The Joni Mitchell renaissance continues.  Following a triumphant surprise appearance in July 2022 at the Newport Folk Festival, the singer-songwriter returned to the stage for a full-length Joni Jam in June 2023 at Washington's Gorge Amphitheatre; tickets were quickly snapped up by ardent fans who had waited roughly two decades to see Mitchell in concert once again. The evening was a transcendent one, a taste of which was supplied to the public when Mitchell and her band of friends performed "Both Sides Now" to devastating effect on the Grammy Awards broadcast of February 4, 2024.  (Her Gershwin Prize tribute to Elton john and Bernie Taupin - a rewritten, rearranged rendition of "I'm Still Standing" - was very nearly as moving.)  The Joni Jam hits the Hollywood Bowl this coming October for two more sold-out shows, but in the meantime, fans can luxuriate in a new, essential presentation of four of Mitchell's most remarkable albums.  The 2022 release of The Asylum Albums 1972-1975, on four CDs or five LPs, has recently been revisited on four Blu-rays as part of Rhino's Quadio series of quadraphonic (four-channel) surround releases.  The box contains three of Mitchell's most acclaimed and beloved studio albums, all recorded for David Geffen's then-new Asylum Records label: For the Roses (1972), Court and Spark (1974), and The Hissing of Summer Lawns (1975), as well as Joni's first live album, Miles of Aisles (1974). The box also includes high-resolution remastered stereo and new Dolby Atmos mixes on each disc.  The Atmos mixes have been newly created by Ken Caillat and Claus Trelby, while the original quadraphonic mixes of Court and Spark, Miles of Aisles, and The Hissing of Summer Lawns have been utilized. (The Miles of Aisles mix is previously unissued.)  Bruce Botnick has created the all-new Quadio mix of For the Roses.

Coming between the intimate, introspective Blue and the bright, brassy Court and Spark, For the Roses remains one of the great "lost" albums in the Joni Mitchell discography - if one can use "lost" to describe an album that peaked just out of the top ten of the Billboard 200 and spun off a top 25 hit single.  After the soul-baring of Blue, Mitchell took her songwriting in varied directions, shifting musical style and lyrical perspective from track to track while retaining her compositional elegance and emotional authenticity.  While Blue was very much a solo album - with minimal additional instrumentation on bass, guitar, drums, and pedal steel - For the Roses made a tentative step toward the "band" album Court and Spark.  Tom Scott's presence on woodwinds and reeds is felt throughout Roses, while the full group, including Wilton Felder on bass, Russ Kunkel on drums, and Bobbye Hall on percussion, is used sparingly but effectively.  Mitchell's piano is out front on "Banquet," "Lesson in Survival," "See You Sometime," and "Blonde in the Bleachers" (prior to its rock coda featuring Stephen Stills).

For the Roses dabbles in the so-called "confessional" territory of Blue as Mitchell plumbs the depths of her relationship on "Lesson in Survival" ("Maybe it's paranoia/Maybe it's sensitivity/Your friends protect you/Scrutinize me/I get so damn timid...") and imagines a different, arguably more conventional life on "Let the Wind Carry Me" ("Sometimes I get this feeling/And I want to settle/And raise a child up with somebody/I get that strong longing/And I want to settle/But it passes like the summer/I'm a wild seed again/Let the wind carry me...").  "Cold Blue Steel and Sweet Fire" pulls no punches as it gives voice to the siren song of heroin.  "You can't deny me/You know what you need," Mitchell sweetly coos over a languid and dreamy band accompaniment.  The lyrics are harrowing yet empathetic; her lover is "bashing in veins for peace" yet he's bound to succumb: "I mean, what does it really matter/You're going to come now/Or you're going to come later..."  James Burton plays the spiky electric guitar on the track which is said to have been written about Mitchell's then-flame James Taylor.  It's not hard to imagine him as the subject of the title song, too, in which she ruefully grapples with the changing nature of his celebrity: "Remember the days when you used to sit and make up your tunes for love...And now you're seen on giant screens/And at parties for the press/And for people who have slices of you/For the company..."

