I don't get it...Exile on main Street-Blue


I love to listen to great podcast/interviews with great musicians. Last night i listened to Rick Beato interview Maynard from the great band Tool. Besides being a fantastic conversation, Maynard told Rick the two most influential albums for his music inspiration are Joni Mitchell Blue, and Black Sabbath's first self titled record.

I understand and love Black Sabbaths first record, but I have listened to JM Blue countless times and just don't understand what the hype is. Full disclosure I love female vocalists, and I also love Joni's  Court and a Spark. With that said I have heard many musicians rave about Blue. Please enlighten me-what am I missing ?

The other head scratcher for me is Exile on Main Street by the Stones. Again I have heard many musicians rave about this double album. I don't get it... Beggars Banquet-Let it Bleed-Sticky Fingers are so much better in my opinion, but just like Blue, It seems like musicians much prefer Exile on Main Street.

I know its all subjective...but these are two records I have never learned to appreciate. Thoughts ?

krelldog

Showing 2 responses by cundare2

Well, as a huge fan of the run spanning Beggar's Banquet through Sticky Fingers, my reaction to Exiles was the same as yours.  I WANTED to like it, I believed it when people so much smarter  than me told me I was SUPPOSED to like it, but I just couldn't break into it.  Over the years, I've owned 3 or 4 copies, all of which I played in depth, and then finally gave up and sold.  There's obviously something there, but other than maybe 2 or 3 tracks, nothing to compare with the accomplishments of the preceding albums.

As Kavi says, to each his own.

 

Anyone who’s having trouble "getting" Joni Mitchell ought to pick up Lloyd Whitesell’s book "The Music of Joni Mitchell." He analyzes every track in her catalog in terms of specific parameters: melody, lyrics/poetry, harmonic structure, personae, arrangement, album concept, etc. There are three appendices that each consider one of her releases in its entirety as a concept album.

There are other books that analyze Joni’s music, but none I’ve found that are as readable, insightful, engaging (not just a dry, academic musicological analysis), and as much fun to read while listening the recordings themselves.

Highly recommended to anyone with a layperson’s background in music theory, poetry, or pop music in general.

From the Amazon page for the book: "The Music of Joni Mitchell offers a comprehensive survey of her output, with many discussions of individual songs, organized by topic rather than chronology. Individual chapters each explore a different aspect of her craft, such as poetic voice, harmony, melody, and large-scale form. A separate chapter is devoted to the central theme of personal freedom, as expressed through diverse symbolic registers of the journey quest, bohemianism, creative license, and spiritual liberation."

I found that, after reading the book, some of my least-favorite Joni albums, like "Seagull" and "Don Juan", became my favorites. I was amazed by how much depth and sophistication was packed into even her earliest songs, such as "Dawntreader" from the first album.