Court And Spark

What a beautiful album. Again, this is another album I haven't heard before, but I am so glad that I've been able to experience it now. Joni Mitchell's voice is superb, right off the bat I was blown away by her performance and lyricism. The soft piano ballads and jazzy pop tunes are perfectly crafted and emotionally moving. I listened to this album twice, which is something I hadn't done with the previous albums. The song structures remind me of Joanna Newsome, but I think Mitchell does it much better. I felt connected to each story told in the songs, and the way they flowed together made the whole experience engrossing. Favorite track: all of them Least favorite track: none

Well, it's better than her later albums, I guess. But she's a much better poet than she is a singer. And a better singer than she is a melody-writer. I don't know why she seems to hate writing choruses so much. Most of the songs are just unstructured messes that never go anywhere. There's a story that Mitchell herself tells about Bob Dylan falling asleep when she played the album for him. It's funny but it's also understandable. It's a boring slog of an album. I would much rather have read these songs as poems than be forced to listen to Mitchell's wandering warble for an hour.

Interesting grunge dive. Can’t help but feel they aped nirvana a bit.

I do not understand the praise Joni Mitchell gets.

Before listening: I always imagined Joni Mitchell's audience as the Emma Thompson's character from Love Actually. Tragic, hopeless, alone.../ I started it for the second time and starting to like it at "Help me"/ The more folkish a song is the less I like it./ "Help me" and "Raised on Robbery" keeps pulling me back (even tough the second one is pretty folkish, but has good vibes, so I don't care)/ This is definitely not the Joni Mitchel I was expecting, and when reading a bit about her it seems that I could like her later stuff, when she ventured to jazzier stuff, seems like this was kind of a starting point.

Sorry lady, not interested in the slides from your trip to Paris.

My mom's favorite Joni album. Mine as well. Straight down the middle folk rock Joni. The trademark floating and swirling Joni melodies but this time with more energy Joni. More direct, incisive lyrics from Joni. More compelling jazz Joni. Incredible Joni production in surprising places (end of People's Parties, middle of Car on a Hill). I'd give it an easy 5 but the cringey final scat scat, so instead it's a labored 5. A+

Finally! A female artist, and it's the legend herself. I really love Joni Mitchell, I find myself torn between thinking she or Bob Dylan is the better songwriter. Hard to argue it's Bob in the face of "Both Sides Now." I haven't listened to this album before, but it's great. It only has one song that I already knew ("Help Me"), but there's plenty of heat here. I really like the exploration of different genres--Joni dips into jazz on some tracks, then more rock/pop on others. It doesn't always suit her, but her voice cuts through anything. It's a great experience overall and held my attention throughout. I'm looking forward to getting more Joni Mitchell albums, especially Blue. Also, if this list listened to my plea for female artists, maybe it will hear me ask to honor Black History Month...maybe some Jimi Hendrix? Aretha Franklin? We'll see what's in store. Favorite tracks: Help Me, People's Parties, Down to You, Twisted. Album art: Simple and sweet. I like the textured look. Nothing too special, but it looks like Joni herself may have painted that picture. That's extremely cool. 4.5/5

This album was so BORING. It wasn't actively *bad*, but I just didn't care about it.

Such overrated artist... maybe she should have been just a poet?

Rating: 10/10 A classic album. Joni Mitchell sounds fantastic, beautiful vocals and great lyrics. This album is absolutely gorgeous. Lush, detailed instrumentation and pristine production. Loved everything about this album, honestly wish some of the songs were longer but that speaks to how amazing this album is. Favorite tracks: Pretty much the whole album but highlights were Court and Speak, Help Me, Car on a Hill, Raised on Robbery, Troubled Child. Least Favorite song: Down to You, a bit too long but still great though.

I love Joni’s voice in the same vein of Chris’s love for Adele. She has such total command over her voice as an instrument, not just in maintaining pitch, but in volume, delivery, especially cadence. I could listen to her sing the verses of Help Me a million times and never get tired of it. On top of her second-to-none vocal talent, the music is interesting enough. This album, IIRC, is about when she begins a pretty full dive into more jazz. Extra star for real guitar, drums, and tasteful horns, but it won’t let me add a 6th star.

Joni Mitchell's voice is such an elixir for the ears. Very expressive and dynamic, with the perfect mix of vulnerability and cool aloofness. I could listen to her sing a shopping list. But the songs here are mostly elaborate monologues of experience and emotion. It's pretty hard to make those kinds of song work, but her voice brings them alive. The music is good, with interesting jazzy additions to the folk palette - but really it's all a backdrop for the voice. The final track is impeccable vocal jazz performance, and I would love to hear a whole album of that. Overall, this album doesn't quite reach the soaring heights of Blue, and I don't really like how it takes a sharp turn in sound for the last three tracks (though they are still good tracks!) so I have to give it a 4*.

