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{{creator}}
[[File:Leonard Cohen17b.jpg|thumb|250px|Leonard Cohen in 1988]]
{{quote|''Now I've heard there was a secret chord''
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''The minor fall, the major lift''
''The baffled king composing hallelujah''
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{{quote|"I don't know. It has a good chorus."
|'''Leonard Cohen''', on why
'''Leonard Cohen''' (1934-2016) was a Canadian poet and singer-songwriter. He is known for his wry, melancholic and frequently beautiful lyrics, his ever-present cluster of angelic back-up singers, his fascination with religion and spirituality, and that ''voice'', good
Something of an acquired taste due to his minimalistic approach to music, often dark tone and average-to-middling ability to actually sing in tune, Cohen is nevertheless regarded as one of the finest and most influential songwriters
Cohen was private and something of a hermit (he spent many years living in a Zen commune atop Mount Baldy, where he was known as ''Jikan,'' "The Silent One"). After his manager Kelley Lynch almost completely emptied his pension account and ran away with the money in 2005, Cohen started touring again in 2008 at age 73. He died at the age of 82 on the 10th of November 2016, three weeks after his final album ''You Want It Darker'' was released. (However, he was working on an R&B album when he passed away...)
Also, [[Phil Spector]] once threatened him with a loaded gun. But that's not important. (At least, not to Leonard Cohen.)
{{Discography}}
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{{quote|''Even damnation is poisoned with rainbows.''}}
* [[Card-Carrying Villain]]: the narrator of ''Future''.
* [[Cool Old Guy]]: Among other things, he
* [[Crapsack World]]: "I've seen the future, baby/And it is murder"
* [[Creator Breakdown]]: Cohen
** ''Songs of Love and Hate'' includes the song ''Dress Rehearsal Rag'', which is notable for - despite Cohen frequently being derided for writing "wrist-slitting songs" - being the only song that actually mentions wrist-slitting.
*** Finally, and ironically, despite this being easily his bleakest album, it's the only album cover where he's smiling.
* [[Deadpan Snarker]]: His interviews
{{quote|From an interview with [[Suzanne Vega]]
'''Cohen''': Do you have your band put together yet?
'''Vega''': No.
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'''V''': It's like I always go see you perform, you always have two very beautiful women standing by you.
'''C''': I could be one of the beautiful women standing beside you. }}
** When ''The Future'' (his most successful album in Canada) gained him a [[Juno Award]] for Best Male Vocalist, he mentioned in his acceptance speech that "Only in Canada could somebody with a voice like mine win Vocalist of the Year."
* [["God Is Love" Songs]]: Numerous songs, but the best example is possibly ''Coming Back To You''; it starts "Baby, I'm still hurting, and I can't turn the other cheek; you know that I still love you, it's just that I can't speak" - and it soon becomes clear that the "Baby" in question is, er, God (or possibly Judaism in general).
* [[Gray Rain of Depression]]: ''Last Year's Man''
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''On a chair with a dead magazine''
''In [[Does This Remind You of Anything?|the cave at the tip of the lily]]''
''In [[Nature Adores a Virgin|some hallway where love's never been]]''...
** Not the straightest use of this trope as it's Cohen's translation of a Garcia Lorca poem. A better example may be ''Light as the Breeze'' a lovely little song about the technique one should employ when performing oral sex.
** Another example, but much less subtle than the above: in ''Chelsea Hotel #2'', a lovely song written for [[Janis Joplin]], he so lovingly
{{quote|''I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel
''You were talking so brave and so sweet''
''Giving me head on the unmade bed''
''While the limousine is waiting in the street''
* [[Isn't It Ironic?]]: ''Hallelujah'' is probably the worst offender. It's not supposed to be a happy song!
** Cohen was also reportedly greatly amused by the non-ironic use of ''Democracy'' (a scathing, wry little statement about American society) as a patriotic ballad. I mean, for heaven's sake:
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''But I'm stubborn as those garbage bags that time cannot decay'',
''I'm junk, but I'm still holding up this little wild bouquet.''
''Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.''
* [[Lyrical Dissonance]]: ''Heart With No Companion'' has a bouncy, jaunty melody and introduction. And then the first line...
{{quote|''So I greet you from the other side''
''Of sorrow and despair!'' }}
** ''The Captain'' also has a rather upbeat, bouncy tune and a rather dark subject matter.
* [[Nice Hat]]: He
{{quote|''"It was the hat, after all."''}}
* [[Offing the Offspring]]: ''The Story of Isaac,'' which retells... well, [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|the story of]] [[The Bible|Isaac]].
* [[Old Shame]]:
** His stated opinions of ''Death of a Ladies' Man''
*** His daughter, on the other hand, apparently loves it.
** Another example is the above
* [[Rage Against the Reflection]]: ''Dress Rehearsal Rag''
* [[Sanity Slippage Song]]: ''Dress Rehearsal Rag'' again and ''Diamonds In The Mine''. But several other songs from the album ''Songs Of Love And Hate'' could qualify.
* [[Self-Deprecation]]: Cohen
* [[Soprano and Gravel]]: The majority of his songs are sung with a back-up chorus of female sopranos.
* [[Vocal Evolution]]: He started out as a middling nasally tenor. His earlier records sound positively soprano when compared to his later ones; over forty years, his voice has dropped to a distinctive rumble, and it seems to be getting deeper with every album. ''Dear Heather'' was positively subsonic. He
{{reflist}}
{{Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame inductee}}
[[Category:Musicians]]
▲[[Category:Music]]
[[Category:Canadian Musicians]]
[[Category:Singer-songwriter]]
[[Category:Names to Know in Music]]
[[Category:Authors]]
[[Category:Canada's Walk of Fame inductee]]
[[Category:Pages with working Wikipedia tabs]]
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