-
A Broken Hallelujah
- Rock and Roll, Redemption, and the Life of Leonard Cohen
- Narrated by: Liel Leibovitz
- Length: 6 hrs and 42 mins
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $19.95
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
Publisher's summary
Brings to life a passionate poet-turned-musician and what compels him and his work.
Why is it that Leonard Cohen receives the sort of reverence we reserve for a precious few living artists? Why are his songs, three or four decades after their original release, suddenly gracing the charts, blockbuster movie sound tracks, and television singing competitions? And why is it that while most of his contemporaries are either long dead or engaged in uninspired nostalgia tours, Cohen is at the peak of his powers and popularity?
These are the questions at the heart of A Broken Hallelujah, a meditation on the singer, his music, and the ideas and beliefs at its core. Granted extraordinary access to Cohen’s personal papers, Liel Leibovitz examines the intricacies of the man whose performing career began with a crippling bout of stage fright, yet who, only a few years later, tamed a rowdy crowd on the Isle of Wight, preventing further violence; the artist who had gone from a successful world tour and a movie star girlfriend to a long residency in a remote Zen retreat; and the rare spiritual seeker for whom the principles of traditional Judaism, the tenets of Zen Buddhism, and the iconography of Christianity all align. The portrait that emerges is that of an artist attuned to notions of justice, lust, longing, loneliness, and redemption, and possessing the sort of voice and vision commonly reserved only for the prophets.
More than just an account of Cohen’s life, A Broken Hallelujah is an intimate look at the artist that is as emotionally astute as it is philosophically observant. Delving into the sources and meaning of Cohen’s work, Leibovitz beautifully illuminates what Cohen is telling us and why we listen so intensely.
Listeners also enjoyed...
-
Book of Longing
- By: Leonard Cohen
- Narrated by: Leonard Cohen
- Length: 3 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Leonard Cohen wrote the poems in Book of Longing - his first book of poetry in more than 20 years after 1984's Book of Mercy - during his five-year stay at a Zen monastery on Southern California's Mount Baldy, and in Los Angeles, Montreal, and Mumbai. This dazzling collection of poetry is timeless, meditative, and often darkly humorous.
-
-
Cohen reading his own poetry is exquisite
- By Cheryl on 06-18-19
By: Leonard Cohen
-
Who by Fire
- Leonard Cohen in the Sinai
- By: Matti Friedman
- Narrated by: Matti Friedman, Andrew Polk
- Length: 5 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In October 1973, the poet and singer Leonard Cohen—thirty-nine years old, famous, unhappy, and at a creative dead end—traveled from his home on the Greek island of Hydra to the chaos and bloodshed of the Sinai desert when Egypt attacked Israel on the Jewish high holiday of Yom Kippur. Moving around the front with a guitar and a group of local musicians, Cohen met hundreds of young soldiers, men and women at the worst moment of their lives. In Who by Fire, journalist Matti Friedman gives us a riveting account of those weeks in the Sinai.
-
-
A gem of a book
- By Grace M-T on 04-06-22
By: Matti Friedman
-
Matters of Vital Interest
- A Forty-Year Friendship with Leonard Cohen
- By: Eric Lerner
- Narrated by: William Dufris
- Length: 7 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A memoir of the author's decades-long friendship and spiritual journey with the late singer, songwriter, novelist, and poet Leonard Cohen. Funny, revealing, self-aware, and deeply moving, Matters of Vital Interest is an insightful memoir about Eric Lerner's relationship with his friend, whose idiosyncratic style and dignified life was deeply informed by his spiritual practices.
-
-
Great intimate book about an amazing all time poet
- By Shay on 11-15-18
By: Eric Lerner
-
The Holy or the Broken
- Leonard Cohen, Jeff Buckley, and the Unlikely Ascent of "Hallelujah"
- By: Alan Light
- Narrated by: Tom Perkins
- Length: 6 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Today, "Hallelujah" is one of the most-performed rock songs in history. It has become a staple of movies and television shows as diverse as Shrek and The West Wing, of tribute videos and telethons. It has been covered by hundreds of artists, including Bob Dylan, U2, Justin Timberlake, and k.d. lang, and it is played every year at countless events - both sacred and secular - around the world. Yet when music legend Leonard Cohen first wrote and recorded "Hallelujah", it was for an album rejected by his longtime record label.
