1. All I Want 2. My Old Man 3. Little Green 4. Carey 5. Blue 6. California 7. This Flight Tonight 8. River 9. Case of You 10. Last Time I Saw Richard

Joni Mitchell would go on from this `71 recording to make more popular, more ambitious, and more challenging albums, but she s never made a better one. Working with minimal accompaniment (Stephen Stills and James Taylor are two of the four sidemen), the Canadian thrush summoned an involving song cycle of romance found and lost. Though Blue is an uncommonly intimate representation, it s also astonishingly open and gracious. Songs such as All I Want, Carey, California, and A Case of You work equally well as poetry and pop music. --Steve Stolder

#Unbelievably sweet (2008-10-21) Although it s almost forty years old, this album sounds so fresh. Mitchell s guitar and piano is wonderfully fluid. And then there s her voice. An instrument so fine, the notes send shivers down the spine. Part of the mystique of this album is the honesty, even fragility of emotions. But there s just as much artistry in Joni Mitchell s Blue. A melancholy beauty. A well-worked gem of an album. The kind of music I remember hearing in kitchens with granola in the cupboard. Or at dawn just as the first birds start to sing. Frost on the grass.

#Probably the Greatest Album.. Ever. (2008-07-05) Joni Mitchell sings a lot of jazz and her songs are so often layered with whimsy and flutes and seem quite thick. While I am overall, a fan of Mitchell s repetoire, none of her albums have managed to penetrate my soul like her masterpiece, the omnipresent, beautiful, spectacularly sad, rich, and of course, appropriately titled, Blue . Blue is a staple for so many reasons. It captures a kind of nostalgia that someone who, like myself, is too young to experience the cultural movements in the 1960s such as the move to California and ...

#Blue ....The most overrated album of all time! (2008-05-01) It may very well be one of the most overrated albums of all time. Yes, Joni is a legend, yes she is a great lyricist and a great musician but after all the accolades, I have to ask myself does her music talk to me? Does her grating vocal style make me want to listen to 3 consecutive songs without being annoyed. I love Joni and I own all her albums so please don t hang me to dry on this. If you want poetic, sparse, personal folk music with the Joni style vocal meanderings, this is the baby you are looking for. She has...

#Desert island record (2007-10-20) On CBC radio there once a program on which people chose the 5 records or books they would take with them if the were lost on a desert island for the rest of their lives. This album is number 1 on my list of 5 I would take with me. I could listen to this album every day, no problem. Joni Mitchell is a genius, plain and simple.

#the most addicting album ever (2004-07-15) ",Just before our love got lost you said, I am as constant as a northern star, and I said, constant in the darkness, where is that at? If you want me I ll be in the bar. . . ", -Case of You, BlueIt takes alot for me to listen to an album over and over and over and over. . . and still not get sick of it. i ve had ",Blue", for about 3 years and Joni still makes it into my cd player more than once every few days. There are at least 2 songs that most passerbyers would recognize: ",California", and ",River",, but m...

1. You re My Thrill 2. At Last 3. Comes Love 4. You ve Changed 5. Answer Me, My Love 6. A Case Of You 7. Don t Go To Strangers 8. Sometimes I m Happy 9. Don t Worry Bout Me 10. Stormy Weather 11. I Wish I Were In Love Again 12. Both Sides Now

Taking its title from one of Joni Mitchell s best-known songs, this atmospheric album traces the arc of a relationship: from first excited flush, through resigned closure, to the next real thing. Two of the tracks are re-recordings of early Mitchell songs--the title track and the lesser-known A Case Of You, but otherwise the tales are told in the words of others. The self-painted cover gives a clue to the album s mood: lush and lavish, with a 70-piece orchestra accompanying songs popularised by Sinatra, Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald. This is Joni Mitchell as torch singer, with well-chosen songs (Stormy Weather, Don t Go To Strangers, Answer Me My Love) brightly arranged and beautifully sung. But from a singer whose reputation as one of rock s most respected songwriters was established by early, folk-influenced albums such as Clouds and Blue and the crowd-pleasing Court And Spark, the lack of new material on Both Sides Now is inevitably disappointing. --Patrick Humphries

#Her Best! (2007-03-09) This is a mature confident Joni at her best. She takes a relationship from beginning to end singing the appropriate songs for each phase of the relationship. I much prefer her newer renditions of her older songs, such as, Both Sides Now and A Case of You. There is a sexy smokey quality to her voice that gives the music emotion and depth. I play this CD frequently and never tire of it.

