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- [00:00]
AFWA Hirsch
Wondery subscribers can binge seasons of Legacy early and ad free. Join Wondery in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Before we start, a warning. This episode contains swearing and homophobic and antisemitic language. Listener discretion is advised. Wondry.
- [00:23]
Peter Frankopan
Hello and welcome to the third episode of our series on John Lennon.
- [00:28]
AFWA Hirsch
It's 1966. Lennon is 25 and still married to Cynthia. Their son Julian is three years old, but he's spending a lot of time in the attic, lost in drug induced music experiments or away on tour.
- [00:43]
Peter Frankopan
That August, the Beatles take off from Heathrow Airport for a tour of the United States. They don't know it yet, but John's big mouth is about to cause big trouble. And he doesn't know that in three months time he'll meet the woman who will change his life forever.
- [01:14]
AFWA Hirsch
From wandering Goal Hanger I'm AFWA Hirsch.
- [01:17]
Peter Frankopan
I'm Peter Frankopan and this is Legacy, the show that tells the lives of the most extraordinary men and women ever to have lived and and asks if they have the reputation that they deserve.
- [01:37]
AFWA Hirsch
This is John Lennon, Episode 3 All you need is love.
- [01:50]
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- [03:19]
Peter Frankopan
So the Beatles Album Revolver is getting pretty ecstatic reaction, but their new material is just far too sophisticated to replicate live. And in any event, no one's really listening because people are too busy screaming. It's really affecting their musicianship. And John Lennon starts to tell audiences, don't bother listening to our music. We're terrible these days.
- [03:39]
AFWA Hirsch
But playing live tours is what bands do. So they're heading to the US for an 18 show tour. But as the Beatles touch down in Chicago, they are nervous.
- [03:54]
Peter Frankopan
Yeah, so just to recap afterwards, so five months earlier, John Lennon had done an interview with Maureen Cleave in the Evening Standard. And in it, amongst other things, he'd said, Christianity will go, it will vanish and shrink. We're more popular than Jesus now. I don't know which will go first, rock and roll or Christianity. And no one in Britain had been really bothered. But in the us, people had gone nuts.
- [04:15]
AFWA Hirsch
You know, I teach journalism and I teach an interview class and I teach this Maureen Cleave interview. And if you look at that quote properly, it is much more a commentary on the popularity of pop culture, of consumerism, of social change, the decline of religion in people's personal lives. All of which really, by the way, are statements of fact much more than it is some kind of self aggrandizement of imagining themselves as the new messiah. But the reason I teach it is that I'm encouraging the journalists, I'm teaching to think about the impact of the quotes they report and to have cultural intelligence to imagine how something that seems harmless in one context could become life threatening in another. Because that's essentially what happened. This quote that no one in England really cared about that the journalists didn't think would be problematic leads to a completely hysterical reaction in parts of America. I mean, a Ku Klux Klan spokesman excoriates the Beatles on local tv. Klansmen are now picketing concerts. Even the Pope weighs in. Pope Paul VI says some subjects must not be dealt with profanely.
- [05:27]
Peter Frankopan
But I think it's that the Beatles represent change. And so when you get DJs in Alabama reading out John Lennon's quotes on air and smashing Beatles records, it's not just that people are going for what it is that John Lennon has said. It's the fact that we're living in an age of real change. They're kind of easy victims to sacrifice. They're a cipher for moral standards declining in the West.
- [05:48]
AFWA Hirsch
I completely agree with you. And they represent that because they just captured the zeitgeist. And for many people, they are the vehicle through which they experience this much more intangible change. But I do think that those comments specifically massively accelerated the demonization of Lenin in particular out of the four, for him to be singled out and attacked. I mean, they were describing him as satanic in parts of the Bible Belt, you know, that he was the Antichrist.
- [06:17]
Peter Frankopan
I mean it feels like a real turning point. And I think it's about fame and expectation and intrusion getting on top of him. And he says, I didn't want to tour again, especially after having been accused of crucifying Jesus when all I'd done was make a flippant remark and having to stand with the clan outside. We've got to find something else to do, Paul says. It's like leaving school and finding a job.
- [06:41]
AFWA Hirsch
Richard Lester, who's directed two Beatles films, offers John a part in his anti war film How I Won the War. But it's not enough. His home life is a sham and the Beatles just feels like a day job. Those in the know are talking about this exhibition by a trendy, very left field avant garde artist. And Lennon's curious to find out more about her work. Monday, 7 November 1966 Indica Gallery, Mayfair, London. A tanned, healthy looking John Lennon walks down the stairs into a basement gallery. He's just back from a couple of months in Almeria, spending Spain filming How I Won the War. He's been invited to a sneak preview of some work by a Japanese artist from New York. There's a low level buzz about the place as people focus on getting the exhibits ready for the official opening tomorrow. John wanders around. The first thing he notices is an apple. A Granny Smith apple on a plinth. The idea is that he you can buy it and watch it decompose. The price tag says £200. Maybe he'll just eat it. He turns to the next exhibit. A white stepladder mounted on a small white stage. There's some kind of painting at the top with a magnifying glass on a chain. Climbing the steps to the top, he can make out a word on the canvas. He picks up the magnifying glass to read it, almost anxious about what the message might be. He sees the word yes. He feels a relief that he doesn't quite understand. Back on terra firma, he's introduced to the artist Yoko Ono. She walks up, handing him a card. It says breathe. So he leans in towards her her and exhales dramatically. That's right, she says, unfazed. You've got it. They Walk together to the next piece, a square of white wood hung on the wall with a little hammer lying across the top. Painting to hammer a nail in, the sign says. Can I hammer a nail in? John asks. No, replies Yoko. She wants it all clean and nail free for the opening. John Dunbar, the gallery's owner, intervenes. Lennon might actually buy something here. Go on, let him hammer a nail in. Okay, she says. For five shillings. John smiles. How about I give you an imaginary five shillings and then I can hammer in an imaginary nail? They lock eyes for more than a moment. He gets it. He knows she gets it. And this is it.
