"I can’t go to the theater. But then sitting in this [Hong Kong hotel] room, taking baths, which I noticed Yoko did, every time I got nervous — I must have had about 40 baths — I’m looking out over the Hong Kong Bay, and there’s something ringing a bell. It’s like, what is it? And then I just got very, very relaxed. And it was like a recognition: this is me! This relaxed person is me!.... I rediscovered [in Hong Kong], the feeling I used to have as a youngster, walking in the mountains of Scotland with an auntie. You know, you’re walking and the ground starts going beneath you, and the heather, and the clouds moving above you, and you think, Ah, this is the feeling they’re always talking about, the one that makes you paint or put it into poetry because you can’t describe it any other way. I recognized that that feeling had been with me all my life. The feeling was with me before the Beatles. So this period was to re-establish me, as me, for myself.... So here I am, right? It’s beautiful, you know. It’s just like walking those hills."
From a December 2020 article in the NYT, "For John Lennon, Isolation Had a Silver Lining/Forty years after the musician’s death, a writer revisits conversations with the former Beatle about the long period of seclusion and self-reflection that inspired his breakthrough as a solo artist, and as a human being."
I was reading that after listening to John's song "Isolation," which I embedded in a post yesterday, in a discussion of the use of the noun "isolate" to describe a type of person. Obviously, the NYT publishes things about John Lennon every December, memorializing his murder, but this article connected to the coronavirus lockdown, in that Lennon imposed a lockdown on himself (from 1976 to 1980).
There's a suggestion that we might take something from his experience and turn the negative of the lockdown positive. He was, though, recovering from the distortions of life as a very famous person, so it's hard to adapt that to your own life, especially if you have aspirations to accomplish things out in the world of your fellow humans or if you were already in touch with the real you.
But one thing that might be useful is Lennon's assertion that recorded music — which you can so easily experience alone and at home (or walking along the purple heather) — is preferable to going out to concerts: "All the performers I ever saw, from Little Richard to Jerry Lee Lewis, I was always disappointed. I preferred the record."
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35 comments:
The Beatles? I hate the Beatles! All of them, except for the Black one, Ringo.
The only problem with this is that Lennon’s post-Beatles work was awful and unlistenable.
The primal scream stuff was beyond awful... almost a Monty Python parade of awful.
So, while I can sympathize with his desire for a decent, private life, it doesn’t seem to have produced a positive outcome in Lennon’s music.
I really don't think we should be taking life lessons from a heroin addict.
He was disappointed in those two guys live?
WTF?
I know I'm a person who prefers isolation. I've lived my entire life in front of a lot of people- for work and play- but when it's my time, I have always preferred to be isolated, to go off with nature, somewhere. Of course, getting married years ago changed that to a degree, but I still manage my 'isolate' time. I need it. I think some just need it. But this year made a lot of people isolate. And I'm not sure it's a preferred way of being for most people. I would think not. That's why there has been so much mental disarray around the world.
And I do get Lennon's point about finding that creative spark in those isolate moments. That's how it works for some (of us). And some, like Lennon, do it better than others.
Lots of bands split up, and then you get the competition of the solo albums. Keith Richards' was better than Mick's for example, during the Stones' brief breakup. In the Beatles' competition, Lennon and McCartney both lost. Harrison's solo work was superb, though.
Isolation? It's a good idea if you're being swept away by strong personalities.
Isolation has its price, as does contact with humans, both pre pandemic and now. Life is made up of tradeoffs.
Later today, I will meet with lifelong friends to talk about a memorial service for the man who was the best man at my wedding and my friend since 1967. He succumbed to COVID last week, after traveling to meet friends over Christmas/New Year’s with his partner, where they both contracted the virus. She shook it off, but he did not.
As a young man, he beat Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and it changed his view of life and gave him a wisdom that most of us do not acquire until a much older age. He was a better friend to me than I was to him, which is true for most of if not all of his friends. In his time, he rewired city buses, climbed to the tops of most tall buildings in this place, played The Rite Of Spring and Mahler 5 for money in an orchestra, taught youngsters how to dress a stage and go up top while not killing themselves in the process, drove endless hours of dance clubs with the funk lines emerging from his bass, built a garage for his Mom pretty much by himself, and spent hundreds of hours looking at me over breakfast while we discussed how to fix the problems of this sinful world.