Easily the most accessible Joni album I've heard. I prefer her jazzier albums with Jaco but that takes nothing away from this one. Really enjoyable listening.

Legendary singer/songwriter, beautiful music, absolute masterpiece.

How can you not love Joni

I was gonna give this only 4 stars but I don't think my mom would ever forgive me if she found out, so I'm rounding up.

Joni Mitchell? More like moany shitshow.

I could listen to this every day.

Incredible melodies and lyrics. Not typical pop music at all. Interesting jazz influences and flourishes. Joni Mitchell is a genius. Every song is an interesting adventure.

It’s a testament to how great Joni Mitchell that this can be a perfect album and still not my favorite by her

Folk, guitar moving into some jazzy flourishes. She knocks it out the park again. Best Tracks: Court and Spark, Raised on Robbery, Twisted

Another high note in a very specific genre (that basically has a one woman sub genre in this particular performer). About perfect, if you like this kind of thing (which I do)

It's like a well-executed, yet unflavored custard. Pleasant enough but there's no point in eating it.

Like a lot of Joni Mitchell's music, I choose to like this album. She doesn't always make it easy for me to like it and in other hands a lot of these sounds and pretensions would seriously irritate me. A lot of these songs have parts I really like and parts I really don't like, often right after one another. I share a home with one or more people who seriously hate her music. So I have to be strategic about when and where I listen to it. In fairness to my housemates, Joni Mitchell's a bit of a musician's musician, I think, and that you'll hear a lot of people like Jimmy Page waxing poetic about her amazing guitar playing, but not a lot of non-musicians waxing about her. I think that's part of why she largely been forgotten over the last 20 or so years. Free Man In Paris is supposedly about David Geffen, who was her manager at the time and during a trip to France together was bitching to her about having put up with random calls from temperamental artists at all hours but in Paris where no one could reach him he was finally free and could relax a little. That's one tune I like all the way through without any major irritations. But my favorite story about Joni Mitchell and David Geffen was the time when he drove her to Woodstock and they got stuck in traffic and ended up just camping out in a motel room and watching the festival on TV where she wrote her song Woodstock that her boyfriend Graham Nash made famous with CSN a year or two later.

This is the second Joni Mitchell album in about a week. They're also not on Spotify cause she "stuck it to the man". So I'm honouring her wishes and not listening - the only time I'll do so in this project (because fuck mean spirited "hippie" boomer cunts like her and Neil Young). Thankfully I know how much her music sucks anyway. So here's a 1/5 and I hope this sets a lovely precedent where I never have to hear her awful wailing again.

at its best its female madman-era elton john written by a 14 yo girl who just went through her first breakup standing in for taupin. at its worst it sounds like joni mitchell. boring, repetitive instrumentation. trite, on-the-nose lyrics. i actively hate it. closing track was particularly insulting

I’m sorry…why haven’t I been listening to Joni Mitchell? Her albums on this list, so far, have been *excellent*. On Court and Spark, her voice, as always, is beautiful and unique, the instrumentation is varied, lively and engaging. Her blend of folk and jazz manages to be both soothing and invigorating, with flourishes of ambitious sonic textures and experimentation. What an excellent album.

Easy 5 even with the awful last track (that I since discovered is not by Joni at all!). Her voice sounds "softest" here compared to the other '70s classics although the songs are far from "pop". Great album

Gorgeous, Side B is a bit weak though.

Another neglected purchase on my hard drive, I may have skimmed off the opening, Broadway-esque piano chords, not in the mood. Silly me, this is very good, and I'm finding it hard to sum up why. Am tired and a blizzard arrives tomorrow, and I imagine this record would be good, conversational company for it. The instrumentation is superficially super normal and actually deeply weird. Free Man in Paris's Paris is a little Emily in Paris; it is still a good song.

I’d say it’s up there with her best pieces of work (I prefer The Hissing of Summer Lawns more though)

It's a good full-listen, but my aversion to singing that speeds up and slows down makes it hard to fall in love with most tracks.

I sense the talent but it's just on the verge of tipping me over into really liking it

Joni Mitchell is overrated. She is a good poet, but not really a musical artist. I don't know why she seems to hate writing choruses so much. Most of the songs are just unstructured messes that never go anywhere. 2⭐️

Can be tough-going Joni. When she's great she's super-brilliant, eg River, Both Sides Now, but the jazz-folk fusion can be a bit grating. This album, for me, was more of the latter.

not available on Spotify?

