One Of Us Cannot Be Wrong
You want it darker, indeed. Another light is extinguished and things seem to be growing darker by the day. Part of me wants to stay in bed with the covers pulled up over my head, but venturing out to see my beautiful friend Thor Harris play last night lit a fire under my ass. Defy the hate, face the darkness and fight to spread the light. Love will prevail. I want to believe.
About the song:
My introduction to the music and poetry of Leonard Cohen was through a live version of Suzanne by Australian band, Dirty Three. They were, and still are, one of my favourite live bands, and witnessing their incredible cover of Suzanne in the early to mid '90s inspired me to make inquires about Leonard Cohen with my friend Warwick Brown, who owned a record store in Melbourne called Greville Records. Warwick has a vast musical knowledge and impeccable taste, and it was Warwick who first turned me onto the Dirty Three. Warwick gave me a copy of Leonard Cohen's first album, Songs of Leonard Cohen, and One Of Us Cannot Be Wrong was the first song I ever learned on guitar.
Some years later I found myself stranded somewhere in Texas, and recorded this cover on a dusty old Tascam 4-track with a ramshackle string section in a huge wooden loft space. I want to re-record this song someday, but it feels right and timely to release this artifact as a charity lathe-cut at the end of 2016, a year book-ended by the deaths of David Bowie and Leonard Cohen, and the year that Donald Trump was selected as the next President of the United States.
During my time in Texas, I had first-hand experience with the care and compassion provided by Planned Parenthood. As a low-income couple, my girlfriend and I relied on Planned Parenthood for low-cost birth control. As an interracial couple we were ostracized by some members of our family and harassed by strangers. But the worst abuse we faced was by anti-abortionists as we entered and exited Planned Parenthood. I stand with Planned Parenthood and support a woman's right to choose.
Adam Harding
Los Angeles, CA
November 13, 2016