Adam Cohen is following in his father's footsteps. For a change.
After more than a decade of running from pa Leonard's musical legacy, the onetime frontman of rockers Low Millions has pulled a 180º and embraced his folk-poet heritage on his latest album.
"It's not that I wasn't aware of how great he was or what a profound influence he had on my life," insists the 39-year-old Cohen from his Los Angeles home. "It's just that I was busy toiling away on the side, trying to cobble together my own career and my own voice. But I ended up going too far off the family farm.
"I think it was a combination of eagerness, ambition and arrogance. I was a young man with avarice and an appetite for glamour and success. I won't go so far as to say it was blind ambition, because I did put in a tremendous amount of work. My problem was that I was a victim of aesthetic choices that were not honouring my legacy."
With Cohen's fourth album Like a Man, he has come back home. A collection of smoky acoustic-guitar ballads about all the girls he's loved before — and some he wants to — it could easily be called Like a Ladies Man. Or perhaps Like Father, Like Son. Before hitting Toronto for the first of several Canadian shows — and the morning after a "very civilized domestic evening that just happened to involve tequila" — the slow-talking but thoughtful singer-songwriter weighed in on changing his tune, avoiding the fedora and playing doctor.
By spending years trying not to be defined by your father's work, weren't you being defined by it anyway? It seems sort of ironic.
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Absolutely. Maybe the most common question I get is, 'Is being the son of Leonard Cohen a blessing or a curse?' I can't go as far as to pronounce that any part of it has been a curse; the good outweighs the bad by too much. But there have definitely been challenges and difficulties. And one of them has been the exploration of my own identity.
A lot of people probably assume you had an easier career path because of your father. I suspect the truth is much different.
Thank you for your empathy. But I really can't and refuse to complain about my lot. I really do see myself as privileged and fortunate. I've had a master lean over my work and say, 'Hey, you should put that in present tense instead of past tense; it will be a more powerful image.' That's a tremendous privilege. So there have been benefits.
After so many years of avoiding it, what made you change your mind?
I'd honestly given up on the music business, thanks to a combination of failures and a loss of appetite. Then two things happened: One, my father's resurgence and triumphant return to the stage had me relive a bit of my past. And two, I was launched into fatherhood, which just linked me to this notion of belonging to a family business. As I speak to you, I'm in my underwear and a T-shirt at the kitchen table, where I found my father almost every morning with an acoustic guitar. I know the profound effect that had on me. Now I see my four-year-old son catching me at my kitchen table with an acoustic guitar. I know my kid is going to consult my work one day the way I consulted my father's. And I want to be able to say that my son will not think I sucked.
Are these songs new, or have they been accumulating over the years.
They've been around a while. These songs are like Chilean coal miners I left in a deep and dark place for too long. The first song on the record, I wrote in college 20 years ago. It may be the oldest song I have. And it's a perfect example of the folly of my choices, because my father has been asking me when I was going to record these songs for years.
But it's still kind of a no-win situation for you, isn't it?
I understand the swift and unforgiving judgment levied on me, based on being too much like or not enough like my father. I can't control that. And it's nothing new. But for the first time, I couldn't be prouder of what I've achieved. There's a part of me that feels like I've acquitted myself or exonerated myself of my past and my prior inability to carve out an honourable path for myself. But I don't see this as the end; I see this as the beginning. I won't be trying to wear a fedora and a suit. I'm just assuming a central role in the family business. I have the keys to the store now.
Do you ever regret being a musician?
I do sometimes wish I'd been more vigourously deterred from going into music, and not as enthusiastically encouraged.
Given that, how strenuously do you encourage or discourage your son from music?
Well, I've thought about coming home with a stethoscope around my neck. But I haven't reached the point where my heart feels good enough to act upon that scam. So he already knows that Daddy makes music. I think the virus has already been passed. And it sure is powerful and seductive. So there's nothing I can do except be as good at what I do as possible to honour the family name, both for what's come before me and what's come after.
Adam Cohen's Canadian tour:
Oct. 1 | Toronto | Massey Hall
Oct. 2 | London | Music Club
Oct. 3 & 4 | Toronto | Drake
Oct. 5 | Montreal | Upstairs Jazz
Oct. 6 | Ottawa | Zaphod's
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