Part 3
LENNON: Not
because of her age but because of a screw- up in the
hospital
and the fucking price of fame. Somebody had made a transfusion of the
wrong blood type
into Yoko. I was there when it happened, and she starts to go rigid, and
then shake, from the pain and the trauma. I run up to this nurse and say,
"Go get the doctor!"
I'm holding on tight to Yoko while this guy gets to the hospital room. He
walks in, hardly notices that Yoko is going through fucking convulsions,
goes straight for
me, smiles, shakes my hand and says, "I've always wanted to meet you, Mr.
Lennon, I always enjoyed your music." I start screaming: "My wife's dying
and you wanna
talk about my music!" Christ!
PLAYBOY: Now that Sean is almost five, is he conscious of the fact that
his father was a Beatle or have you protected him from your fame?
LENNON: I haven't said anything. Beatles were never mentioned to him.
There was no reason to mention it; we never played Beatle records around
the house,
unlike the story that went around that I was sitting in the kitchen for
the past five years, playing Beatle records and reliving my past like
some kind of Howard
Hughes. He did see "Yellow Submarine" at a friend's, so I had to explain
what a cartoon of me was doing in a movie.
PLAYBOY: Does he have an awareness of the Beatles?
LENNON: He doesn't differentiate between the Beatles and Daddy and Mommy.
He thinks Yoko was a Beatle, too. I don't have Beatle records on the
jukebox he
listens to. He's more exposed to early rock 'n' roll. He's into "Hound
Dog." He thinks it's about hunting.
Sean's not going to public school, by the way. We feel he can learn the
three Rs when he wants to -- or when the law says he has to, I suppose.
I'm not going to fight
it. Otherwise, there's no reason for him to be learning to sit still. I
can't see any reason for it. Sean now has plenty of child companionship,
which everybody says is
important, but he also is with adults a lot. He's adjusted to both.
The reason why kids are crazy is because nobody can face the
responsibility of bringing them up. Everybody's too scared to deal with
children all the time, so we
reject them and send them away and torture them. The ones who survive are
the conformists -- their bodies are cut to the size of the suits -- the
ones we label good.
The ones who don't fit the suits either are put in mental homes or become
artists.
PLAYBOY: Your son, Julian, from your first marriage must be in his teens.
Have you seen him over the years?
LENNON: Well, Cyn got possession, or whatever you call it. I got rights
to see him on his holidays and all that business, and at least there's an
open line still going.
It's not the best relationship between father and son, but it is there.
He's 17 now. Julian and I will have a relationship in the future. Over
the years, he's been able to
see through the Beatle image and to see through the image that his mother
will have given him, subconsciously or consciously. He's interested in
girls and autobikes
now. I'm just sort of a figure in the sky, but he's obliged to
communicate with me, even when he probably doesn't want to.
PLAYBOY: You're being very honest about your feelings toward him to the
point of saying that Sean is your first child. Are you concerned about
hurting him?
LENNON: I'm not going to lie to Julian. Ninety percent of the people on
this planet, especially in the West, were born out of a bottle of whiskey
on a Saturday
night, and there was no intent to have children. So 90 percent of us --
that includes everybody -- were accidents. I don't know anybody who was a
planned child. All
of us were Saturday-night specials. Julian is in the majority, along with
me and everybody else. Sean is a planned child, and therein lies the
difference. I don't love
Julian any less as a child. He's still my son, whether he came from a
bottle of whiskey or because they didn't have pills in those days. He's
here, he belongs to me and
he always will.
PLAYBOY: Yoko, your relationship with your daughter has been much
rockier.
ONO: I lost Kyoko when she was about five. I was sort of an offbeat
mother, but we had very good communication. I wasn't particularly taking
care of her, but she
was always with me -- onstage or at gallery shows, whatever. When she was
not even a year old, I took her onstage as an instrument -- an
uncontrollable instrument,
you know. My communication with her was on the level of sharing
conversation and doing things. She was closer to my ex-husband because of
that.
PLAYBOY: What happened when she was five?
ONO: John and I got together and I separated from my ex- husband [Tony
Cox]. He took Kyoko away. It became a case of parent kidnaping and we
tried to get her
back.
LENNON: It was a classic case of men being macho. It turned into me and
Allen Klein trying to dominate Tony Cox. Tony's attitude was, "You got my
wife, but you
won't get my child." In this battle, Yoko and the child were absolutely
forgotten. I've always felt bad about it. It became a case of the
shoot-out at the O.K. Corral:
Cox fled to the hills and hid out and the sheriff and I tracked him down.
