Boats: Cactus Tree

Joni Mitchell: Cactus Tree

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This blog has been very active recently, and at the same time the picks have become a lot more obscure. This is a good thing for me because I get to hear stuff that I'm unfamiliar with and potentially discover new artists. However, sometimes it's nice to go back to the basics and enjoy the familiar. In that spirit, I bring you the god mother of the blog once again, Joni Mitchell.

This is actually one of my favorite Mitchell songs. It's from her debut LP, Song to a Seagull, a concept album that is treated with grudging respect by the critics. I disagree with the reviews that I've read though. I think it's a brilliant and beautiful album. It is our first introduction to this amazing talent, who would go on to write such incredible stories and music.

If my calculations are correct, Joni was about 24 years old when she wrote this album. I'm struck by her sincerity and depth of emotion at that age. She sounds like a much older soul with experience beyond her years. I think if I would have written an album when I was 24 it probably would have been about Mario Brothers or how much I liked vanilla Zingers.

The opening line of Cactus Tree is about a man on a boat:

Theres a man whos been out sailing
In a decade full of dreams
And he takes her to a schooner
And he treats her like a queen
Bearing beads from california
With their amber stones and green
He has called her from the harbor
He has kissed her with his freedom
He has heard her off to starboard
In the breaking and the breathing
Of the water weeds
While she was busy being free