Like Felix Mendelssohn and a handful of other Big Names, Leonard Cohen never made it to Bonalbo.
That’s his loss. He’ll never get to see the Hidden Mural, the Bronze Dog or two consecutive kangaroos hurtling along the footpath on Woodenbong Road, taking a corner too fast and spinning out on a big patch of wet jacaranda flowers (boy, were they embarrassed – they knew I’d seen them).
But say after he took Manhattan, Len did head down here looking for new birds on different wires.
He’d have probably been greeted with accordions, ukuleles, a lone piper, speeches, commemorative trucker’s caps and requests, nay, demands, to sing Hallelujah.
And he would, I’m sure, have chuckled (in a nice, quiet, Canadian way) to himself before calling for a guitar and commencing the singalong.
That song, that bloody song, has been dragged out for weddings, funerals, church consecrations, shopping mall openings, sad ogre-ings, and for all I know, public stonings.
But have you checked out the lyrics?
It’s a funny song. It’s a rude song. It’s not a song of celebration, it’s not a song about death, and it sure as hell ain’t a religious song. Granted, there are biblical allusions, yeah, like the total inappropriate-ism of a king perving on a woman bathing. Hallelujah?
Then there’s this bit. I quote it without comment, except to say that you all know what’s going on, don’t you?
There was a time you let me know
What’s really going on below
But now you never show it to me, do you?
And I remember when I moved in you
And the holy dove she was moving too
And every single breath we drew was Hallelujah
Well, now that we’ve all fluttered our hankies and allowed the flushes to pass, I think we can all agree that Hallelujah has been taken way, way out of context.
Does that matter? I don’t know.
Post-Modernists say that it doesn’t matter what the writer, painter, architect or whoever, said, did or made, the real meaning is what the beholder makes of it.
Take that to its logical conclusion and it would then be legit for someone to read Huckleberry Finn then declare, “Yes! I’m gonna buy me a slave, or two!”
Or maybe after hearing Dylan sing Blowin’ in the Wind it’d make perfect sense to declare that Bob wanted us to nuke up for WW3.
I mean, it’s obvious that Achy Breaky Heart is a love song to L. Ron Hubbard, isn’t it?
But, I’ll tell you what is obvious: whoever wrote The Little Drummer Boy was a nut. Completely mad.
Picture the scene, if you will. Very pregnant woman. Doesn’t know when she’s due, because IT never happened. Long donkey ride. Those little buggers are rough as. Sooner saddle up a jackhammer. Freezing cold.
Joe stuffed up the BnB booking and ‘Mine Host’ was a prize bastard, so you do 16 hours of silent labour in a bulk feed bin surrounded by stinking livestock and leering shepherds.
Three foreign New Age toffs on camels photobomb your first baby snaps.
All you want is sleep. Pain relief, peace and bloody quiet, and some sleep. A month should just about do it.
And then that kid turns up! Banging that friggin’ drum! That friggin’ drum! Rum pum pum! Are you kidding? Aaaargh! Aaaargh! Joe! Joe! Kill him! Kill him now! Kill him to death! Or I will! Jeeeezus Christ!
A lesson to us all.
Bullgoose
and then