Adam Cohen is a snappy dresser. The singer/songwriter (and son of Leonard Cohen) just finished a photo shoot for Elle Canada and recently did one for another fashion-oriented magazine, Dressed to Kill, which is based in his hometown of Montreal.
“I enjoy fine clothes, I have to admit,” he says.
So he’s not a jeans and T-shirt guy?
“I can be,” he says, “but I definitely gravitate to fine things: fine meals and clothing, fine shapes and sounds.”
Cohen’s love of finery seems a last vestige of vanity as he admits that his new record, “Like a Man,” is the result of a chastening emotional low. “Like A Man” follows three albums, including one with his band Low Millions, that left Cohen feeling only failure.
“I was disillusioned to the point that I was about to abandon the business right before this record,” he says. “I thought I was over. I felt that I had been given chance after chance, and record deal after record deal, and I’d blown it.”
That admission, however, pushed Cohen toward a new place and a new attitude.
“Whereas before, my records were filled with anguish, anxiety, insecurity and self-doubt, and had cost a fortune and ended up sounding eager and expensive, this one was to the contrary,” he reveals. “It was joyous, vulnerable and real. That explains why it’s the coming out party it is for me.”
The dads connection
Cohen calls his summer touring mate Rufus Wainwright his “good friend” and “brother-in-law.” (Cohen’s sister is the mother of Wainwright’s daughter).
However, Cohen advises that personal comparisons of these sons of famous musical fathers (Rufus’ dad is Loudon Wainwright III) are spurious: “There’s a misconception that anyone who has parents in the same business shares the entire palette. The truth is that Rufus’ relationship with his parents, or Sean Lennon’s relationship with his parents, etc., etc., are all different. And so is mine. There’s a misnomer that we’re all linked in permanent perfect symmetry. We’re actually not.”
If you go
Rufus Wainwright
With Adam Cohen and Ingrid Michaelson
Sunday, 7 p.m.
Bank of America Pavilion
290 Northern Ave., Boston
$36-$51, 800-745-3000
