Lennon/Janov
... and the beauty in vulnerability
In December 1970, a few days before The Beatles officially broke up, John Lennon released his first solo album, John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band. Produced by Phil Spector, Yoko Ono and John, the album is a collection of songs written as a result of Lennon’s Primal Scream therapy sessions with Arthur Janov.
Having always had a passion for music and writing, starting a music blog was an idea I flirted with for a good while. More than the technical aspects, I was interested in discussing what draws us to specific artists, songs and albums, a recurring topic of conversation for me.
Though there is no clear answer, exploring the context that leads to the creation of a song is a good first step to try and understand what makes it enticing. Incidentally, John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band was the theme of my very first blog entry, which was never finished.
But why is this an album worth discussing? Let us go back to John Lennon.
Lennon was the founder and leader of The Beatles during the first half of their career. His songwriting partnership with Paul McCartney, perhaps the most successful of its kind, led the band to a never before seen level of fame and John Lennon to define and embody what it meant to be a rockstar.
The Beatles’ record-breaking popularity meant the band was constantly in the spotlight and dealing with increasing expectations. On top of the pressure brought by fame, The Beatles’ recording innovations, combining different instruments and studio effects, made it impossible for their songs to be played live. In 1966, the same year Lennon infamously declared The Beatles were “more popular than Jesus”, the band stopped touring altogether.
Three years later, in 1969, The Beatles were at a boiling point: tensions between the band members and creative differences meant they seldom cooperated. As seen in Peter Jackson’s recent documentary, The Beatles: Get Back, they no longer wanted to be a band, but had to fulfil contractual obligations. While Paul McCartney took over as the de facto bandleader, coaxing the other three to push through and collaborate, Lennon was clearly no longer in the mood, more interested in his relationship and projects with his wife Yoko Ono.
It was around this time John Lennon received a copy of The Primal Scream in his mailbox. The book had been sent to Lennon by its author, Arthur Janov, the father of Primal Therapy. A native of Los Angeles, Janov started off practising conventional psychotherapy when, in 1967, an experience with a patient led him to the development of Primal Therapy.
Janov argued that the psychological problems we face as adults are the product of repressed childhood traumas, what he called Primal Pain. According to Janov, “The number one killer in the world today [1970s] is not cancer or heart disease, it is repression”, a description that sounds eerily modern.
He argued that in order for us to overcome our fears and traumas we need to go back to the source of the pain and relive it to resolve it. His California clinic was peppered with cribs, teddy bears and childhood objects used to induce his patients to regress to their infancy, which often led to crying and screaming.
Lennon invited Arthur Janov and his wife Vivian to move into his and Yoko’s home, Tittenhurst Park in Ascot, England. The sessions began in England and continued in Los Angeles, where, after four months, Lennon ended his treatment before its completion due to continued disputes between Janov and Yoko.
Janov later claimed they had had time to open John up, but not to put him back together again. This is a good description of John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band. Ringo, who played drums on the album, reportedly said Lennon would burst out crying or start screaming during the recording sessions.
Starting from the album cover, a picture of John lying with his head on Yoko’s lap under a tree, everything about the album feels raw. The songs have simple, repeating structures, with few chords being played over and over again, creating a cathartic atmosphere.
Mother and Remember are clear snapshots of John’s dispair. It does not get any more direct than the chorus in Mother, with John belching
Mama, don't go
Daddy, come home
Mama, don't go
Daddy, come home
or the verses
And remember how the man
Used to leave you empty handed
from Remember, recorded on October 9th, 1970, Lennon’s 30th birthday.
God, inspired by a conversation with Janov, in which Lennon came up with the verse “God is a concept by which we measure our pain” has John famously proclaiming “The dream is over”, a nod to The Beatles’ impending end.
In the acoustic protest song Working Class Hero John departs slightly from the album’s theme to make a political statement
A working class hero is something to be
A working class hero is something to be
Well Well Well and I Found Out show a raspier, angrier side of John Lennon, another way he found to cope with his frustration
I heard something about my Ma and my Pa
They didn't want me so they made me a star
Lastly, Love, Look at Me and Hold On show a feebler, smitten and yet hopeful John, willing to take on the world with his beloved Yoko
Hold on John, John Hold on
It's gonna be alright
You gonna win the fightHold on Yoko, Yoko hold on
It's gonna be alright
You gonna make the flight
Though there are some overdubs, different recordings layered atop one another, the songs feel bare: for the most part, it is just John on piano/guitar and vocals, Ringo on drums, and Klaus Voorman, long-time Beatle friend and collaborator, on bass. It is Lennon laid bare and the arrangement highlights its naked feel.
Arthur Janov would later say “John had about as much pain as I've ever seen in my life”. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the album’s Japanese title was “ジョンの魂”, which translates to "John's Soul". Even with Primal Therapy later facing severe criticism and Janov’s credibility being questioned, I believe Lennon and Janov really struck something interesting in their collaboration, uncovering Freudian traumas from John’s past.
For a bit more context, Lennon was raised by his aunt Mimi, his mom Julia’s elder sister, after his father had abandoned the family when John was still an infant. John’s good relationship with his mother was cut short due to her untimely death in a traffic accident when John was 17. A bit later in his life, his childhood friend Stu Stutcliffe whom John would go on to describe as "a guiding force" would also die prematurely, aged 21.