And that’s just scratching the surface.
In thinking of this, I ask myself if I knew then what I know now say, two years ago, would I level China to the ground with all the people in it to have him back? How much time do I spend considering the consequences of outsourcing something as dangerous as gain of function research to the Wild West of Chinese medical and professional ethics? (a lot) How angry am I at the people who are still smiling, pretending that everything is OK under their management like Nick Leeson sitting on $800 billion of futures losses before reality finally caught up with him? (same answer) Oh, and telling us whether we can make a living or leave our house.
“Go live your life, but don’t forget to check with us first to get permission. After all we’re taking good care of you.”
Yeah. Sure. You guys are doing some terrific job. SMH. Double facepalm.
Sorry for your loss mezzrow. That is terrible.
"How it is, there is no telling, but Islanders seem to make the best whalemen. They were nearly all Islanders in the Pequod, Isolatoes too, I call such, not acknowledging the common continent of men, but each Isolato living on a separate continent of his own. Yet now, federated along one keel, what a set these Isolatoes were!" – Herman Melville, Moby Dick
More ominous:
“The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic, and a killer. It has never yet melted.”
― D.H. Lawrence, Studies in Classic American Literature
There's aloneness, isolation, loneliness, and now the hyperisolation of COVID winter, all a little different. Loners and isolates still manage to have human interactions. In hyperisolation that gets harder and an ordinary isolate's life can get maddeningly solitary.
John Lennon did turn into a loner, but he was raising a kid at the same time, so not quite as isolated as one might assume. Rush Limbaugh wasn't an isolate. He did have an active social life, at least before he got sick. I guess the point may be that ideologically he was left behind by history, but that happens to everyone sooner or later, even Peggy Noonan.
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Rennie Davis passed away, not quite the last of the Chicago 7, but the last of the ones whose names anybody might remember. It actually happened at the beginning of the month, but I only heard now. Davis started out as the son of Truman's chief economic advisor ... and ended up a venture capitalist. If there was any doubt, the Sixties are indeed over.
ST: the good folks at National Lampoon (and me) agree with you:
https://youtu.be/7qrMEEN6WxM
It's a pity he never read CS Lewis's Surprised By Joy, which discusses that feeling and its meaning in some detail.
Fame sort of caught all of them off guard. If you listen/read to some of their very early interviews it's clear they expected to have the (then) standard 2 or 3 year pop-star run, no one expected it to turn into a life long career, most of all Lennon. According to Mark Lewisohn, Lennon had a term for getting up and going to work every day; "brummer striving". He always swore he'd never become a "brummer striver" and I think over time that's what being a Beatle became to him. That's why he got out, but even then couldn't really escape it.
"The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic, and a killer. It has never yet melted."
U! S! A!
ST: the good folks at National Lampoon (and me) agree with you:
https://youtu.be/7qrMEEN6WxM
Although the Beatles had more catchy pop-tunes, great ones, even, the Stones were better.
I saw Jerry Lee live, can confirm. He seemed to think he was a country artist.
There was just something about those old Phillips sessions in Memphis. We had all those 45s and they were just simple and raw and good.
There was a BBC show called Top of the Pops, a sort of countdown show. The Musicians Union objected to the artists lip-syncing their hits, so an off-camera band and backup singers were brought in and the artists had to do their thing live. It was an embarrassment for some of them, so a limited amount of pre-recording was allowed where necessary for artists who could not duplicate their hit records on TV.
Its too bad the word "fag" has been associated with homophobia, because it was great at insulting weak effeminates men, as in Archie Bunker calling England a "fag country". Anyway, every-time John Lennon comes up the word "fag" pops into my mind. Everything about him was so lame, weak and effeminate. Its a good thing he could sing a little and write pop songs. That he ended up with a "Strong woman" as his wife, doesn't surprise me.
