Album Review: Nadia Kazmi - LAMB

Singer/songwriter Nadia Kazmi incites something fierce on her third release, LAMB, but truth be told she’s been brazen from the beginning.

On her 2010 debut, Arrival, Kazmi showcased a compelling sense of craft, her lyricism in particular bearing out the poetic language and rich cadences of formative influence Leonard Cohen. The very next year she devoted her follow-up, Strange Song, entirely to works by the legendary bard, taking strident liberties with rock-edged arrangements in ways that turned hallowed classics on their heads.

Which brings us back to LAMB, where Kazmi’s creative audacity manifests in striking moments of angst and often fuck-all defiance like “Kill The Monster” and the coiled-riffed “Father Knows Best,” the songs boasting punk’s brevity and swagger if not its most jarring sonic discord. Elsewhere in fact almost unsettling, tribal percussion simmers beneath verses that Kazmi delivers with the authority of a Patti Smith sermon, searing forth with unflinching grace and growl.

Further Reading: An Interview with Nadia Kazmi (2010)

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Interview: Singer/Songwriter Miel de Botton Realizes Enduring Musical Ambition and Passion on 'Magnetic' Debut

“I’m still kind of pinching myself,” says Miel de Botton on the line from her home in London, keen to discuss her forthcoming debut, Magnetic, whilst offering insights to circumstances that both instigated and hindered its making. 

Indeed the Swiss-born philanthropist would be the first to concede that while the double album realizes her life’s abiding passion — to craft and interpret music for the masses, to sing intimately personal songs that reflect universalities of the heart, particularly French chansons she first heard as a child that continue to resonate with her as an adult — it does so as a result of much self-scrutiny and reflection.

Raised in relative affluence, coming of age amid the implicit (and sometimes overt) expectations of scholastic and professional accomplishment, particularly those of her father — Gilbert de Botton, who died at age 65 in 2000, was a venerable financier and fine art benefactor — she wavered between his wishes and her own ambitions. She studied law at Oxford, later worked as a clinical psychologist in Paris. As she entered her forties, having married and divorced while raising two young children, de Botton ultimately decided to pursue her artistic promise in earnest.

Produced by Andy Wright (whose credentials include works by Duran Duran, Simple Minds, and the Eurythmics), Magnetic is whimsical in some moments, solemn in others, and altogether inspired throughout. 

Was there some sort of realization that your passion was translatable as talent? Most people reach a point where they recognize that they can’t go any further than their passion.

It’s interesting. It did take a long time, and I think that time was actually beneficial to me because it was a time of maturing. Then suddenly things did seem to all line up and doors were opening. I had a lot of enthusiasm and passion and … I had a beneficial environment, I guess, that I’m very grateful for. I wish it for the maximum number of people out there, but I can’t fully explain why me at this stage because I’ve myself got a sense of wonder about it. 

How did you connect with Andy Wright?

That was one in a series of coincidences which were, I think, quite magical. I was working with a band before and I couldn’t find a producer who was giving me a reasonable offer. I asked this lady, who’s my healer, and I was just chatting to her and I said, “I’m really having trouble.” She said, “Why don’t you come to this event next week. I think this producer, Andy Wright, might be there.” So I looked him up, and I thought, My God, this guy is the real deal. So, yes, I met him there, and his first question was, “Are you incredibly ambitious?” And I said, “Why, yes sir!” [Laughs] 

The chemistry between you two in the studio has been good?

It’s been really good. I think initially we were both a little bit on our guards and didn’t really know what was going to come out of this. Gradually it just grew stronger and stronger to the extent that we’ve just got this great creative synergy where I come in with my words and my melodies and he puts them to orchestration and instrumentation. It’s just so fabulous. It blows me away every time.

Have you been singing throughout your life or have you only come to it within the last few years?

I’ve been doing it throughout my life just to bring me a feeling of joy and a kind of healing thing in in my life. I just love to do it, singing and dancing. But in a more structured way I’ve only been doing it for three years, but I have been very actively doing it with two voice coaches who are classically trained. They have developed my voice; it’s been really amazing. I’ve seen it develop with their teaching, and that’s been an amazing process. 



You’ve mentioned elsewhere that Leonard Cohen is one of your biggest influences. How did his music first enter your life and ultimately have such a profound effect on you? 

He was played to me in my childhood by my parents. The music that went through the house was mainly classical. We had some Janis Joplin, and a lot of Leonard Cohen. So I sort of grew up with him, liking the melodies but obviously not understanding the words so much. Then, when I was a teenager, I connected with his words. That was when I really connected with him.

Growing up you weren’t encouraged toward the kind of ambition you’re now pursuing, but rather toward a traditional, education-based kind of career. Your father, in particular, was someone who greatly supported the arts and who appreciated the talents of those artists. Still — and it seems contradictory — it seems like he didn’t feel that a vocation in the arts was on par with, say, being a doctor or a lawyer.

It’s an interesting question because, I must say, I think this was very much lying dormant. People would say I had a pretty voice and I had a lovely voice and things like that, but it was not something that stood out. That’s why I think the timing was… In a way, maybe it was meant to be. In any case, it just took some time to mature. Nobody really thought it at the time, including me. I loved to sing and that was my dream, but I’m not sure I even voiced that, to be honest. I think it was just something that I loved. I never thought of it myself even as something vocational. So maybe it was all just a blind spot that we had, I don’t know. 

