Leonard Cohen – Sydney

here is the info file from Dime

Leonard Cohen

28 January 2009

Sydney Entertainment Centre, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

lineage:

Church Audio Cardioids (CA-11) > Church-Audio STC-9000 preamp > Sony M1 DAT recorder > M-Audio Audiophile 2496 via S/PDIF > Cooledit Pro 2.0 > TLH 2.4.1 > .flac16

Taper’s notes:

Just go to

http://www.leonardcohenforum.com/viewforum.php?f=31

to get an impression of the torrent of love and devotion Leonard’s Downunder tour provoked. The papers and radio stations reflected that he truely was the talk of the town after his concerts. I’m glad I went relatively unprepared, just with some memories of some of his best songs, to the show. This allowed me to be totally overwhelmed by the experience, the quality of Leonard’s singing, his miraculous youthfulness and kind and warmhearted presence, by how outstanding the band was and also by the realization of how many immortal songs Leonard has created in his lifetime. I must also confess to bursting into tears with the beauty of the “If It Be Your Will” song.

I was sitting relatively far back, about half way up the ranks. For that I was positively surprised by the quality of the sound. I love to listen to my recording, as the sound is very round and balanced. I suppose every one of these various audience recordings shows a different nuance and can not be summarised by something as mundane as an A- or a B+. It was also great on the night to see the waves of people getting up for Leonard, originating in the stalls and working their way up the ranks.

I’m hoping that some people who were actually there on the night will pick this up and appreciate the chance to hear the show again.

Find the opening act Paul Kelly as a separate torrent here at Dime.

TT: 164:27.53

Set One:

01. [06:27.23] Dance Me to the End of Love

02. [06:51.11] The Future

03. [05:06.42] Ain’t No Cure for Love

04. [06:21.40] Bird on the Wire

05. [05:41.62] Everybody Knows (Leonard Cohen/Sharon Robinson)

06. [05:04.70] In My Secret Life (Leonard Cohen/Sharon Robinson)

07. [07:29.28] Who by Fire

08. [04:01.17] Chelsea Hotel #2

09. [04:03.27] Hey, That’s No Way to Say Goodbye

10. [12:28.61] Anthem

—fade out—

Set Two

11. [08:16.30] Tower of Song

12. [04:02.69] Suzanne

13. [06:29.23] The Gypsy’s Wife

14. [05:20.65] The Partisan (Anna Marly/Hy Zaret)

15. [05:46.43] Boogie Street (Leonard Cohen/Sharon Robinson)

16. [07:34.08] Hallelujah

17. [06:11.32] I’m Your Man

18. [03:23.17] A Thousand Kisses Deep (poem)

19. [10:46.21] Take This Waltz (Leonard Cohen after Federico Garcia Lorca)

—fade out—

Encores

20. [05:38.43] So Long, Marianne

21. [06:36.16] First We Take Manhattan

22. [05:44.44] Famous Blue Raincoat

23. [05:41.68] If It Be Your Will

24. [07:09.04] Democracy

25. [09:00.25] I Tried to Leave You

26. [03:09.64] Whither Thou Goest (Guy Singer after the Book of Ruth 1:16)

Complete concert.

The band is:

Leonard Cohen – vocals, acoustic guitar, keyboard.

Roscoe Beck – bass, double bass, background vocals

Neil Larsen – keyboards, Hammond B3, accordion

Bob Metzger – guitar, steel guitar, background vocals

Javier Mas – bandurria, laud, archilaud

Rafael Bernardo Gayol – drums, percussion

Dino Soldo – keyboard, saxophone, wind instruments, dobro, background vocals

Sharon Robinson – vocals, shaker

Hattie Webb – vocals, harp

Charley Webb – vocals, guitar

Last rev. 18Feb09