The Beatles Boxed Set (25 page)

John released his debut solo album,
John
Lennon/Plastic Ono Band,
after his departure from the Beatles

            While
still celebrating the success of his debut solo album, John was confronted by
the fact that Paul filed suit against him and George and Ringo in the High
Court of London on December 31, 1970, to dissolve the partnership. The legal
disputes continued and the dissolution was only formalized on January 9, 1975.

            Despite
the case chasing him, John was on a roll. He began working on another album,
and was eager to undertake the entire recording on the Tittenhurst home studio
that he had built. During the sessions for this album Yoko was a very
influential player due to her experience reading and writing music. And of
course, there were always the stream of hate mail they receive on a day-to-day
basis. The more Yoko talked about her art scene in New York, the more John
considered living there. When they were there for a visit, John immediately
liked the place.

            John
and Yoko decided to return to New York in August 1971. They packed all their
things and flew to America. They did some interviews where John spoke of his
new album, the Beatle rumors and of his Japanese wife.

            Finally,
John’s
Imagine
album was released in September in the US and the
following month in the UK. Unlike his debut album, this one contained songs
that were gentler, more commercial and less avant-garde. It became the most
popular of his works, particularly because it bore the hit single
Imagine
that outlived its author.

            While
some music critics deemed the album less superior than
John Lennon/Plastic
Ono Band
,
Imagine
reached number one worldwide, with its title track
reaching number 3 in the US. It would be a few years later before the single
Imagine
was released in the UK to coincide with John’s album
Shaved Fish.

            Long
after John’s death, the song
Imagine
was included in some lost-influential
and greatest-songs-of-all-time lists. In 1999, the song received the Grammy
Hall of Fame Award and BMI named it one of the top 100 most-preferred songs of
the 20
^th
century.

            In
2004,
Imagine
was third on
Rolling Stone
’s list of the 500 Greatest
Songs of All Time. 

In
December 1971, John and Yoko released
Happy Xmas (War is Over)
. To
promote the single, they paid for a billboard in 12 major cities around the
world which bore the message, in the national language, WAR IS OVER – IF YOU
WANT IT.”

            The
impact of both
Give Peace a Chance
and
Happy Xmas (War is Over)
cannot be overemphasized enough. The Nixon administration heard rumors of
John’s involvement in a concert to be held in San Diego around the same time as
the Republican National Convention and tried to deport him. Nixon felt that
John’s involvement in the anti-war activities could cost him re-election. In a
February 1972 memo, Republican Senator Strom Thurmond suggested that
“deportation would be a strategic counter-measure” against John Lennon.

            Deportation
proceedings began the following month, with the US Immigration and
Naturalization Service (INS) arguing that John’s 1968 conviction for cannabis
possession made him ineligible to be admitted to the US.

            John
would spend the next three and a half years attending deportation hearings.
Finally, in 1975, the court of appeals barred the deportation attempt, stating,
“…the courts will not condone selective deportation based upon secret political
grounds.”

            While
the hearings continued, John attended rallies and appeared on some TV shows.

            In
March 1973, John was given 60 days to leave the US. Yoko was granted permanent
residence. On April 1, 1973, the Lennons held a press conference at the New
York  City Bar Association and announced the formation of the state of Nutopia,
which they described as a place with “no land, no boundaries, no passports,
only people.” The whole thing was filmed and would appear in the 2006
documentary
The US vs. John Lennon.

           
In the
interim, John busied himself with various activities, including recording and
releasing the album
Some Time in New York City
where he collaborated
with Yoko. The album contained songs celebrating women’s rights, race
relations, Britain’s role in Northern Ireland, and John’s problems with
obtaining a green card. The album was a flop, with one critic deeming it
“unlistenable.”

John, along with Yoko, also gave two benefit concerts in New
York in aid of patients at the Willowbrook State School mental facility. This
would be John’s last full-length concert appearances.

            Soon
after, Nixon was plunged into political scandal; in June, the Watergate
hearings began in Washington, DC. Nixon resigned 14 months later, and his
successor, Gerald Ford, wasn’t as interested to continue the battle against
John Lennon. The deportation issue was overturned in 1975. In 1976, John
finally received his green card, enabling him permanent residency. When Jimmy
Carter was inaugurated as president in 1977, both John and Yoko attended the
Inaugural Ball.

John
and Yoko, who seemed like a strong force since their first appearance together
on a Beatles recording session, slowly began to dwindle. He continued drinking,
then began to take side girlfriends and sneak around. Those who have worked
with the couple for some of their albums observed that they came to the studio
more apart than together.

