Joni Mitchell - Snakes And Ladders Lyrics






He
In a shopping mall
Finally met the perfect girl
She is all that matters
The only one in all the world
Like a Barbie doll
Oh love is snakes and ladders
Snakes and ladders

She
Just to have and hold
Is the perfect air-brushed angel
Makes you hot just looking at her
Stapled into all his braincells
Like a centerfold
Oh love is snakes and ladders
Snakes and ladders

Get to the top and slide back down
Get to the bottom climb back up
Buy the townhouse
Call the preacher
Get to the bottom climb back up
Get to the top and slide back down
Get to the bottom climb back up
Set up credit for the lovely creature
The lovely creature

He
On a corporate climb
Set his sights on power for her
On a silver platter
He gave up happy hour for her
Perrier and lime
Oh love is snakes and ladders
Snakes and ladders
She
In a handsome world
Put her mind to social graces
All the privileged chatter
Setting pretty table places
For the girls in pearls
Oh love is snakes and ladders
Snakes and ladders

Get to the top and slide back down
Get to the bottom climb back up
Buy the carphone
Call the broker
Get to the bottom climb back up
Get to the top and slide back down
Get to the bottom climb back up
Buy the wife a diamond choker
A diamond choker

True love true love true love
He's so nervous
New love new love new love
When he's with her
Oh he's wasting away
True love true love true love
It's so curious
New love new love new love
Just to kiss her
To kiss her to kiss her to kiss her
To kiss her to kiss her to kiss her
To kiss her he has to shave

She
In the gilded mirrors
In the swing of fancy places
Where the black ties flatter
Started seeing other faces
Young fogie financiers
Oh love is snakes and ladders
Snakes and ladders

See
In the crimes of time
How the seasons steal away
How the rungs are shattered
First you're green then you're grey
Still the snakes unwind
Still playin' snakes and ladders
Snakes and ladders

Get to the top and slide back down
Get to the bottom climb back up
Sell the vineyard
Call the lawyer
Get to the bottom climb back up
Get to the top and slide back down
Get to the bottom climb back up
Gather garbage to destroy her
To destroy her

Ladders ladders ladders
The perfect girl
Ladders ladders ladders
The paper chase Love is snakes and ladders
Ladders ladders ladders
The social whirl
Ladders ladders
The rat race
Barbie doll





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Joni Mitchell Snakes And Ladders Comments
  1. J.... T....

    The drum machine is relentless and helpless much like the fools parading around in the lyric; there is no escape from their shallow materialism and the annoying beats reify this unfortunate constancy in their doomed lives.

  2. L.... P....

    Lakota, Clear Water, and Snakes really made this album, and are why I bought it. Look at the lyrics and see how truly deep this woman is. Lonnie's Goddess-Poet hits a chord.

  3. T.... S....

    My favorite poetess (she claims she dislikes poetry...hahahaha!) singer /song writer/individual, painter...a muse for us all.💕🌷💕love you always Joni...in every change and move forward!

  4. D.... N....

    Pure Art in Music!

  5. T.... S....

    Lovers LOVE & haters HATE. everything abt this song is BEAUTIFUL!

  6. J.... L....

    I love this song. My fantasy is to have a DJ remix this for the clubs. I think it could be wonderful.

  7. T.... S....

    A great song from one of her best albums.

  8. L.... a....

    Once again, the exposure of the phoniness of American culture....by the Goddess-Poet

  9. P.... F....

    All you knockers should have a real good look at ya selves. WHAT HAVE YOU DONE 4 THE PLANET LATELY.....

  10. S.... F....

    this song gives a conscious msg...why we do the things we do it's a game of s&l.

  11. F.... ....

    Bloody awful eighties production swamping the basic song structure. It happened with so many recordings that went MIDI/sample mad in the 80s. There was too much temptation to use all this shiny new tech, but the basic sounds where shit.

    F.... ....

    Whinge? What a curious choice of word lol. Through development things have improved considerably. Nevertheless at lot of 80's digital sounds were crude and overused. Who are you referring to when you say 'today's digital mixes'?

    F.... ....

    bloody awful? ... just say No

    F.... ....

    Don't quite understand what you're message means

    F.... ....

    using what is available to a artist could and should be somewhat criticized but this buy Joni was early and well deserved for this song. Enjoy it for what it is

    F.... ....

    Fuck the snobs who say music can only sound the limited way they say it should. This song sounds great. Like all of her work once she introduced more than one instrument into the fold in the 70's, she uses painter principles to give us a playground of sound. There's something kind of new there every time I return to one of her more layered songs like this. She somehow took the artifice of the 80's and made it her own on a couple of records and that studio sound from back then is more pleasing than any studio sound of the last couple decades easy.

  12. K.... B....

    young fogie financiers! Love it! Chalk Mark in a Rainstorm........one of my favorite Joni albums!

  13. O.... ....

    ...snakes & politicians...but I repeat myself...

  14. e.... T....

    Good stuff Walter Wade's house party WBGO standard

  15. t.... ....

    This song is such a perfect encapsulation of the yuppie lifestyle of the late 80's. Manhattan in 1988 felt like this song.

    t.... ....

    The 1980s were hell all over-here in California also. This song was healing to listen to in the early 90s. Joni called them on the fucked greed of the Reagan years, all of it.

  16. L.... L....

    Everything in the 80s was over produced.  Joni restrained more than most, but yeah, the drum machine is pretty bad.

    L.... L....

    I don't think a song is over-produced just because it contains many layers to it. That's just something snobs carry on about because to them music can only be "correct" the more sparsely arranged it is. This is a great song and even the drum programming works.

    L.... L....

    Lilly Lovejoy .....I must disagree....the whole album became so rich rhythmically....in part through the drum machines....I think it works great with these songs

  17. J.... M....

    All these knuckle headed women with their snakes and ladders 

  18. a.... r....

    Great song. Ugly sound.

    a.... r....

    SORRY JOE, BUT THE ORIGINAL SOUNDS TOO MUCH BETTER.@Joe Schmoe

    a.... r....

    Just plain wrong... great sound

    a.... r....

    Drum machine?? Like it's a bad thing?? What about the guitar machine?? Or the piano machine?? Everything's gone electronic but you decide to call out the drums? Why?? Joni makes this song amazing anyway.

    a.... r....

    @Matthew Lafond Yeah, that's snobs for ya, acting like sound & music can only fit some artificially "correct" scope.