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[Sondra]

 Do you have any other thoughts on this, Sandra? What do you make of his sounding subdued and depressed at the time of the recording?

I listened to the longer recording and I don't know, I just think for 1979 he still sounds very bitter. He also sounds as if he had become a bit self important. Or maybe it's just that he had lost touch. He did lock himself up in a tower for years. From what he goes on about, it seems like he's trying to justify his lack of creative output. He calls Paul, Jagger, and Dylan company men, he calls Paul Simon the singing dwarf, he ridicules their music, and so on. After all those years of supposed family harmony and all the therapy and stuff he's still sounds bitter.

I also find it interesting how he says he used to worry about the competition and used to order their albums so he could hear what they were doing. Didn't he say in a few earlier interviews that he NEVER listened to them and didn't care? There we go again! Oh well. He wouldn't be John without all the quirks and if I wasn't such a huge fan, I wouldn't spend the time caring about stuff like this I guess! No matter what, he made amazing music and nothing will ever take away from that.

[freakchic9]

That tape has been out on bootleg for years from the lost Lennon tapes.
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=TawfSfiVmjw

I'm listening to this right now. He, whoever "he" is, sounds extremely BORED.

[adamzero]

Sounds like a typical junkie to me.  Blaming everyone else for his problems.  Belittling those who intimidate him.  Musing about incestuous feelings.  In short, regressing.  

But a lot of John's art was about regressing to a simpler state.  "Strawberry Fields Forever."  "Julia" (in which mother and lover are elided in a child's drawing view of the world).  "Imagine" (why won't all the bad people go away).  "All You Need is Love" (All "I" need is Love).  

When you look for emotional complexity, you don't find that in most of John's songs.  There's very little as complex as Dylan's Blood on the Tracks or alot of Paul Simon's work.   The "adult" John is writing songs like "Jealous Guy" while the "young" John wrote "I'm a Loser."  Not a lot of ground gained.  

John's most advanced work lyrically (like "I Am the Walrus" and "Across the Universe") tends to overlook the personal for the satirical or metaphysical.   He's like a James Joyce who never discovered the voice of Leopold Bloom to offset his Stephen Daedalus.  

It's a shame.  Maybe John would have developed this had he lived.  Songs like "Beautiful Boy" and "Watching the Wheels" seems to have a maturity, candor, and maybe even acceptance of who he was.  

[alexis]

Dang, that man sounds clinically depressed. How sad. I hope he really did perk up in the last year of his life.

[alexis]

Sounds like a typical junkie to me.  Blaming everyone else for his problems.  Belittling those who intimidate him.  Musing about incestuous feelings.  In short, regressing.  

But a lot of John's art was about regressing to a simpler state.  "Strawberry Fields Forever."  "Julia" (in which mother and lover are elided in a child's drawing view of the world).  "Imagine" (why won't all the bad people go away).  "All You Need is Love" (All "I" need is Love).  

When you look for emotional complexity, you don't find that in most of John's songs.  There's very little as complex as Dylan's Blood on the Tracks or alot of Paul Simon's work.   The "adult" John is writing songs like "Jealous Guy" while the "young" John wrote "I'm a Loser."  Not a lot of ground gained.  

John's most advanced work lyrically (like "I Am the Walrus" and "Across the Universe") tends to overlook the personal for the satirical or metaphysical.   He's like a James Joyce who never discovered the voice of Leopold Bloom to offset his Stephen Daedalus.  

It's a shame.  Maybe John would have developed this had he lived.  Songs like "Beautiful Boy" and "Watching the Wheels" seems to have a maturity, candor, and maybe even acceptance of who he was.  

Nicely put, thanks for the perspective.

[DaveRam]

I've listend to the full tape now , and i now think it is John.
I agree alexis he doe's sound clinically depressed .
Boy did he need to start writing music again and get a life ,another year in that appartment and he would have gone like Howard Hughes.

[freakchic9]

I've listend to the full tape now , and i now think it is John.
I agree alexis he doe's sound clinically depressed .
Boy did he need to start writing music again and get a life ,another year in that appartment and he would have gone like Howard Hughes.

^I read that and I thought you said something about Hogwarts. Haha!

But really, I don't wanna believe it's John. I'm not gonna believe it! *blocks ears* I'm not gonna!

But those bagpipes made my day. Were they bagpipes? I can't remember...

[alexis]

^I read that and I thought you said something about Hogwarts. Haha!

But really, I don't wanna believe it's John. I'm not gonna believe it! *blocks ears* I'm not gonna!

But those bagpipes made my day. Were they bagpipes? I can't remember...