- [09:42]
Peter Frankopan
So Yoko Ono is 33, and she's already an established figure on New York's avant garde scene. She's a key member of Fluxus, a multidisciplinary group of artists who reject high art. Their God is Marcel Duchamp, the man who made an artwork out of urinal. And Yoko Ono obviously clicks with John Lennon. She says later, up until then, all Englishmen had looked kind of weedy to me. This was the first sexy one I met.
- [10:10]
AFWA Hirsch
This is a woman who just breaks every convention. She's Japanese heritage, she's avant garde artist. She's definitely dancing to the beat of her own tune, even within the avant garde art world. So I can imagine for him this is something of a revelation, especially for a man who is hounded by groupies who aren't really that interested in what he has to say, just scream over his music. They're both people who test other people's boundaries, and it feels as if in each other they have both met their match. There's only one minor obstacle here, Peter, which is that not only John, but also Yoko are both married at this point. He is married to Cynthia, with whom he has son Julian, and Ono is married to an American film producer called Anthony Cox, and also has a small child. But such is the strength of their attraction, that doesn't necessarily put them off.
- [11:05]
Peter Frankopan
But they're busy swapping ideas, so, you know. Yoko sends Lennon a copy of her book Grapefruit, which is a collection of haiku length instructional poems, which is quite a calling card for kind of, are you interested? And John keeps it by his bedside and returns to particular lines like draw a map to get lost, you know, make a key, find a lock that it fits, and these kinds of things that on the one hand, banal but also incredibly profound. You can see that he would be.
- [11:30]
AFWA Hirsch
Intrigued in the music world. Peter, 1966 is an epic year for the album. We've got Bob Dylan's Blonde on Blonde, the Rolling Stones, Aftermath and the Beach Boys, Pet Sounds still today hailed as one of the greatest records ever made. It's kind of fun to think of all these big acts at this time in conversation with each other, almost like a call and response, releasing these huge albums into the mix of this heady year and into that mix. On the 26th of May 1967, the Beatles release. What's their response to this frenzied musical creativity? And it's the album sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.
- [12:16]
Peter Frankopan
And it's a sort of. It's a moment where there's so much change going on within the Beatles as well as outside. So the Lennon and McCartney partnership that we talked about before, where they're collaborating, correcting each other, you know, trying to improve what they're working on, it's now a completely different thing, you know, most of the songs are being written separately. Paul often gets to the studio first to try out his ideas and then presents them as a fait accompli, which annoys Ringo and George, but it really gets under John Lennon's skin. In the meantime, George Harrison is busy exploring Indian music, has become good friends with the sitar player Ravi Shankar, and he brings that influence to the studio along with some Indian musicians to play on his track within youn without yout. But the bit that's kind of amazing is that in spite of the fact that you'd think that this is a kind of breakdown moment, they produce one of the best and most important albums of all time. I mean, that is one of the great records, right?
- [13:09]
AFWA Hirsch
Well, from my 7 year old Beatles Merton Appreciation Society Saturday meetups, I can tell you that that is the album that sits in pride of place in the cult of Beatles fandom. And there's something about that album that is transcendent. It's a psychedelic adventure as much as it is a piece of music.
- [13:33]
Peter Frankopan
Peter I remember thinking, you know, what is a Lonely Hearts Club band? Who is sergeant Pepper? Why are they dressed in the way they are, in kind of Victorian uniforms, band uniforms. And then, I don't know, you've seen the album cover, which is one of the great album covers of all time by Peter Blake with famous people from all points of, Well, I guess 20th century history, really. Mae West, Bob Dylan, Gandhi, you know, that kind of idea of the Beatles positioning themselves to say we are the leaders of all of these people. It's quite a bold statement as well.
- [14:03]
AFWA Hirsch
I'm very pleased to say that Lennon's idea of having Jesus and Hitler standing next to each other on the album cover was voted down. I feel like that would not. It doesn't even feel right to say it would not have aged well. It would not have been received well at the time.
- [14:21]
Peter Frankopan
But, you know, it's a huge success, this album too, when it comes out.
- [14:23]
AFWA Hirsch
It is an immediate commercial success, Peter. It spends 23 weeks at number one in the UK charts and stays in the top 10 for nearly nine months. The Daily Telegraph, reviewing the 2009 Remastered version, says it is impossible to overstate its impact. From a contemporary 60s perspective, it was utterly mind blowing and original. Looking back from a point where its sonic innovations have been integrated into the mainstream, it remains a wonky, colourful and wildly improbable pop classic.
