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jessferg 's review for:
"There's a blaze of light in every word; it doesn't matter which you heard; the holy or the broken Hallelujah." Cohen's own words seem to pre-ordain the course of his now ubiquitous song, "Hallelujah."
I take issue with other reviewer's complaints that this book should have been a magazine article(a complaint I make a lot!). Light covers a lot of ground glancing off changes in the music industry, the joys and agony of musicianship, an extensive and multi-faceted interpretation of the lyrics of the song at the focus of the book, and also creates a kind of sociological study of the archetype the song has become.
That said, it is rather large print - once I really sat down with it, I blew through it's "231" pages in about four hours. Nonetheless, it is a well-written book and it is fascinating to find one interpretation so close to how I, as a lover of the song, interpret it only to find the next interpretation so far out of my realm and yet find ALL of the interpretations (mostly) acceptable.
The "Selected Hallelujah Discography" with a list of versions discussed in the book is hugely helpful and I give Light credit for calling Bono's version "just awful." Even Bono knows it is, but it still takes some balls to call it out, particularly when Light is quite kind to everyone else - even other not-so-worthy versions.
There are also QR codes (Does anyone really use those things? Are they even still a thing?) linking to live videos of versions discussed and the book is fully indexed.
I take issue with other reviewer's complaints that this book should have been a magazine article(a complaint I make a lot!). Light covers a lot of ground glancing off changes in the music industry, the joys and agony of musicianship, an extensive and multi-faceted interpretation of the lyrics of the song at the focus of the book, and also creates a kind of sociological study of the archetype the song has become.
That said, it is rather large print - once I really sat down with it, I blew through it's "231" pages in about four hours. Nonetheless, it is a well-written book and it is fascinating to find one interpretation so close to how I, as a lover of the song, interpret it only to find the next interpretation so far out of my realm and yet find ALL of the interpretations (mostly) acceptable.
The "Selected Hallelujah Discography" with a list of versions discussed in the book is hugely helpful and I give Light credit for calling Bono's version "just awful." Even Bono knows it is, but it still takes some balls to call it out, particularly when Light is quite kind to everyone else - even other not-so-worthy versions.
There are also QR codes (Does anyone really use those things? Are they even still a thing?) linking to live videos of versions discussed and the book is fully indexed.