Mitchell, Joni - Not To Blame Lyrics

Vindictive.

I think somewhere even Joni said, that it's wasn't about Jackson Browne. It was rumored because of Hannah, because of his wife's suicide in '76, and because he punched Joni in the nose at On the Rox when she threw a stage dig at him for cheating on her. She ran home up the hills without her shoes on and tried to kill herself there and Geffen saved her, taking her to the hospital to have the pills upchucked and cuts stitched up. Both had underlying problems, most definitely.

Jeez what a mess. This all took place when they were pretty young. Theyre now in thei 70s and Jacksons son is maybe 40s or 50s? Idk

I always thought this song was about OJ Simpson beating his wife Nicole. Who's murderer has not met any justice whatsoever. I bought the CD around the time of OJs. trial. My thoughts and prayers go out to Nicole, her family and the friend who was killed with her and his family.

She was evil to write this song about a child after he lost his mother. 20 years and she still carried a crush for a man that didn't want her. I will never look at Joni Mitchell the same after this song!

Most spiteful, hateful, vengeful song ever written. Of course this is about Jackson Browne: 3 year old son, wife's suicide, funeral which she was not wanted at, friends that came to his defense after Daryl incident which was retracted. 20+ years later and she is still holding a grudge against a man who dumped her, so beneath an artist of her talent. A little boy lost his mother, a man lost his wife and was falsely accused of abuse. Used to love JM, but after this evil song came out, will never listen to her again. JB supposedly wrote a beautiful song about her after their break up, one which in hind sight she didn't deserve. Pure hate.

Another article about this incident: https://onstagemagazine.com/jackson-browne-backstory-sky-blue-black/

Read what Jackson Browne finally had to say in response: http://jonimitchell.com/library/print.cfm?id=73


Feud Takes A Public Turn

by Al Brumley
Dallas Morning News
September 24, 1997

Joni Mitchell, motherly musician and artist to millions of fans worldwide, landed one of the most vicious blows in the history of pop music on her 1994 album "Turbulent Indigo" with the song "Not to Blame." 

The blow's target—although she has never acknowledged it—was clearly her former boyfriend Jackson Browne. 

Now, Browne is hitting back. In an interview with The Dallas Morning News, he describes Mitchell as a "violent" woman who twice physically attacked him. He also calls her a "very embittered" artist who believes she has not been given her due as a musical innovator and who has carried a torch for him since they broke up more than 20 years ago. 

The song, he says, was "beneath her." 

"Joni Mitchell is, unfortunately, she's not really well," Browne says. "At this point in her life, you know, she has had deep fallings out with many people in her life. I think there's quite a few people that she's no longer on speaking terms with. She's not a happy person, and what she says in that song is absolutely, 100 percent wrong. And it's really very nasty, very, very ill, you know, very bad-spirited of her to make this kind of conjecture when in fact as she and every one of her friends knows ... it's all about carrying a torch for 20 years." 

A spokesman for Mitchell's record company, Reprise/Warner Bros., requested and received a copy of some of Browne's comments, but he said she was busy in the studio and would not respond. 

In "Not to Blame," Mitchell discusses a breaking news story in which "they say you hit the girl you love the most." 

Darryl Hannah accused Browne of beating her in 1992. 

In 1976, Browne's wife, Phyllis Major, committed suicide. She "had the frailty you despise/And the looks you love to drive to suicide" the song says. A particularly nasty line seems to refer to Browne's son, who was 3 when Major died: "I heard your baby say when he was only 3/'Daddy, let's get some girls, one for you and one for me.'" 

"It was abusive to employ that image of my son as somebody who treated his mother's death lightheartedly," Browne says. "I mean, he was a 3-year old baby, you know. This is inexcusable." 

Browne has vehemently denied Hannah's charges and says it was "inexcusable" for Mitchell to believe the "tabloid [expletives] that gets put out there. 

"I just get so sick of people assuming that she's an authority somehow in my life," he says. "She just thinks that I'm like, you know, the antichrist. But we haven't known each other for 20 years, and she's not an intimate of mine." 

Browne says he wrote Mitchell a letter after hearing the song, but "she's not really big enough—she's not really beyond this enough to, like, actually have a conversation with me about it." 

He says he has tried not to conduct a "public defense" against Mitchell's song, but "I mean, I get tired of being, you know, like, the person to shut up and let this bitter person go on, you know, attacking me." 