Mitchell's vulnerability and self-doubt recurs throughout For the Roses.  On the title track she candidly offers, "I guess I seem ungrateful/With my teeth sunk in the hand/That brings me things..." while on "See You Sometime," she wrestles with imagining her lover (Taylor?) in a hotel room or "holding some honey who came onto you."  Though she admits "I'm not ready to change my name again," she wears her beautifully simple plea on her sleeve: "I'd sure like to see you."  The pointed "Blonde in the Bleachers" asks whether one can "compete with the fans/for your rock 'n' roll man."  Yet, befitting this multi-dimensional artist, she's assertive on "Woman of Heart and Mind," powerfully dropping a certain four-letter epithet as she questions her errant lover.  Mitchell employs striking use of metaphor on "Banquet" and "Electricity," in the latter likening a relationship to "input-output-electricity" with charges and shorts and sparks flying.  The searching, characteristically evocative portrait of a mystical "Barangrill" lyrically captivates while its musical setting anticipates Court and Spark.

Without resorting to simplification, Mitchell would streamline her melodic sensibility for much of Court and Spark; the most overtly "pop" song on For the Roses is the one reportedly written to order.  The playfully biting "You Turn Me On, I'm a Radio" was written in response to the record label's request for a hit single - which it indeed became.  (Graham Nash supplies the Dylan-esque harmonica.)  It doesn't feel out of place at all in an album where the artist wrestles with the effects of the rock and roll life.  The impressionistic "Judgment of the Moon and Stars (Ludwig's Song)" closes the album on a stately note, its subtitle nodding at a certain Mr. Beethoven.  (Bobby Notkoff arranged the strings.)

Bruce Botnick's new four-channel mix of For the Roses is most welcome.  Botnick is naturally limited by the album's transitional sound; when it comes to the tracks featuring Mitchell accompanying herself on acoustic guitar or piano, there's not much to distribute between the channels.  But if the mix is front-heavy by necessity or otherwise, the veteran engineer knows how to keep listeners engaged. Joni's clarion vocals fill all four corners of the room, placing the listener in the center.  Though few elements are isolated solely in the rear channels throughout - even background vocals are present in the front speakers - a full, enveloping sound is nonetheless achieved on such tracks as "Barangrill," "Electricity," and "Blonde in the Bleachers." Botnick makes good use of the expansive soundscape of "Judgment of the Moon and Stars (Ludwig's Song)" to draw attention to the discrete placement.

Mitchell deftly fused folk and jazz with a lithe, sleek pop sound on 1974's Court and Spark.  The album defined the sound of the era's Southern California musical landscape with appearances from Tom Scott, David Crosby, Graham Nash, and even Cheech and Chong, as well as The Crusaders and fellow Canadian Robbie Robertson.  Exploring themes of romance as well as the price of celebrity, most songs on Court express some degree of ambivalence; Mitchell is an artist who explores every angle.  Even when her lyrics are abstract (as they frequently are here), she puts over the feeling, or feelings, in both words and music (and here, arrangements for a full rhythm section, horns, and even strings on one track).

The sinuous title track (and album opener) is written in a first-person voice but melds the artist's "confessional" style with her gift for a finely-wrought character study; the character she encounters (a man "playing on the sidewalk for passing change") can't help but recall her earlier song "For Free."  Like most of the album, the song concerns itself with the vagaries of love and the choices one must make.  "People's Parties" similarly merges observational songwriting with a first-person narrative, inspired by a real-life incident involving Jack Nicholson, Anjelica Huston, and Dutch model Apollonia van Ravenstein.  (Tom Scott supplied the lovely, subtle string chart.)  "People's Parties" segues into "The Same Situation," which Mitchell once commented is "basically a portrait of a Hollywood bachelor and the parade of women through his life, how he toys with yet another one."

On "Help Me," Mitchell weighs the age-old battle of romance vs. liberation.  Though she concludes on a tart if truthful note ("We love our lovin'/But not like we love our freedom"), the melody is so purely intoxicating and the full-band arrangement so shimmering that we've nonetheless fallen in love.  It remains perhaps the breeziest and most irresistible slice of pure pop in her discography, but another track on Court and Spark comes close.  That's "Free Man in Paris," another disillusioned look at the music business doubling as an incisive and transporting portrait of label head David Geffen "stoking the starmaker machinery behind the popular song."  Like Mitchell's best writing, this wholly specific song (on which her voice is bolstered by the harmonies of Graham Nash and David Crosby) struck a universal chord.

