So Long, Len.

In happier times, perhaps I’d have been rustling up a proper Deathblog right now, ruminating about how I first discovered Leonard Cohen, and of all the things my younger self did or didn’t get out of listening to his records, and of all the friends I listened to them with. Of how in recent years I’ve instead found myself sniggering somewhat at the pomposity and earnest inscrutability of the early records I used to love, whilst being slowly drawn toward the weirder, wonkier charms of the later stuff I used to dismiss, even whilst a handful of those early numbers still slay me, and so on. Maybe I could do you a top five favourite moments, or top ten.

But today I just don’t have the heart.

As one or two people have no doubt already noted, Field Commander Cohen was so cool, he somehow managed to record the perfect song for 2016, back in the relatively care-free days of 1992.

I recall hearing this song on the radio a few years back and finding its lyrical bombast absolutely ridiculous. This week? It fits like a glove, and its prescience is terrifying.

Your servant here, he has been told

To say it clear, to say it cold

It's over

It ain't going any further