When Cat Stevens released his third album Mona Bone Jakon in April of 1970, it was his first with Island Records. The result - 11 soft and spare tracks that exist as a seemingly untempered outpouring of emotion - signified a sort of rebirth. For Stevens, born Steven Demetre Georgiou in post-war London to a Swedish mother and a Greek father, this was neither the first nor would it be the last of such personal reinventions.
Steven's first top 40 British hit entered the charts while he was still a teenager, and by the time his second album New Masters was released, he was already fed up with the life a young pop star (albeit a folk-pop star). When he contracted tuberculosis shortly after his 21st birthday and was hospitalized for three months, he dropped Decca records and nearly disappeared from the scene entirely.
Looking for a new start, Stevens went personal, writing a handful of songs that are rife with anxiety and pain, yet still glinting around the edges with flashes of hope. Though some songs definitely hide it well, Mona Bone Jakon is an undoubtedly life-affirming work.
It is the grace and humble eloquence with which the songs' style evokes that emotion - that feeling of cynicism, that sensitive acknowledgement of life's pain that makes this album stand out from the rest. The late '60s and early '70s were the heyday for albums of this ilk, but Stevens isn't a lone man on stage with an acoustic guitar, nor is he drug-dazed hippie protesting the war. Rather, he sings from the heart, with carefully and cleverly arranged tunes, sharp but not overly elaborate lyrics, and a sweet supple voice. That Cat Stevens-sound rings with the sincerity and abandon of a man whose willing to push his voice in funny, odd directions. The risks pay off, and in place of bland, lilting, casting-about present in some of Stevens' folk contemporaries' music, we get something that's idealistic without being na??ve; hopeful without being forced and cheesy. You'll find it liberating.
A lot of fans might own Stevens' Greatest Hits or name the delicate, fine Tea for the Tillermans as his best, most complete album. Some may recall his blissful tunes on the Harold and Maude soundtrack or a tune of his in the popular film Rushmore, but this album possesses something a lot of his later work doesn't: a freedom, a peaceful contagious feeling of relief that comes with letting go. So when in "Fill My Eyes" he sings "I'm just a coaster but my wheels won't roll/can't make no headway on this road," it's no surprise when he comes to a sudden understanding, a new realization, aha!: "What road?"
You can look at the blurred image of Stevens on the back of the liner notes, legs crossed, hands folded, eyes closed and turned to the heavens, and just imagine him writing lyrics, Zen-style in his head. This abandon, this unrestrained passion makes everything - the lolling, lazy ballad "Lady D'Arabanville," the wickedly snide jab "Pop Star" and even the ecstatic, grateful tribute "I Think I See The Light" - all the more potent. Occasionally, that might seem a little much, but more often than not Mona Bone Jakon will strike just right chord, offering the perfect dosage of heart and pleasantly surprising joy.
