Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. CCCLVII--Leonard Cohen: Everybody Knows

 You might think that a deft hipster such as myself would have discovered an artist who is cooler than cool years in advance of the oh so many music aficionado posers...but sadly, no.  My introduction to him and this week's tune was via the 1990 movie Pump Up the Volume (a nice coming of age film)--but, as the saying goes, better late than never.

Leonard Cohen was the very definition of a Renaissance man, having released five books of poetry and two novels before he began his musical journey at the relatively late age of thirty-three (he would release twelve more books of poetry).  A native of Montreal, throughout the course of his forty-nine year career Cohen won several Juno Awards, a Grammy, and has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Canadian Hall of Fame, and the Songwriter's Hall of Fame in both Canada and America.  Bob Dylan said Cohen was the second best songwriter ever, and Cohen enjoyed a tremendous amount of success in the U.K. and throughout Europe.  For his musical career, Cohen released 15 studio albums and had two of them chart in the top ten.  He also released 44 singles, of which, oddly enough, only one ever charted.  Sadly, Cohen passed away in 2016 at the age of eighty-two, but he left behind a vast legacy that will be with us for generations to come.

Fun Fact:  In 1994 Cohen entered a Zen monastery near Los Angeles, where he stayed in seclusion for five years.  He was also ordained as a Buddhist monk during this time, though at no time did Cohen renounce his Jewish faith, and, in fact, was a practicing Jew throughout the entirety of his life.

"Everybody Knows" was the fourth single released from Cohen's 1988 album I'm Your Man.  Neither the single nor the album charted in the United States, but as an interesting side note, the album hit the top ten in Norway, Sweden, and Finland (so many cool kids in Scandinavia!).

"Everybody Knows" is a dark take on the often brutal world we live in (though some have felt the song was so desolate as to be humorous), punctuated by Cohen delivering hard truths ("everybody knows the dice are loaded" "everybody knows the good guys lost") about life.  Cohen sings in a deep baritone giving the song an even bleaker tone, and he's backed by a pulsating synthesizer with a touch of what sounds like a mandolin, while backing vocals over the last part of the song give it almost a hymn like quality.  I don't like to use the word genius when it comes to pop music, but this song is one of those instances where an artist--with his lyrics, his vocals, his production--goes so far above what mere mortals produce musically that one can only listen with wonder and appreciate the depth of talent that created such a master work.

Lyric Sheet:  "Everybody knows that fight was fixed/The poor stay poor, the rich get rich/That's how it goes/Everybody knows..."

Enjoy:

Republican = Racist

Peace,

emaycee

The dice are loaded

You can't have too much money

I'm shocked--shocked I tell you--to find out that America's wealthy elite are lining up to help re-elect the worst President in the history of our republic.

Amazing what a massive tax cut for rich people can do, isn't it?

The wealthy weren't too keen on Donald Trump in 2016, a large number of them choosing to stay on the sidelines.  But now that he's proven himself to be a first class racist, adept at stoking anti-Semitic hate, slept with a porn star while his third wife was recovering from having their child, colluded with Russia, cozies up to dictators, obstructed justice, sends out deranged tweets virtually daily, and has shown himself to be a prize idiot again and again, he's suddenly a-o.k.?

Give me a fucking break.  The wealthy in this country are not to be admired nor emulated--they care nothing for America or Americans and only serve their own interests.  They're not builders or innovators--they're parasites who are sucking our country and our planet dry.  They know nothing of compassion or shame and have all the human worth of a rabbit turd.

And they're more than happy to let our children starve if it means another nickel in their pockets.

This isn't about envy--I happily accept the fact that I don't have the talent to be ultra-wealthy.  What I am not content to accept is that I have the talent to live a a financially comfortable life and yet I live month to month like a vast majority of my fellow Americans.  And the reason I and so many of us do is because the wealthy have bought the stairway to financial heaven through our government (right to work for less laws, the war against unions, their fight against universal healthcare, giving U. S. Cabinet posts to unqualified people like Betsy Devos only because they're wealthy, owning the republican party) are unwilling to let us achieve our fair share because it means less for them.

Supporting a horrible President and even worse human being simply to increase your share of an already avaricious wealth is a sure way for America to end up like France, circa 1789, with an incredibly unpleasant result for people of too much means.

Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee
 

The poor stay poor, the rich get rich

An unwinnable game--like capitalism

Seems the billionaire class is worried about the future of capitalism in America.

Want to ask me how much I give a fuck about the future of capitalism in America?

After nearly forty years of wading through the muck that is working for a living in America, I can honestly say that capitalism is little more than a code word for the rich get richer and the poor stay poor.  Ever since the Reagan devolution, we've witnessed wages that haven't kept up with inflation, levels of income inequality not seen in the history of this country, CEO salaries setting records in comparison to the wages their workers earn, the number of Americans living in poverty continuing to grow, health insurance going from an employer expense to a shared expense (and the level of coverage ever decreasing), and going from the safety of a pension plan to 401ks which are subject to the whims of...rich people.

Frankly, as far as I'm concerned they can stick capitalism up their asses.  To me it's just a word like God or Santa Claus full of empty promises that help no one except the powers that be.

Socialism?  Bring it on--can't be any worse than the losing system we have now.

Fuck Donald Trump
emaycee