Joni Mitchell - The Dry Cleaner From Des Moines Lyrics

Jaco Jaco Jaco! You're all obsessed with Jaco. This is Joni's show!
And don't nobody notice that fluffy soprano sax solo by Wayne Shorter?

Where can you find the soprano sax and tuba transcription

I only got lucky on a slot once, my 21st Bday.... The Grand Hall was brand new, & empty, 1977 summer, so they had to have given it to me, that afternoon, on my way from slc, to l.a. to buy a guitar, lol. All the cashier ladies smiled at my small win, in quarters, gas money, & huge surprise !
lol 🤣😈☂️
i like the music, the subject matter is another matter, lol💜💫✨

Doin laundry at 3:34 AM...and this comes on. 🙌

amazing duo---vocals and bass

The way Jaco plucks the bass to make it bubble and burgle — about four fifths of the way through, before “Luuuuccckkkyyy” — almost sounds like what I imagine the tumblers of an old-time slot machine would sound like. Absolutely perfect music!

funk-jazz

I'm down to a roll of dimes
I'm stalking the slot that's hot
I keep hearing bells all around me
Jingling in the lucky jackpots
They keep you tantalized
They keep you reaching for your wallet
Here in fools' paradise!
I talked to a cat from Des Moines
He said he ran a cleaning plant
That cat was clanking with coin
Well, he must have had a genie in a lamp
'Cause every time, I dropped a dime, I blew it
He kept ringing bells
Nothing to it!
He got three oranges
Three lemons
Three cherries
Three plums
I'm losing my taste for fruit
Watching the dry cleaner do it
Like Midas in a polyester suit
It's all luck!
It's just luck!
You get a little lucky and you make a little money!

I followed him down the strip
He picked out a booth at Circus Circus
Where the cowgirls fill the room
With their big balloons
The Cleaner was pitching with purpose!
He had Dinos and Pooh Bears
And lions, pink and blue there
He couldn't lose there!
Des Moines was stacking the chips
Raking off the tables
Ringing the bandit's bells
This is a story that's a drag to tell
(In some ways)
Since I lost every dime
I laid on the line
But the cleaner from Des Moines
Could put a coin
In the door of a John
And get twenty for one
It's just luck!

Don't understand the comments, maybe I'm not that hardcore. Don't care. Ontopic, Love this little doozy! Great work from Mingus and Mitchell!

I'm down to a roll of dimes
I'm stalking the slot that's hot
I keep hearing bells all around me
Jingling in the lucky jackpots
They keep you tantalized
They keep you reaching for your wallet
Here in fools' paradise!
I talked to a cat from Des Moines
He said he ran a cleaning plant
That cat was clanking with coin
Well, he must have had a genie in a lamp
'Cause every time, I dropped a dime, I blew it
He kept ringing bells
Nothing to it!
He got three oranges
Three lemons
Three cherries
Three plums
I'm losing my taste for fruit
Watching the dry cleaner do it
Like Midas in a polyester suit
It's all luck!
It's just luck!
You get a little lucky and you make a little money!
I followed him down the strip
He picked out a booth at Circus Circus
Where the cowgirls fill the room
With their big balloons
The Cleaner was pitching with purpose!
He had Dinos and Pooh Bears
And lions, pink and blue there
He couldn't lose there!
Des Moines was stacking the chips
Raking off the tables
Ringing the bandit's bells
This is a story that's a drag to tell
(In some ways)
Since I lost every dime
I laid on the line
But the cleaner from Des Moines
Could put a coin
In the door of a John
And get twenty for one
It's just luck!

BLUECOATS FANS ASSEMBLE

Bestial!!! Magia

Man Jaco can play

Incredible musicians' line-up ... ! ...

voice doubling @ 2:28 is nuts. Shouts out Joni n Jaco!

BloooooooooooooOoOooOoOoOoOooOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOOoOoOoOoOoO

Jaco was one of the most exciting artist of the late 1970's......I was there...

