Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Maryrrf
Date: 09 Dec 02 - 04:32 PM

Count me as one who likes Leonard Cohen. I like (most) of his lyrics and I like his voice - there's something soothing about it. Someone else mentioned, and I agree, that he tackles subjects that are different and I admire him for that. My favorites are his early albums - Songs from a Room and Songs of Leonard Cohen, I think they were called. I still remember a concert of his that I attended in Ludwigshafen, Germany. It was superb. He DOES seem to be a performer that people either love or can't stand - not much in between!

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 09 Dec 02 - 03:40 PM

Heh..

You know Chelsea Hotel is about Janus (sp?) Joplin eh?

She's the one he remembers "Talking so brave and so sweet"

Heh...

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Ross
Date: 09 Dec 02 - 03:34 PM

It's the ability to catch something in a smattering of words

such as -

'when you're not feeling holy, your loneliness says that you've sinned'

or

'if your life is a leaf that the seasons tear off & condemn'

or

'but he himself was broken, long before the sky would open'

Cohen's a great poet

He should be admired for having the guts to stand up & portray his world in one dominated by crap holywood/walt disney illusion

One where only pretty people are allowed to participate

now sing Chelsea Hotel

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: GUEST,Geordie
Date: 09 Dec 02 - 01:08 PM

I love leonard Cohen. The fact of not having a great voice has not kept him from being a great singer...there are many in that category..Bob Dylan, John Prine, come to mind. So I guess it is all personal choice. But I do think his lyrics are great, better than Dylans.

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Pied Piper
Date: 09 Dec 02 - 12:45 PM

Jazzyjack, every body is entitled to their opinion, even if they are talking Bollox.
I've seen LC live three times (obviously I'm a fan). Live he is very humorous and entertaining, and always had an excellent band backing him. The concerts I attended had people of a wide age range and the quality of the arrangements really stood out.

All the best PP

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: GUEST,daylia
Date: 09 Dec 02 - 12:16 PM

I'm with you, Catarina.

After struggling for years with my teenage son about whose music gets played in the house/car, we finally came to a workable agreement,

He doesn't play Cannibal Corpse or Slipknot while I'm around, and likewise I spare him Loreena McKennitt and Amazing Grace.

Music is a very powerful thing. Unfortunately within families people sometimes use it as 'weapon' to abuse or control one another. So respecting each other's space - and that includes the airwaves in that space - is something we work on every day.

Here's to happy tunes!

daylia

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Catarina
Date: 09 Dec 02 - 11:47 AM

So, some people like Leonard Cohen, and some people hate Leonard Cohen. Can we live and let live?
I mean, I like Leonard Cohen. I don't feel the need of inflicting him on anyone. Sometimes my hubby complains about me listening to LC records. Weel, sometimes I have to listen to Bach's "Passion according to John" (one of his favourites) for hours, though it bores me to death. We're even.

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Helen
Date: 09 Dec 02 - 12:12 AM

Aw hell, caught out again. Jazzyjack's right again - I didn't read it properly, even when I looked again at the thread title, after I had shut it down, and thought: What was it that Reynolds likes about Cohen? So I opened it up again and re-read the opening post.

It's not April Fools' Day anywhere in the world outside of Oz, is it?

Helen

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 11:50 PM

"Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic 'till I'm gathered safely in
Life me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove
Dance me to th ened of love"

Or one of my favorites....

"Where, where where is my gypsy wife tonight?"

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: sharyn
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 10:22 PM

Yep, Daylia,

That's Cohen, too. Not one of his best, in my opinion, although the refrain is pretty good -- reminds me of another one: "Let's sing another song, boys./This one has grown old and bitter."

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: GUEST,daylia
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 10:14 PM

"You were the promise of dawn - I was the morning after
You were Jesus Christ my lord - I was the moneylender ...

And is this what you wanted - to live in a house that is haunted
By the ghost of you and me"

Isn't that Cohen? Romantic, you say? Hmmmmmmm how tragic...

Only in Canada, I guess.

daylia

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Jazzyjack
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 10:08 PM

Yeah we goofed Reynolds. I reacted as soon as I saw Cohen's name and didn't read carefully. As far as Dylan goes, I like most of his stuff up to and including " John Wesley Harding ". The film of his tour in England showed how electrifying he was on stage. His combination of unusual lyrics, part singing, talking vocals and pretty basic guitar work ends up being appealing to me. I got to see him live about 13 years ago and he stunk out the place. What a downer. I still retain 2 of his tunes in my repertoire " Girl of the North Country " & " I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine ". "Mr. Tam. Man " & " Desolation Row " are stand out classics but unperformable.

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: sharyn
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 09:54 PM

First of all, no conversions planned or in process: if you don't like Cohen, you don't like him.

Why I do. He has a wonderful self-mocking sense of humor. I cite his line quoted above "I was born with a golden voice." He knows. And I like his voice -- at least as heard live within the last ten years -- but then, I like bass voices. He writes incredibly romantic lovesongs:

I see you on the subway. I see you on the bus.
I see you lying down with me. I see you waking up.
I see your hands, I see your hair, your bracelets and your brush.

(From one version of "No Cure For Love")

He tackles unusual subjects: who among you has written a good song about Joan of Arc or about how death will come for us all("Who By Fire")?

