Popular Problems
The 2014 album, written mostly with Patrick Leonard, with Almost Like the Blues and Nevermind.
Leonard Cohen, 2014
- Released
- September 2014
- Label
- Columbia
Popular Problems is Cohen's thirteenth studio album, with songs written by Cohen and Patrick Leonard for the most part. Born in Chains had been played in a European soundcheck in 1985 and on stage in 2010. A Street was a poem he recited in 2006 and that appeared in the New Yorker in March 2009. Nevermind was published as a poem in 2005 and became the opening-credits theme of the second season of the HBO series True Detective in 2015.
It topped the Canadian chart with first-week sales of 20,000 copies and debuted at number 15 on the Billboard 200. Metacritic scored it 86, AllMusic's Thom Jurek said Cohen was at his most confident and committed, and the Daily Telegraph's Neil McCormick called it a masterpiece. The Guardian reported that it won album of the year at the 2015 Junos.
Track listing
- Slow3:25
- Almost Like the Blues3:28
- Samson in New Orleans4:39
- A Street3:33
- Did I Ever Love You4:11
- My Oh My3:37
- Nevermind4:40
- Born in Chains4:56
- You Got Me Singing3:32
Personnel
- Leonard Cohen vocals
- Patrick Leonard keyboards
- James Harrah guitar
- Joe Ayoub bass
- Alexandru Bublitchi violin
- Brian MacLeod drums
- Charlean Carmon, Dana Glover, Donna De Lory backing vocals
More from Leonard Cohen
Songs of Leonard Cohen (1967), Songs from a Room (1969), Songs of Love and Hate (1971), Live Songs (1973), New Skin for the Old Ceremony (1974), Death of a Ladies' Man (1977), Recent Songs (1979), Various Positions (1984), I'm Your Man (1988), The Future (1992), Ten New Songs (2001), Dear Heather (2004), Old Ideas (2012), You Want It Darker (2016), Thanks for the Dance (2019)
Sources
- Popular Problems, Wikipedia
- Popular Problems (master release), Discogs
- Leonard Cohen obituary, The Guardian (2016-11-10)