#Looking Back on Life and Love (2004-12-07) I never much cared for Joni s original version of ",Both Sides Now",. Listening to it conjured-up remembrances of my days as a ",hippie", in the Yorkville district of Toronto: paisley shirts, flowered dresses, sandals and strumming about love - or what I thought love was - on an out-of-tune guitar on a street-step somewhere. But this time around, her rendition is worth the price of the CD all by itself. The song has been recast through the eyes of someone who has likely lived the melody and, therefore, has brought to it a ...

#Both Sides Now -She sings like the CD picture looks POOR (2004-06-24) I can t believe this is Joni . . . a poor attempt. Nothing like Joni . . . I guess she needs the money. I was ripped-off on this one

#Joni enters a mature, new era (2004-04-04) I have to admit, I m one of those people who have listened to ",Court And Spark,", ",Blue", and the like for years, never getting into some of those experimental albums some fans seem to adore. But this album is Joni in a very new place. Like Billie Holiday (whose ",You ve Changed", she covers), Joni has reworked the music to fit the changes in her voice over the course of decades. Don t excpect the old stuff here-- you won t even recognize her voice. But this is a sultry, smoke-filled, fragile, absolutely magnifice...

#Fabulous Collection (2004-02-01) This is a wonderful retro album. I am only sorry it took me until 2003 to discover it. This is an album for lovers. Time to pour a glass of wine, cuddle up with the one you love and enjoy a romantic evening with Joni and her fantastic vocals backed by some creative orchestration.

1. Court and Spark 2. Help Me 3. Free Man in Paris 4. People s Parties 5. Same Situation 6. Car on a Hill 7. Down to You 8. Just Like This Train 9. Raised on Robbery 10. Trouble Child 11. Twisted

Painter-turned-folksinger Joni Mitchell had slipped stark saxophone solos into her prior album, For the Roses, and her singing had often hinted at a capacity for bluesier fare than her guitar- and piano-framed confessional ballads offered. None of those hints prepared fans for this sudden, expansive shift towards a much larger canvas--a sleeker, orchestrated pop style pulsating with jazz elements. Court & Spark found Mitchell casting aside her earth mother affectations and revealing herself as the thoroughly modern, thoroughly complicated woman she is, the songs sustained familiar preoccupations with relationships but replaced courtly settings and naturalistic imagery with recognisably modern locales. Deeply romantic, constantly questioning, classic tracks like the title song, Help Me, Free Man in Paris, Same Situation and Raised on Robbery display a more liberated Mitchell, ready to rumble with unbridled electric guitars (guest Robbie Robertson on ...Robbery), even willing to poke fun...

#HIt me with your best shot (2007-07-31) Though the Top 40 hits Help Me and Free Man in Paris are worth the price of this CD, Court and Spark, as a whole, is a great arrangement of tunes released during what is perhaps the Golden Age of Songwriting. Not your typical folk Joni Mitchell material, this is essentially her jazz phase release, some might say that it is her signature piece. I would not dare go that far, but it is not surprising that it was her biggest chart success, because it blends so well with the music of the other great artists of the time, namely Carly Simon, Carole Ki...

#Joni sells out (2004-07-06) Pretty provocative title, eh? Well, Joni did sell out, but she was one of the last to do so, and when she did the whole hippie thing had been over for some time anyway. But no doubt when this album arrived in 1974, it was the death nell for many hangers-on (except Neil Young) that the revolution, the counterculture movement, the attempt to get ourselves back to the garden, was certifiably defunct. In retrospect the tracks seem more innocent, but in the lyrics Mitchell herself alludes to a change that has come. From Free Man In Paris we have the disap...

