Downloaded from YTS.MX
Official YIFY movies site: YTS.MX
[CROWD CHEERING, APPLAUDING]
[BAND PLAYING "HALLELUJAH"]
♪ Yeah, I've heard that There was a secret chord ♪
♪ That David played And it pleased the Lord ♪
♪ But you don't really Care for music ♪
♪ Do you? ♪
♪ Well, it goes like this The fourth, the fifth ♪
♪ The minor fall The major lift ♪
♪ The baffled king composing Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
COHEN: The word "Hallelujah," of course, is so rich.
It's so abundant in resonances.
People have been singing that word
for thousands of years,
just to affirm our little journey here.
♪ I did my best ♪
♪ It wasn't much ♪
♪ I couldn't feel So I tried to touch ♪
♪ I've told the truth ♪
♪ I didn't come to fool you... ♪
CLARKSON: I just love the whole song
'cause it seems to me to sum up so much of what Leonard is.
ROBINSON: This relationship with God
that he struggled with so much...
He's taking one part Biblical,
one part the woman he slept with last night.
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
FINLEY: He expresses that being alone with the divine
is what can redeem us.
SLOMAN: He was always a spiritual seeker.
And that gave him a dimension
that most rock stars couldn't even fathom.
♪ Hallelujah ♪
CHOIR: ♪ Hallelu...
♪ ...jah ♪
It's nice of you to greet my records so warmly.
You've been doing this for a long time.
Oh, yeah.
COHEN: They always suggest writers
and I always say, "Get Larry Sloman to do this,
he's the only one who gets it."
[COHEN CHUCKLES]
In some respects, I was Patient Zero
in this virus that became "Hallelujah."
So four years ago,
I'm sitting in your house
and what amazed me was when you showed me your books.
The documentation of these songs
and how these songs go through this amazing process.
Especially with a song like "Hallelujah."
I mean, book after book after book with verses.
COHEN: Well, I always thought that I sweated over this stuff.
But I had no idea what sweating over this stuff meant
until I found myself in a shabby room
at the Royalton Hotel,
trying to finish "Hallelujah"
and not being able to finish it.
And I remember being in my underwear, on the carpet,
banging my head against the floor,
and saying, "I can't do it anymore."
"It's too lonely, it's too hard."
Do you think everybody takes this much care with a pop song?
SLOMAN: You know, you can't begin to understand "Hallelujah"
without investigating the long, winding path
that got Leonard to a place
where he could tackle a song like that.
I-I mean, Leonard didn't really even start writing songs
until he was about 30.
SOLES: This month, a new book was published in Canada,
the titleBeautiful Losers, the author Leonard Cohen.
There are those of the audience who know Leonard Cohen
perhaps primarily as a poet.
His eyes through my eyes Shine brighter than love
O send out the raven Ahead of the dove...
CLARKSON: Leonard, in fact, wishes not to be a poet
but a kind of modern minstrel.
He's become very excited by the music of the mid '60s.
And recently, his joys and sorrows of living
have come forth as simple, beautiful
and sometimes sad songs.
Let's listen to one of them.
[COHEN PLAYING "THE STRANGER SONG" ON GUITAR]
♪ It's true That all the men you knew ♪
♪ Were dealers who said They were through ♪
♪ With stealing every time You gave them shelter... ♪
CLARKSON: That was the very first time he sang on television.
The novel was coming out.
And then they said, "He's going to sing too."
And we said, "Oh, sure. Why not?
And then we'll talk about the novel."
You must admit that, for other people looking at you,
Leonard Cohen, the poet, the novelist,
the scion of a Jewish family from Montreal,
pop singer and writer of pop songs...
All of these things, um,
they may certainly add up to Leonard Cohen,
but they do look rather complex at first.
Well, I think, that, uh, you know, the, um...
The borders have-- Have faded between a lot of endeavors,
like the poet or the singer.
All those kinds of expression,
I think are completely meaningless.
They don't mean anything to me.
It's just a matter of what your hand falls on.
And if you can make what your hand falls on sing,
then you can just do it...
CLARKSON: I didn't know him very well then.
I didn't know whether he would hang in there with it.
After all, I knew, and everybody did know,
that he came from a wealthy family in Montreal,
that he'd grown up in a lot of privilege,
and was he a dilettante?
Was he going to drop this and say,
"Maybe I'll study law"? Or whatever.
♪ And leaning On the window sill ♪
♪ He'll say one day You caused his will to weaken ♪
♪ With your love and warmth And shelter ♪
♪ And then taking From his wallet ♪
♪ An old schedule of trains ♪
♪ He'll say, "I told you when I came I was a stranger" ♪
♪ "I told you when..." ♪
COHEN: I came down to New York
and I visited some agents, and they'd say:
"Turn around, kid, aren't you too old for this game?"
I was 32 at the time.
And I didn't have very much success
in getting the ear of anyone.
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING]
COLLINS: Please welcome with me
a great songwriter, poet, novelist and friend,
Leonard Cohen.
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING]
INTERVIEWER: So, Judy, how did you and Leonard Cohen
wind up on this stage together?
Oh, my...
Well, Leonard came to me in 1966,
and he said, "I can't sing and I can't play the guitar,
and I don't know if this is a song." And then he...
[PLAYING "SUZANNE" ON PIANO]He sang me "Suzanne."
[CHUCKLES SOFTLY]
And I said, after he finished:
"Well, that is a song and I'm recording it tomorrow."
[PLAYING "SUZANNE" ON GUITAR]
COHEN: It's a great thing, because I had played it
for somebody in Montreal, and they said:
"No, there's a lot of songs like that."
♪ Suzanne takes your hand ♪
♪ She leads you to the river ♪
♪ She's wearing Rags and feathers ♪
♪ From Salvation Army counters ♪
♪ And the sun pours down Like honey ♪
♪ On our Lady of the Harbor... ♪
COLLINS: It was on an album of mine calledIn My Life.
And "Suzanne" was the one that kind of drove it over the top.
So I said, "Well, you can't hide in the shadows anymore.
You have to come sing in public."
And I had a date here.
And, uh, it was a big fundraiser for WBAI.
Everybody was here, I think Jimi Hendrix was on the show.
It was a whole bunch of people.
COHEN: Judy kind of talked me into doing this.
She invited me out on stage, and I started singing,
and the guitar was completely out of tune,
and I was scared anyways.
So rather than humiliate myself, I left.
COLLINS: He said, "I just can't do this."
And he walked off the stage.
Terror. Ha-ha.
Sheer terror, and everybody loved it.
I mean, they all love you when you fall apart.
You know, they have-- They get so excited.
[CHUCKLES]
BOTH: ♪ You want to travel blind... ♪
COLLINS: So I came back with him,
and then we finished "Suzanne" together.
♪ For she's touched Your perfect body ♪
♪ With her mind ♪
COHEN: The audience was generous. It was just nerves.
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING]
So that was the first time, and after that, you know,
he became known for his voice and singing his own songs.
HAMMOND: Standby. Take 2.MAN: Okay.
[COHEN PLAYING INTRO ON GUITAR]
HAMMOND: Just a sec.
I think you're starting a little slow, Leonard.
COHEN: Right.HAMMOND: Standby, please.
There was a friend of mine that said,
"John, there's this poet from Canada,
he's a wonderful songwriter, but he doesn't read music,
and he's sort of very strange.
I don't think Columbia would be at all interested in him,
but you might be."
So I listened to this guy and...
Lo and behold, I thought he was enchanting.
John Hammond brought Leonard Cohen to see me and...
I do remember that meeting.
Maybe it's our common Jewish ancestry, but I related to him.
And John said, "Leonard is an original."
HAMMOND: Take four.
DAVIS: That he's a poet and that he will make his own way
in a special way that's unique to him.
HAMMOND: Just a sec. Leonard, excuse me. That's over 20 seconds.
I don't think the introduction should be more...
COHEN: No, I wasn't thinking of it that long.
I just want to get into it before I started singing.
I didn't have it, in terms of an introduction.
HAMMOND: Take five.
He was Leonard Cohen. No one walked in his path.
He didn't walk in anybody else's path.
[♪♪♪]
HAMMOND: Bravo, Leonard. Would you like to listen to it?
COHEN: Yeah.
COHEN: People are always telling me:
"Why don't you do something like you did two records ago?"
I just don't want to repeat myself.
To me, the only really exciting thing
about the work is finding new forms.
So I will keep on trying to find new forms.
[ORIGINAL VERSION OF "HALLELUJAH" PLAYING]
LISSAUER: I met Leonard in Montreal...
in 1972.
I was performing in Montreal at the Hotel Nelson,
and it was like a happening.
Everyone in town was there. The place was exploding.
We were there for a week, and it was sold out.
They were lined up around outside.
And this quiet guy comes over
in a black suit and stands there,
one hand in his pocket.
We started talking, he was very complimentary
about how exciting the music was.
Would I be interested
in talking with him about recording?
I said, "I'm heading back to my place in New York."
"Well, I'll come down."
I was 22?
I was unknown.
But we hit it off.
