Customer Reviews

Death of a Lady's Man

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but until a proper review is posted this will have to do...

Mr Cohen is using an old notebook, reworking compositions, poems, notes etc. and commenting on them to describe (I hope!) the loss of his persona to a relationship and what it has done to him and his art. I have assumed that each piece is related, although I haven't read it all as I got half way through and felt like I was illiterate.

However, it is thought provoking with some excellent rants, raves and disgruntled observations.

As a book to dip into occasionally to jar the mind and start thinking on a new level it is very good One very good poem is scathing about the facile use of histrionics to emphasise what one is saying, because words themselves are constructed to describe the object and meaning. It probably has a deeper meaning which I haven't fathomed but it kept me absorbed for a few days.

Sorry I can't be of more help but from this review you will know whether it's your cup of tea. I can recommend this book if you are not afraid of dying and are looking for something that will test your patience. It is a challenge. You will appreciate the quality of Cohen's art even if you don't understand the cultural references. The effort does pay off.

While Cohen has never been a very abstract poet, Death Of A Lady's Man (a sly re-titling of his album of the previous year) was perhaps his first foray into more unique poetics. The vast majority of the book, indeed, is not poetry at all (really), but a sort of very loose type of prose. Rather than being the straight up poetry that his earlier volumes mostly were, this is a collection of rants and raves, almost all of them followed by a commentary on the poem, or a type of analyzation. Highly sarcastic. Cohen seems to be analyzing the deconstruction of his former persona (the "Lady's Man") through a failed relationship with his "wife." Pretty heavy stuff. It can be difficult to penetrate at times; and, indeed, you will probably be asking yourself at times if there is any meaning to it at all. Overall, I'd have to say it's not Cohen's best book of poetry (try The Energy of Slaves for that), it is an interesting one. If you're not a fan of him already, this book certainly won't convince you. However, a fan will want it.

this is one of the best books ever written. there is no one who is as honest as cohen when it comes to marriage combined hate and love all in one person.

Death Of A Ladies Man is an album of great depth and striking songs although some may sound harsh to sensitive souls attuned to the singer-songwriter style of the 1970s. As for the complaints about Phil Spector's production, the sound is not that far removed from certain tracks on Cohen's 1974 album New Skin for the Old Ceremony, for example Is This What You Wanted? and Lover Lover Lover Come Back To Me that have the same raw vocals & heavy rock instrumentation as opposed to the acoustic simplicity & gentle vocals usually associated with his music.

So there definitely was a precedent for Leonard the Rocker. His own aversion to the album - he completely ignored it in compiling The Essential Leonard Cohen - probably has more to do with unpleasant memories relating to the recording process, which apparently was quite harrowing, than with the actual music. There is simply nothing wrong with the melodies or the lyrics; the arrangements and the vocals are a matter of taste.

On tracks like the plodding drum-dominated Iodine, Memories with its complex arrangement and impressive saxophones & the thunderously pounding Don't Go Home his voice strains a bit against Spector's production (quite appropriately echoing the bitter sentiment of the songs), but the tuneful & twirling True Love Leaves No Traces is gentle and tender (one of his best songs) with stirring female vocals by Renee Blackley who contributes same on Iodine and Memories.

The lyrics are sheer poetry, as in "True loves leaves no traces/If you and I are one/It's lost in our embraces/Like stars against the sun" and in the acerbic Paper-Thin Hotel: "It's written on the walls of this hotel/You go to heaven once you've been to hell/A heavy burden lifted from my soul/I heard that love was out of my control." The harshest element in Iodine is the lyrics, not the drums or the overall sound which is rendered highly atmospheric by the other-worldly backing vocals.

Bob Dylan and Alan Ginsberg are credited with vocals on Don't Go Home ... a truly impressive tour de force with a rolling rhythm and vibrant percussive patterns. It is indeed an out and out rock song with powerful guitars, driving rhythms, lovely piano rolls and apparent anger which really turns out to be humor in the end. With more bombast, Meat Loaf could record a rock-operatic cover and surpass his success with Bat out of Hell.

Besides True Love Leaves No Traces, the other immediately appealing songs are the elegantly arranged I Left A Woman Waiting where Leonard's voice hovers between speaking and singing the sensual lyrics & the tuneful and buoyant Fingerprints. This fiddle feast with its lilting, propulsive beat must be one of the most catchy country songs of all time. The closest Cohen came to country again was the track The Captain on the 1984 album Various Positions.

The weighty title track Death of a Ladies' Man is gravitas at its gravest; the arrangement is majestic with outstanding doom-laden choral vocals that advance and recede, occasionally allowing a single female vocal to briefly frame his voice. And it includes segments where a single instrument or hypnotic instrumental pattern comes to the fore.

With its overall drone-like ambience it is a masterpiece so dark that one may consider it an early exploration - albeit accidental - of the direction the legendary band Swans pursued on their album The Great Annihilator in the 1990s. It would have been perfect for Velvet Underground chanteuse Nico as it calls to mind Das Lied der Deutschen on her 1974 album The End.

The sleeve notes credit "Spector & Cohen" as composers of each and every track with no further information as to lyrics or music. Spector was responsible for all vocal arrangements and for rhythm arrangements on six tracks. The two exceptions are I Left A Woman Waiting & Iodine where Nino Tempo takes the credit. Phil definitely set out to recreate his famous wall of sound with seventeen backing vocalists and an array of instruments that includes guitars, drums, keyboards, synth, bass, percussion, fiddle, sax, flute, trombone, trumpet, organ and vibes.

Proof of the quality of these compositions can be found on the excellent tribute album I'm Your Fan where True Love Leaves No Traces is given a breezy 1970s pop treatment by Dead Famous People & Don't Go Home With Your Hard ... is covered well enough by David McComb & Adam Peters. I loved Death of a Ladies' Man when it was released in 1978 and I appreciate it even more now. Like everybody else, Cohen is allowed to shout sometimes. If he doesn't like the production, nothing stops him from re-recording these great songs.