leonard cohen

The British rock writer Nigel Williamson, considering the career of Leonard Cohen, recently observed, “We often describe singer-songwriters as being 'Dylanesque', a band with great harmonies you might describe as 'Beatlesque'. We even talk about someone being 'Waitsean', after Tom Waits. “But have you ever heard the word...
> music/3458/leonard-cohen-the-essential-leonard-cohen-sony/

Tribute albums can be dodgy: some are fun, and the more obscure the artists the better they get. But you are wise to avoid the Joy Division tribute A Means to an End which features those household names Honeymoon Stitch, Girls Against Boys, Starchildren and godheadSILO. Or any of those to Tom Waits. But how can you resist an album of...
> fromthevaults/3450/brix-e-smith-and-nigel-kennedy-hurdy-gurdy-man-1991/

The equation seems simple: Leonard Cohen the self-described "ladies man" + women + bed = But of course nothing is ever quite that straightforward with a Jewish Zen Buddhist poet-cum-singer and unlikely sex symbol even his mid 70s. Here with amusing self-effacement he confronts aging, his reputation, plays with images of...
> fromthevaults/3251/leonard-cohen-because-of-2004/

The Walkabouts have -- for 25 years -- been the vehicle for songwriter Chris Eckman (see here) and Carla Torgerson who have been mainstays in a band with a revloving door membership. Some might push the Walkabouts into the broader indie-rock or alt.country category, but as this tribute illustrates, their songs are so malleable that...
> music/3248/various-artists-got-no-chains-the-songs-of-the-walkabouts-glitterhouse-yellow-eye/

At first glance this might just seem to be one for those who knew the title meant "Rain Without an Umbrella" or just want a bit of that breathy chanteuse mood music for dinner parties. But if you are in the latter camp you will be a little surprised: although this certainly has reflective ballads over piano and soft strings, Hardy's...
> world-music/3142/francoise-hardy-la-pluie-sans-parapluie-virgin/

Many singer-songwriters are prepared to essay their fragility in life and love, but few offer the sense they have some deep emotional strength to leaven the mix and lift their songs out of self-pity. This Paris-based Englishman is a rare one. He can push easily into a falsetto but, as with Jeff Buckley (whose style he otherwise doesn't...
> music/3065/richard-walters-the-animal-kartel/

Back in the late Sixties/early Seventies the American folk-rocker Phillips was known for two things: the astonishing length of his hair, and a soaring falsetto. And although he was moderately successful at the time -- bigger than a cult, not a chart topper -- he barely gets a mention in rock or folk encyclopedias today. That's...
> fromthevaults/3046/shawn-phillips-landscape-1972/

Jacques Brel is alive and well and living in ... Well, back in his hometown of Brussels, funnily enough. This is odd because Brel (1929-78) was ambivalent about Brussels. "Everyone has to come from somewhere," he would sardonically remark. And Brussels has often seemed a bit iffy about him. The great singer-songwriter, who...
> world-music/393/jacques-brel-profiled-seasons-in-and-out-of-the-sun/

In the early Eighties the safe money would have been on Nick Cave -- then battling various demons and his elusive muse -- not making it much further. Yet here is Cave, now in his early 50s, dutifully going to the office every day to write songs, novels, screenplays and soundtracks, and curating arts festivals . . . And seeing his...
> absoluteelsewhere/3056/nick-cave-the-seedy-middle-years-from-tender-prey-to-henrys-dream/

Elsewhere recently noted the tribute CD to David McComb of the Australian band the Triffids who died in February 1999. That all-star concert released as Deep in a Dream was to help raise funds to complete a doco on McCombs' short and sometimes troubled life. Now comes this film taken from four nights of shows (which pre-dated the Deep in a...
> music/3032/the-triffids-and-guests-its-raining-pleasure-madman-dvd/

Seeing kd lang -- "just a big boned gal from Canada" as she described herself to me an eon ago -- at the opening of the Winter Olympics in Vancouver singing a beautiful if slightly overlong Hallelujah reminded what an extraordinary talent she is. She effortlessly opened up her career from country music into big but soft-voiced...
> music/2905/kd-lang-recollection-nonesuch/

Another year, another compilation to accompany the Alliance Francaise Film Festival -- and a chance for an overview of chic music out of France. Big names here are Charlotte Gainsbourg with the electro-title track of her new IRM album, Nouvelle Vague (a previously unreleased version of Fad Gadget's Under the Flag), Rachid Taha (in rather...
> world-music/2895/various-artists-so-frenchy-so-chic-cartell/

At some time in the mid Nineties I spent an afternoon in Melbourne talking with David McComb, the former singer-songwriter with the Triffids then Blackeyed Susans. He was as intelligent as I had expected given the depth of his lyrics in both of those bands, but he was also hesitant, slightly wary and gun-shy, and I left wondering how he might...
> music/2861/various-artists-deep-in-a-dream-stomp-rhythmethod/

Those who saw Cohen's New Zealand concerts earlier this year -- and even those whose wallets couldn't stand the cruel gouging -- will find much to enjoy in this, almost exactly the same show, here filmed live in London's O2 Arena last July. Musically this was an interesting concert (again, what you see here is almost identical, jokes and...
> music/2278/best-of-elsewhere-2009-leonard-cohen-live-in-london-dvd-sony/

Once known as “the only country band on Flying Nun" (Trail of Tears in 90, their sole album for the label), this on-going project of Brian and Maryrose Crook has progressively taken a darker and deeper path the past decade. These 10 songs owes debts to old murder ballads, the Velvet Underground and the Doors, acoustic Neil Young,...
> music/2698/the-renderers-monsters-and-miasma-last-visible-dog/

“We have a fire on stage. If there’s any firemen in the area . . . “ This isn’t an announcement you hear too often at rock festivals -- but nothing was beyond possibility at the volatile Isle of Wight event in 70 when non-ticketholders stormed the site, the enraged promoter abused them for being ungrateful pigs and...
> music/2671/leonard-cohen-live-at-the-isle-of-wight-1970-sony-cd-dvd/

Jordan Reyne is one of New Zealand’s most challenging and innovative songwriters. Whether it be on albums under her own name or as Dr Kervorkian and the Suicide Machine, Reyne has pushed sonic and lyrical boundaries, pulled together electronica and acoustic instruments, explored noir-narratives and personal emotional states  . . ....
> absoluteelsewhere/2629/jordan-reyne-interviewed-2009-tales-from-the-dark-side/

Eckman has been one of the cornerstones of the long-running and very credible alt.country outfit the Walkabouts, has released solo albums, and been a member of the ever-evolving Willard Grant Conspiracy. All of which should recommend him if you follow this particular path of string-augmented, soul-baring songwriting. But the material for...
> music/2509/chris-eckman-the-last-side-of-the-mountain-glitterhouse-yellow-eye/

Jazzman Hancock has long been a supporter of Mitchell so this tribute to her music -- with another longtime Joni sideman Wayne Shorter on saxes -- comes as no surprise. And Mitchell's music has long moved into that melodically flexible area jazz musicians inhabit. What does surprise however is Mitchell's guest vocal on Tea Leaf Prophecy where...
> jazz/1373/herbie-hancock-river-the-joni-letters-verve/

Given that when Buckley died over a decade ago he left only one complete album behind (the breathtaking Grace) and a couple of EPs, it seems to have been remarkably easy to keep the product coming. A couple of years ago there was the Grace Legacy Edition which came with bonus tracks, a doco DVD and videos. There have also been a few live...
> music/1208/jeff-buckley-so-real-legacy-sony/