The Oz Interview- 1969

John Lennon/Yoko Ono Interview
Miles, unpublished, September 1969

These tapes were made on September 23rd and 24th, 1969, at Apple. When Allen Klein fired Ron Kass, the head of Apple Records, John and Yoko took over his elegant white ground floor office at the front of the building overlooking Savile Row.

Here, surrounded by pictures of themselves, they organised their bag events, their peace campaign, their exhibitions and films, maintaining an open house for anyone who wanted to interview them. I had been label manager of Zapple, the experimental and spoken word division of Apple Records since October 1968, and spent a fair amount of time at 3 Savile Row, using their equipment to edit spoken word tapes. Though it was Paul McCartney who started the Zapple division, John and Yoko took a great interest in it so I saw quite a bit of them. This tape was made originally for International Times (IT) to coincide with the release of Abbey Road but because the latest issue of IT was at the printers, I gave it to OZ magazine instead who printed about a quarter of what you see here (this is about half of the rambling conversation). It was not a formal interview and people wandered in and out throughout the recording. There were a great number of interruptions, usually to answer telephone calls; sometimes John would give a five minute interview over the phone to a foreign journalist or radio station or an aide would have a quick conference. Apple press officer Derek Taylor was there for some of the time, "Magic" Alex stopped by, and another journalist came in and asked questions half way through the first tape. The second day's tape came out very indistinct so a copy of the Apple archive recording was used instead which accounts for the abrupt start, cutting off the question and beginning of John's answer. As far as I know, all interviews with John and Yoko were recorded throughout that period, resulting in hundreds of hours of tape presumably now in Yoko's hands.

In those days there was no serious rock press, the pop weeklies were little better than fanzines, still asking "What's your favourite food?". Most serious music journalism was in papers like the Sunday Times or Evening Standard. Rolling Stone, which started in October 1967, was rarely seen in the UK. The underground papers IT and OZ were the only place that ran uncensored Q&A interviews where rock stars could discuss drugs or sex and know that their words would not be taken out of context, though in the case of OZ, they might be very hard to read beneath a psychedelic pattern.

To listen to old tapes like this is a form of time travel; an out of body experience. To go back 26 years to a specific time and place when John was still alive has a poignancy. John and Yoko had just kicked a heroin habit but as far as I remember they were in very good shape. I sound stoned on the second tape, probably the result of spending too much time in Derek Taylor's room. This probably accounts for some of the odd questions. I had been attending Beatles recording sessions since 1965 so I knew perfectly well that whoever sings a song is the one who wrote it and there are other similar inconsistencies which suggest a slight disorientation.

The strangest thing, however, is that despite all the talk of Beatles records and Beatles music, John had in fact resigned from the Beatles three days before, on September 20th, so we were talking about a group that no longer existed. The Beatles had decided to keep their demise a secret and the news was not released until six months later. Reading the transcript with hindsight, it is amusing to see John sidestep questions and carefully word answers to avoid lying, but at the same time maintain the fiction that The Beatles, the world's greatest rock'n'roll group, were alive and well.

M: Abbey Road, then. I made notes on each track. 'Come Together'. Does that relate to what you've been doing in the last year or so?

JL: Yeah...

M: You've been getting more involved with the so-called underground.

JL: I don't know about the underground - I don't believe it exists. Leary was saying "write me a song", you know, for his campaign. And his campaign song was Come Together. But obviously 'Come Together' is not a good campaign song. It didn't work out - it ended up like that; a funky bit of rock. I'm writing, I've got another one for him.

M: 'Something'?

JL: 'Something'? That's George. A great song I think. Possibly a single in the States. If I can get 'Come Together' on the backside I will be very pleased. It's so that I can listen to it without listening to the whole album.

M: 'Maxwell's Silver Hammer'?

JL: That's McCartney as you might know. We don't really write together any more. We haven't written together for two years. Not really, you know. Just occasional bits we help ...somebody's got to use a line or two.

M: How does that affect you when you're playing then?