Neither song was chosen as the lead single off Court and Spark.  That honor went to the seductive "Raised on Robbery," a rollicking rave-up about the singles scene.  "Down to You" is a more sober if somewhat ambiguous reflection on a one-night stand, the aftermath, and the acceptance.  Its scope broadens from intimacy to grandiosity thanks to the complex, Grammy-winning arrangement. (David Crosby and Susan Webb chimed in on harmonies for a pivotal moment in the song.  Tom Scott's strings lend gravity while Mitchell's piano adroitly navigates a fiendishly tricky chord progression.  Every element comes together with startling precision.)  The song sparks the listener's own imagination and experiences as the narrator is never clear as to exactly whom she's addressing.  A similar feat is pulled off with the starkly contemplative "Trouble Child," composed in the second-person.  Could that "you" be the listener?

Calm is juxtaposed with blasts of anxiety on the beguiling "Car on a Hill," in which Mitchell conjures a range of emotions around the simple notion of waiting for your lover to come home.  "Just Like This Train" is an internal monologue and rumination on "jealous lovin'" filled with potent imagery.  Court and Spark reflected Mitchell's many musical personalities, even paying homage to Annie Ross with the bright, closing rendition of the vocalese classic "Twisted."  Court and Spark reached No. 2 on the Billboard 200 and has been certified 2x platinum.  Mitchell had climbed another mountain - and did it her way.

As Mitchell made her broadest overtures towards "pop" on Court and Spark, its expansive, layered instrumentation lends itself to the added dimension of quadraphonic sound.  After the subdued opening of "Court and Spark," the mix kicks into high gear on "Help Me."  John Guerin's drums have never sounded this clear, as they're discretely dispersed to the rear channels.  This placement holds true for most of the mix, with Guerin's snare in left channel and hi-hat in the right.  Lead and background vocals are up front, cascading beautifully ("Didn't it feel good?").  Tom Scott's horns are also placed in the front channels, but even those intimately familiar with the recording might hear new details.  The rear speakers are used effectively on "Free Man in Paris" with the electric guitar joining the drums; the layered vocals and acoustic are well-defined up front.  The full, thick sound continues on "People's Parties" and "The Same Situation," although the strings on the latter make less of an impression in the front channels.  The insinuating groove of "Car on a Hill" benefits from the horns coming from behind, while on the elegant "Down to You," strings lend a cushion from behind as the prominent horns are in front.  With each track mixed differently - you might find yourself turning your head to appreciate every new element brought to the fore on the raucous "Raised on Robbery" or even the slinky, bass-driven "Trouble Child" - there's plenty of excitement to keep a listener involved throughout the entire album.  In, short, it's a wonder and a great disc to showcase the immersive aspects of Quadio.

Joni followed Court and Spark with her first live album.  The double-LP Miles of Aisles reflected her shift from intimate solo shows to large theatres and amphitheaters, and captures her at the height of her mainstream popularity.  Backed by the L.A. Express - Tom Scott on woodwinds and reeds, Max Bennett on bass, John Guerin on drums and percussion, Robben Ford on electric guitar, and Larry Nash on piano - Mitchell never sounded so playful and contented.  Primarily recorded at L.A.'s Universal Amphitheater on August 14-17, 1974, performances were also pulled from a March 4 appearance at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion ("Cactus Tree") and Berkeley Community Theatre on March 2 ("[Real Good] For Free," which earns audience applause for its reference to San Francisco's nearby Fairmont Hotel).  The band shines throughout, with tight interplay between Scott's horns, Ford's searing guitar lines, Bennett's winding bass, and Guerin's earthy percussion, but the solo Mitchell also accompanied herself (on guitar, piano, and dulcimer) in some of Miles' most spellbinding moments.

Contrary to expectations, Miles only included one song off Court ("People's Parties"), and neither of its two hit singles.  (An expanded edition featuring all the songs performed on tour hasn't yet materialized; perhaps some of that material will appear on the eagerly-awaited third volume of Archives.)  A couple of selections from For the Roses ("Cold Blue Steel and Sweet Fire" and "Woman of Heart and Mind") duly proved the artist's ability to captivate the large crowd with intimate, personal statements.

