I emailed someone this video saying it was maybe the birth of the “dissing an ex” genre, but then realized that there are probably medieval ex-dissing ballads. Canadian ex-dissing is the best kind for some reason. I have also been really into Martha Wainwright this week.
Joni’s intro here is incredible — she dedicates the song to “Scientologists.” I guess the line “they monitored your brain, you said, and changed you with religion” refers to Leonard Cohen’s flirtation with Scientology. (See also: “Did you ever go clear”?)
“This song is about being an artist’s old lady … Being a lady to an artist is no easy thing, because as we all know artists are connoisseurs of beauty. And I always like to say, this song is about a man who spent a lot of time running around connoisseuring all those beauties.”
As an olds who was a bit younger than Joni, I bless the day that “old lady” faded out of view as terminology for “girlfriend”. I mean, dude…
