Even the most dedicated follower of Joni must admit that this album is definitely the best that she has produced up till now, and completely outshines Lady of the Canyon and For The Roses.
The album opens with the title track - a slow moving 'romantic' number which immediately shows the prowess of Joni on the piano and the superb guitar playing of Larry Carlton.
In complete contrast, the next two tracks "Help Me" and "Free Man In Paris" are fast-moving and the latter has Wilton Felder on the bass guitar, Jose Feliciano and Larry Carlton on electric guitar and the background voices are provided by David Crosby and Graham Nash.
The following track, "People's Parties," has nothing to do with the recent General Election but is a general look at the behaviour of people who attend the parties given by their friends.
For the last track on the first side Joni has chosen "The Same Situation" - another 'romantic' number about the helpless situation in which a young girl searching for love finds herself.
When I first looked at the title of the opening number on the second side of the album I thought that Joni was going to parody the old Lennon and McCartney number, but "Car On A Hill" has no connection whatsoever with the former Beatles' "fool." It is in fact, the tale of a girl waiting for her boyfriend to come and pick her up.
The next two tracks are again good but nothing special - "Down To You" has Joni on clarinet, Larry Carlton on electric guitar and Susan Webb and David Crosby as background vocalists. "Just Like This Train" is in my opinion the poorest track on the album, and even at that I would give it a rating of three out of five.
"Raised On Robbery" has been rightfully chosen as the single to be released from this album and soon we will see Joni in the top half of the top ten.
A mixture of slow and fast movements with Joni as lead vocalist, Max Bennet as bass guitarist, Chuck Findley on trumpet and Dennis Budimir on electric guitar made "Trouble Child" my favourite track on the album.
"Twisted" was the only cut on the album which was not written by Mitchell/Scott - it is an old Ross and Gray number from 1965 and has very clever double tracking from Joni at the end of it.
This album is in a way different from anything else Joni has ever produced - it was easy to listen to and could be used as background music. Previous albums of Joni's, because of her sudden variations in tones, needed to be listened to from beginning to ending but I feel with this change she will prove acceptable to more people and should have the success in the charts she deserves.
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