First we won custody in court. Yoko didn't want to go to court, but the
men, Klein and I, did
it anyway.
ONO: Allen called up one day, saying I won the court case. He gave me a
piece of paper. I said, "What is this piece of paper? Is this what I won?
I don't have my
child." I knew that taking them to court would frighten them and, of
course, it did frighten them. So Tony vanished. He was very strong,
thinking that the capitalists,
with their money and lawyers and detectives, were pursuing him. It made
him stronger.
LENNON: We chased him all over the world. God knows where he went. So if
you're reading this, Tony, let's grow up about it. It's gone. We don't
want to chase you
anymore, because we've done enough damage.
ONO: We also had private detectives chasing Kyoko, which I thought was a
bad trip, too. One guy came to report, "It was great! We almost had them.
We were just
behind them in a car, but they sped up and got away." I went hysterical.
"What do you mean you almost got them? We are talking about my child!"
LENNON: It was like we were after an escaped convict.
PLAYBOY: Were you so persistent because you felt you were better for
Kyoko?
LENNON: Yoko got steamed into a guilt thing that if she wasn't attacking
them with detectives and police and the FBI, then she wasn't a good
mother looking for
her baby. She kept saying, "Leave them alone, leave them alone," but they
said you can't do that.
ONO: For me, it was like they just disappeared from my life. Part of me
left with them.
PLAYBOY: How old is she now?
ONO: Seventeen, the same as John's son.
PLAYBOY: Perhaps when she gets older, she'll seek you out.
ONO: She is totally frightened. There was a time in Spain when a lawyer
and John thought that we should kidnap her.
LENNON: [Sighing] I was just going to commit hara-kiri first.
ONO: And we did kidnap her and went to court. The court did a very
sensible thing -- the judge took her into a room and asked her which one
of us she wanted to go
with. Of course, she said Tony. We had scared her to death. So now she
must be afraid that if she comes to see me, she'll never see her father
again.
LENNON: When she gets to be in her 20s, she'll understand that we were
idiots and we know we were idiots. She might give us a chance.
ONO: I probably would have lost Kyoko even if it wasn't for John. If I
had separated from Tony, there would have been some difficulty.
LENNON: I'll just half-kill myself.
ONO: [To John] Part of the reason things got so bad was because with
Kyoko, it was you and Tony dealing. Men. With your son Julian, it was
women -- there was
more understanding between me and Cyn.
PLAYBOY: Can you explain that?
ONO: For example, there was a birthday party that Kyoko had and we were
both invited, but John felt very uptight about it and he didn't go. He
wouldn't deal with
Tony. But we were both invited to Julian's party and we both went.
LENNON: Oh, God, it's all coming out.
ONO: Or like when I was invited to Tony's place alone, I couldn't go; but
when John was invited to Cyn's, he did go.
LENNON: One rule for the men, one for the women.
ONO: So it was easier for Julian, because I was allowing it to happen.
LENNON: But I've said a million Hail Marys. What the hell else can I do?
PLAYBOY: Yoko, after this experience, how do you feel about leaving
Sean's rearing to John?
ONO: I am very clear about my emotions in that area. I don't feel guilty.
I am doing it in my own way. It may not be the same as other mothers, but
I'm doing it the
way I can do it. In general, mothers have a very strong resentment toward
their children, even though there's this whole adulation about motherhood
and how
mothers really think about their children and how they really love them.
I mean, they do, but it is not humanly possible to retain emotion that
mothers are supposed
to have within this society. Women are just too stretched out in
different directions to retain that emotion. Too much is required of
them. So I say to John----
LENNON: I am her favorite husband----
ONO: "I am carrying the baby nine months and that is enough, so you take
care of it afterward." It did sound like a crude remark, but I really
believe that children
belong to the society. If a mother carries the child and a father raises
it, the responsibility is shared.
PLAYBOY: Did you resent having to take so much responsibility, John?
LENNON: Well, sometimes, you know, she'd come home and say, "I'm tired."
I'd say, only partly tongue in cheek, "What the fuck do you think I am?
