Listen to Joni Mitchell’s astonishing isolated vocals on ‘Free Man In Paris’
Few voices are as evocative of the counterculture moment as that of the great Joni Mitchell. After rising to prominence in the 1960s as the flower-crowned queen of hippiedom, the singer-songwriter confounded expectations with her 1970 album Blue, a record which extinguished any doubt surrounding her agency as a songwriter and artist. The album would be her last on Reprise Records. By 1972, she’d signed a new deal with Asylum and released For The Roses, her first on the label. We’ve done some digging and bought you a beautiful isolated recording of ‘Free Man In Paris’ from that stunning work.
It’s generally assumed that the free man in question is Asylum boss David Geffen. In this particular track, Mitchell explores the pressures of the music industry and the way that success, money and fame alter the individual. Based on a conversation with Geffen, the lyrics to ‘Free Man In Paris’ paint an ambiguous portrait of the business magnate. While his arrogance sits front and centre in lines like, “I do good business / There’s a lot of people asking for my time,” he’s also a sympathetic character: “I was a free man in Paris,” he recalls mournfully, “I felt unfettered and alive.”
Mitchell’s relationship with Geffen began in the 1960s when he was establishing himself as an agent of important clients like fellow singer-songwriter Laura Nyro. Mitchell was also hustling by attempting to make a name for herself as a musician. Bonded by their mutual instability, the pair become close friends. When Geffen founded Asylum Records, Mitchell naturally hopped onboard to record For The Roses.
From this moment, Geffen and Mitchell continued to confide in one another while she was writing the album, and some of his late-night confessions found their way into her lyrics. ‘Free Man In Paris’, for example, depicts Geffen at a moment of extreme vulnerability, with the music mogul bemoaning the intense pressure he faces day to day. The only time he ever felt truly free, he reveals, was as a young man in Paris, when his responsibilities were paper thin.
Though the song centres on an intimate conversation between two close friends, ‘Free Man In Paris’ carries universal resonance. Geffen’s wistful view of his young life evokes that sense that, with age, we forfeit our freedom. As money and status become more important, we lose sight of what drove us in the first place: a desire for control, for freedom from worry. The irony of Geffen’s story is that in the pursuit of these things, he has forgotten how to feel “alive”.
Make sure you check out Joni Mitchell’s stunning vocal track for ‘Free Man In Paris’ below.
