Surprisingly, time-critical, as

On his previous album "Old Ideas" Leonard Cohen presented his inner worlds, a partly melancholic, partly humorous balance of his life, something that might have been expected of a late seventies thoroughly. All the more surprising are the songs on the new album "Popular problem". The 80-year-old Cohen is from a completely different side. He thinks about the 21st century, tells of (civil) wars, the suffering of those affected and the indifference of those who know this suffering only from the media. It all starts very slowly, with a Blues, a song in praise of the slowness ("Slow"), which threatens to be forgotten in our fast time: "I always liked it slow / I never liked it almost / With you it's got to go: / With me it's got to last ". And anyway, if you approach it slowly, you get more out of life and love.

As early as the second song ("Almost Like the Blues") is the cruel reality of the sound. Cohen sings to funky rhythms on the atrocities that we see every day in the media ("I saw some people starving / There was murder, there what rape / Their villages were burning / theywere trying to escape") and the fact that we are trying , they do not get too zoom allow us because we could not bear.

"Samson in New Orleans" leads us to the survivors of a natural disaster. Shortly after the disaster aid is promised, then comes oblivion: the media and politics call other hot spots and sensations to. The survivors will be left in the lurch. Cohen makes in this ballad, probably the saddest song on the album, one of the forgotten tragedy of New Orleans to speak and desperately-angry questions: "And we who cried for mercy / From the bottom of the pit / What our prayer so / damn unworthy / The Son rejected it? "

The next song ("A Street") leads us to a traumatized, the war in a (civil) has lost a loved one. What remains is the memory of better times, hopelessness and disorientation. A poignant symbol of a street corner, at the passes no more road, the past is no longer available and there is no way in our common future: "The Party's Over / But I've landed on my feet / I'll be standing on This Corner / Where there used to be a street. " Cohen sings not, he recites the text ("A Street" was published several years ago as a poem: [...]) to the music, creating thus an atmosphere that long since ceased to fascinate listeners.

"Nevermind," Song number seven on the album is recited rhythmically in a similar manner. This text was published as a poem ("Book of Longing"). The protagonist has a war lost everything, family, home, identity. By losing everything is wiped out, nothing remains. The stories about the war will tell the winner, the story of the vanquished is forgotten ("There is no need / That this survive / There's truth did live performance / and Truth did so").

"Did I Ever Love You", Cohen asks in another song. It is unclear whether these words are addressed to a woman or God, as so often in Cohens songs. The charm associated with this piece from the contrast between Cohen's voice, which reflects in a slow ballad melancholic about a relationship and deposited the backing vocals, the key passages from the text with a quick, cheerful Country melody.

"My Oh My" is a simple, beautiful love song. A Blues, which manages with a few words: "Was not hard to love you / Did not have to try / hero you for a little while / My Oh My Oh My".

"Born in Chains", a gospel song says, inspired by the biblical story of the Exodus from Egypt, the story of a search for meaning, a liberation of the soul from slavery, from the darkness through the love of God.

And what conclusions does Leonard Cohen from all this? - That despite the darkness and suffering continue to sing and needs. "You got me singing / Even though the world is gone / You got me thinking / I'd like to carry to carry on / You got me singing / Even tho 'it all looks grim / You got me singing / The Hallelujah hymn" ,

CONCLUSIONS: Popular problem is a musically versatile album that plays with different styles. The lyrics Leonard Cohen proves that he is an empathetic and critical observer of current affairs and human abysses.