A tribute to John Lennon – 26 years after his death
The following is a tribute to John that I wrote last year on this date, which was the 25th anniversary of his murder. I thought it worth repeating.
The modern celebrity, sometimes a marginal talent, revels as he or she walks the red carpet, an invisible halo of glamour and self indulgence written in their superficial and forced smiles. It is really our fault. We idolize and live vicariously through the famous faces we watch. And today, on the 25th anniversary of the murder of John Lennon, I think about how different he was – how relevant he made himself to a generation of admirers, not by wanting to be adored, but by hoping he would be respected.
Adoration never came easy to John. His father abandoned him, His mother was rarely around. He grew up angry, and determined to make the establishment aware of his presence by acting out in school. When that phase ended, be began burying himself in sketching, and thankfully for us, music. His band, the Quarrymen, became the Beatles. John knew early that his enormous talent was not enough. His decision to invite Paul McCartney to join the band was courageous and it turns out, historic.
The irony of his life is that the more successful he was as an artist, the more traps he fell into as a person. Pill popping turned to alcohol and drug abuse, which plagued him until the mid seventies. But unlike the stars who lived in a bubble, Lennon was not afraid to share his private side in public. Almost every song he wrote was about how he was feeling at that time in his life. “I’m loser, he wrote at the age of 25. “I’m not what I appear to be.†When he was 30 (thirty) and totally in love with Yoko Ono, he penned the beautiful “Imagine.†Imagine, if you will, that the song of a utopian world, did not become one of the best selling recorded hits of all time until John was dead because he dared to say, “Imagine no war…. And no religion too.â€
His most angry music was written in 1973 when he was fully invested in drugs. Yet, in 1980 he wrote “(just like) Starting Overâ€, a reaffirmation that after five years as America’s most famous stay at home Dad, he was back and ready to entertain again.
His life was filled with mistakes and redemption. He was a womanizer who loved only three, wives Cynthia and Yoko and May Pang, the alluring and insightful secretary who Yoko fixed him up with. He was a womanizer who became an ardent feminist in the late seventies, a pacifist who became one of the most public supporters of police and firefighters, a sometimes domestic abuser who delighted in transforming himself into a student of the frustrating history of female evolution.
John was unselfish in his pursuits, giving his music away to other artists, to the detriment of his own career. He was also, delightfully and dangerously, one of the few people I’ve ever known who said in public what he thought in private, a man who spent most of his adult life thinking about other people, whether it was victims of bigotry in his native Britain, migrant laborers in California, the people who had little, and the citizens of abundance who gave little.
Personally, he is what I call the poster boy for imperfection. In life and in his amazing after life, we see him as a person whose personal decisions we would want to avoid, but whose personal convictions and search for the truth is something to admire.
My travels with him (and the other Beatles) were electric. My arguments with him about war and peace and his public righteousness made us both red in the face and dry in the mouth. He was especially vitriolic and profane when he told me I was an (expletive deleted) fool to leave New York to come back to broadcast in Philadelphia.
He is a one of those few dead poets we want to know more about. The physical being is gone, but he lives on in other ways.
Even now, 25 years after his murder, John Lennon’s voice resonates through the airwaves and the high technology of the times.
Even now, people ask themselves, “Where were you on the night of December 8, 1980â€, just like others asked where they were on the afternoon that John Kennedy was shot in Dallas, Texas.
I can still remember the words of former Mayor Frank Rizzo who had warned me during a visit by John to Philadelphia in 1975 that Lennon needed more protection. After all, on May 18th 1975, I picked him up at 30th street station where he came alone on an Amtrak train. When he met the thousands of people behind the Channel 6 studios, he stood fearless, enjoying the moment. He had come to Philadelphia to host a weekend charity broadcast. Weeks before he died, he confessed that he met more people in that weekend in the flesh than any other time in his life.
Ultimately, John Lennon was in love with people more than his daunting celebrity persona. Today we remember him mostly as a man who made beautiful music. Then, at his death, and now, with his haunting music and lyrics, he challenges us to think less about ourselves, and more about the world and the people around us
Comments(32)
Hi Larry,
This must be a bittersweet day for you this year, and every year. Lennon was fortunate to have you as a friend in life and even moreso to have you as person who keeps his spirit alive.
His controversial remarks, frequently misinterpreted, about religion echoed those of an American hero in 1845. Frederick Douglass, in his autobiography, condemned people who perverted religion by making it a rationale for slavery. More than a century later, Lennon condemned the same type of hypocrites.
