Heck Of A Guy – The Other Leonard Cohen Site

Leonard Cohen – Avalanche
Louisville: March 30, 2013
Video by Wirebirds (Henry Tengelsen)

Evolution Of Leonard Cohen’s Intent To Start Smoking Again At 80 Shtick

Leonard Cohen, who once claimed his raspy voice was the product of “about 500 tons of whiskey and millions of cigarettes,” quit smoking in 2003 on doctor’s advice.¹ A least as early as 2009, Leonard Cohen has held that “I’m waiting for my 80th [birthday] so I can take up smoking again.”²

In 2012, he incorporated the line into his concert stage banter.

Leonard Cohen – Intro to The Future
Seattle: Nov 9, 2012
Video by Arlene Dick

Two weeks later, he had added to the schtick:

This is where 2 years from now, I’ll be smoking a cigarette. A young girl in a nurses uniform will bring out a table and a chair, and I’ll tap out a smoke as this music will begin to play.³

Now, however, the smoking at 80 monologue  has become a saga which includes imagery (“the little Parthenon / of an unopened pack of cigarettes”) from Cohen’s poem, “The Cigarette Issue”⁴ and segues neatly into “Anyhow.”  This rendition is from the March 30, 2013 Louisville show. I’ve included a rough transcription made from the video.

Leonard Cohen – Anyhow
Louisville: March 30, 2013
Video by Wirebirds (Henry Tengelsen)

This is the moment when I take my first cigarette

I’ll have waited until I’ll be 80 and I’m really looking forward to this moment.  It’ll be part of the show. A young nurse in a white uniform, white lisle stockings, and she’ll be carrying a pack of cigarettes on a silver tray.  She’ll walk across the stage – I hope there won’t be any untoward catcalls. The pack will be opened. It will be gleaming, like those pillars of the Parthenon – a beautiful Parthenon of Tobacco.  I’ll take one of the cigarettes out of the pack and tap it on my wrist like I learned to do in those movies. She’ll light me up, I’ll take my first  [inhales deeply] yeah, it’s gonna be so good.  Before she leaves, I’ll say “Nurse, before you go would you mind tapping out a few of those bubbles in my i.v.

I’ll step back into my old self. I’ll begin to hear the strains of the music of the most beautiful jazz orchestra in the world. My thoughts will settle, they’ll smooth out. I’ll be able to develop some kind of charitable take on my shabby life. I’ll be thinking of the past.

 Heck Of A Guy Is Ready

Check out the 2014 Leonard Cohen Where There’s Smoke Tour

Credit Due Department: A special thanks is owed Henry Tengelsen, who went beyond the call in providing assistance to make this post possible.

1. He Has Tried in His Way to Be Free by Sarah Hampson. Shambhala Sun: Nov 2007 [↩]
2. Post by MFL at LeonardCohenForum [↩]
3. Leonard Cohen at the Nov 23, 2012 Leonard Cohen Akoo Theater Concert In Chicago. Quoted in Leonard Cohen Captivates The Akoo Theater by Tyler Curtis (Chicago Music Magazine, November 24, 2012) [↩]
4. “The Cigarette Issue” by Leonard Cohen from The Book of Longing, published in 2006:

   But what is exactly the same
   is the promise, the beauty
   and the salvation
   of cigarettes
   the little Parthenon
   of an unopened pack of cigarettes
   and Mumbai, like the Athens
   of forty years ago
   is a city to smoke in [↩]

Leonard Cohen – Who By Fire
Memphis: March 24, 2013
Video by Wirebirds (Henry Tengelsen)

Leonard Cohen – Suzanne
Memphis: March 24, 2013
Video by Wirebirds (Henry Tengelsen)

None of these videos from the March 30, 2013 Leonard Cohen Louisville Concert are perfect offerings (the stage lighting and the crowd interfere with the first and the other two are taken at a distance) but the audio is good on all of these and that’s how the music, as well as the light, gets in.

Leonard Cohen – Famous Blue Raincoat
Louisville Palace: March 30, 2103
Video by phrenopsis

Leonard Cohen – So Long Marianne
Louisville Palace: March 30, 2103
Video by stilli cling

Leonard Cohen – Take This Waltz
Louisville Palace: March 30, 2103
Video by stilli cling