-
-
Love Cohn and this Is a Great Story
- By Karen & Dennis Lauer on 12-13-22
By: Alan Light
-
I'm Your Man
- The Life of Leonard Cohen
- By: Sylvie Simmons
- Narrated by: Joshua Pollock
- Length: 18 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The legend behind such songs as "Suzanne," "Bird on the Wire," and "Hallelujah" and the poet and novelist behind such groundbreaking literary works as Beautiful Losers and Book of Mercy, Leonard Cohen is one of the most important and influential artists of our era, a man of powerful emotion and intelligence whose work has explored the definitive issues of human life - sex, religion, power, meaning, love. I'm Your Man is the definitive account of Cohen's extraordinary life.
-
-
Biography from a room
- By john e reynolds on 08-21-16
By: Sylvie Simmons
-
The Philosophy of Modern Song
- By: Bob Dylan
- Narrated by: Bob Dylan, Jeff Bridges, Steve Buscemi, and others
- Length: 6 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Dylan, who began working on the book in 2010, offers his insight into the nature of popular music. He writes over sixty essays focusing on songs by other artists, spanning from Stephen Foster to Elvis Costello, and in between ranging from Hank Williams to Nina Simone. He analyzes what he calls the trap of easy rhymes, breaks down how the addition of a single syllable can diminish a song, and even explains how bluegrass relates to heavy metal. These essays are written in Dylan’s unique prose. And while ostensibly about music, they are really meditations on the human condition.
-
-
Needs chapter headings
- By kaon on 12-22-22
By: Bob Dylan
-
Book of Longing
- By: Leonard Cohen
- Narrated by: Leonard Cohen
- Length: 3 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Leonard Cohen wrote the poems in Book of Longing - his first book of poetry in more than 20 years after 1984's Book of Mercy - during his five-year stay at a Zen monastery on Southern California's Mount Baldy, and in Los Angeles, Montreal, and Mumbai. This dazzling collection of poetry is timeless, meditative, and often darkly humorous.
-
-
Cohen reading his own poetry is exquisite
- By Cheryl on 06-18-19
By: Leonard Cohen
-
Who by Fire
- Leonard Cohen in the Sinai
- By: Matti Friedman
- Narrated by: Matti Friedman, Andrew Polk
- Length: 5 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In October 1973, the poet and singer Leonard Cohen—thirty-nine years old, famous, unhappy, and at a creative dead end—traveled from his home on the Greek island of Hydra to the chaos and bloodshed of the Sinai desert when Egypt attacked Israel on the Jewish high holiday of Yom Kippur. Moving around the front with a guitar and a group of local musicians, Cohen met hundreds of young soldiers, men and women at the worst moment of their lives. In Who by Fire, journalist Matti Friedman gives us a riveting account of those weeks in the Sinai.
-
-
A gem of a book
- By Grace M-T on 04-06-22
By: Matti Friedman
-
Matters of Vital Interest
- A Forty-Year Friendship with Leonard Cohen
- By: Eric Lerner
- Narrated by: William Dufris
- Length: 7 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A memoir of the author's decades-long friendship and spiritual journey with the late singer, songwriter, novelist, and poet Leonard Cohen. Funny, revealing, self-aware, and deeply moving, Matters of Vital Interest is an insightful memoir about Eric Lerner's relationship with his friend, whose idiosyncratic style and dignified life was deeply informed by his spiritual practices.
-
-
Great intimate book about an amazing all time poet
- By Shay on 11-15-18
By: Eric Lerner
-
The Holy or the Broken
- Leonard Cohen, Jeff Buckley, and the Unlikely Ascent of "Hallelujah"
- By: Alan Light
- Narrated by: Tom Perkins
- Length: 6 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Today, "Hallelujah" is one of the most-performed rock songs in history. It has become a staple of movies and television shows as diverse as Shrek and The West Wing, of tribute videos and telethons. It has been covered by hundreds of artists, including Bob Dylan, U2, Justin Timberlake, and k.d. lang, and it is played every year at countless events - both sacred and secular - around the world. Yet when music legend Leonard Cohen first wrote and recorded "Hallelujah", it was for an album rejected by his longtime record label.
-
-
Love Cohn and this Is a Great Story
- By Karen & Dennis Lauer on 12-13-22
By: Alan Light
-
I'm Your Man
- The Life of Leonard Cohen
- By: Sylvie Simmons
- Narrated by: Joshua Pollock
- Length: 18 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The legend behind such songs as "Suzanne," "Bird on the Wire," and "Hallelujah" and the poet and novelist behind such groundbreaking literary works as Beautiful Losers and Book of Mercy, Leonard Cohen is one of the most important and influential artists of our era, a man of powerful emotion and intelligence whose work has explored the definitive issues of human life - sex, religion, power, meaning, love. I'm Your Man is the definitive account of Cohen's extraordinary life.
