Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utcsrgv.UUCP Path: utzoo!utcsrgv!elf From: elf@utcsrgv.UUCP (Eugene Fiume) Newsgroups: net.music Subject: Re: Leonard Cohen Message-ID: <5065@utcsrgv.UUCP> Date: Thu, 23-Aug-84 10:58:16 EDT Article-I.D.: utcsrgv.5065 Posted: Thu Aug 23 10:58:16 1984 Date-Received: Thu, 23-Aug-84 12:25:54 EDT References: <199@boulder.UUCP> Organization: CSRI, University of Toronto Lines: 25 Cohen has begun to resurface once again after a long hiatus in Greece and elsewhere. I must say that I left him behind musically some time ago, but in terms of recent work, I think his last album was a rather unpopular effort of a few years ago, which more or less coincided with the publication of his book "Death of a Ladies Man". More recently, he has released a 1/2 hour or so video entitled "I am a Hotel", which interpolates some of his old stuff with a pretty dimwitted story line. Some scenes are very nice, though, and it's many planes above your standard vanilla pop video. Its major problem, apparently, was budgetary. Cohen has rediscovered his Jewish roots in a strong way. His latest book, just recently released in Canada (and perhaps not yet in the U.S.) is a set of 50 rather beautiful prose prayers to coincide with his 50th (!) birthday. Those that identify with Cohen-as-mystic will not find this book inconsistent with the man. I still have a soft spot for some of his earlier albums, especially "New Skin for an Old Ceremony", and "Songs of Leonard Cohen". The first is full of radiant poetic moments, and the second has all those nice little ditties like "Suzanne" and "So Long, Marianne". Eugene Fiume U of Toronto {allegra|decvax}!utcsrgv!elf