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singing any louder would give Mojique the echo to approach his in-concert away. A stunning composition and a sound. The result is the closest thing to performance to match. a live album he's ever recorded. The The punk movement, rebelling arrangements are tight (the songs against the sterility- of music, brought nearly all clock in under four minutes) enthusiasm back to rock. The Talking and the melodies are the strongest and Heads were new, different, exciting. most varied of his career. With Remain In Light, despite their But there's a trade-off. Springsteen imagination, the Heads are running the has always been a poet of our darker risk of a passionless, studio-created side, one of the few songwriters un- sterility. They are a step away from afraid to take us face-to-face with the becoming their own enemy. most depressing parts of our existence and then let in a little light. It's a world —FRAN COOMBS populated by lonely kids, hot cars, sweat and grime, where only the high- way goes on forever. Now, the music is on and the words too often get lost. Like most double albums, The River, Springsteen with 20 songs, is a bit too much. Yet Almost Live when the album hits its stride, it chal- lenges Springsteen's greatest mo- Bruce Springsteen ments. The new rockers are simpler in The River content and impossible to harness, Columbia electric guitar on the verge of melt- down. "You Can Look (But You Better Joni Bruce Springsteen's new double album Not Touch)" and "Ramrod" take the courthouse/And the judge put it all to Shadows and Light, recorded in The River is out, and it's damn good. rockabilly pretensions of Nick Lowe and rest/No wedding day smiles, no walk September 1979 at the Santa Barbara There are flaws, of course, but who's Dave Edmunds and blow them away. down the aisle/No flowers, no wedding County Bowl, features material mostly counting? Add to he list "Cadillac Ranch," the "). culled from Hejira, Don Juan's Reck- It's Springsteen backed by the tight- beach - music - gone - Bowery "Sherry less Daughter and Mingus. Darling" and "I'm A Rocker," a con- The River ends with the oddest—and est bar band in town, tossing off musi- perhaps most moving—Springsteen Mitchell is supported by as breath- cal tributes to rhythm and blues, frontation between TV heroes and song on record, "Wreck On The High- taking a line-up as she has ever assem- rockabilly and any other influence that heartbreak. way." It's the abbreviated tale of bled: Jaco Pastorius holds fort on bass; comes to mind. The street poet sur- Still the most chilling works are the someone discovering a car crash in the Pat Metheny's guitar soars in and out faces occasionally, but most of the time slow, concise songs that close the middle of the night. The final verse like an ethereal third grace; Michael he's on hold; this time out, the music album's last three sides; the lyrics sur- captures in a handful of words the self- Brecker plays a smoky sax that makes does the talking. face here and hold on. The title track ish, possessive fear aroused by a brush one think of camelias and the Cotton Springsteen has always written revolves around Springsteen's harmon- with death: "Sometimes I sit up in the Club; Don Alias' percussion is inspir- songs too powerful to be captured on ica and one of his most memorable bed and I my baby as she sleeps/ ing; and Lyle Mays is crystalline on vinyl. Even his best recorded work is choruses. The story is a familiar one Then I climb in bed and I hold her keyboards. pale compared to his live shows. ("Then I got Mary pregnant/And, man, tight/I just lay there awake in the mid- All this instrumental harmony over- With The river, two years in the that was all she wrote/And for my 19th dle of the night/Thinking 'bout the shadows Mitchell's erratic vocal perfor- making, Springsteen tries to remedy brithday, I got a union card and a wreck on the highway." mance. She fluctuates between abso- that, choosing a studio effect heavy on wedding /We went down to the Maybe this isn't the future of rock lute control and sounding just plain and roll, but it's certainly a departure tired. Her work on the oldest cut on % point. the album, "Free Man in Paris" from r -FRAN COOMBS the 1974 Court and Spark, underscores the dilemma. Moreover, this version of Earthworks has a "Coyote" doesn't pack the wallop of her live performance in The Last Waltz. Joni Mitchell: But when Mitchell is in control of her voice, many of the most inaccessible free giit Undying Rebel songs from Don Juan and Mingus are very effective. She infuses them with Joni Mitchell an incandescence not apparent in their for you! Shadows and Light studio counterparts. Elektra-Asylum "Pork Pie " is a superb compo- sition. Done live, Mitchell's heartfelt Shadows and Light, Joni Mitchell's portrait makes you feel the grime of the new live album, opens with a few bars subway and her runaway joy at dis- of the title song followed by dialogue covering the two little boys dancing from "Rebel without a Cause." under the awning of the Pork Pie Hat The recorded scene comes at the end Bar. Lester Young done proud once of the film where James Dean confronts more. We want to give you a his parents with his participation in She is in magnificent form on Side 4. free hardwood pipe valued the famous "chicken" incident. Jim Brecker's bobby sox sax almost steals Backus, as faceless grey flannel fifties the show on "Why Do Fools Fall in at $3.00. The pipe pictured is only one of several designs daddy, says to his son, "You can't be Love?", and Mitchell rediscovers her you can choose from. And we have over 1,500 free pipes idealistic all your life. No one pays you soprano. She and the Persuasions, her to give away to our customers. What's the catch? for being idealistic." Dean simmers. backup singers, deliver a commanding "Accept yourself," Backus says. a capella on the title cut. Unlike a true Well, you do have to make a purchase. But whether "Accept yourself." jazz singer, Mitchell cannot "make" a you purchase a $650.00 antique ivory pipe or a 10$ pack It is not clear where Mitchell sides in note in the of Sarah Vaughn or of rolling papers, you'll get your free hardwood pipe as the Backus/Dean conflict, and it is not take a standard and make it hers; her meant to be. Conflict has always been later songs are practically impossible to a gift from Earthworks. the central motif in Mitchell's best cover. Why are we giving away free pipes? Because we work. No artist of her reputation, with Shadows and Light concludes with know once you visit Earthworks, you'll come back for all the possible exception of Eric Clapton, "Woodstock." "We are stardust/we has so radically altered her public's are golden" peals clearly, sweetly, the your pipe and paraphernalia needs. And, after all, comfortable perceptions by fiercely flat oval prairie o's encircling the Christmas is just around the corner. So have an early refusing a prescribed . anthem of a generation. The second gift on us. Since the appearance of the experi- reading of the refrain is tentative with mental "Hissing of Summer Lawns" in "some semblance of a garden" now the 1975, Mitchell has, in the opinion of song's keynote. 1724 20th St., NW, Wash., D.C. • 332-4323 many, overreached her grasp and her- Caught up in her own tough-minded self become a rebel without a cause. bargain—not the devil's nor her record Washington's most unusual pipe & paraphernalia store. © 1980 The high priestess of the confessional company's, nor that of her critics—Joni One free pipe per customer, please. Smoking accessories not sold to minors. who plaintively sat in a bar drawing Mitchell moves forward with grace and maps of Canada on placemats had shed passion. No regrets. her mantle. —SUSAN HAUGAN