- [14:57]
Peter Frankopan
I mean, it is amazing how inventive it is. I mean, Strawberry Fields Forever. I was born four years after it came out and I remember listening to it. I think we had quite a sort of groovy music teacher who made us all sit down age 7. I had no idea who the Beatles were. But Strawberry feels forever apart from not quite understanding what the song is all about. You know, it just melts into itself. I mean, Lucy, this guy with diamonds, that was all explained in hushed tones. That had something to do with drugs, although quite what that meant I wasn't quite clear. As I got older, I realized that was the name given to the first female ever in human history. When they were doing the excavations that found the oldest ever jawbone belonging to the oldest ever hominid, they were listening to Lucy in the sky with Diamonds. She was called Lucy rather than Eve, but that's the legacy of the Beatles, right? If they'd been listening to Pet Sounds or Bob Dylan, you know, if they'd been listening to Jailhouse Rock, it wouldn't have been quite so spectacular. But the fact that it's dictated by what the young archaeologists were listening to at the camp, I think it's sort of quite symbolic.
- [15:57]
AFWA Hirsch
It is such a creative time, but the union, the creative harmony that has allowed them to produce this art is beginning to fracture at this point point.
- [16:07]
Peter Frankopan
I mean, they're trying to hold it together, but that bond feels like it's dissolving. You know, none of them are really sure if they want to keep going, but what would they be without each other? Maybe they're reaching the end of the road.
- [16:30]
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- [18:11]
Peter Frankopan
So it's 1967, and in San Francisco, thousands of hippies with flowers in their hair are embracing spiritual awakening, hallucinogenic drugs, and free love. Their counterculture vibe is anti consumer, suspicious of government, fiercely opposed to the Vietnam War. Actually, for many people, it's the Summer of love, right?
- [18:31]
AFWA Hirsch
It's become known as the summer of Love. But I think it's really important to remember that for African Americans in particular, it had a very different name and it's remembered by African Americans as the Long Hot summer because it was a time of unprecedented turmoil in the black community. I mean, we're talking about 150 black neighborhoods burned in riots that one summer, 26 people killed in Newark in New Jersey, 43 people killed in Detroit. And this is also the build up to an even more intense time where we're going to see the assassinations of Martin Luther King and jfk, both people who played such a leading role in the civil rights movement and the 1968 Summer Olympics when Tommy Smith and John Carlos raised their gloved fists in that famous black power stance in Mexico City. So it is interesting how these things coexisted. And not to say they didn't influence each other or weren't connected, but they definitely have very different identities in respect of collective memory.
- [19:35]
Peter Frankopan
Do you think that's one reason why the Beatles also get interested in Indian music as sort of a growing awareness that there are other strands to explore. Would you connect that or do you think that's something to do with George Harrison's wife getting the band along to a talk from Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and his no frills version of Hindu practices? That. That's connected, or do you think that's two separate stories altogether?
- [19:57]
AFWA Hirsch
I think they're completely connected because this is a period where the stranglehold of those ideas of European cultural supremacy are really beginning to be disrupted. I think the Beatles were super aware of all of this and experimenting with where they wanted to position themselves and who they wanted to be aligned with.
- [20:16]
Peter Frankopan
Yeah. And I think Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, we might get to do a legacy just on him. The kind of complications of what that's all about. But John Lennon loves him and he calls him the giggling guru. And he's keen on it because not just Lennon's interested in Indian culture. And, you know, in that same interview with Maureen Cleave, he says, this music is thousands of years old. It makes me laugh, the British going over there and telling the Indians what to do. But Len is kind of looking for something. He's looking for answers and, you know, the kind of that banal and yet profound balance. You know, that Mahi Rishi is saying things like the philosophy of life is this, life is not a struggle, not a tension. Life is bliss. It is eternal wisdom, eternal existence. You know, Lenin is looking for that kind of simple answer that can allow him to have peace.
- [20:59]
AFWA Hirsch
For me, learning about how the Beatles coped with their fame and with all this social change, in part by gravitating towards this version of Indian spirituality that Maharishi offered. It also kind of explains a trend that's still very visible today, with celebrities going off to ashrams and having gurus and doing yoga. The Beatles, they had all the money they could ever dreamed of, all the fame they could ever dreamed of, all the women they could have dreamed of. And almost when you finally saturate those material goals, then you suddenly notice that there's still something missing. And then you turn to spirituality. And in a way, that's kind of a metaphor for what's happening in so many developed countries where we see these crises in mental health and loneliness and this kind of sense of the meaninglessness of life when you have all your material needs met. And I feel like what happened with the Beatles in this period in the late 60s was a microcosm of that phenomenon that's just played out more and more ever since.
- [21:58]
Peter Frankopan
Of course we're focusing on John Lennon. But all four of the Beatles sign up for this. They're all interested in listening to Maharishi and they break off a studio session to go to have a breakaway with him in Bangor. But while they're there, they get shocking and dreadful news. The Beatles manager, Brian Epstein is dead from an accidental overdose of alcohol and barbiturates. He's just 32. John Lennon is absolutely stunned.