Best,
Karl
Hi Larry,
Thank you for posting this beautiful tribute on this anniversary, and for “Lennon Revealed” last year. It meant alot to me to be a part of your sincere efforts to pay tribute to John.
26 years ago today I was home with the flu, and read that infamous Playboy interview. Within hours of finishing it, he was killed. Just like with Kennedy, as you say, I’ll never forget that moment, because it seared my soul. Every year I light a candle for him on this day.
Thanks again Larry,
Shelley
Larry.
I cannot imagine what it must have been like to interact with John in person.
thanks for sharing.
I was 18 that awful night in 1980
and it changed me forever.
John Lennon-Rock and Roll
Shelley–thanks for the note and the update I got in the mail today. Hope to be in Seattle next year for another project, not related to Beatles
Glenn — appreciate your thoughts. Thanks for taking the time.
Larry
Thanks for remembering John Lennon. I was 8 years old when he died and not knowing anything about it. Then the following year I became a Beatles fan. That is when I started to learn that John had died on Dec 8, 1980 just a year after. He really made a difference in our world today. He wrote us some inspirational songs like Imagine and All You Need is Love which he is probably well known for. I am sure that he had a plan to make the life better but unfortunately his life was taken earlier. The only thing we can say today is What If…
Hi Larry,
Thank you for sharing so many of your own experiences with the Beatles, especially John. I have been a Beatles fan since they first came to the US and captured my heart at the age of three (my earliest memory)! While I have read volumes about them – some good; some awful – I appreciate the way you have mediated each one of them to the public. Again, with John especially, you have allowed us a glimpse into a truly extraordinary man in all his talent, compassion, and humor while avoiding the pitfall of “canonizing” him. He certainly was no saint and would be the first to say so.
Like so many other fans, I too grieve on this bittersweet anniversary: both mourning what could have been while, at the same time, celebrating what was. On December 8, 1980, I had just finished working and was driving up the Garden State Parkway to share the news of my pregnancy with my family when the news came over the radio that John Lennon had been shot. By the time I had arrived at my parents home, he had died. It couldn’t have hit me harder if he had been a relative. He and the other Beatles had been such a big part of my life since I could remember. Today, I went to Strawberry Fields with my 25 year old son who is a huge Lennon fan. Thank you Larry for sharing John. Thank you John for sharing your spirit.
God, I still miss him!
Hi Larry!
This is a song I wrote for John in 1981:
The Memory of You
I can`t stop thinking ’bout you
You had so much left to do
They`re shooting down people like you
Isn`t that a pity?
People like you become victims
of New York City.
You sang `bout love and peace
humanity and justice
They`re shooting down people like you
I don`t know why
Is the devil stronger than God?
Why did you have to die?
Chorus:
All your music, the movies, the books
and everything that is written by you
Is all we`ve left over from you
It`ll allways be the memory of you
You`re gone,but you`re still living on
through your music,your music lives on
They`re shooting down people like you
Oh!I miss you so
The dream is over,I wonder;
Where are you now?
Harald N.
Otta, Norway.
Harold–it’s really great.
Thanks for sending.
Larry
Hi Larry
Thanks from Sweden for you sharing some moments with John. The history will more and more understand the genius of John and the other members of The Beatles.
We, my wife and I are constantly working with the Swedish Beatles convention to get new generation to understand something of it all. And it is really some Hars Days Work. Thank you very much.
I read two of your books Larry (Ticket to Ride and Lennon Revealed) and found both to be informative and more important to me, heartfelt. I also met you at last year’s Beatle Convention in New Jersey and it was delightful talking to you about John, Paul George and Ringo. God Bless you and “those guys.”
Good Morning Larry,
Thank you for sharing your very honest, personal perspective and love, for John Lennon.
There is such a commonality to the love and grief shared by those who knew him, and felt they knew him.
I’de like to share the lyrics of a song that I wrote just last year, and as of yet haven’t recorded, that I think express our common feelings about the man.
” Dear John”
Dear John
You know I miss you
Sometimes it seems like only yesterday
Somehow
I felt I knew you
Through all the mind games that we use to play
And I can’t believe it’s been so many years
For at times it seems that you’re still really here
When I listen to your songs
I can’t believe you’re gone
You know I miss you…I do
Dear John.
Dear John
I’m looking through you
There wasn’t much it seems you tried to hide
Your songs
Let me into you
So unafraid to show the child inside
And I guess that’s why you meant so much to me
For somehow you always felt like family
Through the triumphs and the tears
I followed through the years
My heart was with you…it’s true
Dear John.
Dear John
I still imagine
That some day all the world will live as one
That soon
Beyond the passion
We’ll fine our dream my friend beneath the sun
And I thank you as a tutor of my youth
That you sparked me on the path to seek the truth
And your songs of peace and love
I’ll still be singing of
And thinking of you….it’s true
Love you…..
Dear John………….
Thanks Larry for giving me a space to share that!
With hope and Peace,
Randyn
larry: i’m a lifetime philly person…read both of your beatle books, enjoyed them very, very much…thanks for the thoughts…you’re a class act, always……
i think that wherever there are people, even far, far into the future, john’s and the the beatles’ music will be listened to…they are on a short list of musical greats, whose art enriches humanity… great music like this is one of the very high points of humanity…-sue
Lennart and Lynn–
Thanks for the comments..
I think John has become bigger than just music. In a world of mediocre “celebrities: who don’t care much about others (except Bono and Opra and Angelina and Brad) John stands out as a living symbol for positive thinking about the potential for people.
i was just 7 year old when jonh killed but in my growing years songs that he wrote simply touches me. Until now i’m still reading books and articles about his life and musics. Truly be JOnh Lennon the BEST ARTIST OF ALL TIME….
Thanks Glenn
Larry
Larry,
Thank you for reminding me again of what I miss so much of in this world. Like the other testamonials written here today, I grew up with John as a mother, father, brother, best friend and mentor. All in my own mind of course. I have experienced the joy of playing in a band and writing/recording music and in this way can relate to that great genius as a boy relates to his baseball hero. With all of his human frailties, I will always love and miss him dearly, as I also miss his mate, George. May The Beatles Live Forever!
Michael: Well said and much appreciated.
Larry
Hi Larry
I’ve got two of your books; Ticket To Ride and Lennon Revealed, and that will probably be the closest connection we will have to John together. However, I envy you a “little” bit for having been a close friend to John and The Beatles, but also happy that you share this friendship with all of us. Keep up your good writing and all the best.
Regards, Terje from Norway
Hello, I’m not real good with a computer and when I checked my sent messages and didn’t see that the e-mail I had sent yesterday was in there I was thinking maybe I didn’t do it right. I had bought the “Beatles…The Tribute” concert tickets for my wife and I for Christmas, and had just finished your “Ticket to Ride” book two days ago.If your head fills like it’s starting to swell,It should. What a good time you made the whole scene become.I was 13 playing “I want to hold your hand ” on my 45 over and over and remembering them coming to the Civic Arena. Reading your book really has pumped me up for this show Friday the 2nd of Feb.I can almost hear all the screaming now. Thanks for a cool book from the result of some hard work, from a talented and lucky 21 year old.
Jim
You’ll love the show. They are an outstanding group and have the Beatles moves really down.
And thanks for writing.
Larry
Even thought i havent hear the songs the way they talk about him makes him a good person
Hello,Larry:
First off: Thank You for those two great books you wrote on Lennon and The Fabs. I am just finishing “Ticket”.
I have lots of audio of Beatles press conferences and I want to extend my hand in thanks to you for asking them some questions which were a challenge to their intelligence ( of which all four had lots of.) The idiocy of so many of the reporter’s questions must’ve been very frustrating for them,but to give them credit;it was a very rare instance when one of them would lose it.
I first became aware of the Beatles when I was 12 in 1967. Here is is 40 years later and they and their music are still fresh and vital. Their music is heartbeat music and that’s why humans love it so much.
When I heard of Lennon’s murder while watching Monday Night Football on the West Coast,the walls came crashing down.
I never cried so hard in my life,that is until my Dad passed away last June.
It was catastrophic to the Western World to lose Lennon like that.
I felt as if Mark Chapman reached into my chest and carved out my heart.
You were a lucky man to have spent so much time with The Beatles. You must’ve done something really nice in a previous life to gain and cash-in such good karma.
I miss George too. The highlight of mytrip to London in 2001 was going to Abbey Road Studios.
If you have another book in you about the Fabs,perhaps one examining what the Beatles meant to their African-American fans. The Beatles always made sure the public knew where they got their inspiration from and I would think it very interesting to hear some interviews you might’ve done back in the day or now with the contacts you still might have and see if the love White America had for the Beatles was/is shared by Black America.
Well,God Bless You,Larry Kane and thanks again for giving us a peek behind the scenes of our beloved Beatles.You really did us all a great kindness.
Dennis York
Dennis: Thanks for writing such a heartfelt piece.
Larry
my mom was skipping class to go smoke a cigarette when her friend ran outside to tell her the bad news. my mom turned me on to the beatles. whenever we’d go riding around, my mom would put this beatles tape in. it had paperback writer. i used to think it said piggy back rider. people in my band class think i look like john. i went to see yesterday on your show at the tropicana. it was awsome. that ed sullivan guy cracked we up with the nixon thing!!!
p.s. who was that freddie guy?
thanks,
dave
My brother was exactly the right age on February 7, 1964; he was 16 and I was 8. He told me about the reception in New York and when we watched Ed Sullivan that Sunday night, as we did every Sunday night, I wasn’t just interested in Topo Gigio anymore. It took, I don’t know, two minutes? By close to the end of the first song, we were theirs for the asking.
My parents were fans, too, which not all were at the beginning; my brother had a Gretsch Firebird guitar within a week and a band, The Buttons, before the Beatles got to Miami.
They were a standard I used to measure boyfriends in Jr. High and High School – if a boy liked them and wasn’t threatened, then he was O.K.
When I listened to I Wanna Hold Your Hand, I thought Paul might really mean that. You could bring a guy like that home. George would already be there – he was so obviously the boy next door. Ringo was a brother’s best friend. But John? John was dangerous. I was 8 and I knew that and that, too, informed future decisions about guys. A touch of that Lennon energy did it every time.
They sang (All You Need Is Love, of course) at my wedding.
And just as my husband shouted at the screen during Monday Night Football yelling, “What the hell? What’s he saying? Oh my God no” the phone rang and my brother who introduced me to them called so he could tell me first.
Something in me didn’t believe him – I hung up and called The Denver Post so I could prove it wasn’t true. Just another rumor. The woman at the Post answered the phone sobbing and didn’t wait for my question. She just said, “It’s true. It’s true. My God, who could do this?”
My husband and I drove to the University chapel where we had been married and prayed. We didn’t know what else to do. By midnight, the chapel was full.
On Sunday, we went to Red Rocks for the minute of silence.
It is still impossible to answer that question. My brother’s Chinese wife and to his daughter and my own son and the high school students I teach all get around to asking, “Why?” Kennedy. King. Kennedy. Politics has always been dangerous. Unpopular stands can engender violent reaction.
I still don’t have an answer. Someone that human, who didn’t use the power we gave him. We are so much the poorer for losing him. We needed him.
MMD
Larry,
I read Ticket To Ride and remember thinking your portrait of Lennon came across as one of the most honest renderings I have seen. I’ve read many accounts of his astounding successes by other writers, who spotlight Lennon’s fame–yet somehow miss the man. Thanks for sharing your stories with us.
Steve
Dear Larry,
i grew up listening to abbey road and other albums not ever knowing what they were or who wrote them. I’m in high school and was given the option of researching Lennon’s death and comparing it to Hamlet and leapt at the chance. Tonight i got a very good look into the pain of losing Lennon, and from the heartfelt responses and stories i came close to tears. Years after the fact and years before my time and i get close to tears, i cant imagine what it must have been like for you to have known him and lost. I wanted to thank you for writting this tribute and i will now be looking out for those books of yours. you have inspired me to go even more depth into who he was and what a great man we lost that day. I guess you could call me living proof that lennon is still affecting future generations today.
thanks -Andrew
Larry,
I have always wanted to get in touch with you in regards to some John Lennon items that I have. The last trip that he made to Philadelphia back in 1975 for his 3 day trip with Banana Joe. I have 2 very close up pictures and a Signed Album that was released. I am trying to find out what they are worth. Can you possible steer me in the right direction.
Larry,
I have always admired you and enjoyed your great stories of life on the road with the Fab Four back in the day. Now, I’d like to share with you my own experience.
Whenever I’m asked what the worst day of my life was, without hesitation I answer “December 8, 1980.” I still remember that horrible day as though it were yesterday.
I was two months away from my 16th birthday living with my parents in Houston, Texas. That afternoon, I grudgingly performed the annual rite of putting up the Christmas lights on our house. As usual, some of the bulbs were burned out so I decided to walk down to the nearby Target store to get some replacements. As I passed through the store, I happened to glance over at the latest 45′s (singles) and noticed the cover sleeve to John Lennon’s first new release in 5 years “(Just Like) Starting Over” which had just entered the Top 40. Without having even heard the record, I bought it on the spot along with the bulbs I needed. As a lifelong Beatles fanatic (with John my favorite), I just knew I wouldn’t be disappointed. I played it several times on my record player that evening and liked it a lot. It reminded me a bit of the Beatles’ classic “In My Life”. I was really excited that John was finally making music again. As I did with all of my records, I wrote the date I bought it inside the sleeve…”Dec 8, 1980″.
I went to bed around 9:00 p.m. (since I had school the next day) and was a little annoyed that my dad’s Monday Night Football game on the TV in the next room was a little too loud but I eventually dozed off. About two hours later, the ringing of the phone suddenly woke me. It was my best friend Martin. Still half asleep, I barely comprehended what he was saying. Something about Howard Cosell and John Lennon. Then, he told me John had been shot and was dead on arrival at a New York hospital. At first, I thought this was one of the sickest jokes he had ever played on me as he knew how much I revered John. I told him with a few choice expletives what I thought of his “joke” but he kept swearing it was true and the more he spoke, the more concerned I became. But, I still couldn’t believe it. I got off the phone and went into the TV room and asked my dad if he’d heard anything and he said Howard Cossell had just announced John’s death on Monday Night Football.
It was as though a sledgehammer had hit me while, at the same time, I felt completely numb. Some total jerk had assassinated my hero and the icon of an entire generation. Since my childhood, hardly a day went by that I didn’t listen to at least one Beatles tune and often several. I had even been inspired to play guitar from the age of 12…all because of the Beatles, but especially John Lennon.
Over the next week, completely depressed and locked away in my room, I played all of my Beatles albums non-stop as well as two of John’s solo albums that I owned. Later, my sister Peggy gave me John and Yoko’s Double Fantasy album for Christmas. Like millions of others, Martin and I quietly watched the John Lennon memorial service on TV the way others had watched JFK’s funeral seventeen years earlier.
For me, John wasn’t just the leader and guiding spirit of the greatest musical act of all time. As an absolutely genius songwriter, he always gave us hope and knew just the right lyrics to get us thinking about a wide array of subject matter. His greatest legacy is that his songs are timeless and will be passed down through many generations to come. I still miss him and his music every day. Thank you John for what you, Paul, George and Ringo gave the world.
Hello Larry,
I’ve been reading your “Ticket to Ride” book – very enjoyable and will soon be getting your “Lennon Revealed” book as well.
I’m just upto the part where you decided to stop carrying pencils in your pockets when covering the Beatles tour.
I wanted to share with you and everyone else this poem that I wrote as a tribute to John as well as to other tragedies of the 20th Century.
AN ODE TO THE CENTURY PAST
That was the age of despair, disrepair
but this is now, the New Utopia.
That was the time when we killed off our muses
throwing their remains to the ravenous dogs.
Our innocence disemboweled, our hopes quartered
with five hollow-point bullets on that cold december night.
When six million replaced six six six as the accursed number
of all eternity and
six million nameless faces, six million faceless names
were extinguished for that greatest crime of all -
Existence.
But this is now, the Neo-Utopia.
That was the age of despair, disrepair
When raven-black sun
threw rays of shadow upon the earth and
giant bullfrogs ate pygmy antelopes
hooves, bones and all.
But still we fought on, hoping for meaning to appear
yet when it arrived, it was only in our dreams
dissipating as soon as we awoke and tried to grab at its
gossamer threads with our crude, clumsy hands.
And this is now, the Last Utopia.
Dear Larry Kane,
Over a year ago in my theatre freshman college class i picked up a monologue from the play “the day john lennon was shot” then my professor further told me to watch the documentary “The US vs. Lennon”. I am a film major and have always adored The Beatles but in a time when i was still very lost and depressed in life i saw what Lennon did as a human being and saw that he was real with flaws just like an ordinary person. I then went to my local bookstore and picked up your book that you wrote “Lennon Revealed”. Truly, over a year ago i was so lost in life as many 19 years old and learning who Lennon was as a man and all the turmoil he trudged through as a person; it is he who helped me finally see the beauty in life, to learn to love myself in all its imperfections and become a better person and truly love the life given to me as it is. this tribute you wrote to him is amazing. And i still pick up your book whenever i need a bit of a reminder about life and read who Lennon was. I learn something new about him and myself everyday. I bet he had no idea he would still be helping millions with his music and just by being true to himself and to people. Thank you again for writing the biography you did. And Lennon where ever you are out in the universe thank for you always being honest even to the public and fighting for whats right and just being who are were no matter what people thought of you.
Alycia Lourim.
-A fan, but more of a believer in someone that lived a life of truth and most importantly love.