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A software update nuked my Sonos system so I can't listen to music, so I'll write about music instead... Here are a handful of live performances I think are better than the studio versions. I'm only including things that are readily accessible, either on official releases or online. Just my opinion, of course, and I'd love to hear yours. So...
"Cactus Tree" on "Miles of Aisles." I think she was a much better singer in 1974 than she was in 1968. "Circle Game" is perfect on this record, too. It really wants to be a singalong.
"Edith and the Kingpin" on "Shadows and Light." I love the groove of the live performance, and I feel like it presents the lyric better.
"For Free" on the "Refuge of the Roads" DVD. She transforms this song with a couple of new lines added to the end of each verse. It's stunning. And I think she was a much better singer in 1983 than she was in 1970. The performances of "God Must Be a Boogieman" and "Woodstock" are also my favorite versions.
"Comes Love" from the "Painting With Words and Music" DVD. Just wow. So seductive and joyful.
The rest of these are not on official Joni releases, but all can be found pretty easily.
"The Three Great Stimulants" live at the Duke of Your Theatre in 1985. An acoustic version with Joni on guitar and (I think) Larry Klein on piano. It's on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IV7smboHWlY One of my top-10 all-time Joni songs, stripped of its ’80s arrangement and shining like a diamond. I just wish the sound quality was better, and hope something like this shows up on "Archives Vol. 5" someday.
"Just Like This Train" from KCRW Rare on Air Vol.3," a CD released by our local NPR station in 1995, and not too hard to find used. Just Joni and Larry again, with Joni on acoustic. This spare performance reveals the bones of the studio arrangement—it's all in Joni's guitar (which is unfortunately just a little out of tune, but everything else is so perfect I don't care).
"Love's Cries" and "Facelift" live on KSCA 101.9 Music Hall in 1995. These are from a solo acoustic show at the Gene Autry Museum that was broadcast on a local radio station, three years before their studio versions were released. The whole thing is on archive.org: https://archive.org/details/joni-mitchell-1995-gene-autry-museum-la-ksca and also on a reasonably common bootleg CD. "Love's Cries" is an early version of "The Crazy Cries of Love," and I think both the lyric and the melody work better before her very minor rewrite. "Facelift" is the same as the studo version, but the song really benefits from the intimacy of the solo acoustic setting. I recorded it off the radio when it aired, and there was a blast of static right in the middle of a guitar break in "Facelift," so I was very glad to find other recordings.
So what performances would be on your list?
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Q&A
Yes, I get it.
I can only listen to the tracks from Blue as she preformed them on Miles of Aisles.
The cigarettes had brought her register down a notch to what I consider a sweet spot. The only versions I’ll play now.
Jaco just adds something to "Edith and the Kingpin" on that performance that's undeniable.
I have to add from Miles of Aisles, Rainy Night House
I love basically every single damn track on Painting with Shadows and Light.
Comes Love is great and I also love her cover of Taxes, Death, and Trouble, or I guess it's actually called Trouble Man by Marvin Gaye.
She really seems to exude a mature sexuality in PwWaL, and I'm here for it.
It's a shame she didn't tour for Dog Eat Dog. I love that album. I feel like I've seen a video of her playing that song solo on piano somewhere that was magical. I just remember that awful Conspiracy of Hope show (crowd, not her) where no one would shut up and listen. She seemed so hurt by their rudeness.