This should be heralded as great news on multiple fronts. One, it's a Leonard Cohen date, and it's part of his first major jaunt across the U.S. in more than a decade. But just as important, it comes a week before the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, where Cohen will play April 17.
A chance to see such an artist outside of the sweltering heat and on his own should certainly be heralded. So, might this be a relaxing of the so-called radius clauses that permeate the summer festival season, which prevent artists from playing in a marketplace for a specified amount of time before and after an event?
Naw -- don't bet on most major Coachella acts getting similar treatment, outside of some not-so-secret, last-minute club shows (see the Jesus and Mary Chain at the Glass House in 2007). While reps for Cohen and AEG Live have yet to clarify Coachella's radius clause to Pop & Hiss (our fingers aren't crossed), it's certainly expected that Cohen should be allowed to play by different rules -- this is his first tour in 15 years, after all.
But it's not just Cohen's living legend status that come into play here. It helps, of course, when your concert is being exclusively presented by AEG Live, which happens to own the Nokia and Coachella-founders Goldenvoice. But technicalities . . .