- [22:26]
AFWA Hirsch
Epstein's role has diminished since they've stopped touring, but the fans still rely on him. He is the one in their midst who has a business brain and they lean on him for their business decisions. And just that January, he managed to massively renegotiate their royalty rate with EMI, up to 10%. So his death is a real blow. One, because it leaves them alone with their business affairs, a situation they're not really equipped to handle. But two, because he was really a friend, and especially to John, who had his own close friendship with him.
- [23:03]
Peter Frankopan
So in January 1968, they set up their own company, Applecore, to take care of their music and their films. On top of that, John and Yoko are officially an item. John Lennon's moved out of Kenwood, leaving Cynthia and his son Julian behind. And most people around him are baffled by his choice of lover. Lennon is a world famous musician, rock star. He could have gone out with anybody he wanted, but he seems to have chosen someone that many see as a very unglamorous figure from the art world's lunatic fringe. I mean, how do you think that fits together?
- [23:36]
AFWA Hirsch
She's such an outsider and so different from what especially the people in his background in Liverpool are used to. None more so than Aunt Mimi, who in not very diplomatic language when she meets Yoko, says, who's the poisoned dwarf, John? Not the nicest response. I think the fact that she's so misunderstood is only gonna strengthen John's attraction to her because he relates to that sense of being an outsider and being misunderstood by people who come from a more conventional background in terms of what is respectable and successful. And the combination of these two outsiders is really about to become an artistic force. Lennon, on 1 July 1968, opens his first ever art exhibition titled you are Here.
- [24:27]
Peter Frankopan
Then, in November, just after John and Cynthia have got divorced, John and Yoko release an album together called Two Virgins, which takes his experimentation to another level. And not everybody likes Yoko's, let's call it enthusiastic singing style. Nor do they like the album Cover which is a photo of the two of them completely naked.
- [24:50]
AFWA Hirsch
Okay, let's just take a minute. Peter, first of all, have you heard Yoko Ono's singing before?
- [24:56]
Peter Frankopan
I have. And I think enthusiastic is probably the right way of putting it, isn't it? That's polite.
- [25:03]
AFWA Hirsch
I had to look it up on YouTube when we were researching to do this series and I'd heard it described more as yelling or screaming.
- [25:11]
Peter Frankopan
Do you want to give us a sample?
- [25:14]
AFWA Hirsch
I am tempted.
- [25:15]
Peter Frankopan
I almost convinced you.
- [25:17]
AFWA Hirsch
I don't know if my talents extend that far. We do also just need to discuss this album cover because I don't know if you remember when Kanye west and Bianca Censori appeared on the red carpet for the Grammys and she took off this black fur coat to reveal that she was basically completely naked under it and how shocking that was 2025, this is 1968, and the two of them are appearing on the COVID of an album completely naked. I mean, it's hard to really compute how provocative and jaw droppingly shocking that would have been to people.
- [25:56]
Peter Frankopan
Destructive, do you think it's. Is it intentionally looking for trouble? I mean, there are other ways of doing things.
- [26:01]
AFWA Hirsch
I think like maybe an even more devastating critique was that it was attention seeking, that she would do anything to get attention, that she was using him to get attention. And that was one of the things that I think people talked about when this album was released.
- [26:16]
Peter Frankopan
So the opening of the youe Are Here exhibition, they released 360 white balloons into the sky. Each one has a small paper card attached to be mailed back to the gallery with the finder's comments. And many of those returned with really racist and nasty comments about Yoko Ono.
- [26:30]
AFWA Hirsch
She's nicknamed the Dragon lady, which just seems a very crude caricature of her Japanese heritage. And it is really unpleasant to see the ways in which people attacked her for that.
- [26:42]
Peter Frankopan
Yeah, and I think that some of those attacks are in the context of, you know, it's only just over 20 years since the end of the Second World War. And you know, the role that Japan had played in the Pacific and in south and Southeast Asia, you know, obviously was part of that demonization of all things Japanese. But I think it's not just about the racism. Afo isn't. It isn't also the way in which Yoko is brought into the studio and how that upsets the rhythm and the balance of the band.
- [27:06]
AFWA Hirsch
She is brought into the studio and this is a situation in which these four men have grown up making music together and you know, From Lennon's perspective, it was not sensitive of him to bring his partner into that mix. And as McCartney said, let's face it, we didn't welcome Yoko into the studio because we thought it was a guy thing. Our girlfriends or wives wouldn't have done that. But to sit in the studio with us, it was like, no, excuse me, we're working. And I do think Yoko Ono is a trailblazer, and there are lots of strengths to that. But one of the weaknesses is that maybe a lack of interest in when it actually isn't appropriate to be in a space, you know? And I think sometimes you do need to respect the fact that people have a creative and working relationship. And even if you can be in there, is it good to be there or is it imposing and interrupting something that has a kind of like sacred camaraderie to it? That's definitely how other members of the Beatles saw it. They did not appreciate the introduction of Yoko Ono into the studio.
- [28:08]
Peter Frankopan
Lennon's new life as an artist is gathering pace, but there's still a Beatles empire to run. So Apple Corps is owned by all four of them, and funneling their money through a company means they're paying less tax. But they also like the idea of bringing on new talent too. So Ringo Starr says, we thought, now Brian's gone, let's really amalgamate and get this thing going. Let's make records and get people on a label and things like that. So we formed Apple.