#wistical (2004-05-21) This music was the soundtrack for an all-too-brief courtship in northern Arkansas in 1975-76. I have evolved beyond the person I was then but not beyond this timeless music or beyond the influence of the woman I met on the Norfork Lake ferry. That love sparked a string of serendipities and synchronicities that continue three decades later. ",Court and Spark", could not have been equalled by any other music for the poetic commentary it provided to that interlude and my second birthing.

#It s Springtime Again!! (2004-04-20) I just got reading a eulogy for drummer John Guerin, who was the drummer on this masterpiece by Joni Mitchell. No song in the world makes me think of spring more than ",Help Me. ", John Guerin s amazing drumming make this the perfect, floating out-of-body-experience song. I have heard this song thousands of times in my lifetime, but every single time I do, I marvel at its breeziness, as if I m hearing it for the first time. So the next time you have a second to relax, put on ",Court and Spark", and drink a toast to John, for t...

#The Only Joni Mitchell Album You Will Ever Need!!! (2004-03-30) Throughout all of her albums, Court & Spark is probably my favorite Joni Mitchell album. Court & Spark is Joni s experimentation with rock, jazz, and pop. This was a big change for Joni back in the 70 s, but Court & Spark was a commercial success. It sprawled singles like ",Help Me",, (which is my favorite one by her), ",Free Man In Paris",, and ",Court & Spark",. The musicians have alot of energy on this album. Joni s guitar hooks are improved, but it s not the best. I perfer her best are the...

1. One Week Last Summer 2. This Place 3. If I Had a Heart 4. Hana 5. Bad Dreams 6. Big Yellow Taxi (2007) 7. Night of the Iguana 8. Strong and Wrong 9. Shine 10. If

Shine may ultimately register as a fans only milestone, but it proves that Joni Mitchell retains many of the storied calling cards of her best albums. The searing lyricism of 1971 s Blue and the penchant for self-redefinition hailed by 1974 s Court and Spark make cameos here, but sadly, lesser efforts drawbacks abound. True, Big Yellow Taxi reprises the environmental dystopia Mitchell first poeticized on 1970 s Ladies of the Canyon, but the occasion only prompts new pedantic effrontery (This Place, If I Had a Heart). In this regard, Shine s especially cloying title track marks the worst offender. Blissfully, though, Hana boasts a driving rhythm section and blurting squirts of electric guitar and saxophone in support of a compelling character sketch, and If--based on Rudyard Kipling s poem of the same name--paints a lyrical message of affirmation in bold strokes. Mitchell s songwriting shines brightest at such singularly poignant moments where specificity of images meets the vagaries o...

#One of Joni s Best! (2008-06-13) I love how Joni Mitchell sings about social justice including the environment. I ve always loved her because she s a rebel and her lyrics go way beyond the usual ones of love songs. And this CD only reinforces why I love her. She just keeps getting better.

#Joni s Return! (2008-04-05) I was overjoyed to hear that Joni would be back with new material. And I was not disappointed by this album in the slightest. It s among some of her strongest work, right up there with Night Ride Home, Turbulent Indigo and Taming the Tiger. In fact, the album sounds like a peculiar hybrid of those albums - but very effective. In some ways it sounds like a sketch, or an unfinished work, since the instrumentation was largely done on one big synthesizer, but I think that is what makes it so endearing - at least to my ears. The album is driven by keyboards, ...

#The best songwriting to date (2007-12-09) Love it. Can t say enough about the incredible Ms. Mitchell. A true Canadian treasure. Her Court and Spark remains on of my favs, as does Hissing of Summer Lawns and the list goes on and one. Genius. Pure Genius.

