I'm sure many of us are Cohen fans. It seems to me that his songs are often better poetry than his poetry. Agree?

Dave I've been a life long Cohen fan. I just wish that I had the ability to think up tunes to go with my poetry sometimes. The Master does it effortlessly.

Try borrowing someone elses.

Leonard Cohen is brilliant in blending poetry and music.
Have you heard of Rod McKuen he is another poet who sings his poetry and has that distinctive smoky voice that you can almost feel..

I've not run across him, Val. Can you recommend a good place to start in his stuff?

Dave you could Google Rod Mckuen and see on Youtube.

Thanks Val. He's good, and I'd like to revisit his stuff. But not as good as the master.

A bit more optimistic of course, but that isn't difficult

Big fan of the estimable, and sadly deceased Mr. T V Z myself. Went to see Steve Earle do his tribute album only the other week.

Good call Chris!

: )

Jx

PS. The Spice Box of Earth was the first book of poems I ever sent someone as a present...more than 30 years ago.

It worked!.

: )

Jx

PPS. Lyle Lovett's 'If I had a Boat' would be on my desert island disks...you're not a Nick Drake fan too are you?

Leonard Cohen is a legend. He's the closest thing to a superhero this planet has come to. I recently got his novel "beautiful losers" from amazon and it's fucking brilliant (only way i can describe it). There's no point in me trying to place a favourite poem because they are all brilliant, the failure of a secular life is definetly one of his best. I think it's hard to compare his poetry to his lyrics as it is a completely different medium.

saw Cohen in Liverpool abt 6 months ago. Stunning poet with musical brilliance. Also co wrote much stuff with his long term partner...who also sang with her at the concert. Bliss!

back to Nick Drake, I love him but for me his voice is so poignantly beautiful I hardly notice the words. I'm v fond of Brdgette St John. She doesn't have the strongest of voices, but for some reason that doesn't matter and only adds to her charm.

coincidence or what? Just last night I was talking at my chap about my poetry being a bit depressing and how I think I should do something cheery once in a while and he asked why it was I wrote dreary stuff, I said it was because I loved Leonard Cohen, all morning I was humming Suzanne to myself and then I find this discussion...doo do doo doo doo doo doo doo (twilight zone)

I just read Book of Longing. It was amazing, I loved it. His music is still growing on me, I am sure one day I will learn to love it as much as his poetry. One of my favourite poems in that book is, I think, called 'The Tradition'.

I started this thread but managed to miss the later posts. PAY ATTENTION BRADLEY! (well it worked at school)

Fantastic that it moved from Leonard Cohen to Nick Drake. YES yes yes!!!

Off to investigate Bridget now - let's see if she's on Spotify

I've got Book of Longing too oddly enough.. Somebody bought it for me over Christmas.. I quite enjoyed it..

My favourite singer (carrying on the Chris Co approach) is a guy called Mark Kozelek who I think is even more unknown than Townes Van Zandt (who I have his first three albums and do like)

A couple of his youtube stuff are:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mzc7GoDS6CY

Third and Seneca

(Lyrics are somewhere along the lines off)

In my room at Third and Seneca
see the pigeons peck on table tops
homeless on the corners they carrel
fairies float out on pugent sound
scenesters in their converse tennis shoes
skinny girls and pudgy ugly dudes
lift their amplifiers from the ditches
some indoor and barroom witches
Seattle Black Alaska Blue
Oregon grey raincloud Vancouver
dead in denver drowsy Idaho
just dreams away from your love San Francisco...

In my room at Laurel and Beverly
your skin blossoms mine is withering
I retire in your aspiring
dreams of chasing I'm only sleeping
Blood orange LA blood red Arizona
lonestar Sante Fe lone palm la paloma
old soul San Antonio dry grass of old paso
Just dreams away your love I know...

From my room at 32nd Street
winter throats it snows down heavenly
empty halls of friends who've come and gone
i'm a walking rush been dragged along
New York, New York New Haven old hoboken
new skylines appear spinning past in fast motion
the worst's been shed tis all winter spoken
All the worlds away...