I'm 24 hours
with the baby! Do you think that's easy?" I'd say, "You're going to take
some more interest in the child." I don't care whether it's a father or a
mother. When I'm
going on about pimples and bones and which TV shows to let him watch, I
would say, "Listen, this is important. I don't want to hear about your
$20,000,000 deal
tonight!" [To Yoko] I would like both parents to take care of the
children, but how is a different matter.
ONO: Society should be more supportive and understanding.
LENNON: It's true. The saying "You've come a long way, baby" applies more
to me than to her. As Harry Nilsson says, "Everything is the opposite of
what it is,
isn't it?" It's men who've come a long way from even contemplating the
idea of equality. But although there is this thing called the women's
movement, society just
took a laxative and they've just farted. They haven't really had a good
shit yet. The seed was planted sometime in the late Sixties, right? But
the real changes are
coming. I am the one who has come a long way. I was the pig. And it is a
relief not to be a pig. The pressures of being a pig were enormous.
I don't have any hankering to be looked upon as a sex object, a male,
macho rock-'n'-roll singer. I got over that a long time ago. I'm not even
interested in projecting
that. So I like it to be known that, yes, I looked after the baby and I
made bread and I was a househusband and I am proud of it. It's the wave
of the future and I'm glad
to be in on the forefront of that, too.
ONO: So maybe both of us learned a lot about how men and women suffer
because of the social structure. And the only way to change it is to be
aware of it. It
sounds simple, but important things are simple.
PLAYBOY: John, does it take actually reversing roles with women to
understand?
LENNON: It did
for this man. But don't forget, I'm the one who
benefited
the most from doing it. Now I can step back and say Sean is going to be
five years old and
I was able to spend his first five years with him and I am very proud of
that. And come to think of it, it looks like I'm going to be 40 and life
begins at 40 -- so they
promise. And I believe it, too. I feel fine and I'm very excited. It's
like, you know, hitting 21, like, "Wow, what's going to happen next?"
Only this time we're
together.
ONO: If two are gathered together, there's nothing you can't do.
PLAYBOY: What does the title of your new album, "Double Fantasy," mean?
LENNON: It's a flower, a type of freesia, but what it means to us is that
if two people picture the same image at the same time, that is the
secret. You can be
together but projecting two different images and either whoever's the
stronger at the time will get his or her fantasy fulfilled or you will
get nothing but mishmash.
PLAYBOY: You saw the news item that said you were putting your sex
fantasies out as an album.
LENNON: Oh, yeah. That is like when we did the bed-in in Toronto in 1969.
They all came charging through the door, thinking we were going to be
screwing in bed.
Of course, we were just sitting there with peace signs.
PLAYBOY: What was that famous bed-in all about?
LENNON: Our life is our art. That's what the bed-ins were. When we got
married, we knew our honeymoon was going to be public, anyway, so we
decided to use it to
make a statement. We sat in bed and talked to reporters for seven days.
It was hilarious. In effect, we were doing a commercial for peace on the
front page of the
papers instead of a commercial for war.
PLAYBOY: You stayed in bed and talked about peace?
LENNON: Yes. We answered questions. One guy kept going over the point
about Hitler: "What do you do about Fascists? How can you have peace when
you've got
a Hitler?" Yoko said, "I would have gone to bed with him." She said she'd
have needed only ten days with him. People loved that one.
ONO: I said it facetiously, of course. But the point is, you're not going
to change the world by fighting. Maybe I was naive about the ten days
with Hitler. After all,
it took 13 years with John Lennon. [She giggles]
PLAYBOY: What were the reports about your making love in a bag?
ONO: We never made love in a bag. People probably imagined that we were
making love. It was just, all of us are in a bag, you know. The point was
the outline of
the bag, you know, the movement of the bag, how much we see of a person,
you know. But, inside, there might be a lot going on. Or maybe nothing's
going on.
PLAYBOY: Briefly, what about the statement on the new album?
LENNON: Very briefly, it's about very ordinary things between two people.
The lyrics are direct. Simple and straight. I went through my Dylanesque
period a long
time ago with songs like "I am the Walrus:" the trick of never saying
what you mean but giving the impression of something more. Where more or
less can be read
into it. It's a good game.
PLAYBOY: What are your musical preferences these days?
LENNON: Well, I like all music, depending on what time of day it is. I
don't like styles of music or people per se. I can't say I enjoy the
Pretenders, but I like their
hit record. I enjoy the B-52s, because I heard them doing Yoko. It's
great. If Yoko ever goes back to her old sound, they'll be saying, "Yeah,
she's copying the
B-52s."