So this wasn’t a case where you professed your desire to pursue your musical ambition and you were denied.

No, no. But maybe the blind spot was due to the fact that we were all very academically pushed and that this was not something which would have been considered necessarily a career, a serious career. So I think there was some of that involved, but none of it was voiced. 

What I’m getting, then, is that your father wasn’t necessarily disparaging any sort of artistic course. He didn’t even know it was there to encourage.

Exactly. To be honest, he was quite disparaging about the psychology initially. He always said it was akin to flower arranging. He was much preferring the law; that was really his preferred [option].

In a general way, though, your father’s wishes for you were ultimately in looking out for your wellbeing. He wasn’t encouraging you to pursue something just for the sake of pleasing him; he was trying to get you to do something that would provide for you in the future.

Exactly, but in so doing he definitely did have trouble accepting the psychology. When he saw that it was serious, then he accepted it. But he said, “You finish your law degree.” Then he wanted me to continue to become a solicitor or a barrister, and it was my brother [author/philosopher Alain de Botton] actually who intervened and said, “Leave her in peace. She wants to do psychology.” 



As you’ve now come to music after doing other vocations, some of which were rewarding in their own ways but ultimately weren’t as fulfilling to you as a career in music, what finally convinced you to turn your passion into a professional pursuit?

I think it’s a combination of internal and external factors. I was a clinical psychologist before and I did that for many years, but I had stopped doing that quite a while ago. I had a personal tragedy. My father died very suddenly. I decided just to take a break, raise my two children, and I think there was a growing freedom in me in feeling that I really wanted to pursue what I wanted to do in life, and that life can be short. But I think it was just gradually with maturing with a feeling of freedom and joy, and that was coming out in singing and dancing with people around me, and they picked up on it. I think that’s how it happened. Everybody, friends and people who worked with me, [were] suddenly picking up on it and all saying, “You should speak with this person. You should speak with that person. Your voice is really lovely.” It was mainly about freedom and joy and enthusiasm after a lot of hardship — I [also] got divorced — a lot of sadness. Out of that came a feeling that I wanted to be free of that and fully express myself. I think the inner then influences the outer.

Do those hardships you’ve been through inform your songwriting or come through in your music in some constructive way?

Yeah, definitely, maybe in the same way that Leonard Cohen uses it. There’s a mixture of melancholy mood and searching for joy. One cannot really go without the other. I think if you’ve lived through the melancholy you long for the joy. 

Magnetic will be released on March 9. 

For more information on Miel de Botton, please visit the artist’s official website.

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Interview: Barb Jungr on Interpreting Songs of Dylan and Cohen

Barb Jungr is no stranger to the music of Bob Dylan or Leonard Cohen, having performed their works to both critical and popular acclaim throughout her near-forty-year career. Yet with her latest album, Hard Rain (The Songs of Bob Dylan & Leonard Cohen), on which the British vocalist collaborated with pianist and album producer Simon Wallace in arranging eleven songs that share some thread of timeless political or social import, her familiarity with the material didn’t make the task of interpreting it any easier or less daunting.

Of the title track in particular, Jungr recounts, “We recorded that over a period of about four months because we had at least five versions that we didn’t use. I went back and back and back to it and then I’d listen to it a week later and I’d go, ‘I’m not getting this right. This isn’t right. This isn’t right.’ It was a feel, an intuitive thing. You go, ‘This isn’t right. This song’s not right. I’m not singing this song right.’”  

Such dogged determination ultimately served the album well overall as Jungr’s performances, which through moments of jazz sophistication and cabaret panache are strikingly prescient. In their own way, as well, they yield illuminating perspectives on the canons of two of popular music’s most iconic and mythologized singer/songwriters. 

How difficult was it to marry the works of Dylan and Cohen as you’ve done with this album?

It was really easy. It was remarkably easy. The choices of the songs were effortless. They fell in at their own accord. I’m familiar with both sets of repertoire, but picking the songs really wasn’t difficult in any way. What was extraordinary for me was how very married the themes were but from a very different point of view. That was interesting.

Dylan’s known for having written many of his early songs very quickly—“Blowin’ in the Wind” took him twenty minutes, he’s acknowledged—while Cohen has a reputation for having taken years writing much of his work, yet it’s striking how well they complement each other.

Absolutely, and I think you can hear the difference. For example, “Chimes of Freedom” to me is just a mammoth, extraordinary song and, for me, it shows Dylan at his most humane. There’s a humanity about that song that’s startling for me. It’s a wonderful song to sing for that reason, but it’s a sort-of torrent of imagery. You can almost feel it emerging as you sing it; the song emerges itself. Then you take a song like “A Thousand Kisses Deep,” and what I love about Cohen is the way he’ll use words again, he’ll use phrases again, but their repeated use is utterly deliberate. I don’t mean because they’re choruses; that’s not what I mean. He’s playing with threads all the time. It’s a very fine, fine work he does; it’s finely honed and it’s very different to the way Dylan works. I love that about both of them. 

***

Dylan has said, especially about early songs like “It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)” and “Chimes of Freedom,” that he was not the prime force behind those songs, that they were instead channeled through him.

I love that he says that. I love that in his autobiography—in that first volume, the only volume of the three that we’ve ever seen—he talks about when Daniel Lanois comes to him and says, “Can we have another song like “Hard Rain?” and Dylan says, “The spirits that gave me those songs aren’t with me anymore.” I thought that was incredibly self-aware. There’s something very, very astonishing about understanding that and carrying on. 