- [28:36]
AFWA Hirsch
It's objectively a huge amount of work since sergeant Pepper. They've put out three more albums. They're now running this company. This is where the competitive element comes in because McCartney is really working as a functional director of Apple Corp. So now Lennon wants to prove that he's just as much of a director as McCartney. So they're trying to do a lot of different things. Meanwhile, tensions are pulling them apart.
- [29:06]
Peter Frankopan
As usual, it's McCartney who's trying to keep it all together. In January 1969, they regroup. He suggests working towards a one off live show. Maybe they'll recapture some of that early spark. George Harrison doesn't like yokoone being around, so he leaves and just says, I'll see you around the clubs. Doesn't come back for five days. Somehow the band do hold it together. They go for a take of McCartney's song The Two of Us, which he's written for his girlfriend Linda. And when they lean into the same microphone to sing the line, you and I have memories longer than the road that stretches out ahead. Orland John they're sort of recapturing something in those early days. But the idea of live concerts is still a long way away. So eventually someone says, why not just play on the roof of the Apple Building Instead? So on 30 January 1969, engineers set up the kit. No one's sure if Leonard's gonna do it. Eventually he pops up wearing Yoko and his fur coat, steps forward and says, fuck it, let's play.
- [30:10]
AFWA Hirsch
And of course, when the Beatles play, an audience gathers. This time it's an impromptu audience because it's a little bit random that they're playing on this roof in Savile Row. And at the end Lennon says, I'd like to say thanks on behalf of the group for ourselves, I hope we pass the audition. Very Lennon.
- [30:28]
Peter Frankopan
I mean, it's an amazing video of seeing them on the rooftop playing. And, you know, it's the seminal bit about how these guys are willing to like, literally head up into the skies because they don't want to play for mere mortals. But there's something very about that performance too, because it's the last time they play out live. In March 1969, John and Yoko get married in a secret ceremony in Gibraltar, both dressed in white.
- [30:50]
AFWA Hirsch
And John and Yoko know the eyes of the world are on them. Their every word and action is being forensically documented by the world's press, who've become obsessed with this unlikely relationship. But that doesn't mean they can't make all of the interests work in their favour. They send out invites saying, come to John and Yoko's honeymoon.
- [31:14]
Peter Frankopan
1St of June 1969. The Queen Elizabeth Hotel, Montreal. The city lights of Montreal twinkle on the other side of the vast windows of Suite 1742. In between the white carnations and posters saying bed piece and hairpiece, John Lennon sits cross legged next to Yoko Ono. A brightly colored handmade blanket with the words all you need is love is draped across the bed. The room buzzes with people coming in and out. There's been a week's worth of continuous interviews. John's face still carries traces of tension from his earlier confrontation with Al Capp, the Call Stick cartoonist whose antagonistic presence had briefly shattered the room's vibe. He'd been asking the same questions as all the other journalists who've come into their suite at the Queen Elizabeth. What's the point of all this? You're just doing it for the money. You're just trying to cause trouble. But the cartoonist had shown a hostility that had got under John's skin. Just remember what you said to that reporter on our first day, Yoko reminds him. We just want people to give peace a chance. She's right. And as the light grows darker outside, there's a different kind of energy building. The recording engineer fusses with microphones and recording kit, preparing for something special. John nods his fingers absentmindedly, strumming chords on his graffitied guitar. That phrase had come spontaneously when a reporter had pressed him about their goals. Now it's about to become something more. The hotel room is now full of people. There's a group of Hare Krishna's, a rabbi, the singer, Petuna Clark, Timothy Leary, the advocate of psychedelic drugs, and Yoko's daughter Kyoko, all under the watchful gaze of Derek Taylor, John's press officer. The room is thick with cigarette smoke and the slightly damp smell of warm bodies and TV lights. But nobody minds. They're about to create something historic. John looks around the crowded space, takes a deep breath. A one, two, a one, two, three, four. He begins to play the simplest of chords, D and A. The moment has arrived to transform a week of peaceful protest into song.
- [33:55]
AFWA Hirsch
When I think of John Lennon, I can immediately visualize this bed in with him and Yoko. It became truly iconic. And there's this comment that John makes when people ridicule him, saying he's not really serious, it's all just a stunt. And he says, we're Laurel and Hardy. We stand a better chance under that, guys, because all the serious people like Martin Luther King and Kennedy and Gandhi got shot. And, you know, there's some truth in that. Peter, don't you think?
- [34:24]
Peter Frankopan
I don't know, it's a little bit immature. I mean, don't get me wrong, I love to give peace a chance, but, you know, it doesn't really stop the guns from firing.
- [34:31]
AFWA Hirsch
Yeah, but did the serious people or the politicians or the very cerebral intellectual leaders who also devoted their lives to these causes, did any of them manage to stop the guns firing or to the arms trade or to stop the invasion of Ukraine or the war in Gaza? I mean, so many people have tried so many different ways of intervening and the atrocities that we live through, but in terms of the legacy and creating a message that reaches people beyond the news cycle and beyond political affiliation, this cut through into the culture in a way that few other gestures or stunts or celebrity stances have ever done.
