Older, wiser and lovlier than ever - DH review

[diamondsinthemine]

from http://www.yaledailynews.com/article.asp?AID=27040:

"We'll go no more a-roving/ So late into the night," Leonard Cohen sings on the opening track of his eccentric, challenging new album "Dear Heather." But the underrated Cohen, who turned 70 in September, has continued to release album after album despite a failure to achieve widespread popularity or commercial success. His astonishing lyrical skill and the distinct ideas and themes of his work have remained largely constant within a musical landscape that has grown and changed with the times.

In its sound and content, "Dear Heather" marks the culmination of Cohen's music career. Though the album is inconsistent, with several rough spots of experimentation, its high points are as great as anything Cohen has ever released.

As its affable title indicates, "Dear Heather" is a quiet, musing work. The cynicism of "The Future" (1992) and the bleak incisiveness of "Songs of Love and Hate" (1971) are replaced by introspective contemplation befitting an artist who has just reached his 70th birthday. In that respect, the album has an additional perspective of several decades as well as the weight of serving as a reflection on his own work.

Cohen rose to prominence as a singer-songwriter in the 1960s, after having already published two novels and one anthology of poetry in Canada. In 1967, Cohen moved to the United States to pursue a career as a folksinger. His first album, "The Songs of Leonard Cohen" (1967), was popular among college students but his music never caught on with the mainstream. His work has been characterized by melancholy and lyrics that resemble poetry. In 1996, Cohen was ordained as a Zen Buddhist monk; the album's quiet reflection seems inspired by his religion.

Lyrically, "Dear Heather" is as strong as any album of his long career. Cohen pays tribute to his background as a poet by dedicating several songs to the people that influenced him, such as the Canadian poets Irving Layton and A.M. Klein, and F. R. Scott, once one of Cohen's professors. The album even begins with a tribute to Lord Byron; Cohen adapts the poem "Go No More A-Roving" into a jazzy, relaxed song.

"There For You" and "The Letters" are Cohen at his best, with effective musical instrumentation balancing lyrics that are nostalgic, pained and newly aware of mortality: "Death is old,/ But it's always new./ I freeze with fear/ And I'm there for you," he sings on "There For You." On these tracks, the melancholy quality of Cohen's famously unmusical vocals -- deep, coarse and monotone -- are well complemented by longtime collaborator Sharon Robinson's vocals to create a sublime beauty. Cohen's chant, quieted to a barely audible whisper at times, is all the more haunting on songs such as "On That Day," a response to the events of Sept. 11, 2001.

Cohen has tried, mostly successfully, to incorporate a number of musical styles and elements into his work. Recently, his albums have been characterized by a fusion of country and folk, with the continued use of the synthesizer sounds that were so effective in increasing the scope and magnitude of albums like "The Future."

"Dear Heather," though, overuses synthesizers and solo saxophones, and sometimes ventures into the gray area between quiet, unhurried music and cheap elevator muzak. In particular, on the tracks "Villanelle For Our Time" and "To a Teacher," the music seems almost an afterthought to the admittedly fascinating lyrics. In "Villanelle" the sparse noodling on the synthesizer and horn sounds like half-formed ideas rather than realized music. Nevertheless, Cohen's deep, chanting voice commands attention and seriousness, smoothing these rough experimental passages into one continuous whole.

The title track, however, is a bizarre, unsuccessful experiment that is perhaps the weakest song on the album. A repetitive and almost childish melody plays under Cohen and singer Anjani Thomas's repetitive five-line chant. Cohen tries to achieve a certain effect with the repetition, but the result is difficult to listen to and out of context.

One wishes Cohen would stick to the kind of fascinating, unsettling beauty he proves himself so capable of on two of the last tracks, "Nightingale" and "The Faith" -- the album's masterpiece. Cohen's and Thomas's voices combine to give the song a haunting beauty, and its creative instrumentation and arrangement, which includes an enchanting violin solo, are gorgeous. The lyrics are nearly heartbreaking, filled with regret and pain. "So many graves to fill/ O love, aren't you tired yet?" he sings.

Cohen's words seem to look back upon his magnificent career; should this end up his final album, it will be a worthy coda. But the interesting and provocative "Dear Heather" indicates there is untapped potential that can yet be realized in years to come.

[Tchocolatl]

These days I can not but think about the drawings he sent during the making of the album. I had the feeling he was "preparing" or giving insights of what was coming.

