The living legend that is Leonard Cohen is paying a visit to Los Angeles April 10th at the Nokia theatre. Tickets for the show go on sale Monday, March 9th at 10am, but you can win a pair here on Aquarium Drunkard before that. We have two pairs of tickets for AD readers; to win a pair, leave your name, email address and the first Cohen song or album you remember hearing in the comments below. I’m pretty sure mine was “Everybody Knows” off the soundtrack to the 1990 teenage rebel flick Pump Up The Volume. Winners will be notified via email.
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Kevin Stetz
1 | Kevin Stetz February 24th, 2009 at 7:32 pmlastetzladder@hotmail.com
“Famous Blue Raincoat”
Josh Kanipe
Joshkanipe@gmail.com
Suzzane
2 | Josh Kanipe February 24th, 2009 at 7:34 pmDefinitely ‘Waiting For The Miracle” in Natural Born Killers. So at least that movie was good fro something.
3 | Brian Schaefer February 24th, 2009 at 7:40 pmprobably “everybody knows,” but from the Exotica soundtrack.
4 | noah February 24th, 2009 at 7:43 pmlover lover lover blindslug AT gmail DOT com
5 | baker February 24th, 2009 at 7:47 pmMine was also definitely “Everybody Knows” from Pump Up the Volume. Great soundtrack.
6 | brendoman February 24th, 2009 at 8:01 pmdan
7 | dan February 24th, 2009 at 8:08 pmdan.nieman@gmail.com
halleluah . . . after jeff buckley’s grace came out and learning it wasnt his song.
“The Stranger Song”
Heard it during Robert Altman’s fantastic film McCabe & Mrs. Miller…been in love ever since with Cohen’s sound.
8 | Zach Hart February 24th, 2009 at 8:16 pm‘Waiting For The Miracle” in Natural Born Killers. Most definitely,
9 | Kevin February 24th, 2009 at 8:24 pmThe Future
10 | Billy Karan February 24th, 2009 at 8:27 pmI too was a “Pump Up the Vloume” kid. Though the Concrete Blonde cover at the end of the movie is pretty fucking triumphant, I will always remember the Cohen original, creeping through the opening.
11 | Shivar Decrescendo February 24th, 2009 at 8:41 pmSuzanne
12 | Heather Whitten February 24th, 2009 at 8:53 pmtim
tperry10@mscd.edu
the first song i remember hearing of his was “So Long, Marianne.” That’s my mom’s name and she always loved that song and I would hear it all the time as a little child.
13 | tim perry February 24th, 2009 at 9:21 pmYeah, Everybody Knows and It Be Your Will from Pump Up the Volume. I remembering dubbing the video and watching the movie just to hear the songs Hard Harry played.
14 | Matt D February 24th, 2009 at 9:44 pmI strongly recommened anyone and everyone in the US get along to one of his shows on this tour. I saw him here in Wellington, NZ, in late Jan and it was absolutely mint. Just shy of 3 hours, most of the classics, and Leonard looked and sounded supercool.
hallelujah, from grace then getting the live songs album when i found out he wrote hallelujah
15 | Jeff February 24th, 2009 at 10:35 pm“hey, that’s no way to say goodbye” the night my parents split up, my dad put it on the record player.
16 | chris February 24th, 2009 at 10:42 pmYes! Pump Up the Volume was my first exposure to Leonard Cohen – “If It Be Your Will” also plays during that movie. I remember freezing the videotape so I could figure out who sang the versions in the movie, since they weren’t on the soundtrack. And then I saw Leonard in 1993 at the State Theater in Minneapolis. Bliss.
17 | Chris February 24th, 2009 at 10:46 pm“Everybody Knows” from “Pump Up the Volume.” When I heard it, I didn’t know who Leonard Cohen was, but something about the song stuck with me — just from hearing it playing behind Christian Slater — and, years later, I heard more and read more and realized exactly why the song stuck with me immediately.