Dylan seemed to have a grasp on the world around him right from the beginning, whereas Cohen’s grasp seems to have evolved more as he’s aged—and maybe that’s simply because he started later as a recording artist—particularly with albums like The Future. 

But again, who cares how you get to the top of the mountain? You went up the challenging path with crampons; you walked up the easy slope. It doesn’t matter. What matters is you got there. That’s very interesting, I think, in the comparison of those two: how they go about getting there. They both get there. They both get to something profound and spiritual and deeply-connected, profound human observation and questioning. They’re questing.

What, in part, gives this album such a compelling character is how you’ve taken liberties with the arrangements in ways that make the performances your own. You’re not copying these songs; you’re interpreting them. For instance, in a song like “It’s Alright Ma” you have an upbeat arrangement that seems to play against the ominous subtext of the lyrics. Did you intend for those sorts of paradoxical moments?

When that happens that happens by chance rather than design. When we’re arranging, I never go into arranging thinking, “What I want this song to do is…” I go into an arrangement thinking, “What could happen with this song if we listen to it differently?” We ask questions. We try things and we ask questions of the song. We sit the song down at the piano and we go [to the song], “How do you feel if we do this? How do you feel if we moved that section about?” And the song is very clear. The song will go, “Yeah, I like that,” or, “What are you thinking? Don’t be an idiot.” We know that straight away from the song. 

The songs are like live things—living, breathing things. We’re talking about real songs here, songs that Dylan channeled, songs that Cohen crafted, those kinds of songs; songs that come from something really deep that’s to do with the art of songwriting, those songs. They’re alive in the world and when they come to me—and they do come to me—and they knock on my door and ask me to sit with them at the piano with Simon Wallace in this instance, then we have to be awake and alert to what they’ll accept. 

***

Considering the sociopolitical context that binds these songs on the album, did you ever consider recording Cohen’s “Democracy?”

Yes, I did. I couldn’t make it work. The song didn’t want to come. We brought the song to the piano and the song sat on the piano and said, “Get lost.” [Laughs] Interestingly, into the live collection we put “The Future.” That song sat down at the piano and jumped about like a pea in a pod. It was fantastic. We found a great way of working with the song and the song comes out live and rips people out of their seats. I do it after “Masters of War,” and it’s a very interesting juxtaposition of those two songs together. 

In singing songs in which the lyrics are not transparent—particularly ones that have been open to interpretation for many years now—do you have to form some meaning for yourself in order to deliver it with conviction?

Two things about that… I tend to be drawn to and songs are drawn to me—that is, it’s not a one-way street—that I feel can resonate for me. I don’t like analysis because I have to be an instrument for the song—I have to be a singing instrument for the song—and I play by the text. So my technique is the amount of vocal quality I can bring to the text that the text will ask in any given moment. The second part of it is that if I stay completely out of the way, if I do not impose my will upon the song—if I don’t use the song to tell you what I think, but I let the song tell me what it thinks—then the audience will get what the song thinks. And that’s far more interesting. 

So that means in every singing of the song I get something different because the song’s always got something new to tell me, because with songwriters like Cohen and Dylan the work is Shakespearean. It’s multifaceted and it’s mysterious. It isn’t a clear thing. It’s not, “This is a song about traffic control.” It isn’t simple. These are songs about the human condition. 

Hard Rain (The Songs of Bob Dylan & Leonard Cohen) is available now on Kristalyn Records. For more information on Ms. Jungr, please visit her official website.

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British Vocalist Barb Jungr Covers Dylan, Cohen on New LP

More than a decade since she released a critically hailed collection of Bob Dylan covers, British vocalist Barb Jungr is set to offer six new interpretations of his songs alongside five others composed by Leonard Cohen. Hard Rain: Songs of Bob Dylan & Leonard Cohen is due March 24 on Kristalyn Records. Check out the track listing and the video for Jungr’s version of Cohen’s 1974 classic “Who By Fire?” below.

1. Blowin’ In The Wind  (Bob Dylan)
2. Everybody Knows  (Leonard Cohen and Sharon Robinson)
3. Who By Fire  (Leonard Cohen)
4. Hard Rain  (Bob Dylan)
5. First We Take Manhattan  (Leonard Cohen)
6. Masters Of War  (Bob Dylan)
7. It’s Alright Ma  (Bob Dylan)
8. 1000 Kisses Deep  (Leonard Cohen and Sharon Robinson)
9. Gotta Serve Somebody  (Bob Dylan)
10. Land Of Plenty  (Leonard Cohen and Sharon Robinson)
11. Chimes Of Freedom  (Bob Dylan)

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Adam Cohen: The Man Comes Around

His father may as well be Odysseus for all the reverence and mythologies ascribed to his lineage, but today Adam Cohen comes across as having struggled less with the notion of living in Leonard Cohen’s shadow than with living up to his own artistic potential.

That’s not to say the 39-year-old singer/songwriter has relished contending with the sort of scrutiny other progenies of influential figures so often face. In fact for years he resisted it, embellishing some of his early efforts to appeal to what for him were increasingly commercial ambitions more so than artistic ones—Cohen’s eponymous debut, featuring the modest though promising hit “Cry Ophelia,” was released in 1998—while casting others aside altogether lest they’d seem genetically derivative.

