#57 Leonard Cohen – Songs
#57 Leonard Cohen – Songs
When I thought I could write, I had conceived a screenplay in my head based on the song ‘So Long Marianne’. I have to admit the details are hazy, other than to say it would have been some very complicated postmodern plot that would have been hard to follow. Secondly, I had always felt that if I did do something it could have to have been something unique and surreal. Keep formulas in the classroom.
The above does not have much to do with Cohen other than to suggest that a certain song had caught my liking and was played fairly often because that is what you do when you play songs (especially on CD or any electronic format) as it is much easier than the days prior when batteries were wasted rewinding tape players.
At this time, Cohen did not have his raspy, Pall Mall voice but if you were to give me a folk singer that I have most obsessed over it would be Cohen over Dylan anyday. Bold statements, I know, and trust me it is not to diss my namesake Mr. Zimmerman, (minus the second N in the name) but rather to stress what I thought Cohen’s words have been so meticulously chosen.
He’s created a couple of sirens during his time. “Suzanne” for example, which is not a song about love per se, but the human condition especially with the parallel to Jesus.
“So Long, Marianne” offers both the bittersweet reminiscing of past events as well as the current truth of a relationship gone bad, not to mention the subject of a previously mentioned never written screenplay for a movie that will not be coming to your hometown anytime soon.
What strikes Cohen as a true artist was that he was a poet first before grabbing a guitar and beginning a professional music career. His poetry offers a certain vividness that cannot be replaced. You feel that certain bohemian quality in his work. He feels like a man of the streets, seen injustice, seen his heart broken or yearn for others. He did spend some time in Warhol’s Factory which might suggest that bands and artists like The Velvet Underground and Nico might have rubbed off on him.