ONO: We were doing a lot of the punk stuff a long time ago.
PLAYBOY: Lennon and Ono, the original punks.
ONO: You're right.
PLAYBOY: John, what's your opinion of the newer waves?
LENNON: I love all this punky stuff. It's pure. I'm not, however, crazy
about the people who destroy themselves.
PLAYBOY: You disagree with Neil Young's lyric in "Rust Never Sleeps" --
"It's better to burn out than to fade away...."
LENNON: I hate it. It's better to fade away like an old soldier than to
burn out. I don't appreciate worship of dead Sid Vicious or of dead James
Dean or of dead John
Wayne. It's the same thing. Making Sid Vicious a hero, Jim Morrison --
it's garbage to me. I worship the people who survive. Gloria Swanson,
Greta Garbo. They're
saying John Wayne conquered cancer -- he whipped it like a man. You know,
I'm sorry that he died and all that -- I'm sorry for his family -- but he
didn't whip
cancer. It whipped him. I don't want Sean worshiping John Wayne or Sid
Vicious. What do they teach you? Nothing. Death. Sid Vicious died for
what? So that we
might rock? I mean, it's garbage, you know. If Neil Young admires that
sentiment so much, why doesn't he do it? Because he sure as hell faded
away and came back
many times, like all of us. No, thank you. I'll take the living and the
healthy.
PLAYBOY: Do you listen to the radio?
LENNON: Muzak or classical. I don't purchase records. I do enjoy
listening to things like Japanese folk music or Indian music. My tastes
are very broad. When I was
a housewife, I just had Muzak on -- background music -- 'cause it relaxes
you.
PLAYBOY: Yoko?
ONO: No.
PLAYBOY: Do you go out and buy records?
ONO: Or read the newspaper or magazines or watch TV? No.
PLAYBOY: The inevitable question, John. Do you listen to your records?
LENNON: Least of all my own.
PLAYBOY: Even your classics?
LENNON: Are you kidding? For pleasure, I would never listen to them. When
I hear them, I just think of the session -- it's like an actor watching
himself in an old
movie. When I hear a song, I remember the Abbey Road studio, the session,
who fought with whom, where I was sitting, banging the tambourine in the
corner----
ONO: In fact, we really don't enjoy listening to other people's work
much. We sort of analyze everything we hear.
PLAYBOY: Yoko, were you a Beatles fan?
ONO: No. Now I notice the songs, of course. In a restaurant, John will
point out, "Ahh, they're playing George" or something.
PLAYBOY: John, do you ever go out to hear music?
LENNON: No, I'm not interested. I'm not a fan, you see. I might like
Jerry Lee Lewis singing "A Whole Lot a Shakin'" on the record, but I'm
not interested in seeing
him perform it.
PLAYBOY: Your songs are performed more than most other songwriters'. How
does that feel?
LENNON: I'm always proud and pleased when people do my songs. It gives me
pleasure that they even attempt them, because a lot of my songs aren't
that doable. I
go to restaurants and the groups always play "Yesterday." I even signed a
guy's violin in Spain after he played us "Yesterday." He couldn't
understand that I didn't
write the song. But I guess he couldn't have gone from table to table
playing "I am the Walrus."
PLAYBOY: How does it feel to have influenced so many people?
LENNON: It did for this man. But don't forget, I'm the one who benefited
the most from doing it. Now I can step back and say Sean is going to be
five years old and
I was able to spend his first five years with him and I am very proud of
that. And come to think of it, it looks like I'm going to be 40 and life
begins at 40 -- so they
promise. And I believe it, too. I feel fine and I'm very excited. It's
like, you know, hitting 21, like, "Wow, what's going to happen next?"
Only this time we're
together.
ONO: If two are gathered together, there's nothing you can't do.
PLAYBOY: What does the title of your new album, "Double Fantasy," mean?
LENNON: It's a flower, a type of freesia, but what it means to us is that
if two people picture the same image at the same time, that is the
secret. You can be
together but projecting two different images and either whoever's the
stronger at the time will get his or her fantasy fulfilled or you will
get nothing but mishmash.
PLAYBOY: You saw the news item that said you were putting your sex
fantasies out as an album.
LENNON: Oh, yeah. That is like when we did the bed-in in Toronto in 1969.
They all came charging through the door, thinking we were going to be
screwing in bed.
Of course, we were just sitting there with peace signs.