Sounds like Joni was an Annie Ross fan.  I love this.

What the flying fuck is "bloooo"?

Tommys Timeless Treasures The Bluecoats, a drum and bugle corps. They used an arrangement of this song in their 2018 show. It was really good, I suggest looking it up :)

totally not natalie ahh i see.. sorry if I sounded like an asshole..im here because Jaco Pastorius is the bassist in this song but im always open to new forms of old songs. (As long as they're not totally butchered 😅)

BLOOOOOO

Favorite part of Bloo 2018

Bluecoats' singer kills it with this one

BLOOOOOOO

Bloooooo

Bluecoats! Six words! Lets go! BLOOOOOOOOOOOOOO


*Edit

Also I am LOVING this audible aesthetic, the show is gonna ooozeeee funk. My body is ready

BLOOOOO!

Who's here for BLOO??

Bluecoats 2018

BLOOOOOOOOOO 💙🍁

Blootcoatz

Bloo!!!

Bloo 2018

This is an interesting choice 🍁

BLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Bloo :)

From 2.45 onwards they are all clearly singing "That cat got f*cked". Great track. Best on the album.

Ian Gordon Craig “that cat’s got luck”

inhale




BOI

Pretty sure it's 'that cat's got luck'

Shorter with the two note solo...jeebus...that freakin' guy! O.O

Jaco's was at his genius best with Joni. Listen to her album 'Hejira' : much of it's just the 2 of them in a unique string coupling. Her genius was easily up to his and he knew so he upped his game.

Razor sharp horns

I love this like church.

Amazing lines on bass. love you Jaco. RESPECT! <3

I read that Jaco "burn the midnight oil" and did this arrengement in the night and record in studio in the other day. LEGEND! From your friend and fan Forever. Blessings from Brazil, Rio de Janeiro. God bless u jaco.

the first time I heard this song I was driving to Des Moines

My dad was a dry cleaner.

I used to listen to this because of Jaco Pastorius. I had no idea it was Joni Mitchell singing until now

My favorite bassline.

eastlake93 what do you mean " LINE " ?

" .. that cat was clankin' with coin"

the chicken?

I used to sing this when I was 12! He's a musical genius and plays quite a few instruments. He's another form of the great Jaco! And after all these years we still got it!!!

The legend says that Jaco arranged the horns 15 minutes before recording in a dirty sheet of paper.

Outside of the software world, they just call it genius.

Bloooooooo

Incorrect, the horns were overdubbed in another studio during a separate session.

@monsterjazzlicks the session of which he quickly wrote the arrangement just before

Damn! this is so sexy! Love it. Everything in it's right place, and with the perfect amount of energy. Jaco Bass is the spine of everything. And Joni´s voice so sweet and sexy. Oh sexy that's a repeated adjective...

Diego Sebastián Núñez Bloooooooo

I was lucky, man. God blessed me, y'know? I was blessed by God

oddindeed Bloooooooooo

@vita. Jaco grew up with an alcoholic father so he hadn't even touched the stuff yet when this was recorded. It was shortl thereafter

Addicted to bass!

Magic!!! Jaco Maaan. LIVERPOOL

I love you @Joni Mitchell Blessings from Brazil...

Supergroup. Joni, Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, Jaco Pastorius

You forget the great Peter Erskine was on the kit straight killing it.

Oh my holy hell!!!!!!
Peter Erskine made it complete for me!

@Jerry garcia Likewise, you simply Must include Don Alias & Emil Richards - for an infectiously jagged-edged musical fabric stylistically their very own.

galacticos

Clearly never smoked! x

bitchin!

ótimo ritmo

its the best tune ever. they mady it so groovy. ohhh! 

I'm down to a roll of dimes
I'm stalking the slot that's hot
I keep hearing bells all around me
Jingling in the lucky jackpots
They keep you tantalized
They keep you reaching for your wallet
Here in fools' paradise!

I talked to a cat from Des Moines
He said he ran a cleaning plant
That cat was clanking with coin
Well, he must have had a genie in a lamp
'Cause every time--I dropped a dime--I blew it
He kept ringing bells
Nothing to it!

He got three oranges
Three lemons
Three cherries
Three plums
I'm losing my taste for fruit
Watching the dry cleaner do it
Like Midas in a polyester suit
It's all luck!
It's just luck!
You get a little lucky and you make a little money!

I followed him down the strip
He picked out a booth at Circus Circus
Where the cowgirls fill the room
With their big balloons

Tano Coronelli Blooooooo

okay then

@Vita Sibirsky, you seem to have li'l compassion for people with mental problems like Jaco  (ever heard of self medicating of people with mental problems trying to escape them?) surprised you did not slag of joni for having given up her daughter to adoption and not having been able to maintain relations with her once reunited...

you can not be joni's biggest fan if you do not understand jazz too.... but i guess your musical comprehension just does not reach that far...

good luck with being so judgemental... unfortunately karma will most likely catch up with you again and again until you learn to become a kinder person

not that i don't still have some way to go in learning to accept and forgive peoples narrow-mindedness and generally shitty attitude 

inarrivabile!!!

??????you are an idiot!!!!!!!! please lead us to the bass promise land oh messiah!!!!

Love this...love this...

Love Jaco! And yes, his bass was more of a tenor and you probably could add an interesting bass line to it.

From the website dictionary . com
humanness
Use Humanness in a sentence
hu·man [hyoo-muhn or, often, yoo‐] Show IPA
adjective
1. of, pertaining to, characteristic of, or having the nature of people: human frailty.
2. consisting of people: the human race.
3. of or pertaining to the social aspect of people: human affairs.
4. sympathetic; humane: a warmly human understanding.
noun
5.a human being.

There's no such word as humanness.

Funny, with Jaco's bass on this track, and it still has no bottom to it. I had Jaco's double album with his big band, and I felt the same thing. Someone needed to play bass behind jaco while he did his thing. His double album has no bottom either. I've actually tried to add my own bass lines to it. Not lead lines...

perfect

All musicians carry the baggage of their souls.
We need to focus on the music, How it made us feel...
Getting caught up on the humanness of a musicians existence is short sighed and unimportant.

wonder

THIS COMMENT GAVE ME CANCER!

he is considered on of the best, among the best, may i ask you do u have any musicology back ground? jazz is not nothingness or a mess, and jaco became an addict, look at the way the man died, he has a family and friends who unlike you do not judge from a narrow perspective, try thinking before you speak.

What a mystery, a musician who creates the same effect on me as she did 30 years ago. A musician who brings me back to the ears when it's all too easy to be sidetracked by the eyes being seduced by visual presentation. Here we are on youtube, a primarily visual medium, and it's just a sublime feast on the ears. Thanks to Joni Mitchell, thanks to Youtube, we're all happy for this moment! Not bad eh?

Peter!!!

I thought his work with Joni was somewhat better than the Weather band.....i heard he wrote the horn arrangements overnight as he felt it needed something extra....don't know if that is true.....

I can understand your feelings about the Jaco that YOU knew. But being someone who played with him before he was, "sick" & remained friends with him until his passing, I feel he deserves more of a legacy than you recant. His life issues were deeper than any of can or would want to imagine. There is enough documentation of his demise but I would ask of you & all of us who knew him & loved him to try & remember the positive things he did give us. I am sorry you did not get to witiness that side...

I know Jaco is considered the BEST bass player and let me tell you... I knew the dude and he was an outrageous, drugged out dude and not a very nice person. When this was recorded he must have had a saner day and I bet it was Joni who got him centered enough to even make this recording. And to tell you the truth I am her biggest fan and I see no worth in the mess of Jazz-like nothingness.

work of art

She wrote the lyrics to this song that Mingus wrote. How incredible is writing lyric to jazz? And these lyrics? Amazing.

I LOVE IT !!!!