I have always thought of John Lennon first as a poet then a musician, and Paul as musician first, then a lyricist, which explains why each complemented the other so well. During his time with The Beatles, John hid his traumas using sarcasm and humour and was frequently seen pulling faces at the camera.
Though written much later in his career, I find John’s 1980 song (Just Like) Starting Over to be a perfect illustration of his ability to alternate between deep feelings
Our life together is so precious together
We have grown, we have grown
Although our love is still special
Let's take a chance and fly away
Somewhere alone
and tongue-in-cheek humour, mimicking Elvis’ style in the verses
It's been too long since we took the time
No-one's to blame, I know time flies so quickly
Just like Janov argued, the fear of abandonment and loneliness were buried deep in John and if we scrutinise The Beatles’ catalogue, John’s songs tend to be sadder, melancholic and anguish-driven whereas Paul’s are jollier and whimsical or, to quote McCartney himself, they are “silly love songs”.
We can see clear examples of this by juxtaposing Lennon and McCartney songs from The Beatles’ catalogue.
In 1964’s A Hard Day’s Night, McCartney’s jolly Can’t Buy Me Love goes
I'll buy you a diamond ring my friend
If it makes you feel alright
I'll get you anything my friend
If it makes you feel alright
'Cause I don't care too much for money
For money can't buy me love
while Lennon’s If I Fell hints at a fear of unrequited love
If I give my heart
To you
I must be sure
From the very start
That you
Would love me more than her
in Beatles for Sale, also released in 1964, Paul’s happy Eight Days a Week
Eight days a week
I love you
Eight days a week
Is not enough to show I care
contrasts with John’s gloomy I’m a Loser
I'm a loser
And I lost someone who's near to me
I'm a loser
And I'm not what I appear to be
1965’s Rubber Soul opens with McCartney’s rocker Drive My Car
Asked a girl what she wanted to be
She said, "Baby, can't you see?
I wanna be famous, a star of the screen"
But you can do something in between
Baby, you can drive my car
Yes, I'm gonna be a star
Baby, you can drive my car
And maybe I'll love you
followed by Lennon’s gloomy Norwegian Wood
I once had a girl
Or should I say she once had me
She showed me her room
Isn't it good Norwegian wood?
She asked me to stay
And she told me to sit anywhere
So I looked around
And I noticed there wasn't a chair
There are plenty more examples in The Beatles’ records, confirming Janov’s theory that the traumas were there from the start.
British journalist Richard Williams would describe John Lennon/Plastic Ono as “almost unbearably stark” stating it was “not an album I can put on for pleasure”, but I believe the album’s beauty stems from its honest depiction of vulnerability.
Interestingly, Paul McCartney also lost his mother during his childhood, but had a considerably less traumatic experience, which brings to mind Jung’s famous quote: “I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become”. Another historical illustration comes from Michelangelo and Da Vinci: both challenged Catholic dogmas but dealt with the guilt in different ways. While Leonardo led a happy life, Michelangelo was constantly burdened by doubt and insecurity.
Released forty years later, in 2010, Corinne Bailey Rae’s The Sea is another album that deals with loss; the singer lost her husband at the young age of 29. Describing the circumstances of the album’s recording Rae remarked “there is something miraculous that pushes you along (...) it's about loss but it's also about hope, about keeping going and trying to find that beauty”, a description I also think applies to John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band.
Suffering is an integral part of the human condition and we must embrace it. Both albums highlight the tragic nature of life and make a healthy counterpoint to hedonistic and pleasure-seeking lifestyles.
Fame had cost John Lennon his first marriage with Cynthia Powell and made him an absent father to his first son Julian. After John left Cynthia, Paul McCartney tried comforting young Julian by writing him a song, Hey Jules. Hey Jules would become Hey Jude, which sold 8 million copies worldwide.
As for John, therapy and introspection helped him reassess his lifestyle. Lennon would go on to find his stride after his bouts of depression and self-doubt. He would discover the simple pleasures in life, become a present father to his son Sean and enjoy his marriage with Yoko.
Beautiful Boy is a great illustration of the happiness he found in his “househusband” years, from 1975 until 1980, leaving the music business behind, a shift he described in Watching the Wheels
People say I'm lazy
Dreaming my life away
Well they give me all kinds of advice
Designed to enlighten me
When I tell them that I'm doing fine watching shadows on the wall
"Don't you miss the big time boy, you're no longer on the ball?"
I'm just sitting here watching the wheels go round and round
I really love to watch them roll
No longer riding on the merry-go-round
I just had to let it go
The way John sings “I just had to let it go” is one of my favourite vocal lines of all time and feels like a powerful closure. Sadly, as fate would have it, John’s newfound life would be cut short by his assasination in 1980. This time it would be John leaving Sean and his beloved Yoko behind.
I got back to thinking about John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band after reading Lori Gottlieb’s best-selling book Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, Her Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed. Gottlieb describes the hardships faced by four of her patients and her own hardships, showing an interesting dual nature: Gottlieb is both a therapist and a patient in her own right. Likewise, in John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band, John reminds us that, no matter who we are, suffering and struggles are a part of life.
John Lennon’s courage and candour allow him to step away from the artist persona and show himself as a human being, with feelings, disillusions and yearnings, something we all identify with. John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band is an illustration of the hardships and suffering that are part of the human condition.
A sad and beautiful illustration.
May you rest in peace, John.
If you have read this far, thank you! If these lines made you stop and ponder, I have achieved my goal. Want to be kept on the loop? Subscribe below!