A Case of Joni: Mitchell Curates New Love-Themed, Career-Spanning Box Set

In 2007, Joni Mitchell released her last studio album to date, Shine.  That release was her first recording since 2002’s Travelogue and first collection of new songs since 1998’s Taming the Tiger.  Over the past seven years, the influential singer-songwriter has mainly made headlines for her candid and revealing interviews, on which she’s held forth about such topics as Bob Dylan’s alleged plagiarism and her own struggles with Morgellons disease.  So it’s refreshing that Mitchell is back in the spotlight for her music, thanks to a new box set to arrive just in time for the holiday gift-giving season.  On November 17, Rhino will release a new four-disc collection entitled Love Has Many Faces: A Quartet, A Ballet, Waiting to Be Danced.

In the tradition of past compilations curated by Mitchell including The Beginning of Survival, Dreamland and Songs of a Prairie Girl, Love Has Many Faces promises to be a thematic exploration of the artist’s poetic, soulful and jazz-inflected music created over the decades.  The set includes 53 newly-remastered songs selected from her catalogue which began with 1968’s David Crosby-produced album Song to a Seagull and has encompassed such acknowledged classics as Ladies of the Canyon (1970), Blue (1971), Court and Spark (1974) and Both Sides Now (2000).  It’s promised that the remastered songs on Love will be “familiar but fresh,” with “a lot of sonic adjustment.” In a press release, Mitchell elaborated, “I am a painter who writes songs. My songs are very visual. The words create scenes …What I have done here is to gather some of these scenes (like a documentary filmmaker) and by juxtaposition, edit them into a whole new work.”

As the title indicates, the box set was initially conceived for the ballet stage.  “I wanted the music to feel like a total work – a new work,” Mitchell writes in the liner notes. “No matter what I did, though, at that [ballet performance] length, it remained merely a collection of songs.”  So the artist rearranged 53 songs into “thematic acts” like that of a ballet. Comparing her to that of a film editor, she offers, “I had 40 years of footage to review. Then, suddenly, scenes began to hook up. Then series began to form.” She elucidates, “Instead of it being an emotional roller coaster ride as it was before — crammed into one disc — themes began to develop. Moods sustained. I was getting there…When this long editorial process finally came to rest, I had four ballets or a four-act ballet — a quartet. I also had a box set.”

Hit the jump for more details including the complete track listing and pre-order links!

Among the diverse songs chosen by Mitchell are classics including “River,” “A Case of You,” “In France They Kiss on Main Street,” “All I Want,” “Carey,” and “Raised on Robbery” as well as the title songs of Blue, Court and Spark, Hejira, Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter and The Night Ride Home.  Numerous favorites, of course, aren’t here, such as “Help Me” or “Free Man in Paris.”  The discs are housed within a deluxe, hardcover book including 53 “lyrical poems” to coincide with the songs, six brand new Mitchell paintings, and the artist’s liner notes.

Joni Mitchell’s Love Has Many Faces: A Quartet, A Ballet, Waiting to Be Danced arrives from Rhino on November 17 and can be pre-ordered at the links below!

Joni Mitchell, Love Has Many Faces: A Quartet, A Ballet, Waiting to Be Danced (Rhino, 2014) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.)

CD 1

1. In France They Kiss On Main street
2. Ray’s Dad’s Cadillac
3. You Turn Me On I’m A Radio
4. Harlem In Havana
5. Car On a Hill
6. Dancin’ Clown
7. River
8. Chinese Cafe/Unchained Melody
9. Harry’s House/Centerpiece
10. Shades of Scarlett Conquering
11. Number One
12. The Windfall (Everything For Nothing)
13. Come In From the Cold

CD 2

1. Court and Spark
2. No Apologies
3. Trouble Child
4. Not to Blame
5. Nothing Can Be Done
6. Comes Love
7. Moon at the Window
8. Blue
9. Tax Free
10. The Wolf That Lives In Lindsey
11. Hana
12. Hejira
13. Stay In Touch
14. Night Ride Home

CD 3

1. You’re My Thrill
2. The Crazy Cries of Love
3. Love Puts On a New Face
4. Borderline
5. A Strange Boy
6. You Dream Flat Tires
7. Love
8. All I Want
9. Be Cool
10. Yvette In English
11. Just Like This Train
12. Carey
13. The Only Joy In Town

CD 4

1. Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter
2. Two Grey Rooms
3. God Must Be a Boogie Man
4. Down To You
5. A Case of You
6. The Last Time I Saw Richard
7. Raised on Robbery
8. Sweet Sucker Dance
9. Lakota
10. Cool Water
11. Amelia
12. Both Sides Now
13. My Best To You

NOTE: Joni Mitchell re-recorded “Both Sides Now” and “A Case of You” for her 2000 album of the same name and a number of her other songs on 2002’s Travelogue.  The information below pertains only to the original versions of the songs, as we do not yet have confirmation as to which versions she has included on the forthcoming box set.

CD 1, Tracks 1, 9-10 from The Hissing of Summer Lawns, Asylum, 1975
CD 1, Tracks 2, 12-13, CD 2, Tracks 5, 14 & CD 3, Track 13 from Night Ride Home, Geffen, 1991
CD 1, Track 3 from For the Roses, Asylum, 1972
CD 1, Track 4, CD 2, Tracks 2, 13, CD 3, Tracks 2-3 & CD 4, Track 13 from Taming the Tiger, Reprise, 1998
CD 1, Track 5, CD 2, Tracks 1, 3, CD 3, Track 11 & CD 4, Tracks 4, 7 from Court and Spark, Asylum, 1974
CD 1, Tracks 6, 11 & CD 4, Tracks 9-10 from Chalk Mark in a Rain Storm, Geffen, 1988
CD 1, Track 7, CD 2, Track 8, CD 3, Tracks 8, 12, & CD 4, Tracks 5-6 from Blue, Reprise, 1971
CD 1, Track 8 from Travelogue, Nonesuch, 2002
CD 1, Track 9 from The Hissing of Summer Lawns, Asylum, 1975
CD 2, Track 4, CD 3, Tracks 4, 10 from Turbulent Indigo, Reprise, 1994
CD 2, Track 6, CD 3, Track 1 from Both Sides Now, Reprise, 2000
CD 2, Track 7, CD 3, Tracks 6-7, 9 & CD 4, Track 2 from Wild Things Run Fast, Geffen, 1982
CD 2, Track 9 from Dog Eat Dog, Geffen, 1985
CD 2, Track 10, CD 4, Tracks 3 & 8 from Mingus, Asylum, 1979
CD 2, Track 11 from Shine, Hear Music, 2007
CD 2, Track 12, CD 3, Track 5 & CD 4, Track 11 from Hejira, Asylum, 1976
CD 4, Track 1 from Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter, Asylum, 1977
CD 4, Track 12 from Clouds, Reprise, 1969