Leonard Cohen, the established poet, chose exactly the right time to descend from Canada, guitar in tow, and steal the hearts of America's English Lit. majors. Pete Seeger was a bit too old, Joan Baez was busy releasing Christmas tunes and Bob Dylan covers, and Dylan himself had these hipsters spitting up their Greenwich Village coffee over his country leanings and increasingly unliterary lyrics (not to mention that whole electric guitar thing). So, at a time when singer/songwriters were as plentiful as pot, down came the Canadian writer with perhaps the decade's greatest singer/songwriter debut, 1968's Songs of Leonard Cohen. He was wry. He was literary. He was It.

If you know anything about the 1965 Newport Folk Festival, then you know that the '60s folk community, like the indie rock community of the '90s, was a righteous, selfish child. But Cohen didn't disappoint his fans, releasing two more brilliant, spare collections over the next three years. This period, however, would be his creative, critical and popular peak. By the time he returned with his last classic album, 1974's New Skin for Old Ceremony, the pigeon intelligentsia were too busy applauding Baez and Dylan's return to form, as well as hailing the new breed of singer/songwriters, to raise dust about Cohen's use of more sophisticated arrangements. He was still wry. He was still literary. But he was no longer It.

Three more years would pass before his next album-- hardly a prolific pace, especially for those demanding folkies. A collaboration with the reclusive Phil Spector, 1977's Death of a Ladies' Man had the potential to be the defibrillator for Cohen's career, but Spector's suffocating Wall of Sound rendered the project a failure; even die-hard fans, of which Cohen had many, found the album disconcerting. Thus, 1979's Recent Songs was received with perhaps over-exuberant praise from fans and critics alike; the album was considered a return to his earlier sound, albeit with a handful of supporting musicians, including the jazz-rock fusion group Passenger and the backup vocals of Jennifer Warnes and Sharon Robinson. Later that year, Leonard Cohen took the same studio lineup on tour in support of Recent Songs.

Field Commander Cohen: Tour of 1979, was compiled from three consecutive December shows at London's Hammersmith Odean, and another show a week later at the Dome Theatre in Brighton, England. Surprisingly, only four of the twelve tracks here are from the uneven Recent Songs, and they're among that album's strongest moments. Less surprising is how faithful they are to the studio versions, given the identical musical lineup for the album and tour alike. Thus, "The Window," "The Gypsy's Wife," and "The Guests" all feature the exceptional violinist Raffi Hakopian, the shimmering, gypsy-ish fingerpicking of John Bilezikjian (oud, mandolin), Roscoe Beck's deft work on the fretless bass, and either the two female vocalists or an uncredited male vocalist who provide a pleasant vocal compliment to Cohen's monotonous baritone. Unfortunately, "The Smokey Life" also sticks to the blueprint, retaining the dated keyboards that marred the studio version-- and without any of the aforementioned accompaniment to conceal it.

There are a few other missteps. For instance, the one cut from Death of a Ladies' Man, "Memories," is infinitely more grating than the studio version. Forgoing any sense of tact, Cohen gives the song a full doo-wop makeover, coating the song-- a sexual fantasy set at a grade-school dance-- with irony. Another rare low comes near the end with "Bird on the Wire," which isn't served well by the band: the strings from the original are noticeably absent, and the song's subtleties are ruined by more dated keyboards, as well as an unfortunate electric guitar solo.

But the highlights make these moments easy to forget. "Hey, That's No Way to Say Goodbye," from Cohen's debut, contains some stunning accompaniment, none of which is obtrusive. Here, as on "The Stranger Song"-- also from his debut-- it becomes apparent that Cohen's baritone, which is served well by an auditorium, had deepened over the past dozen years and is in peak form. The closer, "So Long, Marianne," also works with plentiful accompaniment, making the song's rejoicing chorus, "So long, Marianne/ It's time we began to laugh and cry and cry and laugh about it all again," even more elating. The two tracks from New Skin are also standouts; "Lover, Lover, Lover" contains an exceptional oud solo from Bilezikjian, and "Why Don't You Try" is far superior to the album version, with a noteworthy sax solo and jazzy vocal repetition from the backup.

But the finest moment on Field Commander Cohen-- one that makes the whole album worthwhile-- is the title track. Like all the other performances here, one never feels claustrophobic, as is sometimes the case with his studio efforts. Instead of just the guitar and strings of the original, this version also offers a marching drumbeat and trumpeting synthesizers that deepen the song's motif and increase its almost unbearable momentum. Of course, it would be hard to ruin a song with one of the most spine-tingling opening verses ever written. But I won't quote the verse here, if only to urge you to experience it as you first should: in song.

-Ryan Kearney