18 | jon February 24th, 2009 at 11:04 pmTim Kinsella
tkinsella2@hotmail.com
Famous Blue Raincoat
19 | Tim February 25th, 2009 at 12:17 amFor me it was my dad’s Songs From A Room vinyl – and The Partisan is the track the made me love his poetry, use of melody and the simplicity of his song structure. This show at the Nokia is going to be amazing! Tickets, please?
stephen@blaim.co.uk
20 | Stephen Ewashkiw February 25th, 2009 at 1:17 amstole my mom’s records when I was fourteen and “Suzanne,” among others, got in and never got out.
“and just when you mean to tell her that you have no love to give her, she gets you on her wavelength, and she lets the river answer that you’ve always been her lover”
I still don’t think she’s noticed they’re missing.
21 | Lia Greaser February 25th, 2009 at 1:22 amBryan Albert
22 | Bryan Albert February 25th, 2009 at 2:30 ambryan@bnalbert.com
“The Stranger Song”
Dance Me to the End of Love from Various Positions.
Various Pos, I’m Your Man, and The Future are classics. And oh so relevant even today.
Love his 80’s and 90’s work. Recently picked up a couple newer CDs on a whim, but haven’t had time to listen.
I’m your fan, Leonard!
23 | kvenlander February 25th, 2009 at 2:31 ami remember lying on my back in the living room with my mother’s oversized headphones resting lopsided on my small head, my legs kicked up, placing the weight of my world on the side of the record player as Hallelujah danced rhythms into my soul, offering solace and a world removed from, yet intertwined in my own.
24 | Melissa Gunter February 25th, 2009 at 4:42 amFamous Blue Raincoat and Bird on a Wire – such masterpieces. Cohen’s 1971 Songs of Love and Hate has to be one of the top 100 albums of all time (time for me to revisit it).
25 | Funky Rutabaga February 25th, 2009 at 8:31 am[...] Aquarium Drunkard is giving away two pairs of tickets to the April 10 Leonard Cohen show in Los Angeles. I might’ve mentioned that book blogs give away all sorts of books. I was not kidding. Here are a few of the current offerings on the book blogs I follow. (Most are paranormals, but there’s a scifi title and even some straight up romance.) [...]
26 | Stumbling Over Chaos :: Uncontested February 25th, 2009 at 9:00 amClosing Time…at about 12 or 13 years old, seeing the video on Muchmusic
27 | Mark H February 25th, 2009 at 10:38 am“So Long, Marianne”
28 | Akiva February 25th, 2009 at 11:11 amFamous Blue Rain Coat – My (now) husband introduced me to it and to him.
29 | Kollyn Kanz February 25th, 2009 at 11:30 amSuzanne
30 | Larry Schumer February 25th, 2009 at 12:03 pm“Store Room”
The Dead are at the top of the pyramid, but man Leonard’s up there!! This song still gets me going every time!
31 | Dustin S February 25th, 2009 at 12:23 pm“so long marianne” was playing on a mix my brother had made for a cross country roadtrip that he and i took. i was 17, driving over the sierra nevada on the way to san francisco, and it was just perfect. hooked ever since.
32 | sam o February 25th, 2009 at 1:06 pmFamous Blue Raincoat!!!!!!!! Made me move to NY to hear the music.
33 | Daniel Cody February 25th, 2009 at 1:29 pmman. late to the party on this one.
i believe the first time i heard leonard was ‘waiting for the miracle’ from the nbk soundtrack. and i take exception to the above snide remark- the film is right up there with stone’s best works.
would LOVE to go to this show. haven’t been to nokia yet.
34 | theMike February 25th, 2009 at 1:32 pmi’m your man
35 | james February 25th, 2009 at 1:33 pmjamesrobison81@gmail.com
Jazz Police!
36 | Jessica Sledge February 25th, 2009 at 1:53 pm“Suzanne”, I was in high school and it was one of the first albums I ever purchased. Saw Leonard during the “I’m Your Man” tour at the Wiltern. Amazing.