When he thinks of Mitchell, he says, he prefers to "think of her great works and not these kinds of bitter attacks."

Printed from the official Joni Mitchell website. Permanent link: http://jonimitchell.com/library/view.cfm?id=73

In September 1992, it was rumored that Joni Mitchell’s ex-boyfriend, Jackson Browne, beat up Hollywood star Daryl Hannah, his girlfriend at the time.

Here is a statement made by Lt. John Miehle of
the Santa Monica Police Department in November 1992:

The Santa Monica Police Department went to the house where Jackson Browne lives regarding a possible disturbance. We resolved the situation in about five minutes. There was never any assault. There are no charges pending and no prosecution sought by or intended by the District Attorney. It is this department’s intention that no citizen, regardless of who she is, suffer any kind of abuse, whether it be domestic violence or any other kind of assault.

But in this case, absolutely no assault occurred. Our investigators tell us nothing happened. Nobody has even alleged that Daryl Hannah was even touched. If they had, we’d be investigating. We’re not hiding anything. The press is trying to make more out of this than there really is, and it’s unfair, not just to Browne, but to us. We did our job, and repeat, no crime occurred here. This whole thing is ridiculous.

more: 

https://genius.com/Joni-mitchell-not-to-blame-lyrics

The story hit the news
From coast to coast
They said you beat the girl
You loved the most
Your charitable acts
Seemed out of place
With the beauty
With your fist marks on her face
Your buddies all stood by
They bet their fortunes
And their fame
That she was out of line
And you were not to blame

Six hundred thousand doctors
Are putting on rubber gloves
And they're poking
At the miseries made of love
They say they're learning
How to spot
The battered wives
Among all the women
They see bleeding through their lives
I bleed for your perversity
These red words that make a stain
On your white-washed claim that
She was out of line
And you were not to blame

I heard your baby say
When he was only three
"Daddy let's get some girls
One for you and one for me"
His mother had the frailty you despise
And the looks you love to drive to suicide
Not one wet eye around
Her lonely little grave
Said "He was out of line girl
You were not to blame"


© 1994;

what is freedom - like that is a big concept - so for example in the uk we re having this big debate about brexit - i was just talking to my uncle a minute ago - the love of family is so big - and of course it can be the opposite - you could hate your family - when you have a vote you have to respect it - if it s not respected it will undermine it - we want to leave the e u - they re a big legal conglomerate

AN INGENIOUS ALBUM.....TOGETHER WITH HEJIRA...THEY STANDOUT AS MASTERPIECES..WITHIN THE SCOPE OF HER WORKS

If you do a little research you will find from an interview with Jackson Browne, Joni Mitchellwrote this song about Jackson Browne and his wife Phyllis, who was a beautiful model.Browne and his wife Phyllis had been married 3 years and had a 2 year old son, when Phyllis commited suicide, thus Joni's lyrics. "She had the fragility you despise" However Joni Mitchell denies this (of course she would, but it is obvious) Joni knows Browne very well they had been in a relationship, prior to his marriage. Many people struggle for their sanity. You would think his "cause or charity" would have been Mental Health. This story is easily found on Google.

She doesn't just know him well---she herself attempted suicide after he dumped her for his wife. One of her ex-partners--Larry Klein or John Guerin--said that they don't get why Joni hates Jackson so much, but her biographer said that he was the one lover that really got to her. Decades later, she is still incredibly bitter about him. It is beyond the pale that Joni would blame him for Phyllis Major's suicide, especially since she knows Major had made many attempts long before Jackson. And I mean--what a horrible thing to say about someone. I had a close family member who committed suicide and my heart goes out to Jackson for having to deal with that. Joni is notoriously vindictive and holds grudges for years, and she is not mentally well. This song was also about his debacle with Darryl Hannah too, even though Darryl Hannah exonerated him and he wont a defamation suit against. JFK Jr. said he doubted it happened as well. There has never been a whisper since of Jackson Browne abusing anyone since, and he's been in a relationship for the past 20 years.

Major and Browne had only been married for four months when she committed suicide. Their son Ethan was around three.

Abuse of women without naming names... Wayne adds a nice touch of melancholy.

I saw the pictures the day after Jackson Browne beat up Daryl Hannah. He didn't hit her "once". More whitewash. Jackson Browne is a serial wife beater, sad to say, and Daryl Hannah is a very sexy, sexual woman, far beyond his puerile emotional quotient (EQ).