And he played me some great songs.
And immediately I sensed that these songs were different.
Leonard's songs felt cinematic to me.
♪ I remember you well ♪
♪ In the Chelsea Hotel ♪
♪ You were talking so brave And so sweet ♪
♪ Givin' me head ♪
♪ On an unmade bed ♪
♪ While the limousines ♪
♪ Wait in the street... ♪
LISSAUER: And right away, I said:
"Boy, we could record these and sort of drape them
in a dream, like every one is a vignette of life."
[PLAYING "LOVER, LOVER, LOVER"]
And he sort of liked that idea, so within a couple of months,
we recorded, I guess it was eight or nine songs.
♪ I asked my father ♪
♪ I said "Father, change my name..." ♪
LISSAUER: This wasNew Skin for the Old Ceremony.
It was the first thing that I did with Leonard.
♪ Covered up with fear and filth And cowardice and shame... ♪
COHEN: In terms of the actual musical style of the record,
a great deal of it is due to John Lissauer.
He's a very young man
and certainly the most interesting musical mind
that I've come across in many years.
♪ Lover, lover, lover Lover, lover, lover ♪
♪ Come back to me... ♪
LISSAUER: We finished the record
and put together a band and went on tour.
It was a small band, just the five of us.
And we did a lot of cities.
We did all of Europe.
And then, after we toured for about nine months or so,
Leonard asked me if maybe I'd like to co-write
an album with him.
I said, "How do you want to do it?
You want to sit around together,
or do you want me to take your poetry
and essentially set them to music?"
And he said, "Well, let's do that."
[COHEN'S "CAME SO FAR FOR BEAUTY" PLAYING]
And he said, "I'm gonna be in L.A. for a couple of weeks.
Why don't you come join me?
We'll go to the Chateau Marmont,
get a couple of rooms and write."
♪ I came so far for beauty ♪
♪ I left so much behind... ♪
LISSAUER: So I flew out there, and he had a piano in the room.
We came up with six songs.
It was gonna be an album calledSongs for Rebecca.
It was thrilling.
We had rough vocals on everything
and arrangements on everything.
It was in pretty good shape.
And he said, "All right, I'm going to go to Hydra
for a couple of weeks.
I'm working on a book of poetry, this and that...
I'll call you when I get back, and we'll finish up."
And I didn't hear from him...
for eight years.
[PHONE LINE RINGS, THEN CLICKS]
COHEN: Hello?SLOMAN: Leonard?
COHEN: Yeah. Hi, this is Larry Sloman.
I was a young reporter for Rolling Stone Magazine in '74,
and I got the plum assignment of doing a piece on Leonard.
Leonard? Yeah.
What's your schedule gonna be like?
COHEN: Let's make a definite appointment
for tomorrow morning.
Do you get up early, or do you...?
SLOMAN: No, I usually sleep pretty late.
I'll tell you what, I'll probably stay in Queens today
'cause I have my stereo out at my parents' house.
COHEN: Shall I call you or...?
SLOMAN: I don't have a phone.
COHEN: Tell me what time you get up.
SLOMAN: I usually get up around 11.
So I'll probably get into the city around,
let's say, 1:00 tomorrow.
COHEN: Okay, I'll see you then. Good.
[LINE CLICKS]
SLOMAN: I became almost like an obsessive.
I mean, I literally stalked him for three days.
And after the first night of the first show,
went back to his hotel room,
just kept peppering him with questions for two hours,
and he was so gracious.
He was, I think, 40 at the time.
He said, "Wouldn't it be wonderful
if I could just keep doing this?"
'Cause, you know, we never see
the mature man chronicling his life.
He says, "It'd be great to hear that experience on the stage,
and really, you know, my goal is to become an elder."
[COHEN'S "WHO BY FIRE" PLAYING]
Leonard was thinking about those issues when he was 40
because he was exploring his Jewish roots.
And in Jewish tradition, I think
you could start studying Kabbalah when you're 40.
You have to wait till you're 40 to have that life experience
to be able to understand Kabbalistic thought.
♪ Who by fire ♪
♪ Who by water ♪
♪ Who in the sunshine ♪
♪ Who in the nighttime ♪
♪ Who by high ordeal ♪
♪ Who by common trial... ♪
COHEN: I was so touched as a child
by that kind of charged speech
that I heard in the synagogue,
where everything was important.
The world was created through words,
through speech in our tradition.
♪ Who in these realms Of love... ♪
BACAL: When we were young, Leonard would say very proudly
that his grandfather could take a pin
and put it through the Torah
and know every word it touched on every page.
♪ Who shall I say ♪
♪ Is calling... ♪
Leonard Cohen once told an interviewer
that he was thinking of changing his name.
When you're a famous Jew, you change your name.
So that's the deal is, you don't want to be too Jewish
'cause you'll get in the way of your fame.
INTERVIEWER: Have you ever thought of changing your name?
Yeah, I was gonna change my name to September.
I beg your pardon?
I was gonna change my name to September
when I started writing songs and singing them.
Leonard September?No, September Cohen.
Oh.
[CHUCKLES]
But Cohen is such a standard name.
Yeah, well, September is pretty standard too.
Not for a first name.
No. Well, I thought that, uh...
You know, I always had this feeling
that new things are beginning.
And I thought that I would change my name
and get a tattoo.
September is how you say Elul to a non-Jew...
'cause Elul is the month of Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur.
This is-- This is the deepest time
when God's on the throne and we're down here,
and we come to God with broken hearts
and God's mercies heal us.
So I think he wanted to say...
Leonard Elul.
You know, Leonard, the man who's immersed
in the world of the month of Elul.
♪ Who by brave assent... ♪
COHEN: When I was standing beside my tall uncles in the synagogue,
and the cantor would catalog all the various ways
that we've sinned and died, that moved me very much.
♪ Who by his lady's command ♪
♪ Who by his own hand... ♪
When my father died, after his funeral,
I found myself writing some words to him.
Then I took one of his formal ties
and I slit it open with a razor blade,
and I put this little note, this little poem into the tie,
and I buried it in the garden.
♪ Who by high ordeal... ♪
I think that was the first time
I ever used language in a sacramental way.
♪ Who in your merry, merry Month of May ♪
♪ Who by very slow decay... ♪
Unlocking the mysteries of life was his primary preoccupation.
[CHUCKLES]
So if you had any questions along those lines,
he was-- He was the guy to talk to.
ROBINSON: I had been working in Los Angeles
as a session singer,
and then Leonard invited me to go on the road with them
for the Field Commander Cohen tour.
I was the other singer with Jennifer Warnes.
♪ Like a baby stillborn ♪
♪ Like a beast with his horn ♪
♪ I have torn... ♪
I was, you know, very, very young.
[ROBINSON LAUGHS]
But I came in and felt an immediate warmth from Leonard.
So we spent a lot of time
talking about his overall philosophy of life.
♪ I swear by this song ♪
♪ I swear by all That I have done wrong... ♪
He was very attuned to human suffering around the world,
even though he was relatively comfortable in life.
And he was constantly aware
of everyone in the world who isn't comfortable.
♪ I saw a beggar He was standing there... ♪
COHEN: When you see the world and you see the laws
of brute necessity which govern it,
you realize that the only way
that you can reconcile this veil of suffering,
the only way you can reconcile it to sanity
is to glue your soul to prayer.
♪ A pretty woman leaning In her darkened door... ♪
He was really on a quest to find his path,
his spiritual path, and he tried a million things.
COHEN: Well, I've been studying
with an old Japanese gentleman for many years.
ROBINSON: Roshi had a Zen center over in Europe,
so he came out and he rode with us on the bus.
COHEN: There were a lot of wonderful things
in my own culture, my own training,
but always in the back of my mind
was some kind of resonating presence in my heart.
♪ I have tried... ♪
Some sense that there was something that could be healed.
♪ To be free ♪
[♪♪♪]
I remember once I was musing on purgatory,
and I was fearful of it.
And he said:
"This is purgatory."
And he meant the whole scene,
what we're living.
And at the same time, he would say
what an amazing experiment this is.
We were very young then.
Even then, it was about the brokenness
of the community that we both had come out of.
They had a lot of rules.
You went to school, you got married.
You had children, you lived in a nice house in Westmount.
That was written for us.
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING]
This is a song based on my extremely boring
and pathetic life at Westmount High School in Montreal,
and it's a song that I wrote a couple of years ago
with Phil Spector.
♪ Ooh-wah-ooh ♪
♪ Oh-oh, oh-oh ♪
♪ Ooh-wah-ooh ♪
♪ Oh-oh, oh-oh ♪
♪ Frankie Laine He was singing "Jezebel" ♪
♪ I pinned an iron cross To my lapel... ♪
LISSAUER: I'd been hearing that Leonard
was going to record with Phil Spector.
SLOMAN: Leonard's experience with Phil Spector...
That whole thing, I think, was Marty Machat,
who was Leonard's manager at the time, also managed Phil.
So he put them together.
LISSAUER: I always got the sense that Marty didn't like me,
I was too young, it was something I just sensed.