-
-
Biography from a room
- By john e reynolds on 08-21-16
By: Sylvie Simmons
-
The Philosophy of Modern Song
- By: Bob Dylan
- Narrated by: Bob Dylan, Jeff Bridges, Steve Buscemi, and others
- Length: 6 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Dylan, who began working on the book in 2010, offers his insight into the nature of popular music. He writes over sixty essays focusing on songs by other artists, spanning from Stephen Foster to Elvis Costello, and in between ranging from Hank Williams to Nina Simone. He analyzes what he calls the trap of easy rhymes, breaks down how the addition of a single syllable can diminish a song, and even explains how bluegrass relates to heavy metal. These essays are written in Dylan’s unique prose. And while ostensibly about music, they are really meditations on the human condition.
-
-
Needs chapter headings
- By kaon on 12-22-22
By: Bob Dylan
-
Starry Messenger
- Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization
- By: Neil deGrasse Tyson
- Narrated by: Neil deGrasse Tyson
- Length: 7 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a time when our political and cultural views feel more polarized than ever, Tyson provides a much-needed antidote to so much of what divides us, while making a passionate case for the twin chariots of enlightenment—a cosmic perspective and the rationality of science. After thinking deeply about how science sees the world and about Earth as a planet, the human brain has the capacity to reset and recalibrates life’s priorities, shaping the actions we might take in response. No outlook on culture, society, or civilization remains untouched.
-
-
Optimistic
- By Anonymous on 09-23-22
-
A Ballet of Lepers
- A Novel and Stories
- By: Leonard Cohen
- Narrated by: Ottessa Moshfegh
- Length: 7 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The pieces in this collection, written between 1956 and 1961 and including short fiction, a radio play, and a stunning early novel, offer startling insights into Cohen's imagination and creative process. Cohen explores themes that would permeate his later work, from shame and unworthiness to sexual desire in all its sacred and profane dimensions to longing, whether for love, family, freedom, or transcendence.
By: Leonard Cohen
-
Music Is History
- By: Ahmir Khalib Thompson, Questlove
- Narrated by: Questlove
- Length: 11 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Best-selling author and Sundance award-winning director Questlove harnesses his encyclopedic knowledge of popular music and his deep curiosity about history to examine America over the past 50 years. Choosing one essential track from each year, Questlove unpacks each song’s significance, revealing the pivotal role that American music plays around issues of race, gender, politics, and identity.
-
-
This would be better read than listened to
- By HomeChef on 11-05-21
By: Ahmir Khalib Thompson, and others
-
Bowie
- By: Simon Critchley, Eric Hanson
- Narrated by: Simon Critchley
- Length: 1 hr and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Simon Critchley first encountered David Bowie in the early '70s, when the singer appeared on Britain's most-watched music show, Top of the Pops. His performance of "Starman" mesmerized Critchley: it was "so sexual, so knowing, so strange". Two days later Critchley's mum bought a copy of the single; she liked both the song and the performer's bright orange hair (she had previously been a hairdresser). The seed of a lifelong love affair was thus planted in the mind of her son, aged 12.
-
-
the best music culture theory book that exists
- By Thomas on 02-20-15
By: Simon Critchley, and others
-
The Beatles
- The Biography
- By: Bob Spitz
- Narrated by: Alfred Molina
- Length: 10 hrs and 13 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Even before the Beatles hit the big time, a myth was created. This version of the Beatles legend smoothed the rough edges and filled in the fault lines, and for more than forty years this manicured version of the Beatles story has sustained as truth, until now.
-
-
Put Away Your, Hunter Davies
- By James on 12-05-05
By: Bob Spitz
-
The Rest Is Noise
- Listening to the 20th Century
- By: Alex Ross
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 23 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Rest Is Noise takes the listener inside the labyrinth of modern music, from turn-of-the-century Vienna to downtown New York in the '60s and '70s. We meet the maverick personalities and follow the rise of mass culture on this sweeping tour of 20th-century history through its music.
-
-
Learned so much!
- By Paula on 02-18-08
By: Alex Ross
-
The Ballad of Bob Dylan
- A Portrait
- By: Daniel Mark Epstein
- Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 15 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Ballad of Bob Dylan is a vivid, full-bodied portrait of one of the most influential artists of the 20th-century - a man widely regarded as the most important lyricist America has ever produced. Acclaimed poet and biographer Daniel Mark Epstein frames Dylan against the backdrop of four seminal concerts - all of which he attended. Beautifully written, The Ballad of Bob Dylan is a unique, eye-opening portrait of an artist who has transformed generations and continues to inspire and surprise today.