Listeners were treated to reinventions of compositions familiar from her early albums.  Both Ladies of the Canyon and Blue were particularly well-represented.  From the former, Mitchell reclaimed "Woodstock" from Crosby, Stills, and Nash and finally turned "Big Yellow Taxi" into a hit.  Whereas the original studio version didn't climb any higher than No. 67 on the Hot 100, the live version made it all the way to No. 24, giving Mitchell her fourth Top 40 entry and third in a row.  Ladies' dreamy "Rainy Night House" and gentle "The Circle Game" charmed the crowd, the latter in sing-along form with a clearly appreciative audience.

Five Blue standouts ("A Case of You," "Carey," "The Last Time I Saw Richard," "All I Want," and the title track) made an equally vivid impression onstage.  Joni dug even further back for a solo "Cactus Tree" from her debut Song to a Seagull and a band arrangement of the touching, inevitable "Both Sides Now" from Clouds.  Two new compositions closed out Miles of Aisles, "Jericho" and "Love or Money."  Thematically and musically, both would have fit comfortably on Court and Spark though Mitchell would ultimately revisit "Jericho" in the studio for a very different album, Don Juan's Reckless Daughter in 1977.  Preserving a very special moment in time, Miles of Aisles reached No. 2 on the Billboard 200 and has since been certified Gold.

One of this box's biggest surprises is the inclusion of Henry Lewy's previously unissued quad mix of Miles of Aisles.  If you're a fan of conservative live mixes - those that replicate a concert experience, with the band in front of you - this won't be for you.  If you prefer those live mixes that play fast and loose with the concert setup to provide an immersive home experience, this is definitely your mix!  From the first moments of "You Turn Me On I'm a Radio," it's clear that the soundstage will be varied and making full, good use of all four channels. John Guerin's drums are placed in front, with Robben Ford on electric in the left rear speaker and Larry Nash's keyboard in the left right.  Joni's voice and Max Bennett's bass are present in all four channels, with audience applause emanating from the rears.  Instrumental separation is vivid and clear throughout; individual elements such as the guitar intro to the rocking "Big Yellow Taxi" or the drums on "Rainy Night House" have never sounded so crisp and present.  The cool, loose "Woodstock" and joyful romp through "Carey" gain a fullness in surround that's missing from the conventional stereo mixes.  The all-encompassing nature of the quad presentation sees the woodwinds on "Rainy Night House" or the sinuous sax on "Cold Blue Steel and Sweet Fire" startling from behind.  Naturally, the solo acoustic portions of the show are less immersive, but Lewy clearly understood the possibilities of four channels and it's a marvel that his mix has been rescued after all these years.

Joni could never bear to repeat herself.  So while The Hissing of Summer Lawns opens with the gorgeous, sparkling "In France They Kiss on Main Street" - a vivid portrait of the early, heady rock and roll days which evoked Court and Spark and features guitar from Jeff "Skunk" Baxter and background vocals from David Crosby, Graham Nash, and James Taylor - it quickly veers into unexpected territory with "The Jungle Line."  Mitchell, widely credited with using the first sample on a mainstream pop record, builds her song around a field recording of African Burundi drummers.  She layers Moog, guitar, and her ethereal vocal over the hypnotic drums: "The jungle line/Screaming in a ritual of sound and time."  The lyric is inspired by French post-impressionist painter Henri Rousseau whose best-known works are jungle scenes.  A slithering snake (as seen on the striking album cover) is just one of the images employed by Mitchell in the fantastical, expansive lyric imagining a louche urban jungle of drugs, music, and "all that jazz."  The sequencing of "The Jungle Line" as the second track made it clear that Joni was exploring new territory and inviting listeners along for the ride.

For all its adventurousness, there are connections on Hissing to its predecessor, notably the musicians of The L.A. Express and The Crusaders who lend the album its accessible sheen. Their soft, burnished sound both draws the listener into the narratives and lends aural comfort on such boundary-breaking tracks as "Edith and the Kingpin" (with its unconventional song form and stream-of-consciousness lyrics about a crime boss and the object of his affection), "Don't Interrupt the Sorrow" (an impressionistic song taking in imagery of religion and booze along with pointed lyrics from the perspective of an empowered woman confronting a lying, cheating lover), and the evocative depiction of the entanglement between art and commerce, "The Boho Dance."  Chuck Findley and Bud Shank played flugelhorn and flute, respectively, on the latter which segues directly into "Harry's House/Centerpiece."   Mitchell repurposed the jazz standard "Centerpiece" by trumpeter Harry "Sweets" Edison and Annie Ross' onetime musical partner Jon Hendricks for this meditation on a marriage set against the backdrop of materialism.

