Leonard Cohen - Tower of Song (with lyrics)

source: Adamfulgence    2014年8月21日
From Cohen’s “London Live” (2009); also included in “I’m Your Man” (1988). The recording here is a bit different given the time span ( he will soon turn eighty vs being in his mid-fifties in the first recording). It is also different because it was done at a live concert while on a world tour as apposed to a studio recording.

The “tower of song” represents the whole area of music (i.e. singing, composing,etc) and the people who are in this business.

Cohen incorporates themes of aging (grey hair), loneliness (looking out the window, burning bridges), melancholy (so damn close to everything lost) , irony (the golden voice) and sexuality (crazy for love, not coming on),and regret (..don’t know how the bridges got this wide).

Some might say that this is a bit of a stretch in interpreting these lyrics. As Cohen says about judgement, “I may be wrong”. One thing’s for sure: parts of his poem show that he can be humorous and light-hearted, not just dark and depressing.