Maybe Marty didn't like my hair.
And so when Spector came along, he was a legendary producer,
he might have been the most famous producer in the world.
It was record producer as star.
So I said, "Boy, I guess they got the real guy."
"Enough work with this kid,
we're gonna get the real pop ringer."
♪ I know you're hungry ♪
♪ I can hear it in your voice ♪
♪ And there are Many parts of me to touch ♪
♪ You have your choice ♪
CLARKSON: How did you feel about the album?
Oh, the album is a disaster.
The songs are good, but Tina Turner should have sung it.
Or-or Bill Medley.[CHUCKLES]
And working with Phil Spector was a little tricky.
Spector imposed his "Wall of Sound" on Leonard.
♪ But don't go home With your hard-on ♪
♪ It will only Drive you insane... ♪
SLOMAN: It had bombastic orchestration,
and a lot of people thought that the music
was competing with the lyrics.
And, you know, with Leonard, you gotta hear the lyrics.
COHEN: That happened, uh, at a curious time in my life
because I-I was at a very low point.
My family was breaking up,
I was living in Los Angeles, which was a foreign city to me,
and I'd lost control of my work and my life.
SLOMAN: I think the breakup
of his relationship with Suzanne
was a very painful process.
[COHEN'S "GYPSY'S WIFE" PLAYING]
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING]
INTERVIEWER: Leonard, talk a little about "Gypsy's Wife."
COHEN: In a sense, the song was written for my gypsy wife.
♪ And where Where is my gypsy wife? ♪
But, uh, in another way,
it's just a song about, uh,
the way men and women have lost one another.
That, uh, men and women have wandered away from each other
and have become gypsies to each other.
♪ I said where... ♪
INTERVIEWER 1: "Suzanne," I've got to ask you about
because there was a Suzanne in your life,
and she's the mother of two children.
But you wrote a song called "Suzanne,"
and someone told me today that that was not about her.
No, I had written the song
before I met this particular lady.
I guess I summoned her.
So it was another Suzanne?It was another Suzanne, yeah.
♪ She says your body Is the light ♪
♪ Your body... ♪
INTERVIEWER 2: You have a great reputation that goes before you,
and perhaps in your wake as well, for being a ladies' man.
Is it well-earned?
COHEN: You know, I'm the last one to ask.
INTERVIEWER 2: No, you're the only one I can ask.
♪ So where... ♪
COLLINS: I would have jumped off a bridge for Leonard.
I would have done anything because I adored him.
I didn't have a love affair with him.
I mean, he was wonderful.
Handsome...
intelligent, mysterious, dangerous...
[CHUCKLES]
I mean, once you're past 25,
you sort of know.
So I knew that.
I knew dangerous when I saw it.
♪ It's too early For the rainbow ♪
♪ It's too early For the dove... ♪
ROBINSON: Leonard had a way of putting women on a pedestal.
He, I think, saw women as part of the path
to some kind of righteousness or enlightenment.
♪ And there is no man ♪
♪ There is no woman ♪
♪ That you can't touch... ♪
COHEN: We are irresistibly attracted to one another.
We are irresistibly lonely for each other.
And we have to deal with this.
And the other side of that is
the same appetite for significance in the cosmos,
where each of us understands his solitude in the cosmos
and longs for some affirmation by the maker of the cosmos,
by the creator.
♪ Where is my gypsy wife Tonight? ♪
[RATSO] One of the reviews I was reading said that...
Leonard's whole career has been pulled
between holiness and horniness.
So let's talk about women.
What was your first love?
[COHEN] My first love? [RATSO] Childhood sweetheart?
Sixth grade? An older aunt?
[SLOMAN CHUCKLES]
[COHEN] You never change, do you?
I was 50 years old when I'd first fallen in love.
[RATSO] Fifty?
[COHEN] I never knew what it meant before.
[COHEN'S "I'M YOUR MAN" PLAYING]
I'm going to be 70 next year.
INTERVIEWER: No way.Yeah.
It's not funny. Don't laugh.
♪ If you want a lover ♪
♪ I'll do anything You ask me to ♪
♪ And if you want Another kind of love ♪
♪ I'll wear a mask for you ♪
♪ If you want a partner Take my hand ♪
♪ Or if you wanna Strike me down in anger ♪
♪ Here I stand ♪
♪ I'm your man ♪
COHEN: I feel that when there is an emotion
strong enough to gather a song about it,
there's something about that emotion
that is indestructible.
ISSERMANN: When I asked him, he said that he'd been working
two years already on "Hallelujah."
Then he wrote a part in Paris, you know?
When he was staying in Paris.
And a part in my house.
You know, he was often starting with this song.
In the morning, first thing,
coffee, then working on "Hallelujah."
[♪♪♪]
I really love when Leonard's doing a work that is really...
[EXHALES DEEPLY]
...bringing you all sort of emotions
and breaking your heart,
and filling your heart after it's broken.
You know, I don't know, it's just beautiful to...
To be able to hear such poetry
with such beautiful music, you know?
INTERVIEWER: Would he try verses out on you?
Asking me? No, he was never asking,
but he was playing in front of me.
But I was not really like somebody at a concert.
He was working. I was working a lot.
We were both working a lot.
So I'm part of that landscape.
I feel it like that.
You are just a person,
or you could be the dog or the cat at the moment
where there was inspiration.
It's so mysterious.
"Hallelujah" is like a symbolist poem, you know?
It's obscure. It's very obscure.
I always see "Hallelujah"
like a bird that is flying in a room,
and sometimes touching the walls of the culture.
It's like a-- a riddle.
Ratso knows more than me.
Oh, yeah, yeah. Of course.
The last time we talked, we were talking about "Hallelujah."
And this is something...
You've been working on this for as long as I've known you.
COHEN: Yeah, yeah, I've been working on that song.
And I think I-I have notes in my present collection
of-of notebooks.
COHEN: Oh, okay, here, here.
"When David played His fingers bled
He wept for every word he said
You hear him still
You hear him singing to you"
Endless variations.
Even here, it says:
"Baby, I've been here before
I know what rooms like this Are for"
"Baby, I've been here before
I know this room This crooked floor"
And "Baby I've been here before
I know this room I've walked this floor"
I mean...
These are all the "Hallelujah" songs.
INTERVIEWER: Did he ever mention how many verses he might've written?
For some reason, the number 180 comes to mind.
[LAUGHS]
It might've been 150, but it was a lot of verses.
Sometimes I think that I would go along
with the old Beat philosophy:
"First thought, best thought."
But it never worked for me.
There hardly is a first thought. It's all sweat.
No, but, I mean, you are kind of...
transmitting the experience...
or passing it along to another generation.
What is the experience? It's the experience of, uh...
of work...
and of failure.
And, uh...
You just try to lay it out as accurately as you can.
[PLAYING AND HUMMING SOFTLY]
LISSAUER: I hadn't seen him in eight years,
'76 to '84.
And so my Leonard days were done.
Except in 1984, I get a phone call.
[IMITATES COHEN] "Hey, John. How are you?"
He said, "Do you want to make a record?"
SLOMAN: Going back to Lissauer to produceVarious Positions,
that may have been occasioned by
the excesses of working with Phil Spector.
Lissauer, the arrangements
were much more subtle and much more elegant,
and it really, I thought,
brought out the nuances of the lyrics much better.
It was very surprising but oddly...
uh, comforting at the same point.
I must have always known that we weren't done.
[PHONE RINGING]
Hello?
LISSAUER: Now, at this point,
he was in New York on a semi-regular basis,
and he was staying at the Royalton.
So he said, "Come on up to my room.
I'll play you some songs."
So I'm in the Royalton, and he's got his guitar out,
but he also has a little device on his table in front of him.
[CLICKS]
[PERCUSSIVE BEAT PLAYING]
Not quite as many cymbals, but he goes...
I'm saying, "What is this?"
[LISSAUER HUMMING]
So I'm saying, "Jeez.
That's kind of like Kurt Weill meets, um...
You know, it's Berlin in the '30s or something."
And at first I thought that he was sort of putting me on.
I mean, it's a Leonard Cohen album, it's-- It's, uh...
tactile and acoustic and serious and deep and historic.
I said, "This electronic stuff,
that's just like a post-disco thing."
[SINGERS HUMMING "DANCE ME TO THE END OF LOVE"]
ISSERMANN: I remember studio sessions with Leonard...
and John.
I remember their relationship,
they were laughing a lot.
Leonard is very intense
but with no show-off of the intensity, you know?
He's, like, producing this incredible performance
without intending to say, "Oh, look at me.
I'm going to do something great and difficult.
Please, I want concentration."
It's a real creativity.
♪ Dance me Through the curtains ♪
♪ That our kisses Have outworn... ♪
LISSAUER: Columbia had asked that we do a record
that would put Leonard on the American map.
And we had this song, "Hallelujah,"
which was pop song-like, and it reached out more.
It just had...
a more contemporary possibility to it
than a lot of his stuff.
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
I could see how great it was.
And as soon as I sat at the piano and we started to do...