-
-
Excellent book, excellent narration
- By L chandler on 12-22-11
-
Listen to This
- By: Alex Ross
- Narrated by: Alex Ross
- Length: 14 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Listen to This, which takes its title from a beloved 2004 essay in which Ross described his late-blooming discovery of pop music, showcases the best of Ross’s writing from more than a decade at The New Yorker. These pieces, dedicated to classical and popular artists alike, are at once erudite and lively.
-
-
Educational!
- By Jason Anschutz on 07-10-15
By: Alex Ross
-
Reckless Daughter
- A Portrait of Joni Mitchell
- By: David Yaffe
- Narrated by: Xe Sands
- Length: 12 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Joni Mitchell is a cultural touchstone for generations of Americans. In her heyday she released 10 experimental, challenging, and revealing albums; her lyrics captivated people with the beauty of their language and the rawness of their emotions, both deeply personal to Mitchell and universally relatable to her audience. In this intimate biography, composed of dozens of in-person interviews with Mitchell, David Yaffe reveals the backstory behind the famous songs.
-
-
Fairly interesting text, maddening delivery
- By Brad on 11-23-17
By: David Yaffe
-
Catch a Wave
- The Rise, Fall, and Redemption of the Beach Boys' Brian Wilson
- By: Peter Ames Carlin
- Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 14 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Catch a Wave, Peter Ames Carlin pulls back the curtain on Brian Wilson, one of popular music's most revered luminaries, as well as its biggest mystery. Drawing on hundreds of interviews and never-before heard studio recordings, Carlin follows the Beach Boys from their earliest days through Brian's deepening emotional problems to his triumphant re-emergence with the release of Smile, the legendarily unreleased album he had originally shelved.
-
-
Not great
- By J. Barker on 08-08-16
-
Why Bob Dylan Matters
- By: Richard F. Thomas
- Narrated by: Nick Landrum
- Length: 9 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When the Nobel Prize for Literature was awarded to Bob Dylan in 2016, a debate raged. Some celebrated while many others questioned the choice. How could the world's most prestigious book prize be awarded to a famously cantankerous singer-songwriter who wouldn't even deign to attend the medal ceremony? In Why Bob Dylan Matters, Harvard Professor Richard F. Thomas answers this question with magisterial erudition.
-
-
Classical Dylan
- By Buretto on 11-27-17
-
Bob Dylan
- A Spiritual Life
- By: Scott M. Marshall
- Narrated by: Dan John Miller
- Length: 8 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Never before has a book like this one delved into the spiritual odyssey of cultural icon Bob Dylan. Tracking an American original - from his Jewish roots to his controversial embrace of Jesus to his enduring legacy as the composer of the Tempest album - Bob Dylan: A Spiritual Life delivers the story of a man in dogged pursuit of redemption. Based on years of research and original interviews, this book sorts through the myths and misunderstandings and reveals Dylan to be both traditional and radical in the way he expresses his spiritual quest for meaning.
-
-
Making Sense of the Elusive Dylan's Faith
- By Paul Atwater on 02-18-20
Related to this topic
-
The Ballad of Bob Dylan
- A Portrait
- By: Daniel Mark Epstein
- Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 15 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Ballad of Bob Dylan is a vivid, full-bodied portrait of one of the most influential artists of the 20th-century - a man widely regarded as the most important lyricist America has ever produced. Acclaimed poet and biographer Daniel Mark Epstein frames Dylan against the backdrop of four seminal concerts - all of which he attended. Beautifully written, The Ballad of Bob Dylan is a unique, eye-opening portrait of an artist who has transformed generations and continues to inspire and surprise today.
-
-
Excellent book, excellent narration
- By L chandler on 12-22-11
-
Catch a Wave
- The Rise, Fall, and Redemption of the Beach Boys' Brian Wilson
- By: Peter Ames Carlin
- Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 14 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Catch a Wave, Peter Ames Carlin pulls back the curtain on Brian Wilson, one of popular music's most revered luminaries, as well as its biggest mystery. Drawing on hundreds of interviews and never-before heard studio recordings, Carlin follows the Beach Boys from their earliest days through Brian's deepening emotional problems to his triumphant re-emergence with the release of Smile, the legendarily unreleased album he had originally shelved.
-
-
Not great
- By J. Barker on 08-08-16
-
The Rest Is Noise
- Listening to the 20th Century
- By: Alex Ross
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 23 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Rest Is Noise takes the listener inside the labyrinth of modern music, from turn-of-the-century Vienna to downtown New York in the '60s and '70s. We meet the maverick personalities and follow the rise of mass culture on this sweeping tour of 20th-century history through its music.
-
-
Learned so much!