I didn't realize I hated Joni Mitchell so much. It's one of those names I've heard a bunch but never listened to.

A five for me. Help Me is beautiful. In a younger time when having such preferences seemed to matter… People’s Parties contains my favourite chord. It still hits. Raised on Robbery is the real jewel in this crown.

Beautiful. Love this. I’ve never really listened to Joni Mitchell before. Why has nobody ever sat me down and said “Mike, you need to listen to Joni Mitchell.”

It is staggering the level of musicality that is held within the 3m2s of Car on a Hill. I have generally favored Hejira but relistening to this after many years away - it's tough to beat. Choruses are on short supply. Melodies extend beyond simple pop convention. She feels fully liberated here. An artist. Like a relationship - if you open yourself up it hits the head and the heart.

Wow. Simply beautiful. "Help Me" will always be a favourite of mine, but the whole album is a work of art. Joni seems to have a knack for writing the most beautiful and poignant lyrics that I so often don't understand a lick of, while dancing them around clothed in meandering melodies that just make you want to get lost in them. A stunning album.

Court and Spark Although I know some of the songs in here, I've not listened to this album before. The opening bars of the title track, although I don’t think I’ve heard it before, are immediately warm and enveloping and comforting, she really does have the knack of making songs feel immediately familiar, as you’ve always known them. I do already know Help Me, but it also has that same feeling of always having existed, and being immediately comforting, like a kind of nostalgic warmth for something I’ve never experienced, even if the lyrics are more emotionally ambivalent by the end of the song. The brilliance of those two songs continues on the rest of side 1, with the excellent Free Man in Paris, the pen portrait People’s Parties and brilliant piano-led The Same Situation with some lovely steel guitar sounds. The 2nd side very slightly doesn’t quite match the quality of side 1, purely because the cover of Twisted doesn’t really do it for me, it has just a little too much forced jazz hands showtune energy for my taste. Outside that though the rest of the songs are again excellent. The soft rock adjacent Car on a Hill, with its spacey middle section, is great and Down To You is a fantastic song, the meandering piano line evoking the weariness in the words. Just Like This Train is another lovely track and although I wasn’t initially as keen on Raised on Robbery I came to very much like its shot of bluesy pop-rock. And Trouble Child is great, it has a nice Steely Dan-ness to it, and I presume the title and opening riff is an evocation of Trouble Man by Marvin Gaye? Even with Twisted, it’s hard not to give this a 5. It's a brilliant album, combining her characteristic shuffling jazzy folkiness, with her idiosyncratic rhyme schemes and uniquely brilliant voice. 🧨🧨🧨🧨🧨 Playlist submission: Down to You

I found it pleasant and engaging.

Listened on the drive to the mall and while walking around the mall. What an incredible story teller. Great range and variety of sounds on this record too. Down To You is a masterpiece of a song. Great record!

Beautiful tone, and songwriting that grabs me throughout. Especially Raised on Robbery & Free Man in Paris

Her voice and phrasing is just mesmerizing. She moves effortless from her chest voice to her head voice. The harmonizing on several tracks is angelic. Her expressiveness and vulnerability draws you in. Must listen to tracks are Help Me, Free Man in Paris, and Raised on Robbery is just fun.

L’ho ascoltato in macchina ieri, mi ha trasmesso un senso di pace e calma. Bella scoperta, mi è piaciuto

My favorite of her albums and that's saying something. Brilliant songwriter and wonderful singer.

Longtemps restée dans l'ombre de son petit-fils Eddy, Joni Mitchell n'en a pour autant pas moins de talent. C'était d'ailleurs prévisible. Je m'explique. Une fois que l'on a compris que Joni était une femme et non un énième gonze, on se doute que l'album sera bon puisque à l'exception de Patti Smith et sa crête iroquoise, aucune représentante de la gente féminine n'a obtenu moins de quatre étoiles de ma part. Et cet album les vaut bien.

great full band and piano, riffs can be pretty fun to listen to

When this is all over, if at least 50% of my reviews are threes, then I will say that I have assessed correctly.

3.5 - decent album. Compared to the first Joni Mitchell album I heard, this one actually makes me understand why people hold her in such high regard

Sorry Shane :-( good songs and great instrumentation but it’s a voice thing

Hated this on the first listen but really enjoyed it second time around

a very intresting mix, nice deep lyrics, love the mesh of the different elements... i expect this to age well, specially the uniqueness of the jazz pop sound which im excited to try in diff contexts. a very strong 3.

