Jan, I recently worked with a gentleman from Amsterdam who was constantly turning me on to new music. He is only in his 20's so most of the stuff he was turning on to was pretty far out there (at least for this old codger). However, he also listed some pretty class acts as among his favorites (Tom Waits, Peter Gabriel to name a few), so I decided to bring up Joni. He told me he had two of her cd's - Hejira and Mingus. He is a bass player in his spare time, and a huge Jaco fan, which is what led him to Hejira and Mingus. He considers Hejira the greatest road record ever made (got to agree with him there!), but he was kind of luke warm on Mingus so he never persued Joni any further.
On our last day working together, I dug through my cd collection and discovered I had extra copies of Shadows and Light and Blue, so I gave them to him as a parting gift. I told him he might like S&L because of Jaco playing on it, and as far as Blue goes, every self-respecting music lover should have a copy of it in their collection. To my surprise, he wasn't too thrilled with S&L, but to my delight, he was blown away by Blue, calling it absolutely brilliant. So obviously when I read your story about hearing Blue coming through the walls of this apartment in Amsterdam at 2 in the morning, I immediately thought of my friend. Who knows, maybe it was him. If not, it's great to know that there several others out in Amsterdam who appreciate this great album. By the way, my friend's name is Jacco... just in case. Jack P.S. - Of all the music Jacco turned me on to, I would say Badly Drawn Boy is my favorite. It takes a couple of listens, but once it hits you, it will be all you want to listen to for a while. I think of it a sort of a hybrid between John Lennon and Beck - or a more experimental World Party.
