Joni Mitchell Shin

Dreamland is the second volume in Joni Mitchell's self-compiled series of "theme" retrospectives. The first, issued on the Geffen label, was entitled The Beginning of Survival. It focused on songs that dug deep into social, cultural, political, and environmental themes, as "commentaries on the world in which we live." Dreamland was compiled from her Asylum, Reprise, and Nonesuch years and focuses, for lack of a better term, on the jazzier side of her catalog musically, including songs with lyrics are all highly imagistic in their makeup. Most are dealing with love and life in the process of moving through it. From "Free Man in Paris" and the title track, to "In France They Kiss on Main Street," "Come in From the Cold," "Help Me," and of course, "You Turn Me on I'm a Radio," these songs turn the tide for the listener from the place of observing love to the terrain of being caught up in it, where everything is hyperreal and the senses are heightened…

The Beginning of Survival is a whopping 16-track collection from Joni Mitchell's Geffen period, recorded between 1985-1998, and carefully chosen by the artist as "commentaries on the world in which we live."
The sequencing here is so meticulous and effective that The Beginning of Survival feels like a topical song cycle rather than a compilation. Tracks trace meaning and impression onto other tracks; they inform and elucidate themes of resistance in the face of the dark deluge that began the culture war in earnest during the 1980s, and which has come to signify the nature of American society in the 21st century with no signs of anything but further fragmentation…

4CD box set features newly remastered versions of Joni Mitchell’s first four studio albums - Song To A Seagull (1968), Clouds (1969), Ladies Of The Canyon (1970), and Blue (1971). In the case of Song To A Seagull, the original mix has been recently updated by Mitchell and mixer Matt Lee. The cover art for THE REPRISE YEARS (1968-1971) features a previously unseen self-portrait Mitchell painted during the time period that was recently rediscovered in one of her old sketchbooks and includes an essay by Grammy winning singer-songwriter Brandi Carlile.

Recorded for live FM broadcast at the Nippon Budokan, Tokyo on 7th March 1983.