Leonard Cohen - Live In London (Music DVD)

The prospect of watching a 73-year-old man who has hit the road after a trusted advisor ran off with his life savings entertain a crowd of 20,000 in order to regain his nest egg may sound a little dire, but Leonard Cohen is hardly your average senior citizen drawn out of retirement, and Live in London -- shot during a July 17, 2008, concert at London's O2 Arena -- demonstrates that whatever the circumstances that caused Cohen to launch his 2008-2009 world tour, he's responded with some of the most passionate and moving performances of his life. Cohen did indeed agree to tour for the first time in over a decade thanks to an unfortunate case of embezzlement, but by the time he got to London, it's clear that he'd once again fallen in love with performing, and there's a joy and excitement that radiates from his face and informs every movement of his body. Though Cohen may not be the most athletic performer on the stage these days, he has both the presence and the gravitas to draw in an audience, and he clearly has the crowd in the palm of his hand throughout. Cohen and his musical director, Roscoe Beck, assembled a first-rate backing ensemble for this tour, and watching Cohen interact with them is half the fun of this disc; he often sings directly to Javier Mas as he plays the banduria or the laud, he has fun playing off of his vocal trio (longtime collaborator Sharon Robinson joined by Charley Webb and Hattie Webb), and he gives richly earned shout-outs to all his bandmembers throughout the evening. The set list offers a well-balanced cross section of material from Cohen's nearly four decades as a recording artist, and the camera work is clear and subtle enough to capture the mood of the concert without calling attention to itself, while the audio (presented in both PCM Stereo and Dolby Digital 5.1) is excellent. For some fans, Live in London could seem like a "next best thing to being there" substitute for seeing Leonard Cohen on his U.S. tour (launched a few weeks after this release), but it's also good enough to prompt a few fans to catch the great songwriter in action if he's performing with this much skill and enthusiasm. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi