Conor Oberst And Ron Sexsmith On Leonard Cohen's 'Old Ideas'

"The thing with Leonard, he's not singing about frivolous things. He never has, you know? It's just great to have someone like him in this world that is very focused on the juvenile sort of things — to have someone that's writing from that place. What's that line in 'The Darkness'? 'I have no future / The present's not so pleasant.' You're not going to get that from Justin Bieber.

"He's always very conversational, too," Sexsmith says. "Obviously, he's a poet, but you never get the condescending thing or the high-brow feeling. It's very simple language. The words he uses — they penetrate because they're very simple, and you never have to scratch your head and wonder what he's singing about."