See Big Thief’s Adrianne Lenker in Exclusive Clip From ‘Lost Angel: The Genius of Judee Sill’ Documentary
variety.comJem Aswad Executive Editor, Music Along with Nick Drake, Judee Sill is probably the greatest lost singer-songwriter of the 1970s — an artist whose gifts were so great but their demons were apparently greater.
While Drake’s legend has taken its rightful place — due largely to a car commercial, of all things — Sill is yet to get her due. “Lost Angel,” a documentary that premiered at film festivals (and was reviewed by Variety) late in 2022 and is opening officially this week, does a masterful job of remedying that.
Although she released just two albums during her lifetime, Sill was a brilliant and innovative singer-songwriter who was the first artist signed to David Geffen’s Asylum Records, where she was labelmates and/or a contemporary of the Eagles, Linda Ronstadt, Jackson Browne, Graham Nash, David Crosby and Joni Mitchell.
She was frequently compared with the latter (to her great annoyance) and although there are few direct musical similarities, they were both among the most original talents of the era: Her music fit early ‘70s Southern California vibe of her label and milieu, but it was stranger, with deep classical influences, wildly unusual structures and voicings and often dark subject matter.The latter factor was no coincidence: Her musical brilliance was countered by a deeply self-destructive streak, including drug abuse, prostitution, robbery and ensuing jail stints that began in her teens, that ultimately led to her death in 1979 at the age of just 35, leaving behind just two vastly under-recognized albums containing brilliant songs like “Lady-O,” “The Kiss,” “Jesus Was a Cross Maker,” “The Phoenix” and others.
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