The long and winding road to a new classic
How it took multiple people and over a decade to make a classic song
In the recent Beatles documentary series, there’s a point in the first episode where Paul McCartney literally forces a song to be created.
While waiting for John to arrive, Paul starts playing his bass while George and Ringo look on and creates a song by just playing until something hits him and then he starts down the path to follow it. By the time John arrives, Paul, George and Ringo are already playing what would come to be “Get Back”. The song gets tweaked over the next week or so and 3 weeks later, they’re playing the full song on the rooftop.
Not every song comes together that quickly. Stevie Nicks famously wrote “Dreams” in 10 minutes. It took longer for her and Lindsay Buckingham to figure out how to flesh it out into the song we remember.
But what about songs that went the other way. Songs that took years and multiple people working on it to be discovered. This is the route that “Hallelujah” took.
Leonard Cohen was a Canadian poet/novelist who decided to transition to making music in his 30s. His first big break was when Judy Collins recorded his poem/song “Suzanne”. He had a very productive 1970s with several albums released. He was never a big seller, but his albums were always well reviewed. He took some time off in the early 1980s to work on a rock musical movie. Then he decided to release his next album Various Positions in 1984. The album included the song “Hallelujah”, which Cohen admitted he had been working on for close to for four years. His US recording company refused to release the album and Cohen had to scramble to find someone else to release the album. The original Rolling Stone review is generally positive to the album, but the future classic “Hallelujah” was never mentioned. Neither was it mentioned in the AllMusic review. The “Hallelujah” on the album was different song than what it became.
And for most songs, that would have been it. Fading into history and never heard from again. But Cohen, knew that the song wasn’t right yet. On tours, he kept playing with the tempo and the lyrics, but he knew something still wasn’t right.
John Cale was a Welsh musician who had been a viola prodigy. After moving to New York in the early 1960s, he helped start the legendary rock/punk/art band The Velvet Underground. After leaving the band he released some solo work and was a well regarded producer, having produced albums for The Stooges, Jennifer Warnes, Modern Lovers, Squeeze and Patti Smith (among others). In 1991, legendary musician/producer John Cale was asked to contribute to a Leonard Cohen tribute album. Cale had heard something that interested him in “Hallelujah” when he was at a Cohen concert. He contacted Cohen, who faxed over the lyrics (depending on sources it could be 15 verses of lyrics or 15 pages of lyrics). Cale realized that the lyrics were too much and picked his five favorite verses. And then he decided to simplify the production. This is the version of “Hallelujah” that we are familiar with.
And again, “Hallelujah” was ignored in reviews and the album didn’t sell that well. Once again, the future classic was ignored.
Jeff Buckley was the son of Jazz musician Tim Buckley. But he grew up only with his mother and step father. It was a musical family and he tried to make a career in music. In early 1991, Buckley was invited to sing at a tribute concert of his father’s music, where he sang a song his father had written about him. He made some friends and found a writing partner. This partnership led him to get a record deal and he went to Woodstock to record his first album, Grace, in 1994. When looking for songs for the album, Buckley remembered when he had house sat for a friend who had a copy of the Leonard Cohen tribute album. He fell in love with the song “Hallelujah” and decided to record it for the album.
The album got mediocre review in Rolling Stone and good review in AllMusic. But the only mention of the song was in Rolling Stone review:
He doesn’t sound battered or desperate enough to carry off Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah.”
The album was well loved by other musicians, but it didn’t sell that well initially. So after touring, Buckley got to work in 1996 to record his second album. Tragically he died during the recording. His death brought some attention to his cover of “Hallelujah”.
Everything changed in 2001. First the Dreamworks movie Shrek became a surprise hit. While searching for music, the producers remembered John Cale’s cover of Hallelujah and decided that it would fit in perfectly after Shrek and Donkey fight.
After 9/11, VH1 started playing an hourly tribute to first responders and someone remembered the Jeff Buckley version of “Hallelujah”. Between Shrek and the 9/11 tribute, all of a sudden, 20 years after Leonard Cohen started writing the song, “Hallelujah” became a hit. It has since been covered hundreds of times and has been named to several greatest songs lists.
All it took to make a successful song was three people and 20 years. So if you are worried that your idea isn’t catching on, maybe it just needs some help and some time. Look for other people to give input on it. Look for ways to make sure people hear it and get a chance to see the best version of it. Not every song can be written in 10 minutes.