- [35:12]
Peter Frankopan
I guess that's right. But, you know, you can see the origins of Last Christmas as a single. You know, you can see the origins of entertainers as activists who are trying to use their platform to make the world a better place. And it's a tricky one because you could be very cynical about all of that. And it's all about self promotion. And these are complex issues and they're not going to get solved by two people lying in a bed in Montreal or anywhere else. But at the same time, there must be a way in which those platforms can be used as an agent for good. I mean, do you think that people, particularly in the music or film industries, who try to take on social activism in a meaningful way, do you think that they can ever really do that in a way that is genuine and real and more importantly, actually changes anything?
- [35:54]
AFWA Hirsch
I do believe that change starts with a single person taking a stance. And I think we live in such an interesting time because now we've got the legacy of generations since John Lennon and Yoko Ono used their kind of unprecedented celebrity in this new globalized pop culture era to take a stance. Now so many people have done that, so in a way it's become more normalized. Maybe that's part of their legacy. And I think it does give courage to others. You know, one of the things about this culture of celebrity is that they influence so many people. You know, I have a 13 year old daughter, she's so influenced by what the pop stars she looks up to do. And when they choose something positive, whether that's like body positivity or standing up for a political cause, it normalises for her the idea that whatever power or platform she has, she should use it to do something, to make a change. Now, the fact that it doesn't have the change we want to see can't mean that there's no point in doing it, because we would be guaranteed to have a world that doesn't change if nobody tried. Right? I mean, that sounds really naive and idealistic, but I do believe that Give.
- [37:00]
Peter Frankopan
Peace A Chance is John Lennon's first solo release. And it becomes the anthem for the anti Vietnam war and for counterculture. On 15 October 1916, 2 million people take part in protests across the United States. It's believed to be the largest demonstration in US history. In Washington D.C. a quarter of a million demonstrators gather to sing Give Peace A Chance.
- [37:23]
AFWA Hirsch
So this is the beginning of a mission for them. They've done one bed in Amsterdam in December 1969. These massive posters appear overnight in Rome, Athens, Tokyo, Times Square in New York and Piccadilly Circus in London are emblazoned with the message War is over. I feel confident everyone listening to this will know and Be able to sing to themselves the Christmas 1971 song Happy Christmas War Is over if you want it, with the challenging opening line. And it is challenging and brave for a Christmas song. So this is Christmas and what have you done?
- [38:01]
Peter Frankopan
And then beyond that, you've got the music, you've got the protest, and you got the business. And one of the problems is that although the Beatles have been phenomenally successful, the band is leaking cash that's flooding out of the company. So according to John Lennon, 18 or 20,000 pounds a week was rolling out and no one was doing anything about it. All of our buddies that have worked for us were living and drinking and eating like fucking ancient Rome.
- [38:25]
AFWA Hirsch
I love that quote. You can quite easily visualize what he's talking about with that one.
- [38:32]
Peter Frankopan
So the Beatles are massive, you know, super successful. You could argue perhaps they were as popular as Jesus, but financial pressures, personal tensions, political statements, different priorities. You know, they're putting the band under pressure and in fact, the business under pressure, and there's the threat that the whole thing might just come tumbling down.
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- [41:33]
AFWA Hirsch
The Beatles need a new manager and Paul and John cannot agree over who's the right man. John gets Ringo and George to sign up with Alan Klein, who's managed the Rolling Stones, but Paul's having none of it.
- [41:46]
Peter Frankopan
Yeah, and Klein is a ruthless cost cutter and control freak. So he axes various departments, he boots out most of the hangers on and he's secured a world beating deal with Capitol Records, who'll put out their music in North America. So he's delivering on what John Lennon wants, but not what John Lennon really needs.
- [42:07]
AFWA Hirsch
20Th September 1969 Apple Core HQ, Savile Row, London Sitting in the boardroom at Apple HQ, you could cut the atmosphere with a knife. The Beatles manager, Alan Klein, spreads the contract papers across the table, his voice animated as he spells out the new deal with Capital records, a lucrative 25% of the US wholesale price, up from their previous 17.5%. John Lennon watches Paul closely as his eyes scan the documents. Ringo drums his fingers on the table's edge. George isn't here. He's visiting his mum, who's not well. Yoko sits close by. John feels tense, fit to burst. Alan has told him to keep quiet until the contract is signed. One by one, they sigh. John watches Paul like a hawk. Why does he always have to act like the parent? We are just your sidemen, John thinks. We're not business people, we just play music. This whole thing collapsed When Brian died. And it's limping on. Why? Who for? The document comes to him. He looks at Alan, who nods, he signs. Someone says something about capturing the moment and a photographer is wheeled in. Everyone makes a play of having fun, their well honed public Personas taking over. John holding the contract, Paul frowning at it through a magnifying glass, giving it a thumbs down, all very jovial. The photographer leaves and John feels the adrenaline swirling. He can't keep quiet a moment longer. Yes, he's going to say it. I want a divorce.
- [44:06]
Peter Frankopan
There have been spats before, but this is different. You know, John Lennon started the beatles with Paul McCartney and now he's ending it 10 years on and after 10 hugely successful albums and records smashed on all sides at the Atlantic. And John Lennon feels like a real weight has been lifted from his shoulders. Can you understand why he pulled the plug? Aphra?
