Janis Joplin s posthumous masterpiece turns 50
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Janis Joplin in London.Daily Mirror / Mirrorpix, Contributor / Getty Images
Fifty years ago, Janis Joplin was three months gone, but her status as an ageless popular music icon was just beginning with the release of “Pearl.” The album sounds bracing even a half-century later, the sound of an artist really finding her voice.
“Pearl” contained Joplin’s take on “Me and Bobby McGee,” an instantly revered recording that found Joplin singing Kris Kristofferson’s words with both coiled restraint and enormous feeling. The song ended up being Joplin’s only Top 40 hit under her own name; with Big Brother and the Holding Company, she hit No. 12 in 1968 with “Piece of My Heart.”