John obviously never saw the Allman Brothers.
Not being able to go to the movies is bs. His famous mid '70s lost weekend of carousing around Hollywood with Harry Nilsson and other celebs puts the lie to that. They were constantly out in public. He was bummed he was in Hong Kong with Yoko instead of May Pang.
I had never heard "Isolation" before this morning, when I was catching up on the Rush thread.
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No sir, I don't like it
IIRC, Archie called the British system "What you call a Fagocracy." And of course "fag" was used in the public schools for younger lads who had to act as sort of junior batmen to the older boys. Gay students were referred to as "shirt-lifters" (description of Graham Chapman by one of the other Pythons).
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Good times
Lennon was the third most talented Beatle...
Ringo number four but will probably outlive them all.
John Lennon finally said something with which I agree: the recorded music is better.
I've seen a lot of acts live, and the only one I saw who was better live was Chicago. I was not a fan of their music when I went - it was a date - but they sounded a lot better than their MOR crappy records.
Jerry Lee Lewis has been a country artist since the late 60s. His brand of country music was not for me.
The energy of going to a concert has something to be said for it. But given the choice between a concert recording and a studio recording, I will take the studio recording every time. It's not like you go to a symphony and the cellist does something not in the score so everyone knows it's live. So what is the thrill in hearing a work performed imperfectly that artists and technicians have spent countless hours working to give us in perfect form?
"John Lennon finally said something with which I agree: the recorded music is better."
Springsteen is a total nitwit, lefty nut-job, but he is insanely good live.
You get your money's worth.
Gotta respect him for that.
If you're into soul, we've seen the Stylistics twice and they are terrific.
Even an 80-year old Tony Bennett was phenomenal...
Really depends on the performer.
I'll take live over Memorex most any time, and have seldom been disappointed at live music events.
In my case it helps a lot for me to see who is doing what; to that degree the sum of the two senses is greater than the parts, and assuming competent performance.
Before the CCPFlu, we had good chamber music performances on campus, some school talent but mostly top younger professional ensembles, with a small amount of on-stage seating. To see and hear a handful of top artists interact, from only a few feet away . . . either you get it or you don't.
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Bowie, Tull, Browne all great live in the 70s
Ringo was the second most talented of the four.
Nobody sounded like Ringo before Ringo came along.
That National Lampoon "Magical Misery Tour" had me rolling the first time I heard it. And when I found out, only last year, that the "lyrics" were actual quotes from Lennon interviews (mainly the Rolling Stone one) when he was still very angry after the breakup made it even funnier.
And as for "fag", when I was growing up that was the "nice" word for a homosexual while "queer" was considered the N-word of slurs.
My, how language changes. ('Bitch' was considered a four letter word too)
"And as for 'fag,' when I was growing up that was the 'nice' word for a homosexual while 'queer' was considered the N-word of slurs."
I can't remember a time when "fag" was ever a "nice" word for homosexuals. Perhaps your perspective is colored by the environment in which you lived and the people around you.
"Nobody sounded like Ringo before Ringo came along."
Correct, but more with the way he tuned his drums...he couldn't write or sing.
I can't remember a time when "fag" was ever a "nice" word for homosexuals.
This was Atlanta, Georgia in the 60s.
I've been to concerts by They Might Be Giants and Weird Al, and they were fantastic. Just as good as the record.
Bonnie Raitt was disappointing. She was touring after her two big records, so she played those tracks exactly as she recorded them.
Oh, and Jimmy Buffett, who I heard several times. Great fun.
YMMV, in the end. And Lennon's opinions changed depending on his mood, his drug intake, and his persona.
I saw the "Rust Never Sleeps" tour by Neil Young and the "Stop Making Sense" show by the Talking Heads.
Those were sure worth it!
She was touring after her two big records, so she played those tracks exactly as she recorded them.
I walked out of a Santana show as he was note for note perfect to the album. If I'd had wanted that, I could have stayed home and listened the album.
Worst show I ever saw was Jefferson Airplane. Don't know if they were drunk or pissed off, but it was a real stinkeroo.
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