"She sings jumping and dancing, her fists alternately clenching and breaking open to clap; the corners of her marvelous mouth turning down in the fierceness of joy breaking through anguish; her hair covering her eyes until swept back with a meaty hand. In great shouts that send her strings of beads flying and knot her face into grimaces, the energy explodes and explodes again, sending out waves of electrical excitement. Some say she can sing more than one note at a time; maybe, but does it matter? In her every note there are infinite meanings."

As the sixties come to a close, Michael Lydon follows Janis Joplin - a year before her death - illuminating the icon's unapologetic, all-out approach to life, her absolute vitality and, above all, her intoxicating, shape-shifting devotion to feeling. Every Moment She Is What She Feels was originally published in the New York Times Magazine, February 23, 1969.