The Essential Leonard Cohen

Listening to the songs on this double album , particularly CD1 with selections from Songs from A Room, Songs of Love and Hate, Songs Of Leonard Cohen, took me back to a point when it seemed that every girl and woman with a tendency to intensity and introspection was endlessly playing the beautiful, sexy, tender half sung/half spoken poetry of Leonard Cohen. Here was a man, not a boy, celebrating and laying out darkness, soul, intensity, seductiveness, intelligence, sensuality, sexuality and lyricism. Cohen seemed to carry a particular sense of history within him, his songs tapping into something incredibly deep about all sorts of human relationships, from the sweet half regretful sensuality of ships that pass in the night sexual encounters (Sisters Of Mercy) to a celebration of political resistance which acknowledges the personal tragedies of heroic action (The Partisan) to the depth of love and hate between friends, lovers and betrayals (Famous Blue Raincoat). Later, the voice darkens and cracks with age and a life well lived, but the man and his music remain a wonderful combination of the deepest celebrations of the life of the body and the life of the soul. Cohen remains both deep in the mire of pain and at times degradation and riding the stars (The Future), gloriously transcendental, all at once. My absolutely favourite track is the intense, restrained, difficult spiritual surrender and challenge offered in If It Be Your Will. This is musically, vocally, lyrically wonderful and potent. Sadly, the CD cover notes don't give the name of the female singer who so 'makes' the piece with her - can't really call them 'backing' - vocals, as they are central to the power of the song. What should also be mentioned is that you can hear every word he sings!! (I'm definitely turning into my mother) Songs are words and music. Often, you can't hear the words, and I'm sure with some singer songwriters that might not matter; they may not be saying much worth hearing. With Cohen, the words matter. The use of increasingly musical texture and beautiful female vocals just adds a counterpoint to Cohen's darkening voice in the excerpts from the later CDs ((Dance Me To The End of Love) Though I have to prefer the earlier songs, not least because of the simplicity and beauty of the younger Cohen's voice, and the simpler arrangements which emphasise those lyrics, its really interesting to chart the progression. Even if I'll play CD 1 probably 6 times to every 1 of CD 2!. Particularly I found a cluster of the tracks from The Future album were ones I could leave, finding the arrangements distracting from the lyrics. I preferred the musical simplicity of the final 3 songs , from the album Ten New Songs, haunting evocations of loves' endings, where again beautiful verbal imagery and a slower delivery display Cohen's still very present troubadour, poetic heritage. Still despite a little cluster of tracks I'll skip over, the depth and number of the treasures absolutely capture 5 stars

I like wordsmiths: Joni Mitchell, Van Morrison, Lennon and McCartney, Bob Dylan. .. so it's strange that it has taken me so long to finally get around to Leonard Cohen. I have been aware of a handful of his most famous songs: Hallelujah, Tower Of Song, First We Take Manhattan, and the sublime You Want It Darker, but his reputation of making "Music to slash your wrists to" had stuck with me. Upon finally succumbing to this Essential collection that's a hugely unfair slur, with many gems revealing themselves gradually. With a track listing chosen by the man himself much of CD1 is simply Leonard accompanied by his own acoustic guitar, with the simple settings belying the complexity of the lyrics whilst making them stand out, such as on Suzanne, Bird On A Wire, Famous Blue Raincoat and Chelsea Hotel #2 - all tracks I'd heard of but never actually heard. What I've found is a master of poetry who clearly spent hours making certain every word counts, every line resonates. Probably his most famous song Hallelujah was whittled down from 80 verses, showing clearly why it's such a highly regarded song with only the very best making the cut. Much concerns relationships in all its forms: love and loss are common themes; but politics and the Holocaust are just as likely to crop up. These are songs crafted with every bit of care and attention that a master painter would afford his canvas, everything is placed with attention to detail, polished and honed for maximum effect. Covering the best from his first 10 albums from 1967's debut "Songs Of Leonard Cohen" to 2001's "Ten New Songs" in a simple chronological progression, Cohen's voice gets deeper around the time of 1988's "I'm Your Man" due to the ravages of whisky and cigarettes, with his speak-singing benefitting from that change and being framed by always carefully selected, delicately phrased instrumentation. Major find of the collection for me is the simply beautiful live version of Dance Me To The End Of Love, but as the songs reveal themselves with growing familiarity there's much here to satisfy. This is undoubtedly a master craftsman at work. Above all these are poems sympathetically set to let those words shine out. A great introduction to a wordsmith extraordinaire.

This is somewhat of a "Greatest hits", and you know what you'll get! For those who like Cohen and do not have a collection of his separate albums, this is a good place to start (and, for some, to stop, perhaps). You'll find all of the most well-know hits here. What you don not get, is some of the interesting, good songs that are included on the separate albums, nor what came in his late life, like "I want it darker". Og course, the "Hallelujah" is here, in the version that became the standard one for cover versions by various other artists.

Loads of great tracks. Really impressed

A nice selection of his early hits.

Great collection from the late man of poetry and song

Amazon tell me I purchased this in december 2013. But I have not written about it until now. So it is my eulogy to this great man. An amazing philosopher, so much to say, has been said about the talent that he shares with us. How to sum it up? I take a phrase from serious cooking programmes where the chefs are asked to de-construct a familiar dish. So this, for me describes what Leonard Cohen does. He de-constructs areas of life. Some of the subjects are huge and profound some are slight, whimsical but significant. He has left us a huge body of work honed to perfection so that I do not mind that he has gone. He has left us a very full life's work which will continue to enrich us - for me probably more than anyone else ever.

Cohen has had a long career spanning form the late 60's to the present day. As a result he has made many tracks that fans would consider `essential', and any effort to compile a best of album is likely to result in some disagreement. However, I feel that Columbia have done a great job on track selection, with selections form right across Cohen's career right up to and including `Ten Songs'. The tracks on offer here show just how consistent Cohen has been over the years. Right from the beautiful `Suzanne' - a great track for any album to open with - through to `Love Itself', this is track after track of seemingly simple, yet also deep and complex music. Great melodies, lyrics to make you think, excellent guitar work and distinctive vocals. You'd have to have a heart of stone not to like this material. This is an excellent collection, and a great way for newcomers to get into Cohen's music. Be warned though - I can almost guarantee that after listening to this you will start to collect all his albums!