Leonard Cohen
28 January 2009
Sydney Entertainment Centre, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

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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

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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.

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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.

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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

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Last rev. 18Feb09