Leonard Cohen RIP

[fotoguzzi]

"
I'm sentimental, if you know what I mean
I love the country but I can't stand the scene.
And I'm neither left or right
I'm just staying home tonight,
getting lost in that hopeless little screen.
But I'm stubborn as those garbage bags
that Time cannot decay,
I'm junk but I'm still holding up
this little wild bouquet:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A. "


http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/leonard-cohen-dead-at-82-w449792

[not-fishing]

Like a bird on the wire
Like a drunk in a midnight choir
I have tried in my way to be free

Like a worm on a hook
Like a knight from some old-fashioned book
I have saved all my ribbons for thee
If I, if I have been unkind
I hope that you can just let it go by
If I, if I have been untrue
I hope you know it was never to you

For like a baby, stillborn
Like a beast with his horn
I have torn everyone who reached out for me
But I swear by this song
And by all that I have done wrong
I will make it all up to thee

Thanks for the music

[Arizona Wayne]

I liked some of Leonard's music.  1 song was about Maryann.  His music was in a movie decades ago.  Forget the name of it about china men working in California in a mine during the gold rush?  2 or 3 of his songs were in the movie. 

[ITSec]

He couldn't dance, but that didn't stop him from dancing.

He had a fling with Janis Joplin, was engaged to Rebecca de Mornay, and charmed countless others.

He was the only popular singer-songwriter other than Bob Dylan to win national and international awards not only for his music, but for his poetry and writing. And like Dylan, many loved him despite his singing.

He was noteworthy enough that for his 82nd birthday, the national news gave a list of 82 reasons to love him.

He had critical acclaim (and resulting 'covers' of his songs) with albums in the 1960s, but didn't have a best-selling album of his own until almost 1990.

He was born in a Jewish family, but his most famous songs included 'Hallelujah' and 'Joan of Arc".

He let one of his backup singers record an album of his songs, including most of the material from an album he was still working on - it was an international hit for her. He went on to credit her on his album not as a backup, but with her name next to his under 'vocals by'...

He met a young woman from Norway with a new son, who had arrived in the Greek Islands (where he lived) only to find her husband had abandoned her. He bought her a glass of wine, and over time helped her come to grips with her situation. Their affair didn't last, but their friendship did, and he continued to write both songs and poems for her throughout his life.

He spent five years in a zen center, becoming a Rinzai Zen Buddhist monk and taking the name Jikan - which means 'silence'.

He wrote one of his most famous songs, titled with a woman's name, about the wife of a close friend that he never had a relationship with - and not the woman (of the same name) who had two children with him.

He was our man - and he died today - and he was Leonard Cohen.

Everybody knows that the dice are loaded - Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed.
Everybody knows that the war is over - Everybody knows that the good guys lost.
Everybody knows the fight is fixed; the poor stay poor and the rich get rich.
That's how it goes...
Everybody knows.

[Kiwi_Roy]

I was lucky to attend his concert in Vancouver, a great entertainer

[auzziguzzi]

McCabe and Mrs. Miller
Warren Beatty and Julie Driscoll from memory.
Probably came out in about 1972 or thereabouts.

I liked some of Leonard's music.  1 song was about Maryann.  His music was in a movie decades ago.  Forget the name of it about china men working in California in a mine during the gold rush?  2 or 3 of his songs were in the movie. 

[oldbike54]

McCabe and Mrs. Miller
Warren Beatty and Julie Driscoll from memory.
Probably came out in about 1972 or thereabouts.

 I think you mean Julie Christie , Driscoll was a singer that performed quite a bit with Brian Auger

 Dusty

[Zoom Zoom]

Sad news. His prose will live on.

John Henry

[RANDM]

As a sometime muso, I mourn his passing and will try to
celebrate his enormous Legacy.
Avae Maestro, Thankyou for being.

[PJPR01]

An excellent article in the New Yorker on Leonard Cohen...very good read.

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/17/leonard-cohen-makes-it-darker

He had a voice, unmistakable, unique and at times mesmerizing.  Interesting back and forth that he and Dylan had thru the years...

[Arizona Wayne]

McCabe and Mrs. Miller
Warren Beatty and Julie Driscoll from memory.
Probably came out in about 1972 or thereabouts.

Yeah, that was the movie. I have Cohen  songs on an old reel to reel tape.   Was into folk music back then.  Still like that stuff but hardly ever listen to it any more.  Used to tape it off of L.A. listener sponsored radio station KPFK - FM back in the day.   

[brenwin]

"I said to Hank Williams: how lonely does it get ? Hank hasn't answered yet
But I hear him coughing all night long
A hundred floors above me
In the Tower of Song "

[Muzz]

A sad loss.

One of my favourite DVD's is of him in concert with "the divine Webb sisters". Pure poetry delivered in his own inimitable style.

[fatbob]

I'd better spin "songs of love and hate" on the turntable tonite. Talented Man indeed.

[wirespokes]

What a guy! I really like his voice, but some don't and I don't understand why. My X (while we were still married) and her soon-to-be new husband strongly objected to him - especially the song already quoted earlier:


Everybody knows that you love me baby
Everybody knows that you really do
Everybody knows that you've been faithful
Ah give or take a night or two
Everybody knows you've been discreet
But there were so many people you just had to meet
Without your clothes
And everybody knows

[Nic in Western NYS]

Never knew anything about him until my wife and I stumbled onto his 2009 Live in London concert on public broadcasting.  Now she's mourning her (thankfully metaphorical) boyfriend. 
LC was the man.