Song 519: This week the playlist honors Trouble Child by Joni Mitchell, who also wrote the song, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. I had already developed an appreciation of JM's music by the time Court and Spark came along in early 1974, and that LP seemed to add a whole new level to my admiration for her. While I never had any deep attraction to jazz, I thought Joni made a very interesting move in that direction with C&S, adding jazz to the singer-songwriter mix in a unique and captivating way. During the first few spins on the turntable, this track, which appears just before the closer on side 2, soon got my attention. Having grown up in a family where my mother was the Trouble Child, the lines really resonated with me, though at the time, I could not have pictured Ms. Mitchell as referring to herself. I did know that she had hooked up with James Taylor for a while, and I also knew that he had issues with heroin, so I thought perhaps the words pointed towards him, although I also thought it possible that she had a family member similar to mine. I saw my mother go through something like this - They open and close you. Then they talk like they know you. They don't know you. As well-meaning as they might wish to be, They're friends and they're foes too - so sang the Trouble Child about a point where she had been breaking like the waves of Malibu. I referenced this song's lyrical message in chapter 7 of the first edition of Expecting the Broken Brain to Do Mental Pushups, and in the second edition, which I hope to release shortly, I expand on what I learned from Joni and other creative types, both known and unknown, about a particular condition that has plagued this special Trouble Child.
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