Julie Cohen

Live BBC recordings from 1968.

Julie Christensen’s story is woven into decades of Roots Music. A veteran of Leonard Cohen’s bands, she co-fronts post- punk rockers Divine Horsemen, which rebooted to release new work in 2021. While the pandemic was still going on, Julie moved from Nashville to NM and began the 2+ year process of recording "The Price We Pay for Love," out 4/14/2023 on WireBird Records.

Although she enjoyed stardom and an enduring multi-decade career in the U.K., folk singer Julie Felix never achieved widespread recognition in her native United States. After immigrating to England in the mid-'60s, the Californian was able to capitalize on the country's sudden post-Dylan appetite for American folk music and subsequently became the first solo folk artist to sign a major-label deal there. During her late-'60s peak, Felix's career in England was booming; she had scored a number of hits, sold out Royal Albert Hall, and hosted a popular variety television show. Her popularity continued into the early '70s, after which she spent a period living and recording in Norway – where she also had several hits – before returning to California and focusing on humanitarian issues.

Canadian singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen was born in 1934. An early writer and guitarist, Cohen began to compose and release folk-rock and pop songs by the mid-1960s. One of his most famous compositions is "Hallelujah," a song released on 1984's Various Positions. Cohen was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008, and he received a Grammy Award for lifetime achievement in 2010. Cohen died in 2016 at the age of 82. In 1968, Cohen recorded a live concert for radio broadcast that comprises this album. These well-preserved sessions from 1968 offer a fly-on-the-wall experience to witness a young Cohen singing practically the entire first album. The voice is fresh and deep, pushing the songs outside the Tin Pan Alley perimeter, and delving into poetry with a richness of words and subject. Today, they still have that raw appeal of a young artist at the peak of his powers.