I enjoyed it, she has a really nice voice, and very poetic lyrics. To me, the lyrics actually gave off strong Taylor Swift vibes, it’s the stories she tells and vulnerability in the way in which she talks about her emotions. Her and Swift may be decades apart in their age and musical careers, but they have the same inner emotional landscape driving their song-writing. Well that’s my take anyway.

This was better Joni Mitchell than The Hissing of Summer Lawns. Still not my style, but much better.

Folk Music. :/

This wasn’t terrible but it’s not for me. Something about her style or voice just makes every song sound the same. Needs to throw a chorus in every once in a while. 2.5

Joni Mitchell is a polarizing figure for me. I enjoy her folky stuff more than her easy listening jazzy style stuff.

Couldn’t find it on Spotify and in the end not overly mad about it. Deedle deedle deedle

I really liked her voice, but the songs are a bit too generic and flat. I'm sure the lyrics are meaningful but I couldn't be bothered to pay them any mind because of this.

meh, just not really my style

A bit meandering and winding in places; middle of the road. Good album for dinner parties.

2 Joni Mitchell albums in 3 days, am I in purgatory?

Realised after one hour that the album was over and that I wasn't listening to anything. Completely forgettable (for me) and even more astonishing if you see the (good) ratings it got on release.

Girls just wanna have fun but this album does not let that. It's so boring except the Twisted song.

I feel like this is what divorced cigarette moms listen to.

Blue is appropriately one color, but it’s the multicolored mid-70s Joni of Court and Spark, Summer Lawns, and Hejira that is my favorite. The Fleetwood Mac-esque pop production can be over the top at times, but mostly it elevates Joni from a singular voice to a sonic worldbuilder. “Car on a Hill” is an all-timer.

Min favoritt av Joni Mitchell.

I got really into this album a couple of year ago on my mind widening search for female artist my father forgot to tell me about. It's an eye opening experience, I feel like I would have really resonated with the vulnerability she displays on songs like People's Parties, like a dude singing that song would focus on getting laid and trolling for tang, but her observations are empathetic and profound. Young love and falling in love are timeless emotions that this album touches upon. It feels like it can seamlessly relate to her time, my youth, and today.... Also, pretty sure this will be the only album on the list to mention the Leafs (Raised on Robbery).

Now THIS - is music. Perfection which today’s generation of “singers” can not even achieve with auto tuning.

A truly beautiful album. It's not my favourite Joni album, but it's not far off.

First time I'd heard it and loved it. Great final track!

Very balanced songs. Good harmony and lyrics.

The majority of this album is vintage classic Joni. However, my favorites are rocking Joni and Jazzy Joni (Raised on Robbery, Twisted)

a favorite album!

One of her best.

Wow this was great! I never listened to Joni Mitchell before and my impression of her before this was adult contemporary sappy romance but this was really interesting and fun! I'll go for 5!

another easy 5-star album. i really like the final 3 tracks that get jazzy and a little silly. "trouble child" has some great minor key horns and electric piano going on. just a great listening experience overall

Nothing like Joni has ever happened in music. She channels just about every love poem ever written and still sounds as original as ever. For her, love is a mythic act, and that's what she's after on this album. Court and Spark is a brighter album than Blue, yet no less a classic. Her melodies meander along like a roller coaster through bliss. "Help me" is a sweet ride, lilting and sweet. She's in good company here, with a consummately tight outfit who really get her. And her voice soars so high with crystal clarity, almost angelic. But she's not after heaven. She's after the grit and grace of love. Her evocation of the disenchanted man in "Free Man in Paris" captures his feelings so well, but it also sounds like a gentle mockery. She also has her jollies making like the Andrew Sisters with the boogie boogie number "Raised on Robbery". (I remember when saxophone solos like the one here was a staple on most 70s songs.) She has just as much fun on her cover of "Twisted" which features Cheech and Chong. (For you kids, they were a comic duo who released a slew of hilarious albums in the 70s.) I thought she'd penned this one for a long time, she performs it with such authority. And what a comical way to end the album, clearly indicating that she means business but she's got a sense of humor too. Nevertheless, it is her beautiful personal ballads which bathe us in her folk soul. I belong to "People's Parties", "The Same Situation", "Down to You", and "Just Like This Train", which are resonantly Joni. Just let me light one up and sway along. I still have my original vinyl and I've played it often, but not so often that the record gets worn down. This is a treasure I intend to... well... treasure.

