Leonard Cohen Talks About First Album in Eight Years

What has Leonard Cohen been doing the past eight years? Two of those were filled by an extensive tour, which was followed up with an album, titled Old Ideas. When faced with a room full of journalists on January 18 listening to his work, he explained about writing the album: “But mostly I was wondering if I myself could be swept along with it. This particular record invites one to be swept along with it even if you happen to have written it yourself."

Over the past eight years, as listeners may hear, Cohen’s voice has deepened. It’s not some sort of delayed puberty. Rather, he said: "It's what happens when you give up cigarettes, contrary to public opinion. I thought it would destroy my whole position and my voice would rise to a soprano."

When it comes to songwriting and musical ability, Cohen seemed modest, answering: "You know, you just work with what you got. I always felt I was kind of scraping the bottom of the barrel trying to get the song together. I never had the sense that I was standing in front of a buffet table with a multitude of choices. I felt I was operating in more like what Yeats used to say was the 'foul rag and bone shop of the heart'."

Cohen may tour after Old Ideas is released. Yet, his last tour – 247 shows spread out over two years – didn’t end that long ago. Rather, finding himself in a precarious financial situation, he decided to tour at the time; upon completing the dates, he immediately went to work on recording his new album. He said: "I hadn't done anything for 15 years. I was like Ronald Reagan in his declining years. He remembered he'd had a good role – he's played the president in a movie and I felt somewhat that I had been a singer. Being back on the road really re-established me as being a worker in the world and that was a very satisfactory feeling."