A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
July 27, 2012
Janis Joplin has been
dead nearly 42 years. During her brief time in the sun, she was hardly
prolific, recording a couple of albums with Big Brother & The
Holding Company and two solo albums, the second released only after her
death.
But all these years later, her music does not seem dated. Her
voice still seems like a tornado blowing through a human throat. When I
listen to Janis Joplin, it’s not out of sappy nostalgia, some longing
for the good old days of Haight-Ashbury or Woodstock. I listen because
her albums are still some of the most powerful, soulful recordings ever
made.
Joplin fans have a lot to be happy about this year. In
recent months, we’ve gotten two albums with plenty of unreleased
material. Here’s a look at both.
*
Live at the Carousel Ballroom 1968 by
Big Brother & The Holding Company.
One of the biggest musical crimes of the late ’60s was when the suits
convinced Janis to leave Big Brother. True, she was the star and she was
the main draw, and they never would have been famous without her. But
Big Brother was a spirited little psychedelic combo, ragged but
righteous.
Janis was the MVP, but guitarist James Gurley was an unsung
monster. His solos here on songs like “Light Is Faster Than Sound,”
“It’s a Deal,” and the nine-minute Joplin signature “Ball and Chain” are
first-class examples of San Francisco psychedelia.
Most of the 14
tracks on this album were never made available, legally at least, before this cool
document saw the light of day this year. (A few songs appeared on a box
set several years ago.) The album was recorded over two nights in late
June 1968, soon after the band finished recording its masterpiece (and
final album),
Cheap Thrills. Most of the songs from that album
are here. And a few, such as “Summertime” and the ever-explosive “Ball
and Chain,” are better than the album versions.
But most fun are the
more obscure tunes: “Flower in the Sun,” “Catch Me Daddy,” and
especially “Coo Coo” —this one is folk-rock at its very finest. For one
thing, it’s an actual folk song. But more importantly, it really walks.
Big Brother used a similar melody and arrangement for their
Cheap Thrills song “Oh, Sweet Mary.”
The
sound here might seem strange. Recorded by Grateful Dead sound man and
famed LSD manufacturer Augustus Owsley Stanley III (who supervised the
remastering for this package last year, before he died in a car wreck),
the album has basically no overlap in the stereo mix. Drums and vocals
come out of one speaker; everything else from the other.
And while
Joplin’s vocals for the most part are right on target, sometimes Sam
Andrews’ vocals seem off. It’s really apparent in the opening song,
“Combination of the Two.” This might be because the group had no stage
monitors back then, and finding their pitch was sometimes tricky.
*
The Pearl Sessions by
Janis Joplin.
Pearl was Joplin’s last album, released posthumously. It’s not as strong as
Cheap Thrills.
By this stage in her career, she had basically become a soul singer, a
wilder Etta James, not a psychedelic waif goddess. And, of course, Big
Brother was long gone. But this was where most of us first heard some of
Joplin’s landmark tunes — “Me and Bobby McGee,” “Move Over,” and her
swan song, “Get It While You Can.”
This album is more for rabid Janis zealots than for casual fans. While disk 1 has the entire
Pearl
album, plus mono-mix singles of several songs, alternative takes and
studio banter make up the lion’s share of the second disc.
Longtime fans
will love hearing how these songs evolved in the studio. And it’s great
hearing Janis’ wheezy horse-laugh as she chastises herself for blowing
some of her vocal parts or gossips about fellow musicians.
Janis as muse:
Not only did Joplin leave behind a lot of music of her own, she also inspired several songs about her.
*
“Janis” by
Country Joe & The Fish. “Into my life on waves of electrical sound/And flashing light she came.” This appeared on The Fish’s second album,
I Feel Like I’m Fixin’ to Die,
in 1968.
Country Joe McDonald had dated Janis before either was famous.
One day, according to an autobiography on his website, McDonald said he
thought they should break up. Janis then “asked me to write her a song,
‘before you get too far away from me.’ I agreed.”
But even though
“Janis” was written and recorded long before she died, the chorus almost
sounds like an epitaph: “Even though I know that you and I/Could never
find the kind of love we wanted/Together, alone, I find myself/Missing
you and I/You and I.”
*
“Epitaph (Black and Blue)” by
Kris Kristofferson. Here’s another songwriter who had an affair with Janis. She included Kristofferson’s “Me and Bobby McGee” on
Pearl, and he wrote this angry, heartbreaking tribute for her, which appeared on his album
The Silver Tongued Devil and I.
“When she was dying/Lord, we let her down./There’s no use cryin’/It
can’t help her now. … Just say she was someone/Lord, so far from
home/Whose life was so lonesome/She died all alone/Who dreamed pretty
dreams/That never came true/Lord, why was she born/So black and blue?”
*
“Chelsea Hotel No. 2” by
Leonard Cohen.
Yet another Janis tribute from yet another of her lovers. Like the best
Cohen songs, it’s sad and funny at the same time.
“I remember you well
in the Chelsea Hotel/You were famous, your heart was a legend/You told
me again you preferred handsome men/But for me you would make an
exception. … You fixed yourself, you said, ‘Well never mind/We are ugly
but we have the music.’”
*
“Saw Your Name in the Paper” by
Loudon Wainwright III.
This entry, admittedly, is questionable.
For 40 years I assumed this
song was a lament for Janis. “Make yourself a hero, it’s heroes people
crave/Make yourself a master, but know you are a slave.”
But last year,
Time magazine mentioned the song, saying it actually was about Wainwright’s jealousy
over “the rising fame” of his then wife and fellow singer, Kate
McGarrigle.
But damn the facts. I don’t care. When I first heard the
song as a freshman in college, only months after Joplin’s death, in my
heart
I knew it was a song for Janis. I’m sticking with that.
Friday, July 27, 2012 
