Courtney Love covered a Leonard Cohen song and guess what — it’s not “Hallelujah”! In fact, on Wednesday night she led the latest incarnation of Hole through the lesser-known “Take This Longing”, from Cohen’s 1974 album New Skin for the Old Ceremony. Cohen wrote the tune about his failed seduction of Nico, an artist tied to Andy Warhol’s Factory scene in the ‘60s and immortalized in the classic album The Velvet Underground & Nico. A countercultural musician, linked to a famous-but-troubled artist, who burnt out in a drug-induced trainwreck…sound familiar?
“im very proud of this leonard cohen cover [sic]” Courtney tweeted, and she should be. Holding a single red rose, she delivers the dense lyrics with a nuance and poise few knew she had in her. See for yourself in the video below.
Hole’s Brixton Academy concert came on a tour promoting Nobody’s Daughter, an album CoS called “the most sincere thing the public has been given by Love since the days of Live Through This.”