[PLAYING "HALLELUJAH" INTRO, HUMMING]
Again, kind of a gospel 6/8 feel, which eventually is...
And my favorite spot is the big hole in the end
where it goes...
[IMITATES QUICK DRUMMING, THEN HUMMING]
The last time through it, really just,
you think, "Oh, please do something."
[SIGHS]
[COHEN'S "HALLELUJAH" PLAYING]
♪ Now, I've heard there was A secret chord ♪
♪ That David played And it pleased the Lord ♪
♪ But you don't really Care for music ♪
♪ Do you? ♪
LISSAUER: When I first heard it,
it had the verses that are on the record.
And that was it.
And I never, ever asked him about his lyrics.
I didn't ever say, "Explain this to me,"
or, "Does this have two meanings?"
All the things that people wanna know.
"Jeez, what did he...?"
♪ ...composing Hallelujah ♪
I wanted to be the audience.
I wanted to make of the lyrics what they were to the listener.
I didn't want to know too much. And I didn't want to...
I think it's insulting in a way
to ask someone to explain his art.
It has to explain itself.
♪ Hallelujah ♪
We're all thrilled with this record.
And there's so much to it.
There's three unbelievably great songs
on this album, and I said, "We've done it.
This is really good."
[ALL EXCLAIM]
And I think Columbia is gonna like this.
They're gonna be happy.
They had their anthem
and they had a pop tune in "Dance Me."
And it had stuff that could catch on all over the place.
And I said, you know, "This is it."
And, boy, was I wrong.
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING, CHEERING]
Sit down, my friend.
Now, your album is called Various Positions.
I know it's available in England, I found out.
But why can't we get it in America?
Columbia Records didn't want to bring it out.
Why? What happened?
They have a transorbital frontal lobotomy?
[AUDIENCE LAUGHS]
It was time to present the record.
Uh...
And they brought it into the new head of Columbia,
Walter Yetnikoff.
Yetnikoff was not a Leonard guy.
And he pretty much hated it, heh.
I visited the chief executive of Columbia Records.
And?
First of all, he reviewed my suit.
[AUDIENCE LAUGHS]
Then he said:
"Leonard, we know you're great,
but we don't know if you're any good."
[AUDIENCE LAUGHS]
Really?
[♪♪♪]
CLARKSON: That record album never came out in the States, did it?
No, Columbia Records refused to put it out.
Why?He said, "I don't like the mix."
I said, "You mix it, Mr. Yetnikoff.
If that's what's going to stop you putting out the record,
you just mix it and put it out."
To me, that was so disgusting and terrible and heartbreaking.
Yeah. Yeah.
COHEN: TheVarious Positions is the positions of the little will.
We sense that there is a will
that is behind all things.
And we're also aware of our own little will...
to succeed, to dominate,
to influence, to be king.
And from time to time,
things arrange themselves in such a way that
that tiny will is annihilated.
ISSERMANN: I remember that he was crushed after that.
All his work that had been so intense
and doing something so precise and so beautiful,
and then they say, "Oh, no, no. We're not interested in this."
It's horrible. It's horrible.
It was like The Twilight Zone for me.
You do something you're absolutely sure is one thing,
and someone else sees it...
as reversed as possible.
[INDISTINCT CONVERSATION]
I said, "Boy, I must have no sense of the music world...
to be this wrong."
And suddenly, everyone thought it was wrong.
And Marty made me feel that I had somehow
ruined Leonard's record career.
He walked in, thinking it was the greatest thing ever,
and he came out and it was my fault.
My record career with Columbia was pretty much done.
So I basically stopped making records with this album.
At some point, someone said:
"Yeah, you're not working in this town again, kid."
SLOMAN: To me, that was such a Philistine move.
I mean, it-it just symbolized everything that's wrong
with those assholes who run music labels.
I don't think that the rejection of an album
after it's paid for...
happens that often.
That's pretty extreme, yeah.
I have no idea why Walter rejected it.
Obviously, the album included one classic.
COHEN: The work is done.
And it's really good, man.
It is impeccable.
The stuff's down in black and white.
Whether it comes out or whether it's seen.
I'm telling you, this is all for the books.
I feel I have a huge posthumous career ahead of me, you know?
My estate will swell. [SLOMAN & COHEN LAUGH]
My name will flourish... I mean, you know.
Look, "Courage is what others can't see,
what is never affirmed.
It is made of what you have thrown away
and then come back for."
I don't think that Leonard ever believed
that he was not any good.
I don't think he ever believed that.
I don't think, no matter who told him,
what titan of the record industry told him,
or what sales figures they could show him,
he would ever believe that he wasn't any good.
♪ Now I look for her always ♪
♪ I'm lost in this calling ♪
♪ And I'm tied to the roots Of some prayer ♪
CLARKSON: I don't think he would let anybody
destroy him in that way.
I think he always knew that he was very strong.
♪ And the night comes on And it's very calm ♪
♪ I want to cross over I want to go home ♪
♪ But she says, "Go back ♪
♪ Go back to the world" ♪
SLOMAN: The album eventually came out...
on some dipshit label out of New Jersey.
COHEN: It came out in a very tiny company.
We had to scurry around to find somebody
just to print the records.
LISSAUER: SoVarious Positions and "Hallelujah"
had gone completely unheralded and unrecognized.
[SOFT STATIC CRACKLING OVER SPEAKER]
There's a lot of stuff that's really good,
nobody really is turned up to, you know?
Most of the things that you're exposed to
are just the things you hear on the radio.
[GUITAR PLAYING "HALLELUJAH"]
COHEN: Nobody heard of "Hallelujah" at that time.
Except Dylan.
And Dylan was singing the song in some of his concerts,
which was a wonderful affirmation.
DYLAN: ♪ You say there was A secret chord ♪
♪ That David played And it pleased the Lord ♪
♪ But you don't really care For music, do you? ♪
♪ It goes like this The fourth, the fifth ♪
♪ The minor fall And the major lift ♪
SLOMAN: I've had many conversations with Bob about Leonard's work.
So "Hallelujah" is a song right up Bob's alley.
INTERVIEWER: Why?
Because it's, um...
Bob is another spiritual seeker. Bob--
Heh, I mean, you know, Bob is a spiritual chameleon.
DYLAN: ♪ Hallelujah ♪
FEMALE REPORTER: What impact did Bob Dylan have on you personally?
The last time Mr. Dylan and I met was at a café
in the 14th Arrondissement in Paris, France,
a day after Mr. Dylan's triumphant concert there.
It was a pleasant conversation,
a conversation that could be described as "shop talk,"
in which we traded lyrics,
both of us astounded at the other's genius.
[AUDIENCE LAUGHS]
SLOMAN: I've heard a lot of different versions of the Paris café.
One version of it goes that Bob
said how much he liked "Hallelujah."
And Leonard said, "Yeah,
it took me seven years to write that song."
I said it was a couple of years. Actually, it was more than that.
But I was ashamed to tell him
exactly how long it took, and then,
the conversation went on,
and I praised one of the songs he wrote.
It was called "I and I" from an album called Infidels.
I asked him how long he took to write it.
He said, "15 minutes."
Bob was kidding.
He also once said that he wrote the Lenny Bruce song
in the back of a taxicab.
COHEN: There are people that write great songs
in the back of taxicabs, but my songs take a long time
to bring to completion, and I don't know what the process is.
But I know that perseverance is the essential element.
HANSARD: I love that.
I love the fact that he worked hard for those words...
It-it, uh...
It makes us feel better about ourselves.
Dylan was like, "Yeah, I wrote it in the back of the cab."
It's like, yeah, okay, okay, you probably did, but come on.
[CHUCKLING] You know.
Come down to earth, you know.
Come down, stand among us for a moment, you know.
It is a gift.
Of course, you have to keep your tools sharp,
and you have to keep your skill in a condition of operation.
But the real song, where that comes from,
no one knows. That is grace. That is a gift.
And, uh...
That is...
That is not yours.
If I knew where songs came from,
I would go there more often.
♪ If it be your will ♪
♪ That I speak no more... ♪
FINLEY: One time when we really talked about creative process,
Leonard acknowledged there's something called the Bat Kol,
which in the Talmud is the, uh...
The feminine voice of God that extends into people.
The Bat Kol arrives,
and if you're in her service, you write down what she says.
And then she goes away.
So the baffled king is:
"I just wrote the secret chord
and I don't even know how I got it.
But what I think I did is I made myself open to the Bat Kol."
♪ If a voice be true... ♪
Refine yourself enough
that the Bat Kol recognizes that you're open.
She arrives.
♪ I will sing to you... ♪
You speak.
She departs. And you polish it.
♪ All your praises They shall ring ♪
INTERVIEWER: Various Positions is the name of the album.
And at the same time, same year, we haveBook of Mercy.
How didBook of Mercy come about?
COHEN: It's a book of prayer.
♪ If it be your will ♪
♪ If there is a choice ♪
The songs are related, of course.
I think everybody's work is all of one piece.
♪ Let your mercies Spill on all ♪
♪ These burning hearts in hell ♪
♪ If it be your will ♪
♪ To make us well... ♪
INTERVIEWER: At one point, I think you say, perhaps at more than one point,
you say, "Though I don't believe."
COHEN: I say that a couple of times:
"Though I don't believe, I come to you now
and I lift my doubt to your mercy."
♪ In our rags of light... ♪
That kind of conversation with eternity,
oh, it certainly is deep in the Jewish tradition
of questioning God.
And I think it's a legitimate concern.
♪ If it be your will ♪
SLOMAN: I guess it was 1988,
Leonard goes on tour and...
he starts singing "Hallelujah," and all of a sudden...
new lyrics.
INTERVIEWER: Is there any verse
that actually no one has ever heard of
that you could tell us?
There are. I don't know how distinguished they are.
But there are a lot of verses to the song "Hallelujah."
They go like this:
"Baby, I've been here before
I know this room I've walked this floor"
♪ You see I used to live alone ♪
♪ Before I knew you ♪
I said, "Wait a minute.
We're not in the Old Testament anymore."
♪ I've seen your flag On the marble arch ♪
♪ But love... ♪
It's more secular.
It's like a completely different song.
And I'm saying to myself, "What the fuck?"
♪ It's a broken Hallelujah... ♪
SLOMAN: You said some interesting things about
the reason you rewrote some of these songs
because you felt that it was inauthentic
to write religious songs anymore.
COHEN: In and of itself, there's nothing wrong with it.
It's whether you can get behind it.
I had the King David song.
It was easy for me to use that Biblical metaphor
until the time came when I choked on the words
because it simply wasn't direct enough.
♪ There was a time You let me know ♪
♪ What's really Going on below ♪
♪ But now you never Even show it to me, do you? ♪
♪ But I remember When I moved in you ♪
♪ Yes, and the Holy Dove She was moving too ♪
♪ Yes, and every single breath ♪
♪ That we drew was Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
COHEN: I wanted to push the song deep into the secular world,
into the ordinary world.
♪ Hallelujah, Hallelujah ♪
HANSARD: "Hallelujah" was a word that you don't really get to use
without sounding too religious.
Leonard pulled that word out of the sky
and pulled it down to the earth,
and made the word okay again.
And hip again and usable again, you know?
Thank you so much, friends.
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING]
SLOMAN: Fast-forward a couple of years
and I was hanging out at Leonard's office,
and his then-manager
told me that, uh, they were doing a tribute album.
It was going to be a tribute album
to Leonard calledI'm Your Fan.
Could I suggest people to be on it?
And I had worked for years with John Cale,
writing lyrics with John.
And John loves Leonard's work.
So I said, "Yeah, Cale would be perfect."
[THE VELVET UNDERGROUND'S "SUNDAY MORNING" PLAYING]
♪ Sunday morning... ♪
INTERVIEWER: We welcome John Cale to the studio today.
One of the founders of the Velvet Underground,
worked with Nico and Lou Reed,
and pretty much everybody else you'd care to think of
during an extraordinary 50-year career,
at the forefront of innovation in rock and pop music.
John Cale joins us.
One of the things I thought we'd have to discuss
is the role that you played
in reviving Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah."
How did you cotton on to the potential,
the power of Leonard Cohen's song
long before other solo artists recorded it?
CALE: Well, I remember seeing Leonard doing it
at the Beacon in New York.
I hadn't heard it before,
and it just knocked me sideways.
So I thought, I could do this as a solo piano thing.
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING, CHEERING]
This is an experiment.
This song was written by Leonard Cohen.
[PLAYING "HALLELUJAH"][AUDIENCE CHEERS LOUDLY]
♪ I heard there was A secret chord ♪
♪ That David played And it pleased the Lord ♪
♪ But you don't really care For music, do you? ♪
HANSARD: I remember John Cale covering that song.
I remember going, "Wow, what a deep cut.
You've just picked a song of Leonard's that I know,
but not a lot of people know that tune."
SLOMAN: Then I called up John and said:
"John, there's different verses.
There's the song that's on the album,
and then there's the song he's doing live.
See if you can get all the verses."
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
CALE: Well, I got a ton of verses that are really gorgeous.
But some of them I couldn't sing myself.
Some of them were about religion
and reflecting Leonard's background.
So I took the cheeky verses.
♪ There was a time You let me know ♪
♪ What's really Going on below ♪
♪ But now you never show it To me, do you? ♪
♪ I remember When I moved in you ♪
♪ And the Holy Dove Was moving too ♪
♪ And every breath We drew was Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah ♪
The spareness of that version was beautiful to me.
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
John has a real talent
for pulling away all of the unnecessary stuff.
♪ Maybe there's a God above ♪
♪ But all I ever learned From love... ♪
SLOMAN: And it was great that he was combining the spiritual
and the secular versions of that song.
Cale really owned that song.
He really made it personal.
♪ It's not somebody Who's seen the light... ♪
But again, that's because, you know,
Cale's a guy like Leonard who's been through the wars.
So, you know.
♪ Hallelujah ♪
[AUDIENCE CHEERING, APPLAUDING]
CLARKSON: I do not remember the first time I heard "Hallelujah."
But I'm pretty sure
that the first time I heard "Hallelujah,"
Leonard wasn't singing it.
I think I must have heard Jeff Buckley?
The first version of "Hallelujah"
I heard was Jeff Buckley.
Jeff Buckley.
I don't know, the Jeff Buckley seems to be theversion
because I'm even shocked sometimes,
even when you go on the Internet,
and sometimes you see people on television, they say:
"Now I'm going to sing a song by Jeff Buckley."
And it's "Hallelujah."
Hi, I'm Mick Grondahl.And I'm Jeff Buckley.
And you're watching 120 Minuteson MTV.
INTERVIEWER: Jeff Buckley and "Hallelujah"
probably wouldn't have come together
were it not for St. Ann's.
How did that happen?
Oh, heh.
By accident.
You know, "Arts at St. Ann's"
was a music theater series
in this important landmark church.
And we were just starting to do these multi-artist shows
that investigated somebody's body of work.
And Hal Willner and I
were doing this homage to Tim Buckley.
♪ You turn and run away ♪
WILLNER: Janine and I got in touch
with Tim Buckley's manager, Herb Cohen.
He said, "You know he has a son."
Or someone said, "He has a son." I went, "Is he good?"
He went, "He's better than his father."
♪ Let me sing a song ♪
I've always played music,
I just have never pursued the music business.
I never sent a tape to anyone or shopped myself.
And then the beautiful people at St. Ann's,
they asked me to come.
WILLNER: And when he walked into the church that day,
he was obviously the type that you could put
in any situation to do anything.
You could just tell. It's just an instinctual thing,
hearing him sing three notes, watching him play guitar,
talking to him about the different music he liked.
He was a magic man.
♪ Once I was a soldier ♪
♪ And I fought On foreign sands for you... ♪
FELDMAN: And then at the very end,
Jeff's guitar string broke.
So he sang it a cappella.
♪ Do you ever... ♪
And you could see the full range of his voice.
♪ ...remember me ♪
NICHOLS: Something had been unleashed, you know.
So he stuck around.
INTERVIEWER: You can be heard performing live at the Sin-é.
BUCKLEY: Oh, yeah.
DOYLE: He came in looking for a gig.
And things developed very quickly.
I believe it was Hal Willner,
actually, told him to come in.
WILLNER: He started playing once a week.
That was his workshop.
And he would just play whatever songs he was learning.
He wasn't playing any originals.
BUCKLEY: I figured to pick my favorite artists
and artists that move a lot of people, or just move me.
FELDMAN: Jeff would play music for me a lot,
and it was a very natural thing
for me to share "Hallelujah" with him
because we'd been doing projects
at St. Ann's with John Cale.
And I had heard John's version of "Hallelujah,"
which I loved.
CALE: ♪ Hallelujah... ♪
And somewhere in there, I played John's song for him.
♪ Hallelujah ♪
"Hallelujah" is a Leonard Cohen song.
♪ Yeah, but, baby I've been here before... ♪
I do the John Cale version.
♪ And I've walked This floor... ♪
I just learned it one night before a gig at Sin-é.
♪ Before I knew you... ♪
It's a great song.
I wish I wrote it.
DOYLE: I didn't know the song.
I knew it when he sang it.
That was my introduction to it.
It was amazing, and everybody knew it was amazing.
Everybody knew he was amazing.
So he's on his way.
[CHUCKLES]
So I brought the A&R guy,
Steve Berkowitz, down there to see him.
The first time that I heard about Jeff was...
Hal and I are walking across St. Mark's Place.
He said, "Buckley's kid plays in here sometimes."
And he points at this little dusty club called Sin-é.
And, um, we looked in the window and there he was.
After, like, one or two songs, I just grabbed Hal by the arm.
"Am I hearing everything I think I'm hearing?"
And he goes, "Yeah, you are."
[CLAP ECHOES]
[BUCKLEY EXHALES SHARPLY]
[PLAYING INTRO TO "HALLELUJAH"]
BERKOWITZ: "Hallelujah," which is so emotional and spiritual
and so open to feeling and interpretation...
Good choice for Jeff Buckley.
Jeff was an instrument of Leonard's and that song
to turn it into something else.
His guitar playing on that is astounding.
People always talk about his voice, which obviously...
But his guitar playing is, like, crazy good.
FELDMAN: I think, musically, he made it his own.
Leonard wrote a beautiful song,
and then Jeff made it sound like an angel was singing it.
♪ Your faith was strong But you needed proof ♪
♪ You saw her bathing On the roof ♪
♪ Her beauty in the moonlight Overthrew you ♪
♪ She tied you To a kitchen chair ♪
♪ She broke your throne And she cut your hair ♪
♪ And from your lips She drew the Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah, Hallelujah ♪
BERKOWITZ: Jeff didn't make it a better song.
It was already a great song.
You know, Leonard wrote it.
But he did elevate the plateau of visibility for that song
to the rest of the world in a more popular vein
and maybe a less forbidding way than those dark, grumbly voices
of those older guys who had done it,
whether it was Cale or Leonard or Dylan.
BUCKLEY: ♪ Hallelujah ♪
WASSER: I did see him end the show often with that song.
It was so effective.
It's just him.
♪ Hall... ♪
And it's very exposed.
♪ Hall... ♪
And he did make it sort of overtly sexual, um,
which, I think, was really fun for him to do.
♪ --lujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah ♪
[AUDIENCE CHEERING, APPLAUDING]
What was the question?
[REPORTER] It was about Leonard Cohen.
Do you know whether he's heard... ?
I hope he never hears it.
Why?
[SIGHS] 'Cause...
Uh...
I don't know.
To me, it sounds more like a boy singing it.
[BUCKLEY VOCALIZING]
Jeff didn't live to see "Hallelujah"
becoming the song it did.
But after he died, of course,
a lot of people came to his version of that song.
KENNEDY: This song was played by a gentleman that
is probably one of my biggest influences
and a number of other people's as well.
We owe a great debt to Mr. Jeff Buckley.
♪ Hallelujah ♪
[CROWD CHEERING]
♪ Hallelujah ♪
The question is, if he hadn't died,
would that song have taken the place it did?
To Jeff Buckley.
"Hallelujah"?
[CROWD CHEERS]
Is that what you're saying?
All right, what the hell.
CARLILE: For me, Jeff Buckley's "Hallelujah"
is paramount to why I sing and how I sing.
Hearing those lyrics come out of his mouth
was the first time it really got me.
I became immediately obsessed with it.
I would put it on repeat
next to my head when I'd go to sleep.
I had a little boom-box CD player.
And just listen to it all night long.
And it kind of informed a lot of my dreams and visions.
It was what was causing me
to reconcile my faith and my sexuality at the time.
It was what was helping me...
feel a part of that narrative.
♪ Well, darling I've been here before ♪
♪ I've seen this room I've walked these floors ♪
♪ You know I used to live alone Before I knew you... ♪
It evokes some of the most primitive human desires.
And it marries it with a concept
that so many of us struggle with,
which is spirituality.
♪ It's a cold And it's a broken ♪
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
Leonard Cohen somehow understood
that "Hallelujah" wasn't a church song,
but that it was actually a moment of realization that...
life can be desperately hard.
And for me, that was just something I really wanted to say
every day to myself,
as I was going through that phase of coming-of-age
and trying to understand, um...
what it meant to be young, faithful and gay.
♪ Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hey, Hallelujah ♪
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING, CHEERING]
Thank you very much!
[♪♪♪]
COHEN: You're watching an in-concert profile of me.
I don't want to say too much about myself
because most of you don't know who I am,
and those of you who do already know something
about my curious career and my marginal presence
on the edge of the music scene for the past 30 years.
One reason I've hung around so long
is it takes me four or five years to do an album.
♪ Hallelujah ♪
[INAUDIBLE DIALOGUE]
♪ Maybe there's a God above ♪
♪ As for me All I ever learned from love ♪
♪ Is how to shoot at someone ♪
[LAUGHS]
♪ Who outdrew you... ♪
COHEN: I had a great sense of disorder in my life,
of chaos, of depression, of distress.
I had no idea where this came from,
and the prevailing psychoanalytic explanations
didn't seem to address the things I felt.
♪ A broken Hallelujah ♪
ALL: ♪ Hallelujah... ♪
At a certain point, I'd finished the tour,
and I'd been drinking a lot,
which became progressively more distressing.
And I didn't see much more future in show business.
♪ Hallelujah, Hallelujah ♪
♪ I did my best I know it wasn't much ♪
♪ I could not feel that is why I learned to touch ♪
INTERVIEWER: You've been spending a lot of time outside of Los Angeles.
COHEN: That's right. There's a Zen monastery
that I've been living at on Mount Baldy,
about 6500 feet up.
[GONG SOUNDING]
BACAL: I visited him up at Mount Baldy.
It was a primordial rock pile.
[♪♪♪]
It was not a comforting place.
[CHUCKLES]
Well, Zen practice isn't comforting either.
It's, uh... It's not for the meek.
COHEN: It's a rigorous life.
It's designed to overthrow you.
If it isn't a matter of survival,
of life and death, of healing or sickness,
then I don't think anyone in their right mind
would undertake this kind of training.
INTERVIEWER: So it's almost like medicine for you, then?
COHEN: Well, it's a very careful and precise investigation
into the self that was urgent for me.
If you're sitting in a meditation hall
for four or five hours a day,
you kind of get straight with yourself.
So this is not on the level of a religious conversion.
It's closer to science than religion.
INTERVIEWER: Do you find it inspiring as a writer?
COHEN: I think it's like peeling away the layers of the onion,
which is the process I've always used
in writing anyways.
You keep discarding the stuff
that is too easy or too much of a slogan.
Yeah, this kind of practice is valuable,
but there's no guarantee that any kind of training
or environment or situation results in a good song.
BACAL: He told me that when he sat in Zazen,
he was writing songs.
That's not exactly what one would think
you're doing in Zazen.
In Zazen, you would clear your mind.
[COHEN'S "ANTHEM" PLAYING]
♪ The birds They sang ♪
♪ At the break of day ♪
♪ Start again ♪
♪ I heard them say ♪
♪ Don't dwell ♪
♪ On what has passed away ♪
♪ Or what is yet to be ♪
INTERVIEWER: Why did you leave Mount Baldy?
COHEN: I felt I'd been there long enough,
and I found myself saying to Roshi
that I think it's time to go down the hill for a while.
♪ The Holy Dove ♪
♪ She will be caught again ♪
♪ Bought and sold ♪
♪ Then bought again ♪
♪ The Dove is never free... ♪
♪ There is a crack ♪
♪ A crack in everything ♪
♪ That's how the light Gets in ♪
♪ That's how The light gets in ♪
SLOMAN: "Hallelujah," you know, obviously had wings,
but what was the thing that really broke it?
When was the first movie version?
It was just Cale, then Buckley...
And then...
INTERVIEWER: And then Shrek. Shrek.
So Shrekreally broke it.
I have not seen Shrek.
And I actually just need to check, is that a cartoon?
♪ The years start comin' And they don't stop comin' ♪
♪ Fed to the rules And I hit the ground runnin' ♪
♪ Didn't make sense Not to live for fun... ♪
JENSON: This was the first of its kind.
They weren't traditional fairytale characters.
And the music was different.
It just reflected our comedic aesthetics and...
what would keep us,
keep our butts in a seat watching a movie.
["HALLELUJAH" PLAYING]
And I'd been a fan of Leonard Cohen
since the early '90s.
♪ I heard there was A secret chord... ♪
I came across him throughI'm Your Fan,
and John Cale's version of "Hallelujah."
I just played that over and over and over again.
And one of the first jobs I was given,
as a newer director on the movie,
was "figure this moment out."
♪ Baby, I've been here before ♪
♪ I know this room I've walked this floor... ♪
It's just this interesting, complex mix of feelings
that you don't often see in a family movie.
But we all agreed we loved it.
And Aron Warner, our producer, said:
"Okay, that's great. Go figure it out."
So I worked with the lyrics,
trimming down the song to edit out the naughty bits
and get the song down to, you know, a couple of minutes.
INTERVIEWER: What are the naughty bits?
JENSON: Oh, "Tied you to a kitchen chair,"
and all of the very personal lyrics
that had to do with the specific
sexual aspect of the relationship.
And we trimmed down choruses
and then re-storyboarded to that version.
COHEN: John Cale asked me for a bunch of lyrics.
Is his in Shrek or is that Rufus Wainwright's?
INTERVIEWER: That's a good question.
I think it's Rufus's.
[WAINWRIGHT PLAYING "HALLELUJAH" ON PIANO]
WAINWRIGHT: What's interesting about my relationship to "Hallelujah"
is that I didn't know the song at all.
I didn't know Jeff Buckley's version.
I didn't know Leonard Cohen's version.
