Leonard Cohen - Songs of Love and Hate

Columbia Records

It's 50 years to the day that Leonard Cohen released his third studio album 'Songs of Love and Hate'. 50 years of avalanches and stone-cold lyrical blizzards.

The poet and his precise point of execution hits home with words as weapon of choice. The lonesome lovers lingo hasn’t been delivered with a tongue as sharp and honed in as Leonard Cohen's. Some people have a way with words. A control of the language. A profound understanding of their weight, worth and nuanced existence. Cohen is one of these people - born to do one thing. Align words with emotive essence and report them back with rhythmic resonance. Cohen is as cold as ice yet entices you in for a warm embrace. A juxtapositial quality ultimately tied to enigmatic characteristics. Winter blankets with little to no insulation to keep heat in.

Songs of Love and Hate is home to beautiful backdrops of acoustic splendor. Angelic harmonies are specifically placed to enhance the haunting burden of Leonard's verbiage. The only downside that I can see comes in between two of the most sullen tracks the album has to offer. 'Diamonds in the Mine', sandwiched by Dress Rehearsal Rag and Love Calls You by Your Name, may just be the most out of place material that I have heard on an album, ever. It feels like it's shown up to a funeral in fancy dress.

Love and Hate are one and the same. The only difference being the word itself and your understanding of it. You put the same energy into both. They head off in opposite directions but end at the exact same point. The serpent eventually eats its own tail.

They locked up a man
Who wanted to rule the world
The fools
They locked up the wrong man.

March 19th, 1971.