I think because my liking of LC goes back to my early youth way I will have to say Songs of Leonard Cohen
Favourite LC Album of all time and why- difficult one I know
Favourite LC Album of all time and why- difficult one I know
What is the most fav album of LC you have?
I think because my liking of LC goes back to my early youth way I will have to say Songs of Leonard Cohen
I think because my liking of LC goes back to my early youth way I will have to say Songs of Leonard Cohen
Life is love so treasure every day.........
-
George.Wright
- Posts: 1874
- Joined: Mon Jul 08, 2002 3:37 pm
- Location: Bangor, N.Ireland
Fav Lennie Albums
Agreed, it was the concept album that laid the foundation for the future(OOPS) works. Without it he would not have launched, I also like the darkness of Songs Of Love and Hate. However i also like a lot of the new works and the change in his voice. Ten new Songs must also stand in it's own right.
Georges
Georges
I am a right bad ass, dankish prince and I love my Violet to bits.
-
George.Wright
- Posts: 1874
- Joined: Mon Jul 08, 2002 3:37 pm
- Location: Bangor, N.Ireland
Re: Favourite LC Album of all time and why- difficult one I know
MASTER SONG:
"I believe that you heard your master sing When I was sick in bed I suppose that he told you everything That I keep locked away in my head Your master took you traveling Well, at least that's what you said And now, do you come back to bring Your prisoner wine and bread? You met him at some temple Where they take your clothes at the door He was just a numberless man in a chair Just come back from the war And you wrap up his tired face in your hair And he hands you the apple core Then he touches your lips, now so suddenly bare Of all the kisses we put on some time before And he gave you a German Shepherd to walk With a collar of leather and nails And he never once made you explain or talk About all of the little details Such as who had a word and who had a rock And who had you through the mails Now your love is a secret all over the block And it never stops, not even when your master fails And he took you up in his aeroplane Which he flew without any hands And you cruised above the ribbons of rain That drove the crowd from the stands Then he killed the lights in a lonely lane And an ape with angel glands Erased the final wisps of pain With the music of rubber bands And now, I hear your master sing You kneel for him to come His body is a golden string That your body is hanging from
His body is a golden string My body has grown numb Oh, now you hear your master sing Your shirt is all undone And will you kneel beside this bed That we polished so long ago Before your master chose instead To make my bed of snow? Your eyes are wild and your knuckles are red And you're speaking far too low No, I can't make out what your master said Before he made you go Then I think you're playing far too rough For a lady who's been to the moon I've lain by this window long enough You get used to an empty room And your love is some dust in an old man's cough
Who is tapping his foot to a tune And your thighs are a ruin, you want too much Let's say you came back some time too soon
I loved your master perfectly I taught him all that he knew He was starving in some deep mystery Like a man who is sure what is true And I sent you to him with my guarantee I could teach him something new And I taught him how you would long for me No matter what he said, no matter what you'd do I believe that you heard your master sing While I was sick in bed I'm sure that he told you everything I must keep locked away in my head Your master took you traveling Well, at least that's what you said And now, do you come back to bring Your prisoner wine and bread?"
This is one of Cohen's most enigmatic early lyrics, and perhaps it does not have any single point of reference. For instance, there seems to be a rather clear Christian typography (the wrapping of someone's tired face in a woman's hair, the Edenic apple core of original sin, a Shepherd with a collar of nails, the word and the rock [In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God; and the disciple Peter, the rock on which the church was to be built], but it is not consistent throughout.
Here is another partial, explanation, which is inspired by the lyric's second verse. "Some temple" is any place where God's work is done, such as the Nazi extermination camps designed to annihilate the Jews, the killers of Christ and polluters of Aryan (Western, though the Nazis had this wrong historically) genes and values. Upon arrival at Auschwitz, the inmates were stripped naked; some were sent immediately to the gas chambers and some were not. They were also tattooed with a number. Here we have a numberless man who had just returned from the war -- someone who had avoided this fate; he's in a chair, rather than engaged in an active pursuit or standing at attention. Perhaps a poet or some other pacifist. He is greeted by a lover, who wraps his tired face (again, inactive) in her hair, and he reminds her that war is the result of the original sin committed by Adam and Eve. But the old passion is gone, her lips no longer wear the kisses of long ago -- perhaps she desired the return of a hero rather than a mere witness or commentator, or perhaps because of her own loss of passion, or her confused perhaps guilt-ridden past. [In a rather incomplete way, this links to the first verse, in which the narrator is given wine or bread instead of bread and water (the typical prisoner's fare) (but note that at the Last Supper, Jesus turns water into wine, and at Mass parishioners eat unleavened bread and drink wine, symbolizing Christ's body and blood). The lover was lured away by the master's song (like the song of the Sirens or of Lorelei) while the narrator was too weak to save her, and the master filled her head with ideas that the narrator indeed had but had kept hidden. The lover perhaps lied when she said the master took her "traveling," not willing to admit that she bought into his Nazi ideology but had only dabbled in it. She is trying to make amends by feeding the narrator.] This concentration camp narrative also links to the 3rd verse, with its imagery of a vicious German dog and the lover's passive acceptance of Der Fuhrer's (the Leader's) every pronouncement without any need to augment them with her own thoughts. The Master (and his Master Race) failed, the Third Reich ended, but everyone knows about the lover's collaboration despite her efforts to conceal it.
