Thanks to the following people for their help with translating this article into English: John Phillip Olsen, David Dentinger, Michel Byrne, and Olivia Frison de Angelis.
*Translator’s note: the original French title contains a play on words that cannot be easily rendered in English; “Maîtresse Flammes” evokes the French term “maîtresse femme”, meaning a “forceful woman” or a “strong-willed woman”, but “flammes” in place of “femme” (and in French the two words rhyme nicely) adds the notion of “flames” or “fire”.
Paris Match: The rumor has been going around that you live as a recluse and that you no longer want to see anyone…
Joni Mitchell: No, I’ve been ill for two years, totally emptied of all energy, but now I’m much better. Western medicine was not able to help me. I am now treated by a Chinese doctor who has brought back my energy using herbal mixtures.
Did you write any new songs during this period of forced rest?
I started to, but I wasn’t able to carry through to the end. Pollution and the poisoning of our habitat have destroyed my sinuses, and now I sing with great difficulty. I used to be able to cover three octaves effortlessly. But you have to know when to stop. The other day I received a letter from a fan who said, « I don’t care whether you sing like an old frog, I want new songs. » That was cute, but my answer is “no”. On the other hand, I think it’s time for me to write my Memoirs. So many books have been written about me that are nothing but gossip, written by mercenaries who have never even met me!
Among the books about you is the recent one by Graham Nash who was once your companion. Do you like it?
No, I skimmed through it, and everything he wrote about me is false. Maybe it’s the drugs which have fried his brain, because when we were together he was quite brilliant, but I was surprised and disappointed.
As a child you had polio. What has that trial changed in your life?
At the age of 8 I was strong, built like an athlete. In fact, I might have become an athlete since social life in the community revolved around that, but I had already forged my identity as an artist. Polio transforms children into fighters; they aren’t sad, they’re serious. They’re soldiers who are fighting for their lives. That made me an adult before my time because I knew what it was to suffer.
At the age of 24 you moved to California and, in his book, Graham Nash speaks with great emotion about that time of Free Love and the Summer of Love.
Of course (Joni sneers)! That was something invented by guys so that they could lay as many girls as they could. And, at the time of the “Summer of Love”, I was considered a serial seductress, which was ridiculous. I didn’t even know most of the guys who claimed to be my lovers. Men were free to do what they wanted, but not women. Reputations are strange things; at the beginning of my career I was portrayed as the incarnation of innocence, the white snow goose from Canada, and then it all turned against me. Like Ingrid Bergman, who became a star in an image of innocence, and who was then cast out by Hollywood when she became pregnant out of wedlock! It all depends on your image: are you a good girl or a bad girl? At the time California was the center of the music world and I was the queen along with Janis Joplin and Grace Slick.
You were only three girls in an almost exclusively masculine world. Was it difficult to gain respect?
No, but it was very difficult to gain respect as a woman. So I decided I would be better than everyone else. And that’s what I did. But the better I got the more I was attacked. And that’s why I wanted to produce this collection, to show that I went through different periods and that I survived. Like Picasso. If you bring together in a single place different works of Picasso from all his periods you still know that it’s Picasso. This collection, if it had been assembled chronologically, would have been a catastrophe. That’s what the record company wanted to do, emphasizing the changes in my voice which, according to them, were caused by smoking. It had nothing to do with cigarettes. I started smoking at the age of 9. When I recorded my first album I’d already been smoking for sixteen years.
Coke really isn’t good for me; I already talk too much and coke gives me heart palpitations.
How does one start to smoke at the age of 9?
I had joined the church choir and after practice we all went out for a cigarette. With my first puff I thought it was wonderful. Cigarettes have always helped me to think and to concentrate.
At the time you arrived in California everyone was taking drugs. You too?
No, but I partook from time to time so as not to wreck the atmosphere. I took coke for a year and then I stopped. My drug experiences are minimal for someone of my age. I was a big consumer of caffeine and saké. Coke really isn’t good for me; I already talk too much and coke gives me heart palpitations. But I smoke two packs a day.
You’ve always been compared to Bob Dylan, with whom you seem to have always had a difficult relationship…
The press would like to pretend otherwise, but I like Bob a lot, though he feels threatened by me. I don’t feel as though I’m in competition with him, but he feels as though he’s in competition with me. Once, when on tour, he tried to hurt me, to trip me up. He fired our sound engineer, Fast Freddie, because Freddie was doing my sound work too well. When I was on stage, Bob had them hand me guitars that hadn’t been accorded the way I asked.
What does he have against you?
Nothing. He simply knows that I’m better than he is, a better poet, a better musician and a better singer. And he doesn’t like that. And I find it insulting to be presented as being the female Bob Dylan. Why can’t he be the male Joni Mitchell? [Just then a record company representative takes a place at our table, explaining that she will remain there to make sure the conversation goes in the right direction. I explain that I don’t need anyone to direct my interviews for me. “Yes, you do,” she answers. “You are speaking about Dylan! And we aren’t here to talk about him”. In the past Joni has often “ranted” about Dylan. Interviews given in “The Los Angeles Times” and in “Uncut” caused a big stir, and this lady is here to make sure that it doesn’t happen again. I promise that we won’t talk about Dylan anymore.]
You quickly put some distance between yourself and the California musicians. Why?
I tried to play with the musicians who accompanied James Taylor, Carole King and Carly Simon, but they very quickly showed their limits. Rock musicians can’t play my music. “Joni’s chords” find their roots in the complexities of female emotions. Men have a more primal approach to chords; a major chord expresses joy, a minor chord expresses sadness. It was a fight for me to explain to them how to play. With jazzmen I didn’t have this problem. My changes of key, of modality and rhythms didn’t surprise them. Duke Ellington explored the same harmonies.
I only listen to Kind of Blue by Miles Davis. It’s an extraordinary album and I never get tired of it.
You recorded an album with Charles Mingus which wasn’t as successful as you hoped it would be. Mingus would have been disappointed ?
He thought that he hadn’t been treated as he should have been, that he’d been underestimated. I felt the same, by the way. I was winning Music Awards, but my records were scorned by the critics. I had many diehard fans, but, let’s face it, I didn’t have any hits. I’m not complaining. I’ve had a career which has allowed me to have many different experiences, but when I went off to work with Mingus they warned me that I wouldn’t get any radio air time. Even my fans were disoriented.
What do you think of the music of today?
Nothing is happening. The current generation is not very talented. Instead of learning how to play the guitar, they learn to play the guitar for a video game. They are creative only for Internet sites. Record companies are not looking for talent. Musical award ceremonies look like porno conventions. I don’t listen to music very much anymore. I only listen to « Kind of Blue » by Miles Davis. It’s an extraordinary album and I never get tired of it.
Did you know Miles Davis?
Yes. He appreciated my painting. I tried to convince him to play with me, but with no success. After his death, his son told me that in his final days he listened to my albums over and over again. Perhaps he was finally going to tell me yes.
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Added to Library on December 27, 2014. (5572)
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