- [44:30]
AFWA Hirsch
I mean, there are these American concepts from personal development and therapy of good endings, closure. I feel like John has not exited the Beatles with any of these things. An implosion more than it is a nice clean break. But the fact that he still says he feels lighter really just shows how much the whole tension of the relationship has been weighing on him. Even the language of a divorce is so interesting because these guys have really grown up together. It's so much more than a professional relationship or even a friendship. It is domestic. And like domestic relationships that break down, it is now about to erupt in misery and acrimony, which still all this time later feels quite sad. Peter.
- [45:16]
Peter Frankopan
They had agreed to keep it out of the public eye for business reasons and also to get the timing right about how to announce it. But then Paul starts talking about it during interviews for his first solo album. It sort of feels like it is the passing of an institution. It feels like the end of an era. And of course there's a symbolism that it's the end of the 60s as well. The Beatles really are the 60s, encapsulating it and the way in which the world has changed. You know, the man on the moon, Martin Luther King dead, JFK dead, Vietnam War in full progress, the hippie movement about to die out, you know, the Beatles and John Lennon's moment of pulling the plug feels, you know, it's a good way of summing up a lot of other change, not just music.
- [45:54]
AFWA Hirsch
In August 1971, John and Yoko leave England for Ono's native New York. They want and need a fresh start.
- [46:02]
Peter Frankopan
So they set up home in a small apartment in Greenwich Village and they have the Minimalist composer John Cage, Legend living next door. He loved the Beatles, although it's quite annoying to have John Lennon's wall mounted speakers blaring through, particularly where some of John Cage's most famous pieces are played in silence.
- [46:20]
AFWA Hirsch
He releases his second studio album that September. You might have heard of it. It's called Imagine. And it's definitely more accessible and mainstream than some of his more experimental previous solo work. And he's really proud of it. I think I finally wrote a song with as good a melody as yesterday, he says.
- [46:41]
Peter Frankopan
It's bleak though. Imagine, I mean, it's a beautiful song. It is, but. But it tops the album charts in multiple countries and it's going to come back and top it again towards the end of this series. But Imagine's message of peace and love doesn't extend to everybody's. It's quite catty. John Lennon taking a shot at Paul McCartney and how do youo Sleep. The lyrics being quite barbed. The only thing you've done was yesterday. Or the sound you make is Muzak to my ears, you know. So there's divorce and then there's acrimony. And McCartney wants to make the split official and to make sure their assets are fairly split. And probably rather predictably, that ends up in court on New year's Eve in 1970, where Paul McCartney's counsel calls for the dissolution of the Beatles. He wins and a receiver is appointed. So, I mean, it's even the divorce and the kind of splitting up of cash. Buck Lennon is now combining his day job being a musician with his political activism. He's found a tribe amongst New York's left wing power brokers like Abbie Hoffman, who's a key leader of the flower power movement, and Jerry Rubin, who's a prominent anti war and counterculture icon.
- [47:46]
AFWA Hirsch
He's late to the party, but he's finally discovered feminism and gay rights. I don't mean to be cynical. I think he has genuinely changed. He was so young when he started found fame and fortune. I do think this represents a general opening of consciousness. And one of the reasons that I feel like he gets some props for that is that he isn't just championing popular causes. He's not just jumping on the bandwagon of things in the mainstream. You know, he's championing people like Angela Davis, who as a Black Panther activist at that time is in prison for murdering a judge. You know, the mainstream media in America is absolutely vitriolic about people like her. And the Panthers are accused of being racist against white people. And being the most dangerous movement in America. And Lennon is taking a risk by being willing to support not just a woman, but a black woman and to lend his name to those movements. So I think he has changed and I think he's becoming a more interesting thinker and artist as a result.
- [48:48]
Peter Frankopan
Despite Yoko Ono and John Lennon campaigning in presidential elections in the early 70s, Nixon's reelected by a landslide with a huge youth vote. It's like a smack in the face for the ideals of the flower power generation. Tell us about his complicated home life because that's also a tricky one.
- [49:05]
AFWA Hirsch
He does things like going to a post election party that turns into a wake because none of the people there are happy that Nixon won, only to then have sex with another woman openly. Which is hugely humiliating for Yoko. But Yoko is also no ordinary woman. She has her own quite unusual ideas about monogamy, about sex. And she seamlessly, quite effortlessly forgives him for that transgression.
- [49:30]
Peter Frankopan
And also she feels hemmed in. You know, they've been joined at the hip for five years. She's been in the public eye, you know, ungenerously judged by pretty much everybody. And she wants to reassert herself as an individual, as an artist. So Leonard moves out of the new apartment they bought in the Dakota Building overlooking Central park to go and spend some time in la. But he doesn't go on his own because Joker decides that May Pang, the couple's Chinese American PA, will go with him and tacitly seems to sanction a sexual relationship between them, doesn't she?
- [50:00]
AFWA Hirsch
This is one of the, I think, most telling incidents in their relationship because it really speaks to who each of them are, but also the power dynamic between them. So she basically decides for him that he's going to have a new sexual relationship with this very young Chinese American woman who's their pa. I mean, there's nothing conventional or very comfortable about this and there's not really any suggestion that this is against May Pang's will. I mean, she's spoken at length about this kind of long liaison they have together and that she was kind of in love with him. But when you just think about the power of this, it's a very weird dynamic.