37 | Lynn Parks February 25th, 2009 at 2:13 pmKyle Evans
38 | Kyle February 25th, 2009 at 2:47 pmkyle.s.evans [[AT]] gmail.com
Suzanne
CHELSEA HOTEL!
My uncle used to pay it all the time when he was lamenting about the guy Ralph that he was in love with in NY, but also he hated. It was a weird time, because I knew he was gay, but also had HIV (still does) so I didn’t get the whole thing of how he could have relations… Either way, he loves NYC and I don’t know if Ralph is still alive.
But that’s kind of what Leonard Cohen means to me – nebulously dark but real with furious emotion desperately intermingling with a rational mind.
39 | J$ (ftw) February 25th, 2009 at 3:10 pmDefinitely ‘Suzanne’.
40 | Cheryl S. February 25th, 2009 at 3:12 pmAvalanche
Nick Cave covers it, and as much as I worship the guy, nobody will ever be quite as eloquently sinister as Leonard Cohen.
41 | Brando February 25th, 2009 at 3:20 pm“It be Your Will,” cuz it makes me want to slit my wrists…but only in the good way, of course.
42 | Sarah February 25th, 2009 at 3:35 pmI’d gotten into his writing before I did his music. I remember this specific scene in “Ladies and Gentlemen, Mr. Leonard Cohen,” written/directed by Donald Brittain in 1965, where Cohen was with a group of hipsters at some cocktail party. He was drunk and/or incredibly high and wailing out this ridiculous song, which he never released. I suppose that would be the song.
toby.carpenter@gmail.com
43 | Toby February 25th, 2009 at 3:38 pm“Closing Time”
I swear it happened just like this: a sigh, a cry, a hungry kiss the Gates of Love they budged an inch I can’t say much has happened since closing time
44 | A.J. February 25th, 2009 at 3:44 pmPump Up The Volume (which, sadly, really doesn’t hold up 15 years later) and EVERYBODY KNOWS…hate to be so derivative.
45 | Ian Moore February 25th, 2009 at 3:52 pmSo Long, Marianne – I was lucky to be the youngest of 6 kids and turned on to music I wouldn’t have heard so young, so the always reminds me of church as a kid. The backup singers in the chorus sounded like the ‘folk band’ they had play at mass. I think I even thought it was a religious song back then with ‘crucifix’ and ‘angels’ and ‘washing eyelids’.
46 | John February 25th, 2009 at 4:09 pm“Suzanne”
47 | S. Minerva February 25th, 2009 at 4:25 pmnot gonna lie, i came late to the game and via a cover, Hallelujah.
48 | rynot February 25th, 2009 at 4:36 pmavalanche, for sure
49 | bryan February 25th, 2009 at 6:34 pm“If it be Your Will” was my first song that I heard, which by the way Antony, from Antony and the Johnsons, really does a fantastic cover. Check out the youtube video titled “Antony singing If It Be Your Will”
50 | Aric Blair February 25th, 2009 at 6:38 pm“Chelsea Hotel No. 2″ – In the early ’90s, when I was in high school, I used to stay up late on Sunday nights listening to legendary NYC DJ Vin Scelsa’s “Idiot’s Delight” program. Every week I’d be exposed to great songwriters old and new, and as a result I developed unquenchable desires to both hear and to write as many songs as possible. Hearing “Chelsea Hotel No. 2″ for the first time was a flashpoint in this. So simple, so personal, just a (very eloquent) dude singing out his memories. Amazing.
51 | Tom February 25th, 2009 at 6:42 pmHa! Mine was ‘Everybody Knows’ from Pump Up the Volume as well
I think I didn’t really sink my teeth into him until his songs were featured so prominantly on Exotica, however…
52 | Michael C. February 25th, 2009 at 7:10 pm“Tonight Will Be Fine”
53 | Melissa February 25th, 2009 at 8:24 pmSOoo Long Marriannnne, It’s Time We Began To Laugh and Cry and Laugh And….