Bullshit! Were you THERE? I didn't think so!
Btw, I wasn't either. Do you know Jackson? I didn't think so. Do you know Darryl? Again I didn't think so. Hey, I'm one of the biggest Joni fans in the world BUT IF* this song is alleging all that I will have to respectfully disagree with Joni on this one UNLESS and UNTIL there is DEFINITIVE PROOF of these rather scurrilous allegations. By the way a case can be made for Darryl RUINING Neil Young's longstanding marriage to Peggi Young?😏😁

http://www.billboard.com/articles/news/69938/browne-prevails-in-defamation-disputes

@DealReal12 Neil left Pegi bc he wanted to. Do you know all these people you mention? I didnt think so

Joni Mitchell was voted one of the Worlds 100 Top Thinkers. I am Certain that is correct. Joni Mitchell is BOMB!!

Joni's lyrics are out of this world - she is a poetic genius. I love how she plays with the term "not to blame." A song about violence against women, an epidemic here and around the world and I am sad that Joni was a victim of domestic violence. This song is beautiful and the victim is "not to blame."

+composermon YOU ARE A FUCKING LIBELER SLANDER-ER with O PROOF except your desire to harm a perfectly INNOCENT MAN out of PURE SPITE!
I LOVE JONI! I LOVE JACKSON!
There is NOTHING true about your LIES!
KINDLY FUCK OFF👿!

+Lara Hall of course you never heard of Jackson BECAUSE YOU ARE A GULLIBLE IDIOT!
Why do you FOOLISHLY BELIEVE the SLANDER of some SPITEFUL ANONYMOUS SCHMUCK on the Internet?????????

Yes...she is genius.

Joni was not beaten by Jackson Browne, she wrote the song in support of him and against the lie Daryl Hannah told. That’s it. 🎤

Gigi Yob WRONG. This will clear things up:
http://jonimitchell.com/library/print.cfm?id=73

I love Joni. She saved my life.

+Jeff Blythe You wrote a very interesting comment. One that invites further thought about how some artists have the capacity to bring meaningful insight to life. This is the first time I've heard this song -- it's beautiful but somehow apropos for the gloominess of this gray day. Best wishes.

+Noe Berengena Noe, Too much to explain here... It started for me when I was 14. I lived in LA for years. I saw her in concert and actually met her at one of her art openings there. It's great that you have found her music. You can find me on FB. Jeff Blythe in Charlotte, NC.

Incredibly great song - violence against women and girls, not only in the U.S., but around the world, is the great shame of our species. As for this song and it's lyics:

"The song "Not to Blame" was rumored to be about Mitchell's singer-songwriting colleague Jackson Browne who was alleged to have beaten his girlfriend, actress Daryl Hannah; Mitchell denies this." Wikipedia

+Rosie Marie again rumor mongering does not help anybody it HURTS!

+anotherjoshua EXACTLY now can we all kindly ALL move on from LIBEL and SLANDER just as EVIL as physical or mental abuse!

It's a song written about Jackson Browne, whom she still hold a torch for. It's a terrible insinuation of an incident that did not occur. If you read the history of what happened with Daryl Hannah even JFK jr. Said he did not believe Hannah. Jackson's wife was troubled and tried committing suicide before over Keith Richards...Oh yes, Joni Mitchell was so jealous she tried to commit suicide herself after splitting with Jackson Browne. I've done a lot of research on this, using several different sources. This is a very vindictive song about one person... she's not trying to save the world from man beaters. She's just a vindictive hag... the Things She Said when his motherless son was 3 years old or repulsive. This Woman's nuts. Read the public statement Browne made in response to her "song", before assuming the tabloids, and jealous women, are in the right.

"a vindictive hag"...get real..."she's an artist...she don't look back"...
Your version...holds no water.

This song was written about Jackson Browne

@Sicilian Princess Please check out http://jonimitchell.com/library/print.cfm?id=73 Peace

Uh, Joni can...!

He was out of line girl. You were not to blame.

How can one person be so talented?

"Your charitable acts seemed out of place, with the beauty...with your fistmarks on her face." Wow. Nobody can write lyrics like that.

Except there were NO fist marks according to the police who went to the house.
more: https://genius.com/Joni-mitchell-not-to-blame-lyrics