♪ I heard there was A secret chord... ♪
But what occurred was that I was on DreamWorks Records,
and DreamWorks was also making the movieShrek.
And there was some kind of backroom deal...
[CHUCKLES]
...that was struck between the powers that be
at the animation studio and the record company.
So I recut John Cale's version in the studio,
assuming that it would be in the movie.
But then they came back to us and they said:
"Unfortunately, the filmmakers
have decided to keep John Cale's version in."
'Cause they thought his voice matched Shrek more, heh-heh!
Yes, it was rejected for the movie.
[INTERVIEWER LAUGHS]And that was just me.
[BOTH LAUGH]
Sorry, I'm really sorry.
I love John Cale's version.
John Cale is one of my all-time favorite artists,
but I can see how there's more of a kind of Welsh,
sour quality, which I could see would work better with Shrek
than my gorgeous, you know, 22-year-old tenor.
WAINWRIGHT: ♪ Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
JENSON: Look, I love Rufus Wainwright. He's fantastic.
And it's a beautiful, beautiful version.
But it always felt too young to me.
It felt like someone's first heartbreak.
♪ Baby, I've been here before ♪
♪ I know this room And I've walked this floor ♪
♪ I used to live alone Before I knew you ♪
So I just put my foot down.
But the caveat that was arranged
was that my version would be on the soundtrack.
ANNOUNCER: Shrek. Music from the original motion picture.
Wow!
♪ Hallelujah ♪
JENSON: And as the years went by,
watching any of the talent shows on TV,
somebody would sing it
and somebody would play it with a ukulele.
And it was always the, you know, Shrekversion,
the shortened version that has all the naughty bits taken out.
[LAUGHS]
["AMERICAN IDOL" THEME PLAYING]
So just give us a little background,
why this song for Lee?
I like him as a person.
And I wanted him to do something
which shows that he's got the potential to be a great artist.
That's why I chose this song, I love this song.
Singing live for your votes, here's "Hallelujah."
[AUDIENCE CHEERING]
♪ Baby, I've been here Before... ♪
♪ I've seen this room And I've walked this floor... ♪
♪ I used to live alone Before I knew you... ♪
♪ Now I've heard there was A secret chord that... ♪
[WHISPERS]
♪ And it pleased the Lord... ♪
♪ Maybe there's a God above... ♪
♪ All I've ever learned From love... ♪
♪ Is how to shoot somebody Who outdrew you... ♪
CHOIR: ♪ Hallelujah ♪♪ Hallelujah ♪
CHOIR: ♪ Hallelujah ♪♪ Oh, Hallelujah ♪
CHOIR: ♪ Hallelujah ♪♪ Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah ♪
[AUDIENCE CHEERING, APPLAUDING]
COWELL: That was just...
I mean, seriously, incredible.
Thank you, Simon.COWELL: You've gotta win.
If you want the winner's single to be released by Alexandra,
you have to vote for her.
INTERVIEWER: Leonard Cohen, let me ask you about "Hallelujah."
It took on a whole new energy this past Christmas.
It appeared Number 1 and Number 2
on the UK bestseller charts.
And your version from 1984 was also in the top 40.
What did you make of that?
Well, of course,
there were certain ironic and amusing sidebars,
you know, because the record that it came from
wasn't considered good enough for the American market.
It wasn't put out, so there was a certain sense of
a mild sense of revenge...
that arose in my heart.
INTERVIEWER: What is the magic of "Hallelujah"?
I don't know.
You know, one is always trying to write a good song and...
like everything else,
you put in your best effort, but you can't...
command the consequences, so...
Of course, I was happy that the song was being used,
but I think people ought to stop singing it for a little while.
Leonard was kidding.INTERVIEWER: You think?
Yes, yes. You know...
I mean, I think he was tickled pink
that everybody and their sister were singing this song.
[BRAKES SQUEAL, THEN DOOR WARNING BELL DINGS]
♪ You don't really care For music, do you? ♪
♪ It goes like this The fourth, the fifth ♪
♪ The minor fall... ♪
[PLAYING "HALLELUJAH"]
CARLILE: What a song can do when it gets out into the world,
despite its challenges, is really, really fascinating.
ALL: ♪ Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
"Hallelujah" really beat the odds
in that it's its own thing now.
It's its own person, and it has its own life.
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
People love it for their weddings and their engagements.
♪ Hallelujah ♪
And their dark times.
♪ Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
CHURCH: It always feels like every time you hear the song
that something big has just happened.
You don't just hear the song and pass by the song
and move to the next song.
I love that it doesn't matter if you're agnostic
or Christian or Jewish or whatever...
There's parts of the song that apply to you.
And they're all right,
none of them are wrong.
I'm going to try something here.
This could go bad.
I was at Red Rocks, and earlier in the day,
I was listening to a mix.
And by chance, Jeff Buckley's "Hallelujah" came on my iPod.
I had never played the song, but I had a little slot
that was kind of a question-mark slot on the set list.
I didn't say anything to the band beforehand.
They didn't know I was gonna do it.
♪ I heard there was A secret chord ♪
♪ That David played And it pleased the Lord ♪
♪ But you don't really care For music, do you? ♪
[AUDIENCE WHOOPING]
♪ It goes like this The fourth, the fifth ♪
♪ The minor fall The major lift ♪
♪ The baffled king Composing Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
What I didn't anticipate,
'cause I'm still pretty new to this song,
I didn't anticipate the way the crowd would react.
[AUDIENCE CHEERING]
I mean, there are 10,000 people between two rocks
in-in what looks like a cathedral.
♪ Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
And for me, that was one of those nights that,
when it's all said and done and all over,
I'm not gonna remember a lot of things, probably,
but I'm going to remember singing "Hallelujah,"
night one at Red Rocks, no doubt.
And I'll remember the people, and I'll remember...
the way they responded to the song.
It was...
just like being in church.
[ALL CHEERING]
[COHEN'S "IN MY SECRET LIFE" PLAYING]
♪ In my secret life... ♪
DABROWSKI: So where are you now?
COHEN: You know, nothing's over till it's over,
but I find myself in a graceful moment.
So the depressions that you suffered from very much
in your earlier days?
They've lifted.
They've lifted completely.
♪ I saw you this morning ♪
It's not so much that I...
♪ You were moving so fast... ♪
I got what I was looking for, but the, um...
the search itself dissolved.
SLOMAN [CHUCKLES]: It sounds like you had an amazing moment of clarity
or revelation or whatever.
COHEN: It wasn't as dramatic as that, there were no bright lights
but something did happen,
and God knows I want to celebrate it.
But I certainly know
that any analysis of it would be futile.
SLOMAN: Right.
♪ And we're still making love ♪
♪ Oh-oh-oh-oh ♪ ♪ In my secret life ♪
♪ In my secret life ♪
♪ I smile when I'm angry... ♪
ROBINSON: We were working on new material.
So he was coming over to my studio and...
One day he came over and he said:
"You know, I went to the ATM and there's no money.
I've been ripped off."
INTERVIEWER: I want to make sure I've said this clearly,
you found out that your business manager
had basically stolen all your money,
the money that had been made
from selling your song publishing,
and your retirement funds.
COHEN: That's true. Yes, that's the way it was.
COLLINS: He really turned everything over to his assistant.
He signed everything off to her.
She could do anything she wanted with everything that he had.
Something that...
[SIGHS] ...apparently is very dangerous.
[♪♪♪]
COHEN: It was enough to put a dent in your mood,
you know what I mean?
[CHUCKLES]
INTERVIEWER: Is there a feeling that,
"Now I better get back to work?"
COHEN: Sure.
But I joke about the economic pressures.
I really did have to get back to work for that reason,
but there's also another kind of pressure.
You know, 70 is indisputably not youth.
I don't say it's extreme old age,
but it is the foothills of old age,
and that urgent invitation to complete one's work
is very much in my life.
And it's more urgent than the economic necessity.
That the two coincide is just a coincidence.
[LINE RINGS, THEN CLICKS]
COHEN: Great talking to you.SLOMAN: Yeah!
COHEN: I haven't spoken to you for a long time.
SLOMAN: I remember last time we talked, you were worrying about
what was a dignified position for an old guy like you,
going from coffee shop to coffee shop with your guitar?
COHEN: Right.
[♪♪♪]
SLOMAN: So are you gonna, uh, tour?
COHEN: I may because it's a good solution to old age and death.
Just play till you drop.SLOMAN: Right.
COHEN: And you keep your work alive,
and your chops get better and better.
[SLOMAN CHUCKLES]
It's a matter of establishing priorities.
SLOMAN: So Leonard came out again.
But I think he was...
kind of apprehensive
in how, you know, he'd be received
'cause it'd been so long.
He wasn't at all confident that it was going to work.
And that's why we started the tour in a very small venue.
[BAND TUNING INSTRUMENTS]
COHEN: You know, even when I was in the monastery at Mount Baldy,
there were times when I would ask myself:
"Are you really never going to get up on a stage again?"
The idea of performing was always unresolved.
I don't mean to suggest I'm not at all anxious.
[SINGING INDISTINCTLY]
But fortunately, this band is so good.