54 | Aaron Embry February 26th, 2009 at 1:48 amThe first song that I fell in love with was “Everybody Knows,” but I will never forget when an old French professor in college told me he knew him as a successful poet and didn’t know that he was a musician. I hadn’t known that he was a writer, but I wasn’t surprised.
55 | Traci February 26th, 2009 at 9:57 am“the partisan” in a cafe in san francisco while on vacation with my family. i was probably twelve or thirteen. i didn’t know it was cohen at the time, but i always remembered the women singing in french at the end.
56 | Ted February 26th, 2009 at 10:25 amHe had me at ‘Joan of Arc’
like scotch for a for a twelve year old
57 | Henry February 26th, 2009 at 10:36 amSuzanne, three versions: Judy Collins. Noel Harrison, Harry Belafonte. Then Choen’s own, later.
Kevin
58 | Kevin February 26th, 2009 at 11:16 amI obviously can’t win, but wanted to share – my first exposure was through an older girl I had a horrendous crush on my senior year of high school. We hung out one night taking turns playing guitar and she served me up a version of “Famous Blue Raincoat.” For years all I could remember was the last line of the song, “Sincerely, L. Cohen.” And it took me almost ten years to find someone who knew the song (why I never bothered to look it up myself, don’t ask) and then it all made sense.
59 | j. neas February 26th, 2009 at 2:58 pmMichael
midlandmigrant@gmail.com
first heard “Lover Lover Lover.” and damn, what a track.
60 | mike February 26th, 2009 at 4:53 pmthe cover of first we take manhatten by rem led me to i’m your fan and that tribute led me to leonards own work
61 | Mark February 26th, 2009 at 8:31 pm“I’m your man” and damned my girlfriends love it!
62 | Tristan Oliver February 26th, 2009 at 9:06 pm“hallelujah” upon hearing jeff buckley’s cover.
63 | rory February 27th, 2009 at 12:00 amSuzanne.
64 | Caroline Rutter February 27th, 2009 at 12:22 pmSuzanne
65 | Grace Chang February 27th, 2009 at 1:15 pm” I am standing on a wishing well that all men call the world” from Stories of the Street.
66 | Jeannine February 28th, 2009 at 12:47 amIn 1980 LC arrived in the nick of time for the drowning 15 year old I once was, I have kept him near and dear ever since. My husband jokes I’ll leave him for Leonard someday, although everybody knows unrequited love is surely the sweetest.
I found a 1960’s LC song book and Bird on the Wire is amazing on accordion.
Thanks LC, for teaching us to live and love lavishly.
my mistake sorry!
67 | Jeannine February 28th, 2009 at 12:52 am“I balance on a wishing well that all men call the world”
Tower Of Song
68 | Nir February 28th, 2009 at 12:51 pmDefinitely “The Stranger Song” from McCabe and Mrs. Miller. I saw it at the Castro Theater in SF around 1990, and the film and the music made long lasting impressions in a grand setting. It was a great introduction to a long love.
69 | Joel Schwartz February 28th, 2009 at 7:21 pmThe First Song I Remember hearing was hallelujah at 18. after that i went out and bought various positions. i love that album
70 | joshua February 28th, 2009 at 7:32 pmAvalance. johngastonii@gmail.com
71 | John Gaston March 1st, 2009 at 3:01 pm“hey, That’s No Way To Say Goodbye” performed by Roberta Flack, off of one of my dad’s favorite records, “First Take,” probably about 1973. Still one of the great moments in my experience of recorded music.
72 | George Jarrett March 1st, 2009 at 3:02 pmMy friend wrote out the words to Take This Longing many years ago, after reading the lyrics I had to hear it. Oof. Been going back to his poetry for some sustenance ever since.
73 | Jason Z March 2nd, 2009 at 1:46 am“Suzanne”
74 | Cristobal March 2nd, 2009 at 12:38 pmI think it was “Dance me to the end of love”… I find myself returning to his music and poetry over and over. This is going to be a great show.