And yet such strategies, while meant to establish Cohen as an artist in his own right and by his own effort and merit, had for the most part undermined the integrity of his talent. Dispirited, he began to question his very relevance in the music industry. “I felt like I could have just as easily bowed out,” Cohen admits, “having been given many, many shots.”

Remarkably, though, his discouragement had never infringed on his ability to be creative. “The songwriting’s never really been affected. I’ve always felt good about it,” Cohen insists, and that silver lining became the catalyst for his current album, Like A Man.

“I’ve always had these songs in my back pocket even though I wasn’t showing them,” he explains, and indeed the album’s most recent material dates back five or six years, the oldest almost twenty. Asked if once he set to recording them was he at all apprehensive about revisiting songs he’d in some cases written as a much younger man, Cohen is quick to reply, “Not at all.” In fact, he says, he felt a measure of redemption in “finally being able to find a home for all of these songs that I’d discarded one after the other, knowing full well that these were my best songs and that I’d abandoned them for all the wrong reasons.”

Throughout the album are hereditary resonances, of course, evident in the rich timbre of Cohen’s singing and sobered phrasing as well as in his lyrics which often examine and explore themes of loneliness and carnal longing. And yet any such similarities never come across as derivative but, rather, descendant.

“It’s not only the language, the interest in creating something that is truthful and resonant, visual and cinematic,” Cohen adds, reflecting on the parallels between his father’s craft and his own. “There’s also the incredible devotion, dedication in writing that he’s always practiced.”

That work ethic, investing however much time and effort it takes to do the job right, is for Cohen what seems to have made on him the most meaningful and lasting impression.

“I remember him saying to me, ‘When you get to that point where you really sweat—there’s sweat on your brow and you’ve hit a wall after spending hours and hours working and you’re really about to quit—that’s where the actual work begins,’” he reflects. “That notion of it being work, of the big stuff coming when it gets hard, that’s definitely something I’ve inherited by proxy and by witnessing from my old man’s process.”

The insight has served him well. Like A Man signifies for Adam Cohen a new beginning while, at the same time, a culmination of the talent and resourcefulness that’s always been there. It’s in his blood.

“It’s so beautiful and rewarding to not only have made a record that is an homage to my father but to have done it with such truthful and fitting pieces, from the songwriting to the musicians to the accompaniment to the spirit in which it was actually recorded,” acknowledges Cohen. “It’s a record I should’ve made a long, long time ago.”

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Singer/Songwriter Sharon Robinson Schedules Rare West Coast Tour

Of late Sharon Robinson has served as an accompanying vocalist for Leonard Cohen on his immensely successful world tour. Beginning in October, she will step onto the concert stage on her own behalf, embarking on her first headlining tour to date with a string of West Coast engagements.

Long distinguished in the music industry as a GRAMMY®-winning songwriter and producer—and this is supplement to nearly three decades of collaborative work with Cohen, their creative partnership peaking with 2001’s masterful Ten New Songs—Robinson established herself as a recording artist in her own right in 2008 with her debut album, Everybody Knows.

Striking an eclectic balance of jazz-inflected soul, eloquent songcraft and Robinson’s suave and sophisticated vocals, the album earned both critical and popular acclaim. It was released in the early phase of what would amount to a nearly-three-year tour with Cohen, however, and thus benefited from only minimal publicity and promotional appearances. Nevertheless, the album ultimately fulfilled the promise of Sharon Robinson's rich, multidimensional talent. “I was looking for a sound that was mine,” she said to this writer of Everybody Knows. “I had to dig deep to find it, but at the same time, it felt very natural. It feels like the kind of music that I like, what I want to put out there.” Now the opportunity is hers to do so in person.

Details on Sharon Robinson’s upcoming West Coast tour is available at the artist’s official website. Dates and locations are as follows:

October 8 // Zoey’s Cafe // Ventura, CA
October 15 // Spaghettini // Seal Beach, CA
October 29 // Hotel Café // Los Angeles, CA
November 3 // Café Du Nord // San Francisco, CA
November 5 // Barkley Theatre // Fallon, NV

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An Interview with Nadia Kazmi

“There are so many different things you can do with music,” says singer/songwriter Nadia Kazmi, and if a consensus were to be gleaned from her debut, appropriately titled Arrival, that'd be a good one. Through the album’s diverse incarnations of rock, pop and distinctive shades of soul, Kazmi reflects the spectrum of her influences and creative range. In so doing, she also bears out her versatility as a vocalist, affecting both subtlety and raw power with unassuming confidence.

And yet the crux of Arrival, and for that matter the crux of the artist, lay in a resonance of lyrical expression. With considered, well-crafted lines of imagery and metaphors, Kazmi evokes a rare sense of emotional purpose that makes her music all the more compelling.

You have a particular appreciation for lyrics. Where does that come from?

I think it’s because I started writing lyrics first. I’ve always written poetry. When I was five years old, I wrote a poem and, while my parents were out and I was with the babysitter, I recorded [it] on top of one of my mom’s favorite cassette tapes of another artist. She put it in one day and she was like, “What is this?” So I was quite creative when I was that young even… Another reason I concentrate on lyrics a lot is that many of my family members are poets. They write poetry in Urdu, which is my mother’s mother tongue. It’s the major language of Pakistan. My uncle and my grandfather are both published poets. I’m not saying it’s necessarily an innate ability. I don’t necessarily believe in innate abilities.

But you grew up around people who appreciated language.

