Joan Baez

Joan Baez – Come From The Shadows (1972/2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 43:04 minutes | 969 MB | Genre: Folk
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © A&M

With the Vietnam War winding down, Joan Baez, who had devoted one side of her last album to her trip to Hanoi, delivered the kind of commercial album A&M Records must have wanted when it signed her three years earlier. But she did it on her own terms, putting together a session band of contemporary jazz veterans like Larry Carlton, Wilton Felder, and Joe Sample, and mixing a wise selection from the work of current singer-songwriters like Jackson Browne and John Prine with pop covers of Stevie Wonder and the Allman Brothers Band, and an unusually high complement of her own writing. A&M, no doubt recalling the success of her cover of the Band’s “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down,” released her version of the Allmans’ “Blue Sky” as a single, and it got halfway up the charts. But the real hit was the title track, a self-penned masterpiece on the singer’s favorite subject, her relationship with Bob Dylan. Outdoing the current crop of confessional singer/songwriters at soul baring, Baez sang to Dylan, reminiscing about her ’60s love affair with him intensely, affectionately, and unsentimentally. It was her finest moment as a songwriter and one of her finest performances, period, and when A&M finally released it on 45, it made the Top 40, propelling the album to gold status. But those who bought the disc for “Diamonds & Rust” also got to hear “Winds of the Old Days,” in which Baez forgave Dylan for abandoning the protest movement, as well as the jazzy “Children and All That Jazz,” a delightful song about motherhood, and the wordless vocals of “Dida,” a duet with Joni Mitchell accompanied by Mitchell’s backup band, Tom Scott and the L.A. Express. The cover songs were typically accomplished, making this the strongest album of Baez’s post-folk career. – William Ruhlmann
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Joan Baez – Ballads of a Lonesome Wildwood Flower (2020)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/48 kHz | Time – 01:24:08 minutes | 932 MB | Genre: Folk
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Jube Legends

Six decades after becoming a regular on the coffee house scene that was emerging around Club 47 in Cambridge, MA, Joan Baez determined that “2018 will be my last year of formal extended touring.” With her 2017 Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame induction topping off a lifetime of awards and honors for her recordings and human rights achievements around the globe, the symmetry of Joan’s decision reverberates. “I’m looking forward to being on the road with a beautiful new album about which I am truly proud,” she said. “I welcome the oppor¬tun¬ity to share this new music as well as longtime favorites with my audiences around the world.”
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Joan Baez – Silver Dagger (2018)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 45:31 minutes | 465 MB | Genre: Folk
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RevOla

“Silver Dagger”, with variants such as “Katy Dear”, “Molly Dear”, “The Green Fields and Meadows”, “Awake, Awake, Ye Drowsy Sleepers” and others (Laws M4 & G21, Roud 2260 & 2261), is an American folk ballad, whose origins lie possibly in Britain. These songs of different titles are closely related, and two strands in particular became popular in commercial Country music and Folk music recordings of the twentieth century: the “Silver Dagger” version popularised by Joan Baez, and the “Katy Dear” versions popularised by close harmony brother duets such as The Callahan Brothers, The Blue Sky Boys and The Louvin Brothers.
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Joan Baez – Joan Baez Vol. 2 (2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 51:35 minutes | 576 MB | Genre: Folk
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RevOla

Joan Baez, Vol. 2 is the second studio album by American folk singer Joan Baez, released in 1961. Like the self-titled debut album, it mainly includes folk songs. Bluegrass band The Greenbriar Boys provides support in two songs. The album peaked at number 13 on the Billboard 200 and was nominated for a Grammy for “Best Contemporary Folk Performance”.
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