Taken from Joni Mitchell’s “Ladies of the Canyon” album, her own version of “Big Yellow Taxi” peaked at only number 67 on Billboard Magazine’s Hot 100, while a simultaneous release by The Neighborhood scored better, at number 29. However, the album did go gold, so there was plenty of radio airplay of the single. As it happened, the album was released a few weeks before the first Earth Day, in 1970.
Joni related the story behind the song to journalist Alan McDougall…
“Living in Los Angeles—smog-choked L.A.—is bad enough, but the last straw came when I visited Hawaii for the first time. It was night time when we got there, so I didn’t get my first view of the scenery until I got up the next morning. The hotel room was quite high up so in the distance I could see the blue Pacific Ocean. I walked over to the balcony and there was the picture book scenery, palm tree swaying in the breeze and all. Then I looked down and there was this ugly concrete car park in the hotel grounds. I thought ‘They paved paradise and put up a parking lot’ and that’s how the song was born.”
Yes, Joni, THEY did it. But, be careful when you point your finger, as the nuns used to say in grammar school, since there are three more pointing right back at you.
Her song wastes no time attacking the big, bad developers:
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique
And a swinging hot spotDon’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got
Till it’s gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
One might note that she DID stay in the hotel, and that such an establishment could provide new opportunities for the locals, unless she felt that they would be happier in the pineapple or cane fields. Besides, what exactly is wrong with a parking lot at a hotel, anyway?
Joni couldn’t know that her typical Leftie enviro-groupie sentiment of the late 1960’s and early 1970’s would be forever betrayed with 2005’s horrible Kelo v. City Of New London decision, granting cities the right to do exactly what she was protesting against. And it was the Left-leaning members of the Court that all supported this outrage. Fancy that.
They took all the trees
Put ’em in a tree museum
And they charged the people
A dollar and a half just to see ’emDon’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got
Till it’s gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
I wonder if Joni’s house was built without removing trees? Beyond that, I would agree that much poorly planned development did not care enough about greenery, although community standards differ around the country. Another question to ponder is the home environment of the individual. Most people who move out of crowded urban apartment buildings into small private homes in the suburbs prefer their new quality of life, even if there aren’t loads of trees.
At best, this whole tree bit is flower child environmentalism, coupled with a strain of anti-capitalism. Did Joni refuse her royalties or performance fees to protest rampant commercialism, or was she just pointing a finger at a cliché target?
Hey farmer farmer
Put away that DDT now
Give me spots on my apples
But leave me the birds and the bees
Please!Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got
Till it’s gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
Now she really gets into the good stuff, parroting the execrable Rachel Carson. Carson’s mixture of junk science and pure fiction was able to convince those in charge to indeed ban DDT, unleashing an almost controlled malaria back on Africa, needlessly killing millions. But, Joni did take a page from Carson, getting the science dead wrong, just like her mentor: There was never an issue of “spots on apples,” and DDT never killed any birds or bees. It was shown that the softening of eggs was a cyclical phenomenon that had nothing to do with the pesticide.
But, not to worry. The African governments are finally getting back to using DDT. Too bad Rachel or Joni never apologized.
Late last night
I heard the screen door slam
And a big yellow taxi
Took away my old manDon’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got
Till it’s gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
The last verse is a bit more personal, and more obscure, as well. We don’t know why her “old man” left (note the oh-so-hip term, replacing lover or boyfriend, or maybe even husband).
My guess would be that he couldn’t stand living with a preachy, self-important politically correct—if startlingly ignorant—scold anymore.