He has integrity: when Columbia Records had an awards banquet to celebrate the success of "I'm Your Man" he thanked them for the modesty of their interest in his recording career.

However unmusical some of you might find his singing, I find many of his songs melodic and many of his arrangements memorable: I like his use of piano lines and female back-up singers.

Scoff on, if you must. And, by the way, Dylan's voice improved with age and experience and he has written many lovely melodies (and stolen others from traditional songs).

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: GUEST,daylia
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 09:53 PM

Well, Clinton, about the "Tower of Song" lyrics - if he figures he's "got no choice" maybe that's why he's so dark and sombre, as the 'golden voice' thing appears to be in question.

And it's not 'Burton who', it's the Guess Who! ;-)

Anyway, for the record, my 20-yr old son and his friends say it's the Tragically Hip who give Canada it's 'cool'!

Whoever it is, they're sure doing a good job tonight! Brrrrrrrr

Peace

daylia

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: GUEST,Q
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 06:31 PM

I have some Leonard Cohen and Bob Dylan on old LPs by Nana Mouskouri. Musically much improved, but much of the meaning is lost.

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Reynolds
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 05:48 PM

Helen,

I guess your sarcasm meter was broken when you read my post.

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Helen
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 05:45 PM

Jazzyjack,

My sentiments exactly. I can stand listening to Cohen's songs and Bob Dylan's songs *only when someone else sings them*. But not when they sing them themselves.

I'll admit that Cohen's musical ability has improved from his first album, but musically he still annoys the hell out of me, and it is the music which is the prime focus for me, rather than the words. (I posted a little theory of mine in a thread here a couple of years ago: that the people who love Leonard Cohen & Bob Dylan relate to the words and don't care so much about the music, and the people who can't stand LC & BD relate to the music and don't care as much about the words.)

Unfortunately my hubby loves Cohen, and for some reason, he inflicts it on me on a regular basis, and gets upset if I go out of the room or ask politely whether we have to listen to so many of his CD's in one sitting. (I think he thinks that it will grow on me. A faulty logic, because Jeff Buckley hasn't grown on him. Maybe I should play Jeff Buckley more often.) To explain, Hubby has a 200 CD player with about 3 or is it 4 Cohen CD's in a row, starting with the oldest one. You know the one: the "let's all go outside and slash our wrists" one, with only about 3 musical notes repeated in endless boring repetitious patterns, i.e. the one I can't stand the most, the one that some radical English teacher first inflicted on our class about 30 years ago and many of the other class members raved about it and they refused to believe that I hated it.

Sorry to be so rampant about this, but I get so tired - over the last 3 decades - of people who think that the more I listen to Cohen the more likely it is that I will suddenly have a "revelation" and fall in love with his songs.

I'm not saying that this is Reynolds' intention in starting this thread. I'm just saying that for some reason many of the Cohen buffs *I know* have this evangelical urge to convert other people to his songs.

So, in my opinion it is "live and let live". I've had my say and now I'll stay out of this thread. And I apologise for being so adamant and raving on like this. I'm not trying to upset Reynolds, or anyone who loves LC.

If anyone can cast any light on why so many LC fans are so intent on converting LC-haters to the cause I'd be eternally grateful, though.

Helen

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 05:22 PM

"I was born like this, I had no choice
I weas born with the gift of a golden voice.."

-Tower Of Song- L. Cohen

Burton who? Never heard of him....

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: GUEST,Bardford
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 05:07 PM

A few years ago Cohen won a Juno Award (kinda like a Canadian Grammy). He said, and I paraphrase - "Only in Canada can a guy with a voice like mine win a prize."

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: GUEST,daylia
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 04:58 PM

As a Canadian I always try to root for Canadian musicians, because they rarely get enough support at home. Seems they don't get noticed till the Yanks find them! And by then they're so frozen and hungry...

But I do find it hard to root for Cohen - he's depressing. Maybe I've just missed his 'less dark and sombre' stuff.

Jazzyjack, are you sure you're not confusing him with Bob Dylan?

I always thought Canada got it's 'cool' from Burton Cummings, eh?

daylia

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Bernard
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 04:53 PM

I'm amazed that Leo Sayer (or his writer?) was never prosecuted for plagiarism - his hit song 'When I Need You' is based (albeit inadvertently, but look what happened to George Harrison!) on 'Famous Blue Raincoat'...

If you listen to Cohen's line 'And Jane came by with a lock of her hair' (etc.), the tune is identical - even down to the speed and key!

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Jazzyjack
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 04:46 PM

I forgot to include Cohen in the list of those whom I dislike the most. I am a Canadian but I do not appreciate his feeble attempts to put his writings to music. The music is extremely bad and his voice should never torture the ear of anyone. He is a fraud and should stick to writing only. I detest people who have no ability to perform music having the icredible gall to think that they can suddenly become performers, subjecting us to their inflated egos.

Subject: RE: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 04:31 PM

Heh...

It's been said he's what gives Canada it's 'cool'

:-)

Subject: Why I love Leonard Cohen's music!
From: Reynolds
Date: 08 Dec 02 - 04:26 PM

I love Leonard Cohen's music because he covers the full range of emotions. From the very dark and sombre to the less dark and sombre.