Mona Bone Jakon is Cat Stevens' third record, made after his struggle with tuberculosis in his early twenties. It is probably best known at this point as being the immediate predecessor to the tremendously successful Tea for the Tillerman, an album I've had memorized for about ten years now.Oddly, even as much as I loved that record, I never bothered to look into his other material. After watching his set at Live Earth last weekend (I swear he forgot some of the lyrics to "Where Do the Children Play," but no one has mentioned this), I finally found a copy of Mona Bone Jakon today. When I came home from the store, there was an old Cat Stevens concert on VH1 Classic, so I felt good about it.
A trio of these songs - "I Think I See the Light," "I Wish, I Wish" and "Trouble" - are best known for their inclusion in Harold and Maude, which, after listening to this record, I badly want to watch again.
As a whole, the record, expectedly, isn't as strong as Tea for the Tillerman, but it's very obviously pointing in the direction he was starting on. Songs like "Fill My Eyes" and "Maybe You're Right" rank up there with his best material, and other than the quirky "Pop Star" (like a more folksy "So You Want to be a Rock 'N' Roll Star"), which doesn't really do much, all the songs here are in the classic Cat Stevens style.
One thing that strikes me is how underrated the instrumentation is on Cat Stevens' records. Most attention goes to his vocals and lyrics, but his guitar work (along with second guitarist Alun Davies) is consistently strong, and his piano playing is remarkably expressive. Even Peter Gabriel gets in on the action here, contributing flute parts. But there's something about his finger-picking and the intricacy of the arrangements that I've always found pretty classic.
While Mona Bone Jakon is typically viewed as a stepping stone more than as a creation in its own right, there's lots of budding greatness on this record. I'm not sure why I can love Cat Stevens and hate James Taylor, but apparently I'm capable. And unfortunately, only one of those two is in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
"Maybe You're Right"
"Fill My Eyes" (couldn't embed this one)
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