Others could be:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mzc7GoDS6CY

Bedtime Lullaby (on 'Yo Gabba Gabba')

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRqg-AqSic0

Down Colourful Hill

And I am yet another big fan of Cohen's - just ordered 'Flowers for Hitler' - and am looking forward to that arriving. I love his music, and have always found his voice very - not quite sure what word to use - compelling, intense, sexy ... all that and more.
I still like Bob Dylan too - 'Blood on the Tracks', I think, is one of the best albums ever(is it still legal to call them albums?). Such a lot of Dylan is tied up with my youth, I remember hearing 'With God on our Side', and realising, perhaps for the first time, that music could be used to protest, not just as entertainment.
DG pointed out that Dylan is a bit 'rhyme-y' - I'd not noticed that before, and now I can't stop noticing it! - thanks Dermot!
Phil Ochs is still worth listening to - though Vietnam is over - other wars continue - and sadly - the message is still relevant.
And finally (if there's anybody still reading this!) - for an absolutely sublimely beautiful, pure voice that can send shivers down my spine, up my neck and so on - James Taylor. Listen to 'Something in the way she moves' (not the Beatles song) - and you'll perhaps hear what I mean.
Cx

I've seen James Taylor three times live and I think he's the only 60's/70's singer who can sound better now than when he first started out.
Shower the people does it for me!

Have to agree with you on Mr Taylor; also from that era Carole King's "Tapestry" - one of the finest all-round albums ever produced. ("Too late" was the soundtrack to my first ever bout of distant and totally unrequited longing; it still makes me cry when I hear it.) Also Carly Simon. I guess I've just given myself away as a hopeless romantic. Please don't tell anyone.

Oh! "Too late"! Heaven - if a sort of heart wrenching tearful kind of heaven!

This summer I will see my eighth Cohen gig in Lucca... he's sublime. Seen Dylan *much more erratic performer* 109 times now. Over 35 years. Obsessive or what.

personal opinion:
Dylan is mighty fine
Cohen less so

Steve Earle is the best!

There is a triumvirate or Holy Trinity if you like. Dylan, Cohen and Joni Mitchell. Then there are the Archangels like Morrissey, Nick cave and Kirsty McColl... This is an absolute unchallengeable fact!!!

I challenge your unchallengeable fact - listen to some Steve Earle :-) some great stuff on youtube - particularly 'my old friend the blues' - i agree about Morrissey, Nick Cave and Kirsty McColl - I would add Billy Bragg, Frank Turner and Kate Bush for the Brits

Billy Bragg...hmm...annoying monotone voice and annoying twanging guitaring...hmm... painful, a bit like Feargal Sharkey: couldn't eat a whole one.
PS re BB annoying lyrics delivered in an annoying way.
TC

Tommy
that's your opinion, it doesn't make it right. I prefer Billy Bragg to Leonard Cohen - which is a truth for me - I'm not saying he is better - I'm saying he's better for me. Oh - and I forget to mention another great poet/musician for the Brits - PJ Harvey - again an aquired taste - but she is a real talent and poet. While I'm posting here - another 'great' is Patti Smith - who is a poet first and a great musician second.
You don't have to agree with me Tommy - in the same way that I don't have to deify Cohen (who to some sounds annoyingly monotone, with annoying lyrics delivered in an annoying way - now where have I heard that before.... :-0)

I don't know enough PJ for an opinion. Patti Smith I like, but she varies from sublime to ridiculous. Does anyone know Divine Comedy... Neil Hanlon is fantastic. I've seen Dylan 109 times so that's clearly an illness. I have met Leonard Cohen. He is just the most lovely decent human being! And the thing I like about Dylan and Cohen are principally the voices and the delivery. It's horses for courses ain't it?

I'm reading 'I'm Your Man' by Sylvie Simmons, a recent biography of Cohen. In it he comments on performance and celebrity and their corruptive nature, the damage they do to an artist. He tells an interviewer - "One feels a sense of importance in one's heart that is absolutely fatal to the writing of poetry...You can't feel important and write well."

In the small world of open mics and occasional slams do we find this to be true? Has attaining any kind of prominence (albeit minor in the great scheme) ever interfered with anyone's writing?