Joni Mitchell: The Hissing of Summer Lawns - Original Asylum Records LP 24/96 rip to redbook

"Hissing" is Joni Mitchell's greatest album. It's been called "avant-garde", but there is something forbidding about that term and this music is accessible and enjoyable. The arrangements are well-textured and always interesting, never overstuffed, gimmicky or cute, and often - very often - astonishingly beautiful. Kudos to Tom Scott and the LA Express, and to Joni for coaxing such a classy performance from them. The music is strongly jazz-tinged without being actual jazz, but the main thing is it works. Devote one full listen to just the instruments, then another to Joni's voice, then a third just to concentrate on the lyrics. Each listen will reveal new pleasures and a greater appreciation for the quality of the entire effort. Each song is a treasure, no song disappoints, and one can listen to them again and again without growing weary of them. Unlike earlier (and some later) efforts in which Joni focuses on herself, here she focuses her laser lens on the world in which she moves, alternately with sympathy and withering criticism. Cinematic imagery abounds in these songs, from the the Kingpin's clasping hands in "Edith", the blood-dipped barbed-wire fence of "Hissing" to the dragonfly helicopter of "Harry". These images suck you in, song by song. One gets the sense that Joni is disgorging her vision of life with some pain, but with the conviction of necessity, and that she is doing so with ambivalence to popular reaction. This album rises above any popular genre, and even above Joni's other lofty output. It is a work of art - ennobling, uplifting, timeless.

Side A:
1. In France They Kiss On Main Street
2. The Jungle Line
3. Edith And The Kingpin
4. Don't Interrupt The Sorrow
5. Shades Of Scarlett Conquering

Side B:
6. The Hissing Of Summer Lawns
7. The Boho Dance
8. Harry's House-Centerpiece
9. Sweet Bird
10.Shadows And Light

Essential Equipment used:
Clearaudio Champion 2 turntable & Unify tonearm
Benz Micro L2 cartridge
Extremephono tonearm cable
Aqvox USB-2 MKII D/A
(light manual declicking)
PLEASE NOTE: Burn gapless (no track gaps) to match original track layout.

I upped two of my LP rips as "24/96" to satisfy myself and other reasonable people that great needledrops need no air nor bloat. My primo vinyl collection of the past 4 years had been ripped and burned to CD for my personal use and enjoyment. Anyone in love with concepts and buzzwords rather than sound can ignore this one and others I have planned. My 'drops stand on their own merits. And no, I'm not "pbthal."

rar pw: INFRANCE