Incredible spring album — “like a church like a cop like my mother you wanted me to be truthful” wow

Beautiful songs by a true songbird, loved it as I don't tend to listen to JM albums as such more songs within playlists etc.

I'm shocked at how good this is. I thought that Joni Mitchell only had one good album and that album was Blue, but this is amazing and maybe even better than Blue.

pure poetry! Fav: Raised on Robbery Least Fav: Just Like This Train

Already much-loved. The opening three songs, I love in particular. I enjoy this Joni stage, where she's moving (to my ears) from folk towards jazz but also sounds unmistakably "70s". Some wonderful melodies - I don't think anyone else writes melodies like she does, to my knowledge - and arrangements, and her usual wry, observant, self-aware lyrics. Fabulous (I'm not very keen on Raised on Robbery or Twisted, but let's not split hairs; she's genius.)

Bien

Man, this is some hot garbage. I don't understand how anybody can like this at all..... April Fools! Yeah, this is amazing. 4 albums in to her discography and I still love Joni Mitchell. Who would've thought? Court and Spark is widely considered to be one of Joni's best albums and I can absolutely hear why. In fact, now that I've heard all 4 albums of hers on this list, I have to say that the people behind this list nailed the Joni Mitchell representation on this list. They went with all of the best albums! Court and Spark is a very nice mid-point between the pure folk of her earliest albums like Blue and the jazzier stuff from a bit later like Hejira. It's quite enjoyable, as one might expect. Joni's songwriting is still full of delightful detail. You've got some all-time classics on here like the back-to-back "Help Me" and "Free Man in Paris." I will say that this album probably ends on its weakest song with "Twisted," but it's a minor hindrance to an otherwise fantastic album. I don't think I've called enough attention to Joni's singing in these reviews. It's quite beautiful, actually. I really love her voice. Combine that with the grade-A storytelling and the lovely musical compositions and you get an album with no major negative aspects to speak of. I do prefer Blue and possibly even Hejira over this, but there's no doubting that Court and Spark is an excellent showing of talent. Great stuff. Low 5/5.

this was the best album i've listened to so far and i really enjoyed every song. genuinely will add this to my playlists and relisten whenever i have an itch for some good ol folk country 70s inspiration.

Very good. Good voice and all songs were enjoyable

YASSS

vinyl day!! this is a classic

'And the more he talked to me, you know / The more he reached me.' Joni is reachin' here, that is, she's happenin', she's loosenin', & she's gettin' it goin': no graspin' at straws here, just reachin' like Digable Planets reach, like the best psychedelics reach, just like the best jazz and funkadelia reach & go on reachin'. You can almost hear the origins of dream pop, so elastic is her voice, ironic b/c she's a lyricist who wants to be heard while Liz Fraser has no such desire. I guess that's b/c 'Saying, laughing, and crying, / You know it's the same release.' It's pretty rare to have a 'folk' singer who's as good a songwriter as she is a vocalist, but that's what Joni offers, the goat in many ways. I may enjoy Hejira a bit more, but that's honest preference.

What else can be said about this beautiful woman. She's absolutely amazing & so is this record. I love everything she does. The beautiful melodies, music, lyrics, intelligence. Amazing.

This was an enjoyable listen considering I'm not usually super drawn to Joni Mitchell. I appreciate the jazz-y influence that runs through this album, it's a fun departure from the classic folk I went into this expecting to hear. I'm giving it 5 stars because, much like Rumours, I anticipate this growing on me from 'I enjoyed' to 'I loved' with repeat listens.

The most accessible Joni album. This is the one that made me buy physical copies of her entire discography a couple of years ago… completely unaware how experimental she got.

A very long time ago, when I was an impressionable college student, I purchased a compact disc: Joni Mitchell’s Clouds. I grew up listening to folk rock thanks to my parents, and Judy Collins’ version of Both Sides Now had always been one of my favorite songs. I remember listening to Clouds and totally expecting something else. I never gave Joni a fair chance. Years later, after getting into Bob Dylan and others, I gave Joni a second listen. This time, I got it and she changed my life. Court and Spark is only one of Joni’s many masterpieces. She opens up her soul and sings with the voice of an angel. Her songwriting is on display here, experimenting with rhythms and harmonies. At this stage in her career, she had started blending in jazz elements and the fusion is pure perfection. Help Me, I think I’m falling in love with Joni’s music again. 5 stars

I’m embarrassed I’d never listened to this in its entirety up until this point. Songs like help me are timeless, but hearing the creative exploration of twisted was so cool. Amazing piano playing, amazing sound, too. Will be in my regular rotation for the foreseeable future.

I loved this Indie-relaxed album