Joni Mitchell: Classic or Dud

I imagine it is less regret and more her people went to her and said we can't put out a cover with you in blackface in 2024.

Wait, that’s her? I even own a copy but I guess I never really looked all that closely, just figured it was some guy.

The album jacket is a photomontage and includes three photographs of Mitchell. In the foreground she is in blackface as her "reputed alter ego, a black hipster named Art Nouveau".

The David Yaffe and forthcoming Ann Powers book go at lengths to describe wtf was on her mind (the Powers book best).

https://static.cambridge.org/binary/version/id/urn:cambridge.org:id:binary:20171016100701055-0366:9781316569207:68091fig18_1.png

tastelessness takes many forms. the new cover art is horrendous

I would've suggested an outtake from her "Skating on Lake Mendota, WI" photo session, but she already used one for the Songs of a Prairie Girl compilation. (Granted so did Hejira, but mostly for the inner sleeve.)

Kind of like this one the most though, with Joni mysteriously in the distance I'd buy that as 'Don Juan's Reckless Daughter.'

I might be wrong but the photo of Joni with the wolf/dog they superimposed on the original blue/orange background is actually from the mid-80s and not from the 70s? I think it's from a photoshoot she did with Norman Seeff (who also did the one of her skating on Lake Mendota btw) for Dog Eat Dog, almost a decade after DJRD? Such a weird choice. I mean, I'm glad they didn't use the original artwork but surely she must have some painting from that era lying around in the attic they could use instead? Or just have some nice simple typography over the original background?

Great, underrated album; deserves a better cover than the two it got.