- By Paula on 02-18-08
By: Alex Ross
-
Why Should the Devil Have All the Good Music?
- Larry Norman and the Perils of Christian Rock
- By: Gregory Alan Thornbury
- Narrated by: Stephen R. Thorne
- Length: 9 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1969, in Capitol Records' Hollywood studio, a blonde-haired troubadour named Larry Norman laid track for an album that would launch a new genre of music and one of the strangest, most interesting careers in modern rock. Having spent the bulk of the 1960s playing on bills with acts like The Who, Janis Joplin, and The Doors, Norman decided that he wanted to sing about the most countercultural subject of all: Jesus.
-
-
Hagiography not Biography
- By Keith Howard on 10-29-18
-
Paul McCartney
- A Life
- By: Peter Ames Carlin
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 13 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The best-selling author of the definitive biography of former Beach Boy Brian Wilson offers new insight into the life and music of Paul McCartney, one of the world's most popular and influential musicians. Informed by new, exclusive interviews with friends, bandmates, and collaborators, the book describes McCartney's many triumphs as well as his failures, from the Beatles era through his decade with Wings and his subsequent solo career.
-
-
Great...But
- By Diego on 05-02-10
-
Dig If You Will the Picture
- Funk, Sex, God and Genius in the Music of Prince
- By: Ben Greenman
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ben Greenman, New York Times best-selling author, contributing writer to The New Yorker, and owner of thousands of recordings of Prince and Prince-related songs, knows intimately that there has never been a rock star as vibrant, mercurial, willfully contrary, experimental, or prolific as Prince. Uniting a diverse audience while remaining singularly himself, Prince was a tireless artist, a musical virtuoso and chameleon, and a pop-culture prophet.
-
-
Reads like a indepth career review & analysis
- By herb on 05-18-17
By: Ben Greenman
-
The Ballad of Bob Dylan
- A Portrait
- By: Daniel Mark Epstein
- Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 15 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Ballad of Bob Dylan is a vivid, full-bodied portrait of one of the most influential artists of the 20th-century - a man widely regarded as the most important lyricist America has ever produced. Acclaimed poet and biographer Daniel Mark Epstein frames Dylan against the backdrop of four seminal concerts - all of which he attended. Beautifully written, The Ballad of Bob Dylan is a unique, eye-opening portrait of an artist who has transformed generations and continues to inspire and surprise today.
-
-
Excellent book, excellent narration
- By L chandler on 12-22-11
-
Catch a Wave
- The Rise, Fall, and Redemption of the Beach Boys' Brian Wilson
- By: Peter Ames Carlin
- Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 14 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Catch a Wave, Peter Ames Carlin pulls back the curtain on Brian Wilson, one of popular music's most revered luminaries, as well as its biggest mystery. Drawing on hundreds of interviews and never-before heard studio recordings, Carlin follows the Beach Boys from their earliest days through Brian's deepening emotional problems to his triumphant re-emergence with the release of Smile, the legendarily unreleased album he had originally shelved.
-
-
Not great
- By J. Barker on 08-08-16
-
The Rest Is Noise
- Listening to the 20th Century
- By: Alex Ross
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 23 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Rest Is Noise takes the listener inside the labyrinth of modern music, from turn-of-the-century Vienna to downtown New York in the '60s and '70s. We meet the maverick personalities and follow the rise of mass culture on this sweeping tour of 20th-century history through its music.
-
-
Learned so much!
- By Paula on 02-18-08
By: Alex Ross
-
Why Should the Devil Have All the Good Music?
- Larry Norman and the Perils of Christian Rock
- By: Gregory Alan Thornbury
- Narrated by: Stephen R. Thorne
- Length: 9 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1969, in Capitol Records' Hollywood studio, a blonde-haired troubadour named Larry Norman laid track for an album that would launch a new genre of music and one of the strangest, most interesting careers in modern rock. Having spent the bulk of the 1960s playing on bills with acts like The Who, Janis Joplin, and The Doors, Norman decided that he wanted to sing about the most countercultural subject of all: Jesus.
-
-
Hagiography not Biography
- By Keith Howard on 10-29-18
-
Paul McCartney
- A Life
- By: Peter Ames Carlin
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 13 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The best-selling author of the definitive biography of former Beach Boy Brian Wilson offers new insight into the life and music of Paul McCartney, one of the world's most popular and influential musicians. Informed by new, exclusive interviews with friends, bandmates, and collaborators, the book describes McCartney's many triumphs as well as his failures, from the Beatles era through his decade with Wings and his subsequent solo career.
