Re: CONCERT REPORT: ADOTG, Geelong, Australia, December 7, 2
Posted: Mon Dec 09, 2013 3:37 am
All these photo are posted in chronological order of the first set of the concert.
http://www.leonardcohenforum.com/
Leonard Cohen – His farewell tour of Australia?
Veronica Ridge
On December 9, 2013
Fans of Leonard Cohen may have seen him on his last tour of Australia ever, writes Ted McDonnell.
THERE is little doubt Leonard Cohen and his ensemble are more than a little weary after yet another long year on the road touring the United States; all over Europe, New Zealand and finally Australia. Thousands of kilometres and thousand of songs later since beginning his ‘Old Ideas’ tour in North America earlier this year.
Since making his comeback in 2008, after his life savings where stolen by an employee, Cohen has not stopped touring.
Yet despite the relentless demands of travelling, Cohen, 79, Sharon Robinson, the Webb Sisters, and his brilliant ensemble of musicians, never pause and never let their fans down.
Now in the twilight of his eighth decade on this mortal coil, Cohen’s energy is simply stunning. For more than three hours in provincial Geelong, in Victoria, he kept thousands adoring fans in raptures.
The sad thing is, with just two concerts left of his Australian sojourn, at the Palais in Melbourne on 9th December and Adelaide on 11th December, his time touring Australia may well have just over six hours left. The whisper out of the Cohen camp is that he will concentrate his future tours in parts of the world he has yet to get to like Africa and the many Asian countries he has never toured.
What does this mean for his Australian fans? More overseas travel to see the great man!
To borrow words from Cohen’s Tower of Song…
“Now I bid you farewell, I don’t know when I’ll be back… There moving us tomorrow to that tower down the track… But you’ll be hearing from me baby, long after I’m gone…”
Leonard Cohen - A Day on the Green @ The Hill Winery in Geelong - Saturday 7 December 2013).Photo: Ted McDonnell
I have been saving the reading of these Australian concert reviews because I sensed there would be a time when there is less activity on the forum and I could savor these posts.blonde madonna wrote:I could see how he pays attention to the audience and responds genuinely to them within the confines of this very professional performance;
This time I wanted to stand for the encores that demanded it, and sing along if it was required. They were doing their job and I thought I should do mine. Thankfully, the crowd danced and sang along to ‘So Long Marianne’ and the band looked like they enjoyed it, we may have done an extra chorus. The same to ‘First we take Manhattan’, strongest for ‘then we take Berlin’ for some reason;
I think it was because of the audience participation that I saw Leonard let the band know we were getting extra and he turned to us to say ‘I’ve got a little secret’, Jim didn’t understand my excitement at first at those words, I’d seen the video but now…BM