Joni Mitchell has taken control over most things she has been involved with, so this four-disc set is as much a retrospective as it is familiar music presented in a new, artistically vigorous, self-curated way.
Likening her work to that of a visual artist ("I'm a painter who writes songs"), Love Has Many Faces sees more than 50 remastered songs positioned, according to the songwriter, in a precisely paced manner.
While Mitchell’s concept is based around “a ballet, waiting to be danced”, what grips the imagination more than the idea behind it is the quality of the music.
Factor in the quality hard copy treats of a book of lyrics, six new paintings and sonic fine-tunings across superlative folk, pop and her later exploratory pop-jazz, and you’ve got sheer class from a songwriter delighted to be “out of sync with these tragic times”.
