Joni Mitchell's historic concert at Newport

This was truly the most feel good moment to happen in popular music since forever.  Joni Mitchell returned to the Newport Folk Festival for the first time in over fifty years, performed her first proper concert in nearly twenty years, and the world seemed to stop.  Take the time to watch even a few minutes of her set and feel all the uncertainty and chaos in the world around you melt away instantly.

This story is getting attention for all the right reasons. After hearing that she had suffered a brain aneurysm, I was resigned to the fact that Mitchell would never appear in public again, let alone perform music.  But then came the Kennedy Center honours, and the Grammys appearance, and finally this set at Newport which sprung out of a series of informal jams she'd been having at her home for the past few years.  She nearly died and had to relearn everything (walking, getting out of bed, next to those everyday tasks relearning the guitar seems rather trivial).  She had to regain her passion for singing.  She worked on it privately, with the support of her friends through their informal jam sessions, to the point where she felt good enough to appear on stage again.  Even then, it was uncertain what she'd be up to doing once they arrived at Newport.  

When I was growing up in the 80's, Joni Mitchell and Leonard Cohen were niche artists, even in Canada.  They were years past their 70's primes and widely respected, but not considered as part of an inner circle of all-time greats.  Rock criticism was dominated by admiration of the stadium-filling classic rock giants (Led Zep, The Who, The Rolling Stones).  Rock stars in the 80's were MTV-ready celebrities with a larger than life aura.  The era of the introspective singer-songwriter writing folksy melodies and confessional lyrics was a fading memory.  

It's been wonderful to see Joni Mitchell get the credit she's due over the past few years, with her albums now frequently mentioned among the best of all time.  The appearance at Newport was the best possible tribute to her: she was feted as an all time legend, treated as a queen seated in a luxurious throne-like chair, holding court in front of thousands of her followers who will never forget those moments they got to share with her. 

The downfall of Ariel Pink

Armin Rosen's article on the rise and complete collapse of the career of Ariel pink is an exhaustive and exhausting read.  It's probably twice as long as it needs to be.  The avalanche of music insider detail will alienate most music fans, let alone the average Tablet reader.  The elephant in the room is the article's most glaring flaw: is it meant to evoke sympathy for Ariel Pink?  Is it an attempt to start rebuilding his legacy?  Do Rosen and Tablet believe that Ariel's side of the story has been misrepresented, and are providing him a forum (albeit a highly critical one) to fill a journalistic need?     

The Tucker Carlson interview mentioned in the article is a slobberfest of forced sympathy and manipulation, even by the standards of Fox News.  I have no doubt that TC had not heard of Ariel Pink the day before their meeting and has not thought about him for five minutes since, and yet most of the interview is Carlson practically weeping over the tragically unfair state of the man's career.  I will not link to the interview here, but you can easily find it.  Rosen's article is certainly not that.  But if there's one overarching narrative he presents to his readers, it's that Ariel Pink was and is a unique and even irreplaceable talent.  Rosen doesn't say that great art should be above politics.  However, he seems to spin a cautionary tale about being too quick to degrade great art.  History is full of great artists who fell out of favour because they didn't trade in the dominant politics of the day. 

I don't care one way or another about Ariel Pink.  I've never heard an album, and laughed off the term "chillwave" during the scant years when it was popular.  I recognize that Ariel Rosenberg was a problematic and controversal person even before Jan. 6 of last year.  But I don't see how anyone can defend the complete cancellation of a person and his livelihood based on his mere attendance at a protest.  He didn't storm the Capitol, didn't advocate for violence or insurrection, he just stood in place and listened to a speech.  By no measure can it be said that he committed a crime.  And yet R. Kelly was sentenced to jail time only a couple of weeks ago, after more than twenty years of second chances from critics and fans alike.

We could list off any number of artists who have been given free passes for decades: white, black, male, female.  It would only serve to prove that the line between who gets cancelled and who gets left alone is a fuzzy, even arbitrary one.   A musician might have disagreeable, or even odious opinions, and it is ultimately a personal decision whether to continue listening to them or not.  I struggle with these decisions too and don't pretend to have the answers, not when it comes to Morrissey, or Herbert von Karajan, or Brian Eno.  But I don't think cancellation or pressure politics is the answer either.