When I was five I don’t think I had read or heard any poetry by any of my family members, but I chose that vehicle as my expression. It was immediate and automatic in some way.

You also have a great appreciation for Leonard Cohen and his songwriting.

He’s my favorite artist of all time…Actually, for my next album I’m doing Leonard Cohen songs. I know it’s been done before many times, but I’m trying to do something a little more interesting because I’m going to infuse it with that rock/soul element that I have for the rest of my stuff. So I’m really going to change the songs quite a lot.

Have you decided what songs you’re covering?

I have decided on a few of them. I think right now—of course, it’s a working title—I’m going to call the album Stranger’s Song. And I’m definitely going to do “I’m Your Man”—I don’t think a lot of females have done that song—“Hey That’s No Way To Say Goodbye,” “Waiting For The Miracle,” and also “Ain’t No Cure For Love,” but I’m going to do a real soul/gospel/rock version of it because I think it lends itself to that.

The whole album will be Cohen?

It will be all Cohen. And it’ll be, like, “Leonard Cohen Rocks,” because they’re all going to be rock tunes. They’re all going to be very high-energy. I think there’s only going to be one or two that I’m going to do as true ballads, but I’ll pick songs he didn’t really use as ballads and then do very slow, intimate takes on them.

As far as your appreciation of Cohen as a songwriter, is his kind of discipline indicative in any way of how you write? Not that you spend ten years working on a song, but…

[Laughs] Well, I don’t necessarily spend ten years working on a song, but I do go back a lot and I spend a lot of time on my lyrics. I’ll sit in my room or in the coffeeshop just working on lyrics strictly before I head to the piano. So I always want to have the lyrics fully done before I go to the piano or the guitar and start working out. Even if I have a melody in my mind, I really want to have the structure of the verses and the choruses decided before I do that. Sometimes, now lately, I will go to the keyboard or guitar once I have one verse, one chorus, but not until then usually. And I do definitely work my lyrics over and over… I get an inspiration for a lyric. I usually record it immediately into a voice recorder or my iPhone now. And then I’ll take it the next day and I’ll start working through it. But if it doesn’t strike, I leave it; I leave that song aside and work on something else. Because I don’t feel like you can continuously work something if the inspiration isn’t coming.

What was your creative ambition for Arrival? It’s an eclectic album. 

That album was inspired by all the artists that I love. I said, “Why can’t you have Leonard Cohen’s poetry mixed with the rock ‘n’ roll of the Rolling Stones and the soul ambitions of Stevie Wonder?” You can have all of those things because they’re not actually that far apart… I’m also very influenced by Queen. Freddie Mercury’s voice is very inspiring to me. If you collect all of these very different artists, such as Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Queen, Stevie Wonder, and mix them all together, that was my intention for the last album. 

I hear a bit of Prince in the album too. 

Yes, definitely, because Prince already does that. He already [mixes] the soul and the rock—I mean, he plays 13 instruments or whatever—so he really can create the sound he hears in his mind. Which I would love to do in the future and that’s why I’m trying to brush up on my guitar playing, my piano playing, so that maybe five years from now I can create the exact guitar line that I want and the exact keys line that I want to have in there. Right now I have to rely on somebody else’s understanding of what I’m aiming for there. 

Is it a challenge then, as a songwriter, to not always be able to flesh it out as it sounds in your mind? 

It definitely is a challenge. And you have to find people who gel with you, but [are] also at the level that you’re at… The band that I work with in New York, though, is really incredible. If I say anything, they always figure out a way to bring it out. The previous album was really the producers and I who really worked together to create all those sounds, but [on] the next album I would like to flesh it out a lot with my band so we can work through different options. The last album was a learning experience because I was very new and I would try to put my foot down about certain things, but I gave a lot of deference to the producers. On the next album I’m going to have a lot more say. 

For more information on Nadia Kazmi, including future live dates and their locations, please the artist's official website as well as her Facebook fan page.   

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Interview: Murray Lerner, Isle of Wight Film Director, Talks Leonard Cohen

Released this week on DVD, Leonard Cohen: Live At The Isle of Wight 1970 chronicles the singer/songwriter’s landmark set at the five-day music festival in England. Directed by Academy Award winning filmmaker Murray Lerner—whose credits include Message To Love: The Isle of Wight Festival 1970, The Other Side of The Mirror: Bob Dylan At Newport and Amazing Journey: The Story of The Who—the documentary renders Cohen as the infamous event’s saving grace.

Despite an unprecedented audience of 600,000 and a roster of high-profile acts from The Who and Joni Mitchell to Sly & The Family Stone and Jimi Hendrix, the massive happening quickly took on an iniquitous subtext. Tension between many in the crowd and the concert organizers (who hadn’t prepared for such staggering attendance) was inevitably directed toward the artists, resulting in a climate of random disruptions and resentment.

It’s within this context that Lerner frames Cohen’s performance, interspersing it with present commentary by other artists, including Joan Baez and Kris Kristofferson, who were also on the bill.

Murray Lerner recently spoke to Donald Gibson about his latest film as well as his thoughts on Dylan and the essential power of music.

There are a lot of sustained close-ups on Cohen’s face, which seem to reflect the way the audience was paying attention to him.

Excellent point. I think he made them feel very intimate with him. And I wanted to show that. He was the only one that I can think of, out of all the performers, who actually expressed sympathy and consensus with the audience’s ideals and feelings. [When] he in a sense said, “We’re a nation, but we’re weak. We need to get stronger,” he was telling the audience that he was on their side ideologically. 