We jelled in the rehearsal hall.
ROBINSON: We rehearsed for a long time.
An unusually long time.
Three months, I think.
Leonard really honored his audiences.
He said every night before the show:
"We're gonna give you everything we've got."
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING, CHEERING]
[BAND PLAYING "TOWER OF SONG"]
♪ Now my friends are gone And my hair is gray ♪
♪ I ache in the places Where I used to play ♪
♪ And I'm crazy for love ♪
♪ But I'm not comin' on ♪
♪ I'm just paying my rent Every day ♪
♪ In the Tower of Song ♪
[ALL VOCALIZING]
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING]
[AUDIENCE CHEERING, APPLAUDING]
[AUDIENCE LAUGHS]
♪ I was born like this ♪
♪ I had no choice ♪
♪ I was born with the gift Of a golden voice ♪
♪ And 27 angels From the Great Beyond ♪
[BACKUP SINGERS VOCALIZING]
♪ Yeah, they tied me To this table right here ♪
♪ In the Tower of Song ♪
It's been a long time since I stood out here.
It was about, uh, 14 years ago.
I was 60 years old, just a kid with a crazy dream.
[AUDIENCE LAUGHS]
♪ Now you can say That I've grown bitter ♪
♪ But of this You may be sure ♪
♪ The rich have got Their channels ♪
♪ In the bedrooms Of the poor ♪
♪ And there's a mighty judgment Coming ♪
♪ But I may be wrong ♪
[BACKUP SINGERS VOCALIZING]
♪ You see, I hear These funny voices ♪
♪ In the Tower of Song ♪
Don't stop.
Sublime.
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING, CHEERING]
Thanks so much, friends.
It's been a real privilege
and honor to play for you tonight.
ROBINSON: And then, of course, it just grew from there.
They kept booking concerts and they kept being sold out.
It was like, "Oh, okay," and we just kept going.
[AUDIENCE CHEERING]
This isFresh Air, I'm Terry Gross,
back with Leonard Cohen.
The great songwriter and singer is back on the road,
doing his first tour in 15 years.
♪ When they said ♪♪ They said ♪
♪ Repent ♪♪ Repent ♪
♪ I wonder what they meant ♪
♪ When they said ♪ ♪ They said ♪
♪ Repent ♪♪ Repent ♪
SLOMAN: One of the remarkable things about Leonard
is how much he throws himself into whatever he does.
♪ Of the ancient Western... ♪
Look at him, close to 80.
People his age are more worried
about getting to the early-bird dinner special.
♪ And a white man dancing... ♪
SLOMAN: I mean, Leonard is on-stage
for three hours jumping up and down,
and skipping off at the end of a three-hour set.
Here we go.
[AUDIENCE WHISTLING, CHEERING]
GROSS: What have you learned being back on-stage
for the first time in 15 years?
Learned? I-- I don't know,
it's hard to teach an old dog new tricks, as you know.
I don't know if I've learned anything, but I've been, um...
I've been grateful that it's going well.
Because...
you never know what's gonna happen
when you step on the stage.
♪ Now I've heard There was a secret chord ♪
♪ That David played And it pleased the Lord ♪
♪ But you don't really care For music, do you? ♪
The only way you can sell a concert
is to put yourself at risk.
And if you don't do that, people know,
and they go home with a feeling that they liked the songs,
but, you know, they prefer to listen to them at home.
♪ Hallelujah... ♪
But if you can really stand at the center of your song,
if you can inhabit that space
and really stand
for the complexity of your own emotions,
then everybody feels good.
The musicians feel good and you feel good
and the people who've come feel good.
♪ Well, your faith was strong But you needed proof ♪
♪ You saw her bathing On the roof ♪
♪ Her beauty and the moonlight Overthrew you ♪
♪ She tied you To a kitchen chair ♪
♪ She broke your throne And she cut your hair ♪
♪ And from your lips ♪
♪ She drew the Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah, Hallelujah... ♪
LISSAUER: When people hear "Hallelujah,"
it must be something so universal.
It's really, really powerful.
Now, that's a big deal.
We don't get to be involved in very many things that...
hit people as strongly as that does.
♪ Well, maybe There's a God above ♪
♪ As for me, all I ever learned From love is ♪
♪ How to shoot at someone Who outdrew you ♪
♪ But it's not a cry That you hear tonight ♪
♪ No, it's not some pilgrim ♪
♪ Who claims To have seen the light ♪
♪ It is a cold And a very broken ♪
♪ Hallelujah ♪
PALMER: I was doing my first-ever solo show at Coachella,
and I remember looking at the lineup and going:
"Oh, my God! Leonard Cohen."
Seeing Leonard Cohen felt like a beautiful, holy moment,
to be outside with all of those people watching him.
It was a church moment.
SPEKTOR: You get this feeling of having a modern prayer.
I think that's why people were coming to the shows so much
because they were getting that feeling.
Even how he thanked everybody,
everybody in the crew,
and all the different jobs that people did
to put together the show.
It was like an instruction manual
on how to be in the world.
It's like you can be this good, you really can.
♪ I did my best It wasn't much ♪
♪ I couldn't feel ♪
♪ So I learned to touch ♪
♪ I've told the truth ♪
♪ I did not come here To Coachella to fool you ♪
[AUDIENCE CHEERING]
♪ And even though... ♪
COLLINS: People who respond to him in the way they do,
and they respond to him all over the world, of course,
are responding to something that is different.
You're getting things that are so deep and so resonant
in your own spiritual journey,
that you are benefitting from his.
And that's of course the highest compliment
to a poet or a songwriter.
♪ Hallelujah ♪
[CROWD CHEERING, APPLAUDING]
SLOMAN: Leonard closed his 2009 tour with an emotional concert
on September 24th at the Ramat Gan Stadium near Tel Aviv.
It was three days after his 75th birthday.
Leonard made a plea
for Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation,
then raised his hands
and gave the priestly benediction.
So, dear friends...
[IN HEBREW]
[AUDIENCE CHEERING WILDLY]
[IN ENGLISH] God bless you. Good night, friends.
[COHEN'S "SAMSON IN NEW ORLEANS" PLAYING]
COHEN: I think it was Tennessee Williams said:
"Life is a fairly well-written play
except for the third act."
The beginning of the third act, in my case,
seems to be very, very well-written.
But the end of the third act, of course, when the hero dies,
that, generally speaking, from what one can observe,
can be rather tricky.
[COHEN'S "LEAVING THE TABLE" PLAYING]
Should I read a couple of these?
"Ducking away to write and write feverishly,
if two words a day constitutes a fever."
"Many pressing concerns,
but ignoring most of them in favor of a finished lyric."
"Not interested in anything else,
and this interest fairly fragile also."
"Another beautiful day."
It's the broken Hallelujah.
♪ I don't need a reason ♪
♪ For what I became ♪
♪ I've got these excuses ♪
♪ They're tired and lame ♪
♪ I don't need a pardon No, no, no, no, no ♪
♪ There's no one left To blame ♪
♪ I'm leaving the table ♪
♪ I'm out of the game ♪
[PIANO PLAYING "HALLELUJAH"]
♪ I heard there was A secret chord ♪
♪ David played And it pleased the Lord but ♪
♪ You don't really care For music, do you? ♪
♪ Well, it goes like this The fourth, the fifth ♪
♪ The minor fall The major lift ♪
♪ The baffled king Composing Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah ♪
♪ Hal... ♪
♪ ...lelujah ♪
♪ Hallelujah ♪
[AUDIENCE APPLAUDING, CHEERING]
♪ Hallelu... ♪
♪ ...lujah ♪
[AUDIENCE CHEERING]
You look around and you see a world that is impenetrable,
that, uh, cannot be made sense of.
You either raise your fist,
or you say, "Hallelujah."
I try to do both.
[COHEN'S "YOU GOT ME SINGING" PLAYING]
♪ You got me singing ♪
♪ Even though the news is bad ♪
♪ You got me singing ♪
♪ The only song I ever had ♪
♪ You got me singing ♪
♪ Ever since the river died ♪
♪ You got me thinking ♪
♪ Of the places we could hide ♪
♪ You got me singing ♪
♪ Even though the world Is gone ♪
♪ You got me thinking ♪
♪ That I'd like to carry on ♪
♪ You got me singing ♪
♪ Even though It all looks grim ♪
♪ You got me singing ♪
♪ The Hallelujah hymn ♪
♪ You got me singing ♪
♪ Like a prisoner in a jail ♪
♪ You got me singing ♪
♪ Like my pardon's In the mail ♪
♪ You got me wishing ♪
♪ Our little love would last ♪
♪ You got me thinking ♪
♪ Like those people Of the past ♪
♪ You got me singing ♪
♪ Even though The world is gone ♪
♪ You got me thinking ♪
♪ That I'd like to carry on ♪
♪ You got me singing ♪
♪ Even though It all went wrong ♪
♪ You got me singing ♪
♪ The Hallelujah song ♪
[BACKUP SINGERS VOCALIZING]
♪ Singing the Hallelujah song ♪