At last a proper presentation of the works!

So far, Leonard Cohen was treated fairly neglected by his record label CBS / Columbia; the first generation CD sound gruesome, and even before the LPs witnessed all too often the infamous thin, distorted sound CBS. 2007 finally the remastering of the first three albums, then again intermission. Until now. I have long wondered whether I should invest the money for music that I already twice own - well out of the experience that Remasters not always better, but unfortunately in recent years often even worse than the "untreated" recordings (keyword: Loundness War) sound.

To those who are still hesitating, I can now say with allerbestem conscience that the remastering of Mark Wilder is excellent. Even more: some albums cover only now to identify hidden subtleties. One of my favorite albums of LC, "New Skin for the Old Ceremony", I know really by heart, but the new edition has details of superfine arrangements brought to light that I had never heard before (and that on the system, do not have a headphones). That made me really speechless. Overall, of course, the bass is also something more than it used to, at the time the original recordings, was common, but also voice and other instruments get more simple contour and presence, without that seems to have been highly compressed here. According to Simon & Garfunkel remasters of Irwin / Anesini I consider this LC box for one of the best editions. Others have said it before, I repeat briefly: A text addition would have been self-evident.

Because: Leonard Cohen is in the history of popular music without example. He is truly a poet of stature, probably even Dylan comes close to the only in its best moments. His dark verses of Religion & Sex, Love & Death, Lust & Pain turn out in the end mostly as a mythology of failure, his heroes are "Beautiful Losers" (as one of his novels is called), captains whose ships were never built. In popular art one has looked more deeply into the mystery of life as Leonard Cohen. To compare you have to go in the league of the great literature.