The rock & roll industry is very incestuous, and we have all been close at one time or another. A lot of beautiful music and a lot of beautiful times came from that. A lot of pain, too, because, inevitably, different relationships broke up.
Interpretation
The rock & roll industry is interconnected, leading to both beautiful music and personal turmoil.
Joni Mitchell reflects on the complex relationships within the rock & roll industry, suggesting that the closeness and personal connections among artists create both wonderful music and emotional difficulties. The inevitability of relationship breakups amidst this intimacy implies that while beauty can arise from these bonds, they also come with significant pain.
In practice
During a music festival speech discussing the importance of collaboration in the industry.
There's a man who's 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
Unlike some of my peers, I haven't really hit a writer's block. When I hit a block I just paint, which is an old crop rotation trick.
This is a nation that has lost the ability to be self-critical, and that makes a lie out of the freedoms.
You wake up one day and suddenly realize that your youth is behind you, even though you're still young at heart.
I have an aversion to being mislabeled. Here's a label I'd accept: I'm an 'individual.' I'm someone who can't follow, and doesn't want to lead.
What I do is unusual: chordal movements that have never been used before, changing keys and modalities mid-song.
Much as I adore the melodies, I choose a song for what it has to say.
I grew up with the Grand Ole Opry, Dottie West, Conway Twitty, Buck Owens... not realizing it was influencing me as much as it was.
I used to think that, given enough goodwill, anybody would be able to 'get' any music, no matter how distant the culture from which it came. And then I heard Chinese opera.
Which is the other reason hip-hop is controversial: People don't bother trying to get it. The problem isn't in the rap or the rapper or the culture. The problem is that so many people don't even know how to listen to the music.
I had a vague idea of the song's impact in the '60s, but that was tempered by the hate mail and threats I was receiving. It was only about ten years ago, when I finally put it back in my show because so many people were asking for it, that I understood 'Society's Child' real impact.
The difference between blues, jazz, rock n' roll and rap is that rap stayed poor. Even the white rappers are poor. It's scarier to look at poor people; it makes everyone uncomfortable. Their pain is something that people would like to see swept under the rug.
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