PLAYBOY: What was that famous bed-in all about?
LENNON: Our life is our art. That's what the bed-ins were. When we got
married, we knew our honeymoon was going to be public, anyway, so we
decided to use it to
make a statement. We sat in bed and talked to reporters for seven days.
It was hilarious. In effect, we were doing a commercial for peace on the
front page of the
papers instead of a commercial for war.
PLAYBOY: You stayed in bed and talked about peace?
LENNON: Yes. We answered questions. One guy kept going over the point
about Hitler: "What do you do about Fascists? How can you have peace when
you've got
a Hitler?" Yoko said, "I would have gone to bed with him." She said she'd
have needed only ten days with him. People loved that one.
ONO: I said it facetiously, of course. But the point is, you're not going
to change the world by fighting. Maybe I was naive about the ten days
with Hitler. After all,
it took 13 years with John Lennon. [She giggles]
PLAYBOY: What were the reports about your making love in a bag?
ONO: We never made love in a bag. People probably imagined that we were
making love. It was just, all of us are in a bag, you know. The point was
the outline of
the bag, you know, the movement of the bag, how much we see of a person,
you know. But, inside, there might be a lot going on. Or maybe nothing's
going on.
PLAYBOY: Briefly, what about the statement on the new album?
LENNON: Very briefly, it's about very ordinary things between two people.
The lyrics are direct. Simple and straight. I went through my Dylanesque
period a long
time ago with songs like "I am the Walrus:" the trick of never saying
what you mean but giving the impression of something more. Where more or
less can be read
into it. It's a good game.
PLAYBOY: What are your musical preferences these days?
LENNON: Well, I like all music, depending on what time of day it is. I
don't like styles of music or people per se. I can't say I enjoy the
Pretenders, but I like their
hit record. I enjoy the B-52s, because I heard them doing Yoko. It's
great. If Yoko ever goes back to her old sound, they'll be saying, "Yeah,
she's copying the
B-52s."
ONO: We were doing a lot of the punk stuff a long time ago.
PLAYBOY: Lennon and Ono, the original punks.
ONO: You're right.
PLAYBOY: John, what's your opinion of the newer waves?
LENNON: I love all this punky stuff. It's pure. I'm not, however, crazy
about the people who destroy themselves.
PLAYBOY: You disagree with Neil Young's lyric in "Rust Never Sleeps" --
"It's better to burn out than to fade away...."
LENNON: I hate it. It's better to fade away like an old soldier than to
burn out. I don't appreciate worship of dead Sid Vicious or of dead James
Dean or of dead John
Wayne. It's the same thing. Making Sid Vicious a hero, Jim Morrison --
it's garbage to me. I worship the people who survive. Gloria Swanson,
Greta Garbo. They're
saying John Wayne conquered cancer -- he whipped it like a man. You know,
I'm sorry that he died and all that -- I'm sorry for his family -- but he
didn't whip
cancer. It whipped him. I don't want Sean worshiping John Wayne or Sid
Vicious. What do they teach you? Nothing. Death. Sid Vicious died for
what? So that we
might rock? I mean, it's garbage, you know. If Neil Young admires that
sentiment so much, why doesn't he do it? Because he sure as hell faded
away and came back
many times, like all of us. No, thank you. I'll take the living and the
healthy.
PLAYBOY: Do you listen to the radio?
LENNON: Muzak or classical. I don't purchase records. I do enjoy
listening to things like Japanese folk music or Indian music. My tastes
are very broad. When I was
a housewife, I just had Muzak on -- background music -- 'cause it relaxes
you.
PLAYBOY: Yoko?
ONO: No.
PLAYBOY: Do you go out and buy records?
ONO: Or read the newspaper or magazines or watch TV? No.
PLAYBOY: The inevitable question, John. Do you listen to your records?
LENNON: Least of all my own.
PLAYBOY: Even your classics?
LENNON: Are you kidding? For pleasure, I would never listen to them. When
I hear them, I just think of the session -- it's like an actor watching
himself in an old
movie. When I hear a song, I remember the Abbey Road studio, the session,
who fought with whom, where I was sitting, banging the tambourine in the
corner----
ONO: In fact, we really don't enjoy listening to other people's work
much. We sort of analyze everything we hear.
PLAYBOY: Yoko, were you a Beatles fan?
ONO: No. Now I notice the songs, of course. In a restaurant, John will
point out, "Ahh, they're playing George" or something.
