‘Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man’ Is Part Tribute Concert, Part Profile Of The Enigmatic Outsider

My mother has been unwell. At 83 years old, having survived a stroke and buried her husband, she’s allowed to be. In fact, she’s been making preparations for her demise since I was 16. The other day I was helping box up her poetry collection. She said I could keep anything I wanted. There were nice hardcover Milton and Yeats collections and a Dylan Thomas first edition. Then I came across Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Collected Works in paperback. It was from the 1950s. Have you ever tried reading a 70 year old paperback? The pages crumble to the touch. You’re lucky if you make it to the second chapter without the binding unraveling, the book collapsing in your hands ignominiously, like a water balloon punctured by a hat pin. I passed, knowing its ultimate destination would sooner or later be the trash, the recycling bin at best, a sad fate for the life’s work of a man who helped start the English Romantic movement of the 1800s.

I doubt Leonard Cohen, who died in 2016 at the age of 82, lost any sleep over the final resting place of his art; his books of poetry and prose, the recordings of his songs. “I’m not a very nostalgic person,” he tells us at the beginning of Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man, the 2006 tribute concert and documentary, which is currently available for streaming on Amazon Prime. Later, while reading aloud the introduction to a new Chinese translation of his 1966 novel Beautiful Losers, he tells the reader, “This is a difficult book, even in English, if it is taken too seriously. May I suggest you skip over the parts you don’t like.”

I’ve never really taken to Cohen’s recorded works, but his lyrics, his words, they’re really something else. I first became aware of their excellence listening to Lou Reed recite them as he inducted Cohen into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008. As a member of that small minority who have both been listening to rock n’ roll since the age of two and also possess a degree in poetry, I can say with authority that most rock and pop lyricists suck. I mean, you got Chuck Berry, Dylan, Iggy, Phil Lynott, Paul Westerberg, and that’s about it. William Blake they ain’t. Cohen had a leg up on the competition being a writer and poet before starting his music career in 1967 at the age of 33.

Filmed upon the occasion of a 2005 tribute concert at the Sydney Opera House in Australia, Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man jumps between performances by such singers as Nick Cave and Rufus Wainwright, among others, and Cohen himself ruminating on his life and inspirations. As a Jew in predominantly Catholic Montreal, Canada, Cohen was predetermined to life as an outsider, always a good starting point for any writer. Religious imagery has been a recurring motif in his work. While fellow Quebeckers and tribute concert performers Kate & Anna McGarrigle say this religiosity is a byproduct of their native city, filled with church spires and nuns in habits, Cohen credits the synagogue. Comic books were also an influence. You get the sense the how and why was of little importance to Cohen, so long as the results were worth the time. People speak of him working on a single song over the course of a year, while the writer himself says numerous rewrites are not uncommon.

Performances from the concert, which was produced by professional musical tribute organizer Hal Willner, illuminate Cohen’s skills as a songwriter. Anohni’s “If It Be Your Will” and Rufus Wainwright’s “Everybody Knows” are particular standouts. Cohen would have probably been the first to tell you singing wasn’t his strong point. The nasal whine of his early records gradually dropped in pitch to a gravelly burble, and pitch, that isn’t really his thing. In the mouths of real singers, however, his words soar to the majestic heights they so often allude to.

Hilariously, for someone revered as a wordsmith, Cohen’s celebrity admirers are short on any intelligent insights themselves. U2’s The Edge speaks of his “Biblical significance,” I’m sure Bono says something equally dumb though I fast forwarded through it and even the usually well-spoken Cave can only muster up, “He can really write.” In contrast, the segments with Cohen are funny and thoughtful, whether he’s referencing Zen Buddhism and the Bhagavad Gita or talking about his preference for suits and the effects of wine.

Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man will appeal to longtime fans and is also a good introduction to his songwriting genius. Though it contains only snippets of his own recordings, the tribute performances illuminate his greatness. Sometimes it’s the song, not the singer. Not that I think Cohen would have minded. Speaking of his time in a Buddhist monastery, he says, “Who I was began to wither. And the less I was, of who I was, the better I felt.”

Benjamin H. Smith is a New York based writer, producer and musician.Follow him on Twitter:@BHSmithNYC.

Where to stream Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man