Leonard Cohen - "Passing Through (Live)"

About ten years ago now, my brother was the talent wrangler for the short-lived and mostly awful late-night program, the Ralph Benmergui Show. During his time at the show, Dave (my brother) was most excited about wrangling Leonard Cohen. He brought a baseball for Cohen to sign and upon presenting it to him, Dave said, “I guess you don’t sign one of these everyday.” To which Cohen replied, “What do you mean? I sign one after every game.”

This isn’t the best Leonard Cohen song - that would probably be “Suzanne,” a song whose construction is so pure and easy that, according to Dave, it seems as though Cohen always sings it with a smile. There are many others, too. Almost every song on New Skin For the Old Ceremony, one of my favourite albums, is brilliant. But you’ve probably heard most of these songs. Here you get to hear a playful Cohen slowly luring an unexpecting audience (an audience who came to mourn, not to celebrate) into a clap-along; an illustration of an essential element of Cohen's music: that sometimes mourning is a celebration. [Buy]

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Sparrow - "This Is How It's Done"

Sparrow is Jason Zumpano’s latest project and it shares a lot in common with the work of his former bandmate, A.C. Newman. Both artists favour clean guitar and carefully orchestrated pop songs. I was not a fan of the Zumpano/Newman band, Zumpano, and sometimes Sparrow can’t avoid the Zumpano pitfalls: boring power-poppiness, general saminess. But sometimes he gets it right - like here - and evokes the simultaneous giddiness and melancholy of a late high school summer. [Buy]