MOSES’ ZOOMER PHILOSOPHY

POP ICONS: ROCK OF AGES

In 1992, while I was still running that pioneering youthoriented music-video channel, Much Music, we began to play a certain 58-yearold Singer’s song called “Closing Time,” which he’d released in support of his then-new album, The Future. Up to that point, this Singer’s albums had usually posted modest Canadian sales in the range of 30,000 to 50,000 records. The Future ended up selling double platinum (200,000-300,000) and relaunched the Singer’s then languishing career. I remember record retailers calling and saying, “What’s going on? I’ve got teenage girls coming in and asking for … Leonard Cohen?!?”

That video, that album, helped mark the beginning of Leonard Cohen 2.0. Now 80, Cohen has just released his 13th album, Popular Problems, which, together with his 12th, Old Ideas, may constitute, in my humble opinion, his best work yet. Here are the opening lines from the first cut on Popular Problems. It’s called “Slow.” I’m slowing down the tune, I never liked it fast; You want to get there soon, I want to get there last; It’s not because I’m old, it’s not the life I led, I always liked it slow; that’s what my momma said.

Pure Cohen: deft, funny, profound and a little bad all at once. Add in those subtle and sophisticated musical arrangements that have never really gotten the attention or credit that they deserve, a European-Yiddish-bluesy mix that includes exotic instruments like the oud and the balalaika, and you see why Cohen has managed not just to survive as an artist into his ninth decade but to do it on a creative rise. I get a kick out of my little contribution to his late resurgence to stardom, but Leonard has persisted in the classy end of the popular music business by hanging in and by staying true to himself. In fact, of all the notable Canadian artists who’ve distinguished themselves over the past 50 years, I firmly believe, in fact I boldly predict, Leonard Cohen is the one who will last.

In my last two chapters on the recent return of the older hero, I examined the growing phenomenon of the older protagonist in movies and literary fiction. In music, that most skittish of all pop cultures, surprisingly, it may even be more so. If you look at the Best Albums of 1964 on the website besteveralbums.com, which calculates overall yearly rankings by collating 16,000 charts, you’ll see the following names: The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Barbra Streisand, Paul Simon and The Beach Boys. All have released albums in the past two years, a full half-century later. At one time, pop culture was overwhelmingly invested in the young; but in music today, you can see that the most enduring stars are the ones who got established in the ’60s and even earlier. Tony Bennett is a case in point. In 1964, an already established 38-yearold Bennett had an album out called I Left my Heart in San Francisco after his signature song. Now 88, Bennett is promoting a duet album with Lady Gaga that he released last year to rave reviews. (It’s delicious to note that the actual recording of the album had to wait for Gaga, 28, to recover from hip surgery.) Meanwhile, Bennett himself will perform solo concerts in three Canadian cities this fall.

All of which makes me wonder: why are these older musicians still so popular? Why is their celebrity so long-lived compared to the typically fleeting fame of most pop stars, who are hot one day, gone the next. In 50 years, who will the Bennetts and the Cohens be? Will any exist at all?

My theory can be summed up in one word: speed. The law of the celebrity cycle is that it’s always faster and more intense than it used to be. For one thing, technology intrudes. To use a TV metaphor, we no longer live in a five-channel world; we live in a 500-channel world; indeed, a 5,000,000-channel one given the unlimited capacity of the Internet. With so much competition and attention so fickle, few artists can actually gain a permanent foothold on the public imagination. It takes a while to institutionalize as an icon, yet the time available is ever-shrinking. Just when you figure out who Bruno Mars is, he’s apparently gone. Instead, the guy with the funny hat appears singing “Happy.” In a year or so, Pharrell Williams will likely be gone, too. No one’s safe, including Tony Bennett’s latest partner, Lady Gaga. What are the chances that when she’s 88, 20-something pop stars will be clamouring to sing duets with her?

But Tony’s fame is secure for now (he was featured on the cover of this magazine in December 2011), as is that of The Rolling Stones (average age 71) and The Beatles, (average age 73). It’s no accident that on our ZoomerRadio station AM 740 ( am740.ca), only two artists