- [50:40]
Peter Frankopan
It is a weird dynamic. John in the meantime goes to LA where he becomes a hellraiser, going out on alcohol fuelled benders, hanging out at the legendary troubadour club on Santa Monica Boulevard. He has a temper that's back. He throws maypang against the wall, she later tells a chat show. But it's tricky his relationship with Yoko Onna. They're in touch the whole time. And in fact, May Pang is just a kind of pawn in the game between John Lennon and Yoko. And it's a kind of. It's an odd life that he's living. Getting drunk, rabble rousing and then channel hopping on the TV late at night.
- [51:14]
AFWA Hirsch
Although that does lead to some creative inspiration. The song Whatever gets you through the night that he then records with his friend Elton John on backing vocals and piano comes from his actual obsession with TV channel hopping.
- [51:27]
Peter Frankopan
And in fact it goes to number one. And Elton John has made Lennon promise that if it goes to number one, that he'd go on stage with him to sing it together. And at this point Lennon's not been on stage for two years. But he keeps his promise. On 28 November 1974, a glamrock audience where the Rocket man is at his peak. Lennon is so scared about going on stage he throws up beforehand. And in fact Elton John's lyricist Bernie Torpin is watching in the wings and Lennon says, I'm not going on unless you come with me. So Torpin hugs him, walks a couple of steps and then sends him off. But he gets a rapturous welcome, doesn't he?
- [52:01]
AFWA Hirsch
Absolutely rapturous. From the 18,000 strong crowd. Elton John describes it as the greatest standing ovation I've ever heard. And that is a man who knows about a standing ovation. Backstage after the show, one Yoko Ono appears. And this is the reunion. They sit for a long time holding hands. This is still very much a couple in love. And spare a thought for poor May Pang, who's now relegated to the old flame of the past now that the relationship is rekindled.
- [52:36]
Peter Frankopan
February 1975. John and Yoko are back at the Dakota. They're expecting a baby. And John Lennon has a new album out. 13 covers of his favorite rock and roll songs from his youth. On the 9th of October and John Lennon's 35th birthday, Sean Tara Ono Lennon is born. And John Lennon is going through a change now. He's got rid of his girlfriend, he's back together with Yoko. He cancels his subscribers subscription to Billboard magazine and switches his radio to easy listening. He's going to be a stay at home dad. And when it's his turn to feed, he pops the bottle in Sean's mouth and dances around with him. You're giggling Afro. You don't see the wholesome dad that maybe I'm describing.
- [53:17]
AFWA Hirsch
I am the biggest advocate of stay at home dads. Of fully present fathers of men as primary carers. I think it's all great. It's just so not John Lennon. Nothing in his life to this point has suggested that this is his natural calling, but I think a lot of his life is really him experimenting with different identities, and there's something that is quite fascinating about him. But for little Shawn, it's great. He's got his dad's full attention, he's given a lot of artistic encouragement. One day they're at a close friend's house and Shawn is watching the Beatles film Yellow Submarine on the TV and he says, daddy, were you a Beatle?
- [53:57]
Peter Frankopan
Is that part of his life dead? Are the Beatles over? Is John Lennon going to be popping milk bottles into his son's mouth and listening to easy listening? Or is there some kind of way that he's going to pull together all the different complicated strands of his life into some kind of integrated whole and live happily ever after and maybe find peace? That's next time on Legacy.
- [54:33]
AFWA Hirsch
Follow Legacy on the Wondery app, Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge seasons early and ad free right now by joining Wondery plus in the Wonder App or on Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey@wondery.com Survey from Wondery and Goal Hanger this is the third episode in our series about John Lennon.
- [54:59]
Peter Frankopan
A quick note about our dialogue we can't know everything that was said or done behind closed doors, particularly when we go far back in history, but our scenes are written using the best available sources, so even if a scene or conversation has been recreated for dramatic effect, it's still based on biographical research.
- [55:18]
AFWA Hirsch
We've used many sources for this series, including Lennon Remembers Interview for Rolling Stone with Jan S. Benner, Philip Norman's John Lennon the Lie and Revolution in the head by Ian MacDonald. Legacy is hosted by me, Efwer Hirsch.
- [55:32]
Peter Frankopan
And me, Peter Frankopan.
- [55:34]
AFWA Hirsch
Scene Writing by Stephanie Power For Goal Hanger.
- [55:37]
Peter Frankopan
Our series producers are Kate Taylor and Anoushka Lewis. The associate producer is Karen Pirie. Our production managers are Izzy Reid and Alex Hack Roberts. The executive producers are Tony Pastor and Jack Davenport.
- [55:50]
AFWA Hirsch
Legacy is sound engineered and designed by Dan King.
- [55:53]
Peter Frankopan
Music supervision is Scott Velasquez for Fritz and Sync.
- [55:56]
AFWA Hirsch
Our producer for Wondery is Emanuela Quinorti Francis and our managing producer is Rachel Sibley.
- [56:02]
Peter Frankopan
Executive producers for Wondery are Estelle Doyle, Chris Bourne Morgan Morgan Jones and Marshall Louie.