out a wholly unique position in music.
Alongside her evident artistic mastery, Mitchell has made her name as one of the more opinionated musicians out there. From tearing into some of her most prominent peers to her politics, or even how she views her art, the Canadian songstress has provided multiple hot takes over the years that can only be described as smouldering.
Join us, then, as we list five of Joni Mitchell’s hottest takes.
Joni Mitchell’s five hottest takes
I am not a confessional songwriter
Most music fans know that Joni Mitchell is hailed as one of the finest confessional songwriters of all time, and she makes a solid claim to being the ultimate in that category. From ‘Help Me’ to ‘River’, the songs that evidence this argument are many. However, Mitchell argued the contrary when speaking to Morrissey for Rolling Stone in 1997.
At one point during the interview, Morrissey asked Mitchell: “Because your music is confessional, you have to explain yourself repeatedly in much more depth than anyone who makes nonsense, throwaway, useless music?”.
Being the polemical character she is, Mitchell found fault with Morrissey’s account of her work. She replied: “I don’t think of myself as confessional. That’s a name that was put on me”.
Mitchell feels that her music is different from what is defined as “confessional”. Using the somewhat controversial example of poet Sylvia Plath, she explained: “The confessional poets like (Sylvia) Plath, whom I read later when they started calling me confessional, most of their stuff seemed contrived to me and not as greatly honest as it was touted to be.”
Madonna is a “whore”
Madonna, the undisputed ‘Queen of Pop’, is loved by legions of fans, and despite her gushing with praise about Joni Mitchell, she cannot count the ‘River’ singer amongst her avid followers. Madonna was enthralled by Mitchell when she was a teenager, telling Rolling Stone in 1997: “I was really, really into Joni Mitchell. I knew every word to Court and Spark; I worshipped her when I was in high school. Blue is amazing.”
She added: “I would have to say of all the women I’ve heard, she had the most profound effect on me from a lyrical point of view.”
Unfortunately for Madonna, when speaking to the same publication six years prior, Mitchell had already torn into her in a highly vitriolic manner. She said: “Music has become burlesque over the last few years — video’s done that. Every generation has to be more shocking than the last. But at a certain point, you’ve got to reel it in because decadence ultimately isn’t that hip. Our country is going down the tubes from it. It’s rotten to the core. And I think women can be more than decorative.”
Using Madonna as an example of this cultural decay, she continued: “Yet someone like Madonna can be seen as a feminist hero because she’s exploiting her own sexuality rather than being exploited by some man. That’s an interesting idea, but what’s the difference between her and a hard hooker, you know? Who’s being exploited there? She’s revelling in herself, too. But she can take it. I guess that’s what it is. It’s just being able to take it, you know”.
Saving the worst part for last, Mitchell concluded her tirade, labelling Madonna a “terrible role model” and a “whore” by stating: “She’s got that whore-Madonna thing built-in [laughs]. She’s like a living Barbie doll but a little bit on the blue side. There’s always been that type of female. There’s always been a market for it, but the danger is that she thinks she’s a role model. And it’s a terrible role model. It’s death to all things real.”
Not done with the hate, during a 2010 interview with the Los Angeles Times, Mitchell compared the ‘Like a Virgin’ singer to the murderous Roman Emperor, Nero.
Poetry is “narcissistic”
As well as being one of the great confessional songwriters, most of Mitchell’s fans would agree that she is also an inherently poetic songwriter, delivering a host of utterly exquisite lines over the years. Take the following segment from ‘A Case of You’ for example: “Just before our love got lost you said / I am as constant as a northern star / And I said, Constantly in the darkness, / Where’s that at? / If you want me, I’ll be in the bar.“
Despite this, for the most part, Joni Mitchell despises poetry. When sitting down with New York magazine in 2005, she was asked whether the “great poets” influenced her style. Giving the ancient form of literature a dressing down, she said: “I didn’t like poetry. When I read the Shakespearean sonnets, I feel like some of them are mercenary. How many poems can you write where you say, ‘You’re so beautiful that you should reproduce yourself and I’m the guy to do it’? (Laughs.) They can’t all be inspired. It’s like somebody came to him and said, ‘Give me a poem like you did for Joe and I’ll give you 50 bucks.'”
Positioning herself as a companion of Friedrich Nietzsche when it comes to “narcissistic” poetry, she continued: “I find a lot of poetry to be narcissistic. I agree with Nietzsche on the poets. He said something like: ‘The poet is the vainest of the vain, the peacock of the peacocks … he muddles his waters so that they might appear deep.'”
However, Mitchell did caveat her point by revealing the names of some poets she doesn’t mind: “I know I’m throwing the baby out with the bathwater in a lot of ways. I guess there are a few poets I like, though, like E. J. Pratt and Carl Sandburg.”
“I’m a punk”
One of the most contentious entries on the list comes by way of Joni Mitchell defining herself as a punk. At one point during the Morrissey discussion from 1997, the former Smiths man enquired whether there is truth to the rumour that Glen Matlock was fired from the Sex Pistols for listening to her.
After briefly laughing it off, Mitchell compared herself to Sex Pistols frontman Johnny Rotten before claiming that she is a punk like him. She said: “When I met Johnny Rotten, I liked him immediately. He was younger than I was, but he was a lot like I was in high school: fashion-conscious… kind of pale and pimply and avoiding the sun. But I’m a punk. I’ve never really been in the mainstream.”
Bob Dylan is “not authentic” or “very gifted” either
Although Dylan and Joni Mitchell were once friendly, it all went sour after the storied Rolling Thunder Revue tour of 1975-1976.
“We are like night and day, [Dylan] and I,” she said. “Bob is not authentic at all. He’s a plagiarist, and his name and voice are fake. Everything about Bob is a deception.” It must be noted that this comment is highly ironic, as Joni Mitchell also changed her name.
In 2013, her opinion stayed the same, and she provided yet another scathing review of Dylan. She said: “Musically, Dylan’s not very gifted; he’s borrowed his voice from old hillbillies. He’s got a lot of borrowed things. He’s not a great guitar player. He’s invented a character to deliver his songs … it’s a mask of sorts.”