PLAYBOY: John, do you ever go out to hear music?
LENNON: No, I'm not interested. I'm not a fan, you see. I might like
Jerry Lee Lewis singing "A Whole Lot a Shakin'" on the record, but I'm
not interested in seeing
him perform it.
PLAYBOY: Your songs are performed more than most other songwriters'. How
does that feel?
LENNON: I'm always proud and pleased when people do my songs. It gives me
pleasure that they even attempt them, because a lot of my songs aren't
that doable. I
go to restaurants and the groups always play "Yesterday." I even signed a
guy's violin in Spain after he played us "Yesterday." He couldn't
understand that I didn't
write the song. But I guess he couldn't have gone from table to table
playing "I am the Walrus."
PLAYBOY: How does it feel to have influenced so many people?
LENNON: It wasn't really me or us. It was the times. It happened to me
when I heard rock 'n' roll in the Fifties. I had no idea about doing
music as a way of life until
rock 'n' roll hit me.
PLAYBOY: Do you recall what specifically hit you?
LENNON: It was "Rock Around the Clock," I think. I enjoyed Bill Haley,
but I wasn't overwhelmed by him. It wasn't until "Heartbreak Hotel" that
I really got into
it.
ONO: I am sure there are people whose lives were affected because they
heard Indian music or Mozart or Bach. More than anything, it was the time
and the place
when the Beatles came up. Something did happen there. It was a kind of
chemical. It was as if several people gathered around a table and a ghost
appeared. It was that
kind of communication. So they were like mediums, in a way. It's not
something you can force. It was the people, the time, their youth and
enthusiasm.
PLAYBOY: For the sake of argument, we'll maintain that no other
contemporary artist or group of artists moved as many people in such a
profound way as the
Beatles.
LENNON: But what moved the Beatles?
PLAYBOY: You tell us.
LENNON: All right. Whatever wind was blowing at the time moved the
Beatles, too. I'm not saying we weren't flags on the top of a ship; but
the whole boat was
moving. Maybe the Beatles were in the crow's-nest, shouting, "Land ho,"
or something like that, but we were all in the same damn boat.
ONO: The Beatles themselves were a social phenomenon not that aware of
what they were doing. In a way----
LENNON: [Under his breath] This Beatles talk bores me to death.
ONO: As I said, they were like mediums. They weren't conscious of all
they were saying, but it was coming through them.
PLAYBOY: Why?
LENNON: We tuned in to the message. That's all. I don't mean to belittle
the Beatles when I say they weren't this, they weren't that. I'm just
trying not to overblow
their importance as separate from society. And I don't think they were
more important than Glenn Miller or Woody Herman or Bessie Smith. It was
our generation,
that's all. It was Sixties music.
PLAYBOY: What do you say to those who insist that all rock since the
Beatles has been the Beatles redone?
LENNON: All music is rehash. There are only a few notes. Just variations
on a theme. Try to tell the kids in the Seventies who were screaming to
the Bee Gees that
their music was just the Beatles redone. There is nothing wrong with the
Bee Gees. They do a damn good job. There was nothing else going on then.
PLAYBOY: Wasn't a lot of the Beatles' music at least more intelligent?
LENNON: The Beatles were more intellectual, so they appealed on that
level, too. But the basic appeal of the Beatles was not their
intelligence. It was their music.
It was only after some guy in the "London Times" said there were Aeolian
cadences in "It Won't Be Long" that the middle classes started listening
to it -- because
somebody put a tag on it.
PLAYBOY: Did you put Aeolian cadences in "It Won't Be Long?"
LENNON: To this day, I don't have any idea what they are. They sound like
exotic birds.
PLAYBOY: How did you react to the misinterpretations of your songs?
LENNON: For instance?
PLAYBOY: The most obvious is the "Paul is dead" fiasco. You already
explained the line in "Glass Onion." What about the line in "I am the
Walrus" - - "I buried
Paul"?
LENNON: I said "Cranberry sauce." That's all I said. Some people like
ping-pong, other people like digging over graves. Some people will do
anything rather than be
here now.
PLAYBOY: What about the chant at the end of the song: "Smoke pot, smoke
pot, everybody smoke pot"?
LENNON: No, no, no. I had this whole choir saying, "Everybody's got one,
everybody's got one." But when you get 30 people, male and female, on top
of 30 cellos
and on top of the Beatles' rock-'n'-roll rhythm section, you can't hear
what they're saying.
