quasar's Full Review: Pearl [Remaster] by Janis Joplin
I was blessed with parents with eclectic tastes in music and the record collections to match. There's very little music I wasn't exposed to in my early youth; from opera to showtunes to jazz to rock to folk, I heard it all.
One thing I didn't hear was Janis Joplin. She seemed to slip through the cracks of the eras, too late for my parents' youth and too early for my own. Sure, I heard Me and Bobby McGee on the radio, and maybe Mercedes Benz although I don't explicitly remember it. But she was nowhere to be found in the piles of albums, the boxes of 45s, the stacks of 78s that littered my house.
I'm not really sure when I became aware of Joplin. Our lives didn't overlap at all - I was born over a year after she died - and she just wasn't the in thing in my rural Pennsylvania school. Not that I paid attention to what the in thing was, but I at least heard enough through the school day to recognize the names of the musicians who made my classmates swoon. She wasn't one of them.
By the time I bought a copy of Pearl I was well out of school and well aware of who Joplin was, but I wasn't that much more versed in her music than I was as a youngster. I bought Pearl out of curiosity more than anything else.
I must admit at first I wasn't very enthralled by the album. It was strange, different from anything I'd heard before. I recognized Me and Bobby McGee immediately as that freedom song I'd always liked on the radio, and I immediately took to the humor of Mercedes Benz. But the rest of the album, well, let's just say I usually played two tracks and only two tracks when I pulled out the CD.
I can't really say when that changed. I do know that every time I listen to the album I like it more. It definitely grew on me. Perhaps I needed to experience more of life before I could recognize the pain in her voice and identify, but I didn't exactly have a superbly happy childhood and I knew what suffering sounded like at an early age. Perhaps I just needed time to process the words, to absorb them into my being, and to identify with them. Perhaps I just needed to be in the right mood to feel it, to get the full effect. Whatever the reason, Pearl is one of the very few albums I can think of that truly grew on me over time, that I appreciated much more the 20th time I listened to it than I did the first time.
The Songs
The album starts with a strong drum beat, slowly joined by a strong funky guitar riff at the exact moment Joplin starts to sing. Her voice is rough, the guitar pounding in Move Over. The lyrics are repetitive and secondary to the blending and fighting of voice and guitar.
Cry Baby is Joplin at her screaming, gravelly, yet suddenly sweet best. Her voice quavers, it booms, it flies. Soaring over pretty piano and hard guitar, long spoken passages left Joplin breathless as long piercing notes couldn't. A song of heartbreak, of longing, of unrequited love, Cry Baby is a glorious combination of words and music:
Don't you know, honey,
Ain't nobody ever gonna love you
The way I try to do ?
Who'll take all your pain,
Honey, your heartache, too ?
And if you need me, you know
That I'll always be around if you ever want me
Perhaps the softest and prettiest song on the album, A Woman Left Lonely continues the theme of lost love started in Cry Baby. Unlike that song, this song mostly remains soft throughout, with small swells of uplifting feeling and long extended notes highlighting her unusual voice. Even the more gravelly sections are softer than in other songs. It almost feels like a gospel song with its accompanying organ and the gathering swells of voice holding long notes.
I don't like the beginning of Half Moon and I think that caused me to overlook the song at first. It has a catchy funky melody, and starts with a breathless soft Joplin singing rather obscure words written by John Hall. About 30 seconds into the song it changes, swells a bit, becomes more bluesy and more accessible. As the song progresses it turns into a wonderful marraige between words and music:
Rings of cloud and arms aflame,
Wings rise up to call your name.
Sun rolls high, Lord, it burns the ground
Just to tell about the first good man I found.
Buried Alive in the Blues is a funky instrumental piece that evokes many of the same melodies used in the other songs mixed in with slower almost motionless sections that leave wondering why. I don't really care for this song too much.
My Baby is a simple bluesy song with alternating gravelly almost spoken and hard sung passages. Like several other songs here, the words are secondary to the music, and at times almost fade into the background.
Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose, or so Kris Kristofferson and Janis Joplin would have you believe. Joplin's most successful song, and in my opinion her best, Me and Bobby McGee is a sweet blues story song replete with beautiful imagery such as winshield wipers moving in time to the music. Like many of her songs, this is a song of lost love and longing, a song full of memories of the good old times. Not only lyrical, it fits Joplin's voice perfectly.
The other well-known Joplin song, even to folks who aren't fans, Mercedes Benz is less than two minutes of good old fashioned fun. Sung to the tune of Mockingbird, this song of great political and social import holds a special place in my heart. Believe it or not, Mercedes Benz makes farm trucks and they are quite popular in Israel. Driving from Galilee to the Dead Sea, my friend Marci and I ended up behind several such trucks filled with hay and other such items. We both spontaneously started singing:
Oh Lord, won't you buy me a Mercedes Benz ?
My friends all drive Porsches, I must make amends.
I can't hear the song without remembering that day and smiling.
Trust Me, like Cry Baby, showcases Joplin's versatility. Alternately screaming and singing softly, with a soft melody behind her all the way, her voice accentuates the pretty Bobby Womack lyrics about how hard it is to trust, and how trust needs time to grow just like it takes time to grow grapes from the seed.
The last song seems almost prophetic. Get It While You Can is a slow drawn out sad song that cautions love may not be here tomorrow, get it while you can. By the time this album was released Joplin was no longer here. It's the only song on the album that can bring me to tears.
Overall Thoughts
Joplin turns her voice into an instrument more so than just about any other singer I can think of. I tend to be a words person, getting more enjoyment out of a well written lyric than a well played instrumental. In many of these songs the words are secondary or even somewhat mediocre, but I don't care. I am taken away by Joplin's voice more than what she says with it. She has the power to turn a mediocre song into a good one. On those songs where she does combine her voice with exceptional lyrics, it is a marraige made in heaven, one that can transport me into another place entirely. She brings a true freedom and joy to each of these songs, and it definitely shines through.
I recommend giving Pearl a try - it may give you a new appreciation for blues. If you don't like it, put it away for a while and try again later. It seems to have really grown on me, perhaps it will grow on you too.
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