Don Juan's Reckless Daughter - Joni Mitchell > Reviews > Reckless

Author's product rating:   

Originality	Groundbreaking
Lyrics	Mediocre
Quality and consistency of tracks	Mixed
How does it compare to the artist's other releases	Weak
Value for Money	Good

Advantages:	Impressive guitar
Disadvantages:	No consistency

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

First off, full marks for the striking and effective cover sleeve; yes here Joni is black, and ugh yes she is a man too. Of course this serves as a heads-up to what can be expected of the content. Yes folks it's bold, but is it effective? The one before this; Hejira, was confidant but monotonous. "Overture - Cotton Avenue" breaks that mould spectacularly with smashing acoustic guitars and warm fretless bass. Could possibly be one of the best album openers ever - very cool indeed.

Oh but what's this? "Coyote" from previous pastures? No it's actually called "Talk To Me" now and has better guitar. She then says 'piss' in the lyrics followed by a metaphor… More shaky ground continues with an unremarkable recording of "Jericho" which sounded so good on her live album Miles Of Aisles. Then there is the real wildcard; it's called "Paprika Plains" and is over sixteen minutes of Joni bumbling on piano. Uh huh, no kidding!

"Otis & Marlena" - wow, more great guitar playing from Joni. Thematicly similar to "Sweet Bird" from her Hissing Of Summer Lawns, but less elusive and more tragic. Good going. "Tenth World" drums you to sleep, as does "Dreamland" nearly running over seven minutes. Oh and look what we have again; the title track has a familiar sound to "Talk To Me"!

"Off Night Backstreet" with its cool guitars could have been forgiven for its dull subject matter of infidelity, but after the last two tracks one might be wondering what happened to all the genius lyrics. "Silky Veils Of Ardor" is kinda' nice but a bit too sad to end a generally disappointing album. Innovative guitar playing and confidant vocals extraordinaire, but Don Juan's Reckless Daughter has ran out of songs themselves. This conflicts with "Overture - Cotton Avenue" and "Otis & Marlena" - they are among Joni Mitchell's best tracks and it's a shame she didn't do more to this effect.