Mitchell's eye was well-trained on the other side of so-called domestic bliss.  The title track "The Hissing of Summer Lawns" (that phrase referring to the sound made by sprinkler systems on the lawns of the well-to-do) paints a melancholy portrait of a woman trapped in both her marriage and her mansion, seemingly unable or unwilling to leave. Reality and fantasy collide in "Shades of Scarlett Conquering," with its references to Gone with the Wind and a bygone Hollywood.  The specter of La-La Land and celebrity also informs "Sweet Bird," the title of which recalls Sweet Bird of Youth, Tennessee Williams' play about a faded movie star.  Mitchell's song addresses the "sweet bird of time and change," two inevitable occurrences.

Like "The Jungle Line," "Shadows and Light" innovatively used the studio as an instrument, with an ARP string machine and multiple overdubs of Mitchell's voice.  More challenging than Court and Spark but just as rewarding, Hissing was greeted by a mixed reaction from critics of the day even as it's come to be accepted as another milestone for the artist and a fan favorite.  (Those fans included Prince, who was vocal about his appreciation for the album.)  Mitchell was rewarded with a Grammy nomination and the album reached No. 4 on the Billboard 200.

The most experimental of the four albums in this set, Hissing surprisingly received the most subdued of the quad mixes.  Even the shimmering opener, "In France They Kiss on Main Street," doesn't fill the room as one might expect based on listening to the first three albums in this box.  There are some discrete elements that make good use of the rear channels, but they're sparingly doled out; much of the LP is mixed with the instruments and vocals distributed evenly in the four speakers.  That reduces the overall clarity of the separation, even if the album (naturally) still commands attention.  "Edith and the Kingpin" achieves a rich fullness of sound as Joni's vocals float ethereally to the center of the room; "Harry's House/Centerpiece" might be the most impressive track here with Chuck Findley's trumpet and Joni's layered vocals (as well as the spoken lines following "Centerpiece") bouncing from rear channels to fronts.  "Sweet Bird" also comes alive as the listener is surrounded by Joni's acoustic guitar and piano, and Larry Carlton's electric guitars.

Each of the four albums also can be experienced in Dolby Atmos; these intricate mixes by Ken Caillat and Claus Trelby are very different in terms of instrumental placement than their quad counterparts owing to Atmos' expanded soundstage incorporating height channels.  (These are playable on a standard 5.1 system or via headphones.  Though Atmos utilizes spatial audio rather than discrete channels, it interprets the audio data to create an approximation with the speakers at its disposal.  Switching back and forth between the quad mix and the Dolby Atmos mix on a 5.1 system, as we did here at TSD HQ, will immediately reveal the unique soundscape to each.)  Finally, Bernie Grundman's beautifully-detailed stereo remasters are also on these Blu-ray Discs in high resolution.

The second volume of Mitchell's album series, like the first, is beautifully adorned with her own artwork.  For the Quadio box (like the original CD set), the original album jackets have been painstakingly replicated in miniature, right down to the embossing on the covers of Court and Spark and The Hissing of Summer Lawns.  Happily, every disc is housed within a protective inner sleeve.  A foldout sheet offers brief words from Joni's longtime friend and admirer Neil Young along with her 1975 drawing of him.

From gleeful abandon to somber contemplation, Joni Mitchell traversed the emotional spectrum on the remarkable run of four records contained within The Asylum Albums (1972-1975).  These are albums which only grow deeper and richer with each consecutive listen - a true "banquet," indeed.

The Asylum Albums (1972-1975) is available now at:

4CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
5LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
4BD (Quadio): Rhino.com / JoniMitchell.com

Portions of this review were originally published in our Holiday Gift Guide feature of December 2, 2022.  As an Amazon affiliate, we earn from qualifying purchases.