-
-
Great...But
- By Diego on 05-02-10
-
Dig If You Will the Picture
- Funk, Sex, God and Genius in the Music of Prince
- By: Ben Greenman
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ben Greenman, New York Times best-selling author, contributing writer to The New Yorker, and owner of thousands of recordings of Prince and Prince-related songs, knows intimately that there has never been a rock star as vibrant, mercurial, willfully contrary, experimental, or prolific as Prince. Uniting a diverse audience while remaining singularly himself, Prince was a tireless artist, a musical virtuoso and chameleon, and a pop-culture prophet.
-
-
Reads like a indepth career review & analysis
- By herb on 05-18-17
By: Ben Greenman
-
Dreaming the Beatles
- A Love Story of One Band and the Whole World
- By: Rob Sheffield
- Narrated by: Rob Sheffield
- Length: 9 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Dreaming the Beatles is not another biography of the Beatles or a song-by-song analysis of the best of John and Paul. It isn't another exposé about how they broke up. It isn't a history of their gigs or their gear. It is a collection of essays telling the story of what this ubiquitous band means to a generation who grew up with the Beatles' music on their parents' stereos and their faces on T-shirts. What do the Beatles mean today? Why are they more famous and beloved now than ever? Find out.
-
-
Wonderful ramble
- By Tad Davis on 05-18-17
By: Rob Sheffield
-
John Lennon
- The Life
- By: Philip Norman
- Narrated by: Graeme Malcolm
- Length: 12 hrs and 52 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Philip Norman turns his formidable talent to the Beatle for whom belonging to the world's most beloved pop group was never enough. Drawing on previously untapped sources, and with unprecedented access to all the major characters, here is the definitive portrait of John Lennon. This biography takes a fresh and penetrating look at Lennon's much-chronicled life, including the songs that have turned him, posthumously, into almost a secular saint.
-
-
Really Bad Abridgement Job (slash job)
- By Let's Be Reasonable on 12-04-08
By: Philip Norman
-
An Outlaw and a Lady
- A Memoir of Music, Life with Waylon, and the Faith That Brought Me Home
- By: Jessi Colter
- Narrated by: Devon O'day
- Length: 6 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The daughter of a Pentecostal evangelist and a race-car driver, Jessi Colter played piano and sang in church before leaving Arizona to tour with rock n' roll pioneer Duane Eddy, whom she married. Colter became a successful recording artist, appearing on American Bandstand and befriending stars such as the the Everly Brothers and Chet Atkins while her songs were recorded by Nancy Sinatra, Dottie West, and others. Her marriage to Eddy didn't last, however, and in 1969 she married the electrifying Waylon Jennings.
-
-
Thank you Jessi
- By Jene't on 06-28-19
By: Jessi Colter
-
Beatles '66
- The Revolutionary Year
- By: Steve Turner
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 12 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The year that changed everything for the Beatles was 1966 - the year of their last concert and of Revolver, their first album created to be listened to rather than performed. This was the year the Beatles risked their popularity by retiring from live performances, recording songs that explored alternative states of consciousness, experimenting with avant-garde ideas, and speaking their minds on issues of politics, war, and religion. Music journalist and Beatles expert Steve Turner investigates the enormous changes that took place in the Beatles' lives and work during 1966.
-
-
Great listen
- By Tad Davis on 07-28-18
By: Steve Turner
-
Go Ahead in the Rain
- Notes to A Tribe Called Quest
- By: Hanif Abdurraqib
- Narrated by: Ron Butler
- Length: 6 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The seminal rap group A Tribe Called Quest brought jazz into the genre, resurrecting timeless rhythms to create masterpieces. This narrative follows Tribe from their early days as part of the Afrocentric rap collective known as the Native Tongues, through their first three classic albums, to their eventual breakup and long hiatus. Throughout the narrative, poet and essayist Hanif Abdurraqib connects the music and cultural history to their street-level impact and draws from his own experience to reflect on how its distinctive sound resonated among fans like himself.
-
-
Beautiful
- By Joshua Lindell on 03-06-19
By: Hanif Abdurraqib
-
1965
- The Most Revolutionary Year in Music
- By: Andrew Grant Jackson
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 11 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
During 12 unforgettable months in the middle of the turbulent '60s, America saw the rise of innovative new sounds that would change popular music as we knew it. In 1965: The Most Revolutionary Year in Music, music historian Andrew Grant Jackson (Still the Greatest: The Essential Songs of The Beatles' Solo Careers) chronicles a groundbreaking year of creativity fueled by rivalries between musicians and continents, sweeping social changes, and technological breakthroughs.