PLAYBOY: What does "everybody got"?
LENNON: Anything. You name it. One penis, one vagina, one asshole -- you
name it.
PLAYBOY: Did it trouble you when the interpretations of your songs were
destructive, such as when Charles Manson claimed that your lyrics were
messages to him?
LENNON: No. It has nothing to do with me. It's like that guy, Son of Sam,
who was having these talks with the dog. Manson was just an extreme
version of the
people who came up with the "Paul is dead" thing or who figured out that
the initials to "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" were LSD and concluded I
was writing about
acid.
PLAYBOY: Where did "Lucy in the Sky" come from?
LENNON: My son Julian came in one day with a picture he painted about a
school friend of his named Lucy. He had sketched in some stars in the sky
and called it
"Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds," Simple.
PLAYBOY: The other images in the song weren't drug- inspired?
LENNON: The images were from "Alice in Wonderland." It was Alice in the
boat. She is buying an egg and it turns into Humpty Dumpty. The woman
serving in the
shop turns into a sheep and the next minute they are rowing in a rowing
boat somewhere and I was visualizing that. There was also the image of
the female who
would someday come save me -- a "girl with kaleidoscope eyes" who would
come out of the sky. It turned out to be Yoko, though I hadn't met Yoko
yet. So maybe it
should be "Yoko in the Sky with Diamonds."
PLAYBOY: Do you have any interest in the pop historians analyzing the
Beatles as a cultural phenomenon?
LENNON: It's all equally irrelevant. Mine is to do and other people's is
to record, I suppose. Does it matter how many drugs were in Elvis' body?
I mean, Brian
Epstein's sex life will make a nice "Hollywood Babylon" someday, but it
is irrelevant.
PLAYBOY: What started the rumors about you and Epstein?
LENNON: I went on holiday to Spain with Brian -- which started all the
rumors that he and I were having a love affair. Well, it was almost a
love affair, but not
quite. It was never consummated. But we did have a pretty intense
relationship. And it was my first experience with someone I knew was a
homosexual. He admitted
it to me. We had this holiday together because Cyn was pregnant and we
left her with the baby and went to Spain. Lots of funny stories, you
know. We used to sit in
cafs and Brian would look at all the boys and I would ask, "Do you like
that one? Do you like this one?" It was just the combination of our
closeness and the trip
that started the rumors.
PLAYBOY: It's interesting to hear you talk about your old songs such as
"Lucy in the Sky" and "Glass Onion." Will you give some brief thoughts on
some of our
favorites?
LENNON: Right.
PLAYBOY: Let's start with "In My Life."
LENNON: It was the first song I wrote that was consciously about my life.
[Sings] "There are places I'll remember/all my life though some have
changed. . . ."
Before, we were just writing songs a la Everly Brothers, Buddy Holly --
pop songs with no more thought to them than that. The words were almost
irrelevant. "In My
Life" started out as a bus journey from my house at 250 Menlove Avenue to
town, mentioning all the places I could recall. I wrote it all down and
it was boring. So I
forgot about it and laid back and these lyrics started coming to me about
friends and lovers of the past. Paul helped with the middle eight.
PLAYBOY: "Yesterday."
LENNON: Well, we all know about "Yesterday." I have had so much accolade
for "Yesterday." That is Paul's song, of course, and Paul's baby. Well
done. Beautiful --
and I never wished I had written it.
PLAYBOY: "With a Little Help from My Friends."
LENNON: This is Paul, with a little help from me. "What do you see when
you turn out the light/I can't tell you, but I know it's mine ..." is
mine.
PLAYBOY: "I am the Walrus."
LENNON: The first line was written on one acid trip one weekend. The
second line was written on the next acid trip the next weekend, and it
was filled in after I
met Yoko. Part of it was putting down Hare Krishna. All these people were
going on about Hare Krishna, Allen Ginsberg in particular. The reference
to "Element'ry
penguin" is the elementary, naive attitude of going around chanting,
"Hare Krishna," or putting all your faith in any one idol. I was writing
obscurely, a la Dylan, in
those days.
PLAYBOY: The song is very complicated, musically.
LENNON: It actually was fantastic in stereo, but you never hear it all.
There was too much to get on. It was too messy a mix. One track was live
BBC Radio --
Shakespeare or something -- I just fed in whatever lines came in.
PLAYBOY: What about the walrus itself?