The Fiddle and The Drum –

Both Sides, Now –

Alright, alright. Let’s step back only one year from last week’s LP to cover a talented folk singer.

Clouds (1969), Joni Mitchell. An unconventional album at times, with unusual harmonies, open-tuned guitar work, and unique love stories. Clouds is even more impressive when you consider this was only Mitchell’s sophomore offering, strongly signaling at what was to become of her impressive career.

Joni Mitchell, possibly one of the few music artists that did not originally choose to primarily be a musician. She has a strong passion (and skill!) for painting and is often famously quoted as being a “painter derailed by circumstance”. Her ability as a visual artist is apparent in several of her album covers (including this one, a self-portrait) where she would paint, photograph, and design much of her own work. Oh, and she almost always produced all of her work herself, beginning with this album. Her music ranges from a more traditional folk sound to full orchestra pieces, jazz, R&B, prog, and even some electronic work. When some people refer her to as “The female singer/songwriter of the 20th Century”, you can really understand the wide-spread effect of her work.

While she played guitar and sang from a young age, initially Mitchell just wrote songs for musicians in the music scene. She wrote (and inspired) a few songs for Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young, as well as others like Judy Collins and Dave Van Ronk. Much of her songwriting is often likened to that of her fellow Canadian, Leonard Cohen, with a strong poetic quality to her lyrics. As for her guitar playing, Mitchell was famous for playing open-tuned, which is where a guitar is tuned to play a chord with “open” strings (without fingers pressing on a string). She learned to play like this because as a child she contracted polio that effected her ability to stretch her fingers when first learning to play. Originally a limitation, it ended up influencing her songwriting as she discovered unusual harmonies and chords through her experimentation.

The songs I included are the final two tracks on the record. “The Fiddle and The Drum” is completely acapella, uncommon for her music, but I feel that it really shows off her raw, sometimes rugged vocal range as a singer. The lyrics of the song address “Johnny” (often interpreted as representing the U.S.) and his choice to “trade the fiddle for the drum”, referring to his desire for war. While clearly written in response to the Vietnam War, the song saw a resurgence in 2004 when it was attached to the protest against the war in Iraq.

“Both Sides, Now” is possibly Mitchell’s most recognizable work, but she actually wasn’t the original one to record it. In fact, roughly a dozen different singers and bands would cover the tune before she finally released her own version and then followed that up with another version in 2000. The song addresses three subjects: clouds, love, and life. Each verse tackles one subject with the singer expressing her initial positive reaction and opinion of each topic before admitting her now bleaker outlook on it. The verses are then followed by its corresponding chorus exclaiming that she’s “looked at both sides, now”, but she still fails to fully understand the merits and issues each one carries.

The love stories depicted on Clouds are fascinating, addressing their shortcomings while admiring their highlights. The record is through and through authentic Joni Mitchell material, with only the occasional song where she is joined by David Crosby (from the Byrds) on electric guitar. Along with the stellar album that is Blue (which would shortly follow this album), Clouds provides a solid example of Mitchell’s songwriting and what she brought to the folk scene.