He was empathetic.

Yeah. Therefore, I think that meant a lot. A lot of the performers were upset with the audience—and rightly so because of the conditions… As Joni [Mitchell] was saying, “Please give me some [respect].” In other words, be aware of my feelings. She wasn’t saying, “I’m aware of your feelings.”

She was basically saying, “I need you to quiet down so I can do my thing.”

Right—“I’m an artist and this is my life.” She wasn’t saying, “Well, you’re in a bad position; I understand why you’re doing this.” But [Cohen] was. He wasn’t being clever; I think that’s just what he really felt… He was one with the audience almost instantly… Ordinarily a quiet, acoustic set wasn’t their thing… The thing is, though, he was there for them. [Also], T.S. Eliot said, “[Genuine] poetry can communicate before it is understood.” And as Joan Baez said [in the commentary], she didn’t understand a lot of it, but it worked. That’s true. Because of that, they were really listening.

Also in the commentary, Kris Kristofferson suggests that one of the reasons the crowd didn’t turn on Cohen was because he wasn’t intimidated by them.

Right. He was very prepossessing. He was his own man and he wasn’t really feeling adversarial.

Having filmed Dylan at Newport, particularly in ’65, and then Cohen five years later at the Isle of Wight, how would you contrast their relationship to the audience?

That’s a good question. It was a big contrast. The audience booed in ’65—not the whole audience, [but] in a way, it was the opposite of Cohen. To me, the music was absolutely hypnotic and mesmerizing with Dylan; I loved it. Now, people were thrown by the unexpectedness of it, but if you think about it, the lyrics reflected what the audience felt. He was talking about their feelings, the alienation of young people. It’s a very mysterious thing because I guess they didn’t respond to the lyrics. They responded to…

The volume.

The volume, right, the electric part of it, which I thought was great. I don’t think it’s volume [though] that creates the power of electric music. It induces a kind of hypnosis in the body, gets into the nerves. It’s always fascinated me.

What is it about music in general or music performance specifically that has interested you as a primary subject to document?

I was fascinated with how a performer used the power of music to relate to the audience. I think that’s really my constant theme. But someday I want to make a film about the power of music. It’s an amazing phenomenon… What does it mean to get 100,000 people—or 600,000 people—in concert? They want something that the music gives them but also that the music allows [for] them to be together with other people.

It’s communal.

It’s a communal activity. People evidently need that. Why, we don’t know, but they do.

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Sharon Robinson's Debut Album Leaves Lasting Impression

Having established herself as a versatile songwriter, vocalist, and producer with a roster of artists—most notably Leonard Cohen, with whom she’s collaborated for three decades and is currently on tour—Sharon Robinson could have just as well maintained a successful music career behind the scenes. Thankfully, she had other ideas.

On her debut album, Everybody Knows, Robinson draws on the eclectic dimensions of her craft as well as on the breadth of her talent, summoning fractions of jazz and soul into a sound that is bound by neither. Through seven originals and three cuts previously co-written with Cohen (including the title track), she is at turns transportive and sensuously prescient, her smoky voice recalling shades of Sade while achieving an aura all her own. 

Amid ethereal soundscapes and muted, electronica-based arrangements, Robinson strikes an ambient tone that is well suited to the contemplative themes she explores. From the empathetic resonance of “Party For The Lonely”—its ironic refrain, “I think we should go,” reverberating in rhythm—to the soulful complexions of “Invisible Tattoo” and “The High Road,” she sings with equal conviction and wisdom. On certain songs, as on “Forever In A Kiss” and “Secondhand,” she creates a contrasted dynamic of live and synthesized instruments—like a piano progression set atop a subtle drum loop—further underscoring the album’s sophisticated allure. 

Lest anyone question whether Robinson is capitalizing on Leonard Cohen’s stature and present renaissance of sorts, consider that her musicality and production skills have informed some of his most celebrated works. And in the realm of lyrics—which she delves into quite deeply here—any semblance to Cohen’s pensive expressions isn’t one of imitation, but rather of a mutual ethic for rendering penetrating, visceral insights. 

Even on the songs co-written with Cohen—particularly “Alexandra Leaving,” on which she affects a more intimate vibe than the original—Robinson steers them into her own style, which in turn inspire altogether separate appreciation. 

In fact, inspiring distinctive appreciation is what Sharon Robinson so exceptionally achieves with Everybody Knows, the result of having harnessed her creative energy and sensibilities to yield her own voice.

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London Calling: It's Leonard Cohen

Before Leonard Cohen embarked on his current world tour — which is now winding its way through the United States and Canada — few, if any, could have predicted the septuagenarian would deliver a nearly three-hour, multiple-encore performance for all of his headlining dates. 

That the tour would be so well received proved — if not at first to Cohen, then certainly to his devoted fans — far less surprising.

Recorded on July 17, 2008 at the O2 Arena in the United Kingdom, Live in London (released this week as a 2CD set as well as on DVD) finds Cohen in unassuming command of his audience while paying unselfish deference toward his songs.

In serving the character and enduring distinction of his works — from early ruminations like “Hey, That’s No Way To Say Goodbye” and “Bird On The Wire” to latter-day prophesies like “Democracy” and “The Future” — Cohen enlivens them on the stage, revisiting his acute perceptions of the human psyche and soul.