            One
night late that summer of 1973, Bob Gruen was driving John home after a
Mind
Games
session at the Record Plant. John asked to be dropped off to East 91
^st
Street instead and said, “I’m staying with May.” He was referring to May Pang,
who had began working for John and Yoko as assistant.

John’s relationship with May Pang, shown
here with Julian Lennon, came with Yoko’s blessing

            It
would be years later before what happened in that “lost weekend” would come to
light, through May’s side of the story. Contrary to what most people assumed,
the “weekend” didn’t refer to just a few days, but, according to May, spanned ten
years, from December 1970 to December 1980.

            May
wrote that in the summer of 1973, Yoko approached her in her office in the
couple’s apartment at the Dakota building, New York. Yoko told her that she and
John were not getting along and was scared that John might be hooking up with
another woman. And then Yoko dropped the bomb: “I think you should go out with
him.”

            May
was horrified at the suggestion, but Yoko insisted that if John asked her out,
she should go out with him. When John began flirting with her, May slowly
succumbed to his charms. While John and May were together, Yoko would call him
nearly every 24 hours.

            But
during this period, some friends of John and Yoko recalled many more affairs
that John squeezed in between May and Yoko. Bob Gruen recalled, “I’ve always
been surprised that no more girlfriends have come forward. There were many,
many different women Lennon slept around with, although Pang was with him the
whole time. Some she knew about, others she didn’t. But she’s the only one
who’s stepped forward to write a book.”

           
Mind
Games
, which John recorded between July and August 1973 and came out in
early November, both in the US and the UK. It was a commercial failure and
received negative reviews. It peaked at number 13 in the UK and number 9 in the
US, where it went gold.

            In
1974, John’s drinking became even more serious. In March of that year, John
made headlines when he and Harry Nilsson went to The Troubadour, where John
placed a menstruation “towel” on his forehead and scuffled with a waitress. Two
weeks later, they were back on the same club and were kicked out after heckling
the Smothers Brothers.

            John
then decided to produce Nilsson’s
Pussy Cats
album. May rented a beach
house in Los Angeles where the musicians could convene. After barely a month,
John and May moved back in New York to finish working on the album.

            Back
in New York, John began work on the album
Walls and Bridges
. He released
it in October 1974, and it contained the song
Whatever Gets You thru the
Night
. It was John’s only number one single as a solo artist. The album and
the single both reached number one on the US charts the same week, and peaked
at number 6 in the UK.

            While
recording this album, John reestablished a relationship with his son Julian,
then already “a little man” at 10 years old. He also patched things with the
other Beatles, including Paul. On November 28, John appeared as guest at Elton
John’s Thanksgiving concert at Madison Square Garden, where he performed his
number one hit
Whatever Gets You thru the Night
along with
Lucy in
the Sky with Diamonds
and
I Saw Her Standing There
, which he
introduced as “a song by an old estranged fiancée of mine called Paul.” This
was John’s last major live performance.

            John
also began on his
Rock ‘n’ Roll
album as early as October 1973. The
recording spanned a year and when it was released in 1975, it was derided as “a
step backward.” While the critics slammed the album, it reached number 6 in the
US and the UK.

            In
February 1975, the lost weekend concluded with John getting back with Yoko. He
visited Yoko at the Dakota, intending to just visit. But John said, “..it just
fell in place again. It was like I’d never left. I realized that this was where
I belonged. I think we both knew we’d get back together again sooner or later,
even if it was five years, and that’s why we never bothered with divorce. I’m
just glad she let me back in again. It was like going out for a drink, but it
took me a year to get it!”

            According
to Jerry Hopkins, Yoko’s biographer, she welcomed John back under three
conditions. First, that he clean up his drug intake and flush his body of
poisons and adopt a macrobiotic diet. Second, that he “repair the holes in his
aura” and listen to her counsel on spiritual and astrological matters. And
third, that she take over his day-to-day business affairs.”

            John
was only too happy to agree. Once he moved back into their Dakota apartment,
Yoko became pregnant. She had miscarried three times already with John, but
this pregnancy seemed destined. In June, the couple spent summer on Long Beach,
Long Island, where John retreated from public life.

After three miscarriages, Yoko finally
gave birth to Sean Taro Ono Lennon on John’s 35
^th
birthday

            On
October 9, 1975, Yoko Ono gave birth to Sean Taro Ono Lennon on John’s 35
^th
birthday. John felt as though his chest would burst at the sight of their son,
the child that they badly wanted.

After
the birth of his second son, John comfortably settled in as a househusband,
just as he had agreed with Yoko when they reunited. This would begin a
five-year hiatus from the music industry. Before giving all his attention to
his family, John completed his album
Shaved Fish
, a compilation of
previously recorded tracks.