Stone Cupid Real

This music documentary film, in which I was able to participate, is playing at the Los Angeles Film Festival at the John Anson Ford Amphitheater. Though not announced anywhere, I'll be singing a song and so will Perla Batalla before the start of the film, as will Martha Wainwright..

Leonard Cohen I'm Your Man
[Mid-Length]
(2005, 104 min)
plays with A Leonard Cohen Evening

Welcome Leonard Cohen to the Ford for a rare personal appearance, as we celebrate his life and music. Martha Wainwright will perform live, followed by a screening of Lian Lunson’s Leonard Cohen I’m Your Man. More...
Sat, Jun 24, 8:00 pm
John Anson Ford Amphitheatre
$10

Plus, coming next year is an entirely different Cohen tribute show that Perla Batalla is organizing at UCLA's Royce Hall on February 24th, 2007.

James Spader's character delivers a great speech about how we've let liberties slide in this country, in defense of a young woman who evades taxes in protest of all of it. My friend Beverly Spicer sent me the following letter regarding the clip, which you can also see in WMA here at crooksandliars.com:

"...See James Spader on "Boston Legal" giving a passionate closing statement that addresses the state of our sleeping, apathetic nation. A question that comes to mind we might ask most Americans: did you take your antidepressants today? Perhaps that is why nobody seems to care very much. What else can explain it, except fear of the gulags? Too bad it's a TV show that makes my heart beat in the correct rhythm. I don't even watch that kind of TV. I hope the sheep are all watching as they lounge on their couches, but, well, baaaaaaaa, baaaaaaaa, baaaaaa - - show over, change the channel, get a bowl of ice cream, pop another zoloft, and go to bed."

xoxo

Beverly

I made a little movie and wanted you to see it. I asked my friend Hal if I could use his music, called "Sundust", which was on the Frisell record, and he said ok. And other people involved said ok, too.

How did we let this happen? From the imagined voices near ground zero to the flag-draped coffins, what would the dead tell us, if they could speak, about where we're going?

Here's another link.
Now, if you download and save or share this thing, there are some ground rules on this page, meaning you gotta be cool and not do it for money.

Review of the Show From the Sydney Morning Herald.....
with my boldface in your face! It was such an honor working with everyone again on this great music, and an Australian woman named Lian is making a documentary film on Leonard for which some of the concert, rehearsals and interviews with artists was filmed. Scotty has beamed most of me back, but some is still on Cloud Nine....
Came So Far For Beauty
By Bernard Zuel
January 31, 2005

Page Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House, January 28

In Leonard Cohen's 1973 song A Singer Must Die, presenting himself
before a panel of stern judges he declares: "I'm sorry for smudging the
air with my song." Some smudge. Some song.

That smudge's lasting imprint on several generations of singers and
fellow songwriters is the subtext of what simplistically would be
called a tribute show but in effect was a celebration of song. Spread
across nearly four hours it was as strong on interpretation as it was
light on unnecessary reverence; as steeped in Jacques Brel and country
music as German cabaret and folk; as joyous as it was moving.

You could see that with a cocked-hip Jarvis Cocker wholly inhabiting
Death of a Ladies Man (in duet with Beth Orton) and bringing a
self-mocking playboy touch to I Can't Forget. And certainly it was
there in Nick Cave, who made us re-evaluate one of Cohen's more
contentious songs, Diamonds In The Mine - "a nasty Leonard Cohen song"
he cheerfully declared - by playing up some Vegas sleaze while the
always impressive and flexible backing group briefly turned into Elvis
Presley's TCB band.

Not that the evening's stars were only the best-known faces. The
Handsome Family took and gave great delight by relocating A Heart With
No Companion to the Kentucky hills, while Teddy Thompson (whose mother
Linda Thompson earlier had hushed the room with The Story of Isaac)
found a bruised centre to lines such as "I choose the rooms that I live
in with care/the windows are small and the walls almost bare".

And in the category of "where the hell has he been hiding?" was the
hulking, shambling figure of New York singer Antony, who left open
mouths on and off the stage with his heart-piercing explorations of The
Guests and the prayer-like If It Be Your Will. (He's playing tonight at
the Vanguard and must be seen.)

What was staggering was how each time you thought the night had just had its peak someone else would stroll on stage and give you another one. And then another. For example, Rufus Wainwright's version of Hallelujah, which escaped from the shadow of Jeff Buckley's seemingly definitive interpretation with an elegant but effortlessly transporting take, is the kind of song that would climax any regular show, but here was presented early in the first set. Three songs later a former Cohen backing vocalist, Julie Christiansen, beautifully balanced The Singer Must Die between pathos and humour and upped the ante again.

Martha Wainwright's bared-to-the-bone Tower of Song was matched by her
appearance with her mother and aunt, Kate and Anna McGarrigle, on a
spare but riveting You Know Who I Am. But soon after that came Perla
Batalla, the other of Cohen's long-term backing vocalists, delivering a
rich, passionate exploration of Bird On a Wire.

It was a wondrous night. A long, winding, rich and constantly rewarding
evening brought to us by the musical equivalent of a fantasy football
team whose dedication was to the work and not the ego.

Somewhere in California you imagine the droll Mr Cohen hearing this and
saying to them, "I thank you, I thank you for doing your duty/you
keepers of truth, you guardians of beauty".

Following are some of the agencies accepting contributions
for aid to people affected by the earthquake and tsunami in
Asia.

OXFAM AMERICA
Donor Services Department
26 West Street
Boston, MA
12111-1206
800-77-OXFAM


DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS
P.O. Box 1856
Merrifield, Va.
22116-8056
888-392-0392


INTERNATIONAL FEDERATION OF RED CROSS/RED CRESCENT


INTERNATIONAL MEDICAL CORPS
Earthquake/Tsunami Relief
1919 Santa Monica Boulevard,
Suite 300
Santa Monica, Calif. 90404
800-481-4462

ACTION AGAINST HUNGER
247 West 37th Street, Suite 1201
New York, N.Y. 10018
212-967-7800 x108

AMERICAN FRIENDS SERVICE COMMITTEE
AFSC Crisis Fund
1501 Cherry Street
Philadelphia, Pa. 19102
215-241-7000

ISLAMIC RELIEF USA
Southeast Asia Earthquake Emergency
P.O. Box 6098
Burbank, Calif. 91510
888-479-4968

AMERICAN JEWISH WORLD SERVICE
45 West 36th Street, 10th Floor
New York, N.Y. 10018
800-889-7146

DIRECT RELIEF INTERNATIONAL
27 South La Patera Lane
Santa Barbara, Calif. 93117
805-964-4767

MERCY CORPS
Southeast Asia Earthquake Response
Dept. W
P.O. Box 2669
Portland, Ore. 97208
800-852-2100

INTERNATIONAL ORTHODOX CHRISTIAN
CHARITIES
Asia Disaster Response
P.O. Box 630225
Baltimore, MD 21263-0225
877-803-4622

OPERATION USA
8320 Melrose Avenue, Suite 200
Los Angles,
Calif. 90069
800-678-7255

SAVE THE CHILDREN
Asia Earthquake/Tidal Wave Relief Fund
54 Wilton Road
Westport, Conn. 06880
800-728-3843

( I checked the gushy corporate donor page against "choosetheblue.org"
and it looks to be as much blue as red. Let's hope the corporate
partners give a lot, too...)
I actually went to the web pages of all the charities listed in the New
York Times and left off some that looked too partisan, and American Red
Cross and a couple others that have been in the news as being shady.
If you'd care to see that full list, you can go here:
NEW YORK TIMES

Have a safe and strong new year.