The rest of the poem does not fit well with either interpretation, Nazi or Christian, but flying an airplane without any hands is akin to performing some task without any practical skill or knowledge; an ape with angel glands is the bestial/spiritual duality of humans; and a rubber band tightened around an arm could stop the bleeding from a suicidal slashed wrist, or, alternatively, a reference to heroin users applying a rubber band before shooting up, and that they use the drug to ease the pain of living.
"I believe that you heard your master sing When I was sick in bed I suppose that he told you everything That I keep locked away in my head Your master took you traveling Well, at least that's what you said And now, do you come back to bring Your prisoner wine and bread? You met him at some temple Where they take your clothes at the door He was just a numberless man in a chair Just come back from the war And you wrap up his tired face in your hair And he hands you the apple core Then he touches your lips, now so suddenly bare Of all the kisses we put on some time before And he gave you a German Shepherd to walk With a collar of leather and nails And he never once made you explain or talk About all of the little details Such as who had a word and who had a rock And who had you through the mails Now your love is a secret all over the block And it never stops, not even when your master fails And he took you up in his aeroplane Which he flew without any hands And you cruised above the ribbons of rain That drove the crowd from the stands Then he killed the lights in a lonely lane And an ape with angel glands Erased the final wisps of pain With the music of rubber bands And now, I hear your master sing You kneel for him to come His body is a golden string That your body is hanging from
His body is a golden string My body has grown numb Oh, now you hear your master sing Your shirt is all undone And will you kneel beside this bed That we polished so long ago Before your master chose instead To make my bed of snow? Your eyes are wild and your knuckles are red And you're speaking far too low No, I can't make out what your master said Before he made you go Then I think you're playing far too rough For a lady who's been to the moon I've lain by this window long enough You get used to an empty room And your love is some dust in an old man's cough
Who is tapping his foot to a tune And your thighs are a ruin, you want too much Let's say you came back some time too soon
I loved your master perfectly I taught him all that he knew He was starving in some deep mystery Like a man who is sure what is true And I sent you to him with my guarantee I could teach him something new And I taught him how you would long for me No matter what he said, no matter what you'd do I believe that you heard your master sing While I was sick in bed I'm sure that he told you everything I must keep locked away in my head Your master took you traveling Well, at least that's what you said And now, do you come back to bring Your prisoner wine and bread?"
This is one of Cohen's most enigmatic early lyrics, and perhaps it does not have any single point of reference. For instance, there seems to be a rather clear Christian typography (the wrapping of someone's tired face in a woman's hair, the Edenic apple core of original sin, a Shepherd with a collar of nails, the word and the rock [In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God; and the disciple Peter, the rock on which the church was to be built], but it is not consistent throughout.
Here is another partial, explanation, which is inspired by the lyric's second verse. "Some temple" is any place where God's work is done, such as the Nazi extermination camps designed to annihilate the Jews, the killers of Christ and polluters of Aryan (Western, though the Nazis had this wrong historically) genes and values. Upon arrival at Auschwitz, the inmates were stripped naked; some were sent immediately to the gas chambers and some were not. They were also tattooed with a number. Here we have a numberless man who had just returned from the war -- someone who had avoided this fate; he's in a chair, rather than engaged in an active pursuit or standing at attention. Perhaps a poet or some other pacifist. He is greeted by a lover, who wraps his tired face (again, inactive) in her hair, and he reminds her that war is the result of the original sin committed by Adam and Eve. But the old passion is gone, her lips no longer wear the kisses of long ago -- perhaps she desired the return of a hero rather than a mere witness or commentator, or perhaps because of her own loss of passion, or her confused perhaps guilt-ridden past. [In a rather incomplete way, this links to the first verse, in which the narrator is given wine or bread instead of bread and water (the typical prisoner's fare) (but note that at the Last Supper, Jesus turns water into wine, and at Mass parishioners eat unleavened bread and drink wine, symbolizing Christ's body and blood). The lover was lured away by the master's song (like the song of the Sirens or of Lorelei) while the narrator was too weak to save her, and the master filled her head with ideas that the narrator indeed had but had kept hidden. The lover perhaps lied when she said the master took her "traveling," not willing to admit that she bought into his Nazi ideology but had only dabbled in it. She is trying to make amends by feeding the narrator.] This concentration camp narrative also links to the 3rd verse, with its imagery of a vicious German dog and the lover's passive acceptance of Der Fuhrer's (the Leader's) every pronouncement without any need to augment them with her own thoughts. The Master (and his Master Race) failed, the Third Reich ended, but everyone knows about the lover's collaboration despite her efforts to conceal it.
The rest of the poem does not fit well with either interpretation, Nazi or Christian, but flying an airplane without any hands is akin to performing some task without any practical skill or knowledge; an ape with angel glands is the bestial/spiritual duality of humans; and a rubber band tightened around an arm could stop the bleeding from a suicidal slashed wrist, or, alternatively, a reference to heroin users applying a rubber band before shooting up, and that they use the drug to ease the pain of living.