-
-
Seems like a good overview
- By wylie smith on 01-12-23
-
Uncommon People
- The Rise and Fall of The Rock Stars
- By: David Hepworth
- Narrated by: Matthew Lloyd Davies
- Length: 10 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The age of the rock star, like the age of the cowboy, has passed. Like the cowboy, the idea of the rock star lives on in our imaginations. What did we see in them? Swagger. Recklessness. Sexual charisma. Damn-the-torpedoes self-belief. A certain way of carrying themselves. Good hair. Interesting shoes. Talent we wished we had. What did we want of them? To be larger than life but also like us. To live out their songs. To stay young forever. No wonder many didn't stay the course.
-
-
INSIGHTFULL!
- By CLAUDIA R KENNEDY on 02-18-18
By: David Hepworth
-
The Secret Life of the American Musical
- How Broadway Shows Are Built
- By: Jack Viertel
- Narrated by: David Pittu
- Length: 11 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For almost a century, Americans have been losing their hearts and losing their minds in an insatiable love affair with the American musical. It often begins in actors and reaches its passionate zenith when it comes time for love, marriage, and children, who will start the cycle all over again. Americans love musicals. Americans invented musicals. Americans perfected musicals. But what, exactly, is a musical?
-
-
Great review lacked music
- By joseph f mcgovern on 10-14-18
By: Jack Viertel
-
The Never-Ending Present
- The Story of Gord Downie and the Tragically Hip
- By: Michael Barclay
- Narrated by: George Stroumboulopoulos
- Length: 17 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From our talent-rich neighbor to the north comes this biography of one of the most successful Canadian rock bands, The Tragically Hip, which announced a year-long tour after sharing the news of lead singer Gord Downie’s inoperable cancer. Now available to US listeners, The Never-Ending Present details what led up to the memorable night when music fans all over the world watched Downie’s heroic final performance.
-
-
Hometown Heroes
- By Tommy Garou on 12-13-18
By: Michael Barclay
-
Facing the Music
- My Story
- By: Jennifer Knapp
- Narrated by: Jennifer Knapp
- Length: 8 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At the top of her career in the Christian music industry, Jennifer Knapp quit. A few years later, she publicly revealed she is gay. A media frenzy ensued, and many of her former fans were angry with what they saw as turning her back on God. But through it all, she held on to the truth that had guided her from the beginning. In this memoir, she finally tells her story: of her troubled childhood, the love of music that pulled her through, her dramatic conversion to Christianity, her rise to stardom, her abrupt departure from Christian contemporary music....
-
-
I'm a fan. I have a history with Jennifer Knapp.
- By Steve Lee, Sr. on 01-26-23
By: Jennifer Knapp
-
Lennon, Dylan, Alice and Jesus
- By: Greg Laurie
- Narrated by: George Newbern
- Length: 5 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Lennon, Dylan, Alice, and Jesus examines wretched excess, self-absorption and miraculous redemption; the book is a raw, sensitive, and unforgettable journey of sex, drugs, rock and roll, and sweet salvation. Author Greg Laurie traces the lives of rock stars and entertainment figures and legends who wallowed in the decadence of both the high life and low life, as they alternately experienced Heaven and Hell on Earth. He travels with them into their demonic abysses and joyfully chronicles their ultimate ascension to their prodigal moments.
-
-
I wished Greg would of narrated the book.
- By Dennis DeMeis on 06-28-22
By: Greg Laurie
-
Torment Saint
- The Life of Elliott Smith
- By: William Todd Schultz
- Narrated by: Travis Young
- Length: 13 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Elliott Smith was one of the most gifted songwriters of the 90s, adored by fans for his subtly melancholic words and melodies. The sadness had its sources in life. There was trauma from an early age, years of drug abuse, and a chronic sense of disconnection that sometimes seemed self-engineered. Smith died violently in LA in 2003, under what some believe to be questionable circumstances, of stab wounds to the chest. By this time fame had found him, and record-buyers who shared the listening experience felt he spoke directly to them from beyond: astute, damaged, lovelorn, fighting, until he could fight no more.
-
-
Almost interesting, often overwrought, poorly read
- By PerpetualGeorge on 01-27-14
What listeners say about A Broken Hallelujah
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Barbara J. Anderson
- 12-20-16
Authors should NOT read their own books
I couldn't get past the poor narration. It might have been a good book, I tried, skipped forward listened for an hour, repeated sequence... I just couldn't get past the narrator.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Joe Kraus
- 12-14-16
B-Sides and Demos
Any additional comments?
Sometimes when you’re a hardcore fan of a band or a singer, a completist, you come across the old “B-Sides and Demos” style release and just have to have it. There are usually some familiar songs in their original unproduced incarnations, a promising song that never made it onto any of the official releases, and a lot of things you tell yourself – for as long as it takes to justify the price of the album – are OK.
