Chapter 6 - Judith

Chapter 6 - The Curious Case of Judith 

Back in a former life with fluorescent lit hallways and eldritch doors  to rooms with piano and chalkboards i would often ponder seminars i wanted to give. One of my favorites was titled The Art of the Cover and we'd look at what happens to a song when you turn it into disco, or grunge up a Wham! song, or turn Neil Diamond into Reggae. Judy Collins did a cover of Salt of the Earth, and that would surely be on the list somewhere. Alas, this book is about self titled albums, so we have 12th album and the quagmire of legal vs familiar names. The coal miner's daughter is Judith Marjorie Collins, but we've all been calling her Judy. That means it's much less "hello, Denver, i'm Judy," more "will the real Jude Shady please stand up and sing some eclectic selections from her vast repository of brain songs?" 

First time around we talked about the split personality and i said the real Judy Collins has to deal with being multiple people. She has to please everybody. Some of those everybody's are worth 20 bucks, some have an "exponentially multiply that number" button. 

Let's just do a quick thumbs up/down of every song. 

1 - Up 

2 - borderline

3 - nice save thumbs up, Houses is phenomenal.

4 - down. Nosir, i don't like it. Mostly 'cause i don't love the game.

5 - up up up, no Phil Collins jokes, this is a wonderful eulogy for Duke Ellington.

6 - hard to mess up Sondheim, and she doesn't, great Side A ender. 

7 - tough song, she changes the lyrics but it still works because this is an ironic song. I think she nails that irony whether that was her intention or not. 

8 - thumbs way up, half Sinatra half Girl from Ipanema, so bizarre and interesting. 

9 - baaarf. Again, that's all my own prejudice against schlock Country. The song is fine, i just don't like rhinestone studded showtune Country. 

10 - all the thumbs up, i'll cut off your thumbs so i can raise them too. I'll Be Seeing You is fantastic. Haunting, delirious, terrifying, luscious, you get the idea.

11 - another one of those really interesting covers. We could compare her version with The Cure's version. That would be interesting. 

12 - meh. Kind of wimpy for the album closer, but not particularly terrible. 

So, to sum up, put Judy in front of a real orchestra and give her emotionally complex songs to sing and i'm totally on board and clapping like a crazy guy after every song. Her voice is so clear and steady, her pitch is immaculate, and you can understand every syllable, not just a wah-wah of vowels like she's an adult in an episode of Peanuts. Sorry opera singers and broadway belters, i just prefer vernacular vocals to bel canto. 

Put it all together, and this isn't a Hello album at all. This is a self-eulogy. "Who was Judith Marjorie Collins? Here, i'll show you." 

Now we can see what's really happening with that Jagger/Richards opening to Side B. That is not an honest song in the sense of taking the lyrics at face value, and you can see it when you read the original lyrics. The verses are that drinking song ode to the plight of the common man, but the chorus is the self-reflective recognition that it's feel good lip-service (i the singer don't actually connect with the crowd as real human beings, i'm an elitist POS and coming from me this is actually demeaning). Judy is the girl up there on stage pandering to that crowd, but secretly criticizing herself for not going out and doing anything to change that. She's reminding herself she needs to do more. It's a subtle little change, but it makes a gigantic conceptual difference. 

So, whether she truly succeeds or not in your own mind, here's what this album really does in mine. The first 11 Judy Collins albums are "Girl, you'll be a woman soon," and this 12th one is "I'm a woman now, time to reconsider and really do something." Now i don't hate those couple songs at all, at least not in their function for the album as a whole. 

It's a great album except for the last song. Conceptually it works, sonically not so much. I have to try to hear it as not a conclusion, but as the artificial stopping point from which the real story continues. That's tough, and it doesn't feel right. Probably still my own fault, but the song itself as recorded isn't giving me any assistance in that regard. 

Is it really a self-titled album in the same way as the previous 3? No, i think not. One, it contains its own enigma by differentiating the subject itself: stage Judy vs person Judith. It's a goodbye not hello album. 

Interesting stuff.

Chapter 7