Considering the dreary complexion that has long beset his canon and reputation, it’s striking (and refreshing) to behold Cohen in such good spirits as he is here, injecting some self-deprecating humor between songs or, better yet, within them. The audience often chokes up in laughter when he sings particular lines, many written decades ago — like “Well my friends are gone and my hair is grey/ I ache in the places where I used to play,” from “Tower of Song” — as if only then had everyone gotten the joke that was originally intended.

All the more remarkable, though, is what hasn’t changed, particularly that the setlists haven’t varied considerably over the extensive arc of this tour; Cohen’s banter between songs hasn’t even deviated all that much either. And yet, for those who’ve taken in a show, even for those who’ve taken in multiple shows — witnessing Leonard Cohen summoning these timeless, treasured songs to fresh life — each concert feels altogether exhilarant and genuine.

For those, including this writer, who have attended a performance during this singular and epic concert tour, Live in London serves as a befitting and thoroughly enjoyable souvenir. For those who haven’t but who appreciate Cohen’s music nonetheless, both the audio and visual presentations make for outstanding live documents.

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An Interview with Sharon Robinson

Eight days from now—on April 1 in Austin, Texas—Leonard Cohen will begin the North American leg of his ongoing world tour, heralding his first run of U.S. dates in over fifteen years. At his side, singing backup as she’s done throughout this itinerary, will be Sharon Robinson.

In fact, she’s been a recurring figure in Cohen’s music for the last three decades, whether serving as a vocalist (on stage and in the studio) or co-writer (as on “Waiting For The Miracle” and “The Letters”). Robinson broadened her creative palette on Cohen’s 2001 album, Ten New Songs, which she produced as well as having co-written, arranged, and sang on each of its tracks.

The sessions for Ten New Songs ultimately served as a template, of sorts, that Robinson later referred to while crafting her debut album, Everybody Knows. “I’ve definitely been very fortunate,” she says, “to be working with Leonard, and to be able to benefit from observing his process and his integrity as a writer.”

On this initial release, Robinson deftly interprets three songs previously co-written with Cohen—“Summertime,” “Alexandra Leaving,” and the title track—having solely composed seven originals that further distinguish her talent.

Before heading back out on the road, Robinson discussed her new album with Donald Gibson, reflecting not only on the music, but also on what insight she gleaned from her mentor as she sought to find a voice to call her own.

Was there a primary impetus—because you’ve had a career for many years—something that inspired you to go out on your own this time?

Making Ten New Songs with Leonard was the main impetus. Because not only did Leonard encourage me to make my own record after we did that one, [but] I kind of had a method established for doing so. At least initially, I embarked on my record in the way that we made Ten New Songs, in terms of the recording and the arrangements.

But also, and probably more importantly, I learned a lot about working with that artist’s voice and being true to a certain voice. Leonard knows himself very well as an artist, as a poet, as a writer; and it’s very informative to watch his process up close like that and to understand how he gets to the stuff that he deems relevant for him as an artist.

Was there tentativeness on your part—as producer, making Ten New Songs—not to infringe on whatever vibe he had going?

Of course, I brought in my aesthetic musically, but as a producer my job was really to facilitate his expression. And I tried to keep my eye on the ball with that all the time… It was not up to me to push any concept of mine on him, but to open things up and offer ideas for him to choose from.

So it wasn’t a Phil Spector rerun.

No! [Laughs]

Leonard is known for spending eons writing his works; for you, is songwriting an effort?

Yes, it often is quite a bit of an effort. You never know, when you write a song, how it’s going to go. Some of them… I’m sure you’ve heard people say, ‘They write themselves.’ Others definitely don’t [Laughs]. And there are songs where, parts of it, you really feel good about and believe in and then other parts you don’t. You may spend years trying to fix a song.

Of the songs that you wrote alone on Everybody Knows, did you know at the start of the endeavor that these songs were meant for you to sing?

Some I wrote years ago when I was writing for other people, but most of them I wrote for myself. It took me a little while to find that voice, to figure out what it [was] that I wanted to say. It was difficult, but extremely worthwhile. I feel good enough to have found an identity for myself as an artist.

There’s an ethereal vibe in the music and your vocals even reflect that on some songs as well with slight echo effects and embellishments. Yet the songs are weighed down by an intimate, almost meditative quality. Was that something you wanted to achieve, that contrasted dynamic?

I was looking for a sound that was mine. And I had to dig deep to find it, but at the same time it felt very natural. It feels like the kind of music that I like, what I want to put out there. The ethereal quality that you talk about, it’s just part of the way I find the emotion.

The ways certain things intertwine—how you’ll have a live piano over electronica flourishes—come off really well.

I’ve never been one to be very genre-specific. And that’s one of the things I like about this record is that it just crosses over genres and it’s being noticed by people from a lot of different genres. That’s always been my approach to music. And my enjoyment of music always crosses genres. That’s part of the character of this record. 

As you co-wrote everything on Ten New Songs, why did you choose “Alexandra Leaving,” in particular, over anything else from that album?

I felt that “Alexandra Leaving” fit well with the other songs and that, melodically, it was something I wanted to do in that I could do something different from what’s on Ten New Songs.

Is there a specific or prevailing way that Leonard has inspired you as a songwriter, in the way you approach the craft?

He’s shown me how to write from the point of view of one’s heart and not from the point of view of trying to get a hit record. When I was a staff songwriter in the past, that was more the point of view. Now, it’s changed. As an artist, I’m always reaching for that same kind of integrity.

