The Press gush over Leonard Cohen as the best singer songwriter /poet but is he?

With Cohen touring we are getting lots of newspaper inches about how wonderful he is.

Nice to see the accolades but please ladies and gentlemen, let’s put it in perspective.

The Guardian called Cohen “arguably the greatest singer-songwriter of modern times”. I guess the key word is “arguably” in the phrase.

The line is fluff from his official webpage.

Cohen is the child of Bob Dylan who clearly holds the title of greatest singer songwriter.

Dylan created the modern poet singer songwriter and keeps creating at over 800 songs. Most modern singer songwriters credit Dylan as a main influence. He even influenced the Beatles.

On hearing Dylan, Cohen is reported to have said – “if he can do that so can I.”

What about Paul McCartney and then the duo Lennon/McCartney? Then there’s Tom Waite and Paul Simon and a host of others.

Here’s the BBC poll on Dylan’s 60th birthday of top singer songwriters.

Bob Dylan: 32.65%
John Lennon: 18.83%
Bob Marley: 13.64%
Paul McCartney: 8.47%
Paul Simon: 6.73%
Cole Porter: 5.63%
Jim Morrison: 4.44%
Eminem: 3.50%
Joni Mitchell: 3.47%
Irving Berlin: 2.64%

Cohen doesn’t make that list but he is 6th on the Paste Top 10

The Top 10

10. Prince
9. Joni Mitchell
8. Elvis Costello
7. Brian Wilson (The Beach Boys)
6. Leonard Cohen
5. Paul McCartney (The Beatles, Wings)
4. Tom Waits & Kathleen Brennan
3. Bruce Springsteen
2. Neil Young (Buffalo Sprinfield, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young)
1. Bob Dylan

I like Leonard Cohen and his concerts are wonderful. But he is not the world’s best songwriter.