This book reads a lot like a B-Sides and Demos release.
On the one hand, Leibovitz has an intriguing fundamental take on Cohen. He sees him as a kind of wannabe prophet, someone pushing popular music to more authentically spiritual dimensions than anyone else. He has a number of striking readings of Cohen songs, and he adds some real depth to a few. I’ve been listening to a lot Cohen’s music in the last several weeks – more than at any other time in my life – and Leibovitz gives me a few new ways to listen to something like “Famous Blue Raincoat” as a song vacillating between an abstract philosophical inquiry and a personal, signed letter.
But…much of the rest of this feels like filler, like the demo tracks that might have sounded good at the time and now don’t feel fleshed out.
To take a representative example, we get an extended description of the Isle of Wight Music Festival. We hear about its promoter, about the anarchists resolved to overturn it, about the performers’ reactions to hostile crowds. For 20+ pages, it feels as if the book is going to talk just about the festival. And then, near the end of the section, Cohen emerges and calms the audience by talking to them. It’s a great scene, and it led me to what my favorite music books do: to track down the track described on Youtube and enjoy it in a new way.
I expect that exegesis to be emblematic of how Leibovitz sees Cohen on stage, but it turns out to be mostly anomalous. Cohen was not generally able to connect with crowds in those days. It’s a great story, but the first two-thirds feel like digression and the final third doesn’t seem to connect to the rest of the portrait Leibovitz is painting.
We get similar digressions all the time. We hear about Jewish religious practices, about the rise of punk or prog rock, about the zeitgeist of 1975 or 1984. There are places for that kind of work. Greil Marcus – widely quoted here and a clear inspiration – has a knack for doing what we might call rock criticism’s version of literary theory’s new historicism, of taking a small cultural moment and demonstrating how it reflects larger political and aesthetic tensions of its age. But Leibovbitz – as well and as insightfully as he writes in small sections – doesn’t quite have that same breadth of vision for his subject. (At least not here. I get the impression I’d enjoy spending time with this guy.)
The largest problem here, however, is that the book can’t quite decide what it wants to be. It isn’t quite a biography though we do get substantial pieces of Cohen’s life. It isn’t quite a literary analysis because it jumps from one era to another too markedly, never quite developing its core argument but applying it in repeated (if interesting) ways. And it isn’t quite a music history since we hear anecdotes of performance but no sustained description of Cohen as performer.
In the end, this works to take me back to Cohen’s music, but it seems more an invitation to return to the greatest hits – to the songs I already know – than to explore more rarities from the, sadly, now deceased master. Leibovitz has some tunes that I think could be polished and produced into hits, but they feel too much like unfinished demos for me to recommend this as highly as its best parts make me want to.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
5 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- amber
- 04-17-15
Leonard cohen book
good story. the narrators voice pronunciation of words and cadence is hard to get past.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
4 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Kindle Customer
- 12-22-16
Amazing .....Hallelujaah
I am fascinated by passion. Those amazing people are focused on their vision. This is the story of a Jewish intellectual Canadian who never fit into the time or place he lived.....but has profoundly shaped poetry and music. If you are a fan of dense and upper level vocabularies this is a rich find. It rather reminded me of wine lovers reviewing various wines. The taste, the smell etc all have a special vocabulary. I don't know it but if you listen to the wine lover you feel his passion and share the experience. This was an amazing experience...
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Dan
- 04-02-15
There is a crack
Good and interesting "story". At times, however, it goes into lengthy discussions that could be made concise leaving more space for the real story.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
4 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- J.C.D.
- 09-27-17
FACTUAL, WELL-RESEARCHED AND BORING
if nothing else, Liel Leibovitz has a catchy title for his work. He went into great detail with Leonard Cohen's poetry reminding the reader that Leonard Cohen was not just a singer or song writer, he was a gifted poet. However, the book reads like a senior thesis. I suspect it was , and after being highly praised by academics, it was turned into a book. It should come with a warning notice that iit is acceptable for reference purposes but not entertaining.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Sandra
- 07-10-14
A beautiful story about a beautiful man
What disappointed you about A Broken Hallelujah?
The reader! Why, oh why, didn't the author hire a professional reader? Even though I listened to the end, it was painful. I had to work so hard to understand his immature phrasing, and his attempts at foreign names was unintelligible.
What did you like best about this story?
The subject. I'll read anything written about Leonard Cohen.
Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Liel Leibovitz?
Joshua Pollock who read I'm Your Man is good.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
8 people found this helpful