I imagine that takes a lot of digging.

Yes. And unless you can get yourself into a certain kind of head space, you can’t even begin to do that kind of digging. It’s so worth it [though], because the deeper you can go, the deeper you go into humanity, the more people you’re reaching. We have so much in common, in terms of being here on this earth.

After this tour with Leonard, are you planning any shows of your own?

I am planning to do some shows when the opportunity presents itself… I’m sure I will be doing that before too long.

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Leonard Cohen Takes Manhattan

Conceit or modesty aside, even the most accomplished and prolific songwriters could seldom attest to having created a genuine masterpiece. Leonard Cohen is of the rare few who can, of course, but last Thursday night at the Beacon Theatre it was abundantly clear that he could lay claim to far more than one.

Taking the stage for his first American concert in fifteen years, Cohen received a reverent welcome by the sold-out audience, its applause overlapping the opening bars of “Dance Me To The End of Love.” Dressed to the nines in a dark suit with bolo tie and fedora, the 74-year-old bard cut a distinguished figure, his sophic disposition tempered by a laconic, often self-mocking sense of humor.

What Cohen imparted most, though, was a selfless commitment to his songs. After a mirthful trip through “The Future”—during which he pirouetted as the ominous “white man dancin’”—and having plead his case on “Ain’t No Cure For Love,” he dropped to his knees at the start of “Bird On The Wire,” turning out a truly stunning rendition that soon saw him singing at full stride. Likewise, he enlivened an avalanche of imagery and delicate melodies on “Chelsea Hotel No. 2” and “Hey, That’s No Way To Say Goodbye,” his rich voice at times recalling the lissome timbre of his younger days.

The esteem to which Cohen paid his compositions extended to his superb nine-piece band. Each time a musician soloed—as when guitarist Javier Mas played a gorgeous, flamenco-styled prelude to “Who By Fire?”—or when a background vocalist assumed a leading role, as did long-time collaborator Sharon Robinson on a soulful version of “Boogie Street,” Cohen stood aside in deference, his hat held to his chest, his face betraying an appreciative smile.

The ultimate pleasure and privilege, however, lay in listening to Cohen. With the conviction of one who’d labored more in composing these works than most others could’ve otherwise endured, he stepped into each song—from the understated grandeur of “The Gypsy’s Wife” and “Famous Blue Raincoat” to the synthesized thrust of “First We Take Manhattan”—and rendered each one with rich perception. He recited “A Thousand Kisses Deep” as written in Book of Longing (as opposed to singing the version from Ten New Songs), drawing out evocative lines and phrases in cadenced tones. And at his most transcendent, Cohen surrendered “Suzanne” and “Hallelujah” to those fortunate enough to have attended—to those who knew they’d witnessed something very special. Now, everybody knows.

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Once Again, Ladies and Gentlemen... Mr. Leonard Cohen

Between 1978 and 2006, Leonard Cohen produced a body of music that rivals among the finest in his entire canon. Also in this era, he saw his popularity grow exponentially as his albums resonated with critics and audiences on a major scale. No longer a fringe artist with a cult following, Cohen evolved into a full-fledged (if not most-unlikely) pop star.

Leonard Cohen Under Review 1978 — 2006 examines this era of the legend’s music, paying particular attention to the context within which it was created and why much of it remains so highly regarded. Like other documentaries in the Under Review series, assorted music journalists (like Robert Christgau and Anthony DeCurtis) as well as other subject-relative specialists (like Cohen’s official biographer, Ira Nadel) lend their perceptions and insights. If any songwriter invites such meticulous assessment, it’s Cohen, but thankfully these commentators don’t succumb to tedious, condescending analysis.

While it highlights each studio album from Recent Songs to Dear Heather, the film uses Death of a Ladies Man, Cohen’s ill-fated 1977 collaboration with Phil Spector, as its thematic spark. Described as nothing short of a “debacle,” the project is evidenced to show that Cohen could only be at his best when he didn’t compromise his creative intent or accommodate anything but his own muse. 

The documentary’s most astute contention, though, is that Cohen’s latter day ascent in popularity could, in part, be attributed to the recognition afforded him by a series of tribute albums featuring more mainstream performers covering his works. In particular, the 1987 Jennifer Warnes LP, Famous Blue Raincoat, as well as the various artist compilations, I’m Your Fan and Tower of Song: The Songs of Leonard Cohen, exposed Cohen’s songwriting prowess to a mass audience. And after appreciating these interpretive versions from an arguably more palatable perspective, much of that mass audience then sought out their source. 

That visibility, so goes the assertion, thus enabled Cohen, upon the 1988 release of I’m Your Man, to reach and ultimately appeal to an unprecedented number of listeners. Unanimously acknowledged in the documentary as a masterpiece, the album catalyzed Cohen’s music career while subsequent efforts—most notably, The Future, with its prophesied, apocalyptic motif—substantiated his newfound distinction. As well, his voice having taken on a deep and sobering tone around this time, Cohen invested gravitas into his songs that rendered him an affecting vocalist in his own right.

A clear and convincing case is made in Leonard Cohen Under Review 1978 — 2006 as to how and why the music Cohen produced in this era so crucially factors into his overall renown. There are, of course, a multitude of reasons why, at age 74, Leonard Cohen still draws sell-out audiences in venues the world over. Nevertheless, this documentary addresses a few of them quite well.

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