Live Songs

Live Songs was the Canadian singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen's fourth album, released during the three-year silence between Songs of Love and Hate and New Skin for the Old Ceremony. It is a compilation of live recordings, performed mostly in Europe in 1970 and 1972. Cohen is backed by a medium-sized, country-influenced group, which includes guitarist/fiddler Charlie Daniels and vocalist "Jennifer Warren", who would soon become famous as Jennifer Warnes, among other things a popular interpreter of Cohen's songs.

The album consists mostly of reinterpretations (often with additional or significantly altered lyrics) of songs from Cohen's second album, Songs From a Room ("Nancy" is a version of "Seems So Long Ago, Nancy", and "Improvisation" is an extended instrumental guitar trio version of the vamp from "You Know Who I Am", which is also featured). Neither Songs of Leonard Cohen nor the then-recent Songs of Love and Hate (which featured a live track, "Let's Sing Another Song, Boys", culled from the same tour as the 1970 recordings here) are represented. The other tracks are a cover of the folk standard "Passing Through", and two new compositions: "Please Don't Pass Me By (A Disgrace)" (a thirteen-minute singalong recorded in 1970) and "Minute Prologue". A "bonus" track, "Queen Victoria", was recorded by Cohen alone in his Tennessee hotel room in 1972.

At the beginning of a Paris, France performance of "Bird on the Wire", Cohen recites the first verse of a French translation of the song's lyric.

Track listing

• All songs written by Leonard Cohen except "Passing Through" (by Dick Blakeslee, arranged by Cohen).
• All recorded in 1972 except "Please Don't Pass Me By (A Disgrace)" and "Tonight Will Be Fine" in 1970. Location of recording in parentheses.

Side 1 (Recorded in 1972)

1. "Minute Prologue" – 1:12 (London)
2. "Passing Through" – 4:05 (London)
3. "You Know Who I Am" – 5:22 (Brussels)
4. "Bird on the Wire" – 4:27 (Paris)
5. "Nancy" – 3:48 (London)
6. "Improvisation" – 3:17 (Paris)

Side 2 (Recorded in 1970 and 1972)

1. "Story of Isaac" – 3:56 (Berlin)
2. "Please Don't Pass Me By (A Disgrace)" – 13:00 (London)
3. "Tonight Will Be Fine" – 6:06 (Isle of Wight)
4. "Queen Victoria" – 3:28 (Tennessee)