Track Listing

1. Harlem In Havana
2. Man From Mars
3. Love Puts On A New Face
4. Lead Balloon
5. No Apologies
6. Taming The Tiger
7. Crazy Cries Of Love
8. Stay In Touch
9. Facelift
10. Here's To You
11. Taming Bones

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #29595 in Music
• Released on: 1998-09-28
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .23 pounds

Amazon.co.uk Review
Taming the Tiger finds Mitchell playing her guitar through a Roland VG8, adding fresh texture to her continuing musical association with Wayne Shorter's sax and the rhythm section of Larry Klein and Brian Blade. "Happiness is the best facelift" is the line you'll hear quoted, but it isn't truly representative. Song painter Joni knows that light creates infinite gradations of shadow, and this is as varied a collection as she's given us. "Love has many faces," she sings in "Love Puts on a New Face"; and her portraits of longing ("Man from Mars"), abandon ("Crazy Cries of Love") and quiet fury ("No Apologies") are exquisite. --Ben Edmonds

CD Description
Arguably Mitchell's best studio recording since MINGUS, TAMING THE TIGER picks up where TURBULENT INDIGO left off, but there's a notable progression, both musical and lyrical. Thebiggest reason may be Mitchell's grasping of the productionreins. Gone are the slick excesses of bassist Larry Klein'sproduction. TAMING THE TIGER achieves a unity of vision, a fact that also owes to the arrangements' focus on Mitchell'sown guitar and synthesizer work. The recurrent sonic texture here is an almost Zawinul-esque tapestry of electronic sounds; silvery synth and guitar-synth form an attractive latticework over which Mitchell lays her jazzy, unpredictable vocal melodies.
Though she's grown a bit crankier as she's gotten older, when she lambasts contemporary pop culture (thetitle track) and attacks Victorian mores ("Face Lift") she doesn't come off as curmudgeonly as she did on the diatribesof her previous album. There's an airiness and joy to TAMING THE TIGER that had been missing in Mitchell's music for a long time. Even the most cerebral tunes have a winning lightness.

Customer Reviews

Joni - don't stop!
I just love this album - everything about it is wonderful.
Joni's singing is superb - the set is laden with gentle, subtle, tuneful songs, but listen to the lyrics and the messages are there for us to hear, but not rammed doww your throat.

In an album which does not have even an average song - no weak links here - my favourite is "No Apologies". The message of anger at what is happening in the world comes across, but with quiet authority, pedal steel guitar and Joni's unmistakable guitar picking. This is typical - throughout, the musicianship is top-notch, very much understated and enhances her singing.

If you loved "Turbulent Indigo", and thought it would be hard to beat, I urge you to listen to "Taming The Tiger" and you will find that it has exceeded it's predecessor. What is more, the booklet of lyrics and paintings is, as you might expect of Joni, wondrous.

Joni is an icon who, it appears from reports, may stop recording (is she disenchanted?). I suggest that other artists would still learn a great deal from Joni and I hope she continues to grace our CD players with new material for many more years to come.

Yet another musical breakthrough for Ms Mitchell
After the double Grammy she received for Turbulent Indigo, Joni Mitchell returns from her artistic sabbatical with even more flair. After Fred Wallecki persuaded her not to give up recording by pushing a VG-8 into her hands, this new guitar has provided her with an even greater musical muse. Starting off with the exuberant 'Harlem In Havana', Joni revisits places she grew up in as a child and writes an untypical sounding song (for her and anyone else!)which kicks the album into a new area and makes sure her audience knows where she is going.

An album full of reminisces, old and new, about family, her new boyfriend, about the music business. Highlights include the deeply heartfelt 'Stay In Touch', 'Love Put's On A New Face' and the evocative 'Man From Mars'. Not shying away from world issues, her 'No Apologies' is hard hitting, while 'Lead Balloon' is pure bite. This album points forward to beyond her upcoming album, 'Both Sides, Now' which is an album of standards recorded with the London Symphony Orchestra.

As moving as ever
We've grown older with Joni Mitchell and some of the songs here reflect the passage of the years. The music is as moving, sharp and intelligent as ever, with wonderful saxophone from the great Wayne Shorter and insistent drumming from Brian Blade (I see Joni returns the compliment by singing on Brian's Perceptual Album). Joni has always been a great jazz singer and she sounds specially fine with jazz players (check her Summertime on Herbie Hancock's Gershwin's World). Nice length too. Just becuase a CD can hold 60 minutes of music doesn't always mean it should be filled.