Knowledge of his impending death helped Leonard Cohen work with “a little more concentration,” the songwriter said.
The Tower of Song writer would say his cancer diagnosis made him work with a focus and urgency which had been absent earlier in his career. Cohen is notorious for sometimes taking years to write songs, with Hallelujah taking five years and around 150 drafts to finish. Though an all-time great song, it would not reach the charts until after Cohen’s death in 2016. That year also saw the release of You Want It Darker, an album which released just a few months before Cohen died. Still intent on promoting the album despite his failing health, Cohen opened up about his mortality and knowing this album would, more than likely, be his final work.
Cohen would say “less distractions” than usual, given his diagnosis, helped him piece together a worthy final album. Speaking to The New Yorker’s David Remnick just months before his death, Cohen would suggest there was a “tremendous blessing” to how he worked in the darker, final months.
He said: “In a certain sense, this particular predicament is filled with many less distractions than other periods of my life and actually enables me to work with a little more concentration and continuity. The only thing that mitigates against full production is just the condition of my body. There are times I just have to lie down.
“Sometimes, it’s just like ‘you’re losing too much weight now, man.’ You’re dying, but you don’t have to cooperate so enthusiastically with the process. It’s very compassionate at this stage. I mean more than any time in my life, I don’t have that voice in my head saying ‘you’re fucking up!’ That’s a tremendous blessing, really. I took care of business and I’m ready to die.”
Cohen would go on to express his relief at getting You Want It Darker over the line, calling it a chance to put his house in order. He said: “At a certain point, if you still have your marbles and are not faced with serious financial challenges, you have a chance to put your house in order.
“It’s a cliché, but it’s underestimated as an analgesic on all levels. Putting your house in order, if you can do it, is one of the most comforting activities, and the benefits of it are incalculable.”
A posthumous collection of songs would follow, called Thanks For the Dance. Cohen would suggest there was a “great deal of material that I haven’t sorted out,” with songs referenced by Cohen in his interview with The New Yorker eventually finalised and featured on the posthumous album, which was released in 2019. Cohen would go on to recite an at-the-time unfinished song which he described as “not half bad.” You can listen to his recital below.