75 | Caroline March 2nd, 2009 at 1:35 pmI’m Your Man. Third on a great mix, made for me by a woman. Yes!
76 | Eve Troeh March 3rd, 2009 at 6:10 pmwaiting for a miracle…from natural born killers.
77 | Seth Dalton March 3rd, 2009 at 8:39 pmthe miracle that is.
78 | Seth Dalton March 3rd, 2009 at 8:42 pmSuzanne (but… I came to it from Nina Simone’s version… I still debate which one I love more… Usually it’s the one that happens to be playing at the time)
I am sooooooo excited for the show! I thought I was going to have to pay $120 and drive all the way to Coachella, so glad to see him in a better environment.
79 | Michael Antonia March 3rd, 2009 at 10:00 pmMy mom used to play Suzanne for me all the time as a little girl =)
Definitely still my favorite Leonard Cohen song. I think I really got back into Cohen when my dad gave me some Buckley albums and I found out that Hallelujah wasn’t originally by him.
80 | Katherine Lee March 4th, 2009 at 12:54 amMine is “Suzanne”
81 | Slava March 4th, 2009 at 4:40 pmDon’t remember the first, but the one that makes me want to dust off the old razor blades…Hey That’s No Way To Say Goodbye
82 | Hannah March 4th, 2009 at 5:54 pmFamous Blue Raincoat
83 | Ana March 5th, 2009 at 1:00 pmSuzanne.
84 | Miles March 6th, 2009 at 6:29 pm“Bird On A Wire”
85 | Kirk Anderson March 6th, 2009 at 11:59 pmBird on a Wire. Moved me instantly. Purchased album the same day.
86 | Craig Brown March 8th, 2009 at 3:24 amSuzanne, Sisters of Mercy, and Hey, That’s No Way to Say Goodbye … all pretty much simultaneously …. but first must have been ‘Suzanne’ and probably first through Judy Collins’ cover, and probably in 1967 … and then the other two songs also first via Judy the next year but all fused in memory with Leonard’s own versions of them. I can recall by late 1968 that the line “your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy golden storm” was already embedded in my early senses of myself as a woman in love. For all the years and all the soul-stirring songs, and how much I loved how his voice had evolved by the time of The Future in 1990 (the one CD of his where I have to say nobody’s cover has ever exceeded his original versions), I have to put “Anthem” – and the cover by Batalla and Christensen in/on “I’m Your Man” DVD/CD in particular – at the top of the list as the most repeatedly emotion-rousing for me of them all, and that’s saying more than a lot (“Everybody Knows,” esp. in Rufus’s voice, and “Hallelujah” in Buckley’s being but a tip of the iceberg of all the richness out there that it is edging out to take first place in my heart.) His poetry, his fiction, his lyrics. He is our man.
87 | Carolyn March 8th, 2009 at 1:40 pmChristina Hunter
88 | CHRISTINA HUNTER March 9th, 2009 at 11:16 amtinahunter@gmail.com
“Bird on a Wire”
Closing time…future CD
89 | Nancy Allen March 10th, 2009 at 2:55 pmI’m Your Man
90 | Doug March 15th, 2009 at 5:25 pmi was in high school, and i found out that the jeff buckley song was a cover. i remember downloading the original hallelujah and thinking…what the fuck? this sucks! ah…youth.
91 | drew March 16th, 2009 at 4:42 amit occurs to me that i heard sisters of mercy and that”s no way to say goodbye …..chelsea hotelnyc…..saw the show at the beacon in nyc…awesome….
92 | ruth miles March 16th, 2009 at 11:37 am[...] Aquarium Drunkard [...]
93 | Win Contests For Leonard Cohen Concert Tickets March 17th, 2009 at 10:22 ami fell in love with leonard at first hearing suzanne when i was in college–thought he was too old for me in 1970 but loved him anyway
94 | suzanne March 24th, 2009 at 6:30 pm