#Cheesy synthesizer music (2007-10-08) I am a fan of Joni and I have bought most of her albums over the years. I was excited to see a new CD from Joni after so many years. Although lyrics and music are fine on Shine, I was really disappointed by the really cheesy use of cheap synthesizer instruments. The fake saxophone and robotics rhythms are particularly painful to listen to. I hope Joni will re-edit this one with a real band, it will sound much more alive.

#Extraordinary songwriting ability, exceptionally moving work. (2007-09-27) Following Paul McCartney, Joni Mitchell is the second musical heavyweight to be courted successfully by Starbucks Hear Music label and, again, it feels like an odd alliance, especially given the avowedly noncorporate hankering for the simple life which is threaded lyrically through this album. As well as airing her distaste for the trappings of modern living on Bad Dreams, Mitchell offers dignified anti-war comments, describing history as a mass murder mystery on Strong and Wrong, and warnings of ecological w...

1. Urge for Going 2. Chelsea Morning 3. Big Yellow Taxi 4. Woodstock 5. Circle Game 6. Carey 7. California 8. You Turn Me on I m a Radio 9. Raised on Robbery 10. Help Me 11. Free Man in Paris 12. River 13. Chinese Cafe/Unchained Melody 14. Come in from the Cold 15. Both Sides, Now

She has only had a few bona fide hits, but after almost 30 years, she s finally delivered a 15-song compilation of her signature songs that will be a CD point-of-departure for casual fans and newcomers well into the new millennium. The companion Misses volume is an intriguing curio that might rather more generously have been marketed as a bonus disc. --Jeff Bateman

#The Blonde In The Bleachers (2004-04-28) joni is the blonde in the bleachers to graham nash. . that interesting circle of talented artists that hung around laurel canyon. . . . sharing and inspiring the great american music that followed the Byrds breakthrough. . . joni was one of the matriarchs, along with cass elliot, of that important movement. . . its repeated, crosby stills and nash sang their first official harmonies together at joni s house. . . and joni could easily hang with the boys. . . she could write and chord with the best of them. . . buy this ",Hits", album to ...

#hippie flowerchild Joni Mitchell s Hits (2004-04-23) I love this album. It has many of her early and best songs. I listened to it constantly when I first got it. Several of the songs gave me just the most incredible inner spiritual experience of delight, that almost otherworldly feeling you get when you re deeply moved or stimulated by a work of art, be it a painting, a book, or a piece of music. If you get this ",Hits", album, don t lend it to a friend. I did, and never got it back :)David Rehakauthor of ",A Young Girl s Crimes",

#New Joni Fan (2004-01-18) Ok, so i wasn t around in the late-60 s and early-70 s when Joni Mitchell came onto the scene. So I obviously missed this music the first time around. I ve always been a fan of the singer songwriters of this era such as Carole King, Carly Simon, and Elton John, but seemed to overlook Joni Mitchell *big mistake. * I got this for Christmas and enjoy it very much. I m a teenager so I m not very knowledgable about this type of music, but I love Joni Mitchell s voice and songwriting style. True, she only had four top 40 hits, her biggest being the top 10 hit He...

#Roadmap to Joni Mitchell (2003-11-28) This, like many hits records, offers a decent sampling of what the artist, in this case, the amazing Joni Mitchell, has to offer. Notice I said a decent sampling. For all those out there who want to try Joni Mitchell s music, or just the genre in general- This is for you. Joni Mitchell is such an amazing artist, though- experimenting with severl entirely different sounds somehow without losing meaning or a musical identity- that one collection can never begin to cover her music. If you are already a fan, or own most of Joni Mitchell s music, I ...

#Incomplete, but good for casual fans (2003-11-16) This is a decent selection of Joni s best-known (not best) songs, but it s impossible to do her career justice on one CD. I own all of Joni s albums up until and including Mingus so there wasn t much reason to get this but I wanted to have Urge For Going on CD so, if that s you re only reason for getting it, make sure you find it cheap! Urge For Going is terrific though, classic Joni from her earlier period (my favourite). This song would have fitted nicely on Clouds and it is a nice addition to her catalogue. On another positiv...