Nick Cave pays tribute to “the greatest of them all,” Leonard Cohen

Nick Cave has penned a tribute to the late, great Leonard Cohen, who has passed away aged 82.

Posting on Facebook, Nick Cave declared Cohen to be “the greatest songwriter of them all,” adding that he was: “Utterly unique and impossible to imitate no matter how hard we tried. He will be deeply missed by so many.”

This isn’t the first time Cave’s expressed his appreciation of Cohen’s legacy. He told Les Inrockuptibles in 1994: “I discovered Leonard Cohen with ‘Songs of Love and Hate’. I listened to this record for hours in a friend’s house. I was very young and I believe this was the first record that really had an effect on me. In the past, I only listened to my brother’s records. I liked what he liked, followed him like a sheep. Leonard Cohen was the first one I discovered by myself. He is the symbol of my musical independence. I remember these other guys that came to my friend’s house that thought Songs of Love and Hate was too depressing. I’ve realized that this ‘depression’ theory was ridiculous.”

Watch Nick Cave cover Leonard Cohen’s ‘Suzanne’ below.