As far as I can see, the more the critic is a specialist the more he seems confused and lost with the experimental material and reassured by the conventional one. Too much years passed into the same paths again and again, all this trainging to be certain that this the how it should be. Joe Way exposed the idea precisely :

"But he is challenged and challenges us, beyond this. Poetry is words set to music and song complicates the process. We can fallback to those sounds that create comfort in our soul and reject those noises that don't fall within the patterns that life has taught us".

The experimentations enchant me, however.

Dear Heather, the song? I see it like a flirtatious man that begins to make you smile, it's a game, it is just for fun, it is not serious, and it is the serious hypnotic tactic of snake catching the prey.

[lizzytysh]

I agree with your commentary here, Tchocolatl. It seems that many people [even those who seemingly 'should'] don't really 'get' Leonard. I think of his abilities as a vast, dark, natural pool of water. This album has him enjoying languid days of fishing, and bringing forth all different varieties of those that live in the pool. He brings them to us, as I already said elsewhere, as light through a prism, where all the colours and patterns of those beings can be seen. Forgive my dovetailing of probably inconsistent metaphors, but I'm so uncomfortable when I see Leonard being shortchanged in the process of people's assessments of his work.

I love the title song, and don't find it in the least "unlistenable." I also feel it couldn't be more obvious that it was experimental, and experiment for fun. I love your comment that, "it is the hypnotic tactic of the snake that is catching the prey." Even as I listen, I find myself trying to keep track of which words are actually being spelled out, and in which order. It's a wonderful spark of creative play on the album.

"In 'Villanelle' the sparse noodling on the synthesizer and horn sounds like half-formed ideas rather than realized music."

Here's one who doesn't understand the minimalist point-counterpoint, between the lyrics and the instrumentation, that has always leant such a sense of the eternal.

Besides all that, this reviewer refers to Zen as Leonard's "religion."

[Tchocolatl]

He is all of a sudden after having been the saint monk of Mt.Baldy, and more then everle poète maudit. Ah! if only he had done a little interview or 2 to feed the lions... I wonder what they would have purred, then... hum...

He uses 2004's Jew's harp to do folk music (synth). Nobody is critisizing about the traditional Jew's harp because they are already used to hear it. I think. (Do you remember our conversation about the evolution of language? From jaw's harp it passed to Jew's harp in spoken and after in written English, a harp which Leonard Cohen is one of the few Jews who used ).

Forgive what? I like how you like him.

[lizzytysh]

Ah, you added "serious" to the "hypnotic tactic"? Or, did I miss that the first time around? Good 'etymology' lesson on Jew's harp and, yes, here he is using a real one. Seems like those who criticize the synths could at least bring themselves to give credit where credit is due for using an authentic one, underscoring his own heritage, as well.

Granted, I'm strongly and solidly in Leonard's camp; however, I feel that my reasons for being so are legitimate, as well. Glad you don't object to my loyalty .

Yes, sour grapes on the page end up looking like dark smears and smudges, don't they? Leaving them all to themselves to come up with copy....without any hints from the one who knows best. Well, I guess "he'll pay for this!" They could use some 'smudging' themselves ~ with some cleansing, white sage.

[linmag]

That 'hypnotic' comment is interesting. Heather is the name of the family's maid in The Favourite Game. The one the hero hypnotises.......

[lizzytysh]

AHA! Have we located the Heather? The maid would have certainly walked by Leonard many times, in reality or his imagination ~ and at eye/leg level . If so, I suspect that Tchocolatl was aware of her use of the hypnotic reference. Tchocolatl? It is, indeed, hypnotic in its repetition. Someone [can't recall her name] here used the word "mesmerizing" regarding this album. [I was able to resist 'seconding' that at the time ~ however, in the end, here it is !]

[lizzytysh]

Tchocolatl! Look who just showed up ! With all that time on her hands, I guess she decided she could spare a little of it for the Forum . Or, might this be an imposter ?

[Tchocolatl]

Yes, as far as I know it is me (I do not know if you consider me as an imposter, however)

Yes I added seriousness to the snake's activity.

Ys, I mentionned that Heather was the name of the maid in the novel, somewhere around here a "long" time ago. But believe me or not, I did not made the connection when I posted the above comment. Good for me that you two came up with it. Maybe DH is the passage of this novel as FBR is for a detail of BL? Who knows?

Old Ideas was a very nice title for the album.