It's OK, we all get sick at times (flu, or mumps, etc.), and mental illness/depression is no different, just a bit less common perhaps  

[Joost]

Just a theory:
John was without a doubt someone who wanted to be seen as an interesting person. And maybe that's why he sometimes just said things to shock people. Like the famous "We're bigger than Jesus" comment. John was a smart guy, he must've known that people would take it the wrong way. But he said it anyway...

[alexis]

Just a theory:
John was without a doubt someone who wanted to be seen as an interesting person. And maybe that's why he sometimes just said things to shock people. Like the famous "We're bigger than Jesus" comment. John was a smart guy, he must've known that people would take it the wrong way. But he said it anyway...

Lot to be said for this! Especially as he was obviously green with envy at the success of the "company men" (Paul, Jagger) and the "singing dwarf" (Paul Simon). If he couldn't get attention musically, he'd get it some other way. Nice one, joost!

[Sondra]

Just a theory:
John was without a doubt someone who wanted to be seen as an interesting person. And maybe that's why he sometimes just said things to shock people. Like the famous "We're bigger than Jesus" comment. John was a smart guy, he must've known that people would take it the wrong way. But he said it anyway...

I think you're onto something there.

[Sondra]

Then it's suggested that he had a crush on Paul. "On the principle that bohemians should try everything," writes Norman, John had contemplated an affair, "but had been deterred by Paul's immovable heterosexuality." Yoko, again, is party to this speculation. She recalls hearing people in the Apple office who called McCartney "John's Princess".

Okay, I'm sorry. I just COULD NOT resist! Forgive me. Please?  :X

[Mairi]

Just a theory:
John was without a doubt someone who wanted to be seen as an interesting person. And maybe that's why he sometimes just said things to shock people. Like the famous "We're bigger than Jesus" comment. John was a smart guy, he must've known that people would take it the wrong way. But he said it anyway...

I have to agree with this. Bisexuality was all the rage in the '70s with Bowie and Elton John. I wouldn't be surprised if John had thought about using it as a marketing tool.

[Geoff]

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=TawfSfiVmjw

He sounds awful: disjointed and obsessive ramblings about his mother, along with sharp, resentful stabs at his contemporaries, probably for still having the careers and lives John doesn't and is afraid he can't have. The fact that he's ruminating about boyhood fantasies involving his mother at one point says more about his terrible state of mind at the time the tape was recorded than it does about the fantasies themselves. Very sad.

[Geoff]

More grist for the (rumor) mill:

Sir Paul McCartney Denies John Lennon 'Gay Claims'
by Jason Gregory
15 September 2008


Sir Paul McCartney has denied that his former Beatles band mate John Lennon ever tried to make a sexual advance on him.

A new book about Lennon, who died in 1980, claims that the former Beatle wanted a gay relationship with Sir Paul.

But in a new interview, Sir Paul has rubbished the claims, saying the pair only occasionally shared a bed on tour.

"I don't think (the gay claims) are true. John never ever tried anything, I slept with him a million times,

[Sondra]

More grist for the (rumor) mill:



"I've seen him on tour roaring drunk, out of his mind in the early days before he sobered up and went to rehab. Roaring drunk and it was always with a female, never once.

"If you've got a little gay tendency and your roaring drunk I'd have caught him once."


http://www.gigwise.com/news/46046/sir-paul-mccartney-denies-john-lennon-gay-claims

He said the same thing YEARS ago on a radio show. I have no reason to doubt him. I think if anything, like Joost and Mairi say, John was just trying to shock. But then, who knows!

[adamzero]

More grist for the (rumor) mill:

"If you've got a little gay tendency and your roaring drunk I'd have caught him once."

Maybe this adds an ironic twist to "How Do You Sleep?"  

Maybe Paul slept a little too soundly . . . ?

[alexis]

More grist for the (rumor) mill:

Sir Paul McCartney Denies John Lennon 'Gay Claims'
by Jason Gregory
15 September 2008


Sir Paul McCartney has denied that his former Beatles band mate John Lennon ever tried to make a sexual advance on him.

A new book about Lennon, who died in 1980, claims that the former Beatle wanted a gay relationship with Sir Paul.

But in a new interview, Sir Paul has rubbished the claims, saying the pair only occasionally shared a bed on tour.

"I don't think (the gay claims) are true. John never ever tried anything, I slept with him a million times,

[Geoff]

John went to rehab?

Yeah: Dr Robert's. It got him off the bottle, anyway.  

[alexis]

Yeah: Dr Robert's. It got him off the bottle, anyway.  

I liked him better when he was on the bottle, he seemed to have lost his spark after that. I never did understand how they could party so hard and late, and still have enough energy to be so good. Like around AHDN - it seems like they never slept!