JL: It doesn't make any odds you know, who writes them. It's when the Beatles perform that makes it into Beatle music. Its a long time since we sat down and written together for many reasons, because we used to write together mainly on tour. Then there was a valid reason for it. It got false - "Come round to our house and we'll write some songs" - it doesn't work any more.

M: You still go into a studio - isn't that a great ideas place...

JL: You have a - I want this funky - like with 'Come Together' I just said, "I got no arrangement for you, but you know how I want it, like that." And they play like that. I think that's partly because we've played together for a long time. Give me this, give me something funky. I'll set a beat maybe and they'll all just join in.

M: 'Oh Darling'. Is that one of yours?

JL: No, that's Paul's, whoever sings it is whoever's song it is. If we sing together we usually both wrote it .

M: I see, that's tricky. 'Octopus Garden'...

JL: That's Ringo - we all sing on that and we all helped on the arrangement or whatever. Its as simple as that.

M: 'I Want You'?

JL: That's me.

M: What's your attitude towards heavy blues?

JL: I love it, you know. I've always liked it. We used to play it at college. We were allowed to play rock and roll by infiltrating, by playing blues at art school, because they would only let you play trad jazz on the art school record player. So I got myself voted onto the committee so that we could play rock'n'roll. So that we could get the snobs by playing them blues - which was alright. All that Leadbelly or whatever it was in those days, Bo Diddley...

M: There seems to be a whole range of music on Abbey Road

JL: I suppose it's because I do what I like, Paul does what he likes and George does what he likes, and Ringo. You just divide the album time up between ourselves. Its more apparent on the double album. Its always been that really and the combination of the music is what we call pure Beatles. Like 'It's Getting Better' where we've all written it and we've all turned into pure Beatle.

If I want to sound like 'Come Together' and 'I Want You' all the time - which I always did and I always do. 'Dizzy Miss Lizzy' - and whatever, I wanted to be that guy. And Paul wanted to be whoever it is he wants to be. And George. So when the combination does it, we come out with what we term Beatle music.

M: Do you no longer have a direction that the whole group is going in?

JL: We never did - I mean it was just whoever was pushing the limits of the bag at the time. You know, we often all pushed at the same point. There was never, "this is the way we are going".

M: No but there seemed to be a type of music one could identify as Beatle music which had elements of all four personalities in it.

JL: Well, does that no longer exist? I don't know, you see, I can't really be objective about it.

M: On this album I thought probably it didn't.

JL: Well did it exist on the Beatles double (White) album?

M: To a greater extent, and even more on Sgt Pepper.

JL: (interrupts) Cos I mean as far as we're concerned, this album is more Beatley than the double album. Cos that was just saying, This is my song, we'll do it this way. That's your song, you do it that way.

M: How do you conceive of an album these days? Do you have a vast array of material?

JL: There's an awful lot of songs. It's pretty hard, trying to fit three guys' music onto one album, that's why we did a double. It's hard to bring out double albums all the time you know, it takes us a long time. So we probably outlet them in other things like Plastic Ono, or George gets....Jesus and the something else. So we split them up like that because it's like being constipated with all the other material. That's the only way we can do it really. We don't have conceptions of albums. I think Paul has conceptions of albums - or attempts it. Like he conceived the medley thing. I'm not interested in the conception of an album. All I'm interested in is the sound. I like it to be whatever happens. I'm not interested in making the album into a show. I just put 14 rock songs on.

M: The idea of the track at the very end...

JL: We like gags, you know, we always have. We like little jokes and surprises at the end of things. Because we are all sort of..

M: There seem to be a bit of stage act...

JL: We've got a bit of that too..

M: Do you long for those days?

JL: I don't long for them, no. We stopped doing it because it was a drag. But I dug performing in Toronto and I didn't have that Beatles' mystique to live up to, which is the drag about performing with the Beatles. You've got to be The Beatles. But performing is a groove, I enjoyed it like mad, even if I did have to sing 'Dizzy Miss Lizzy' and 'Money' again, because they're the only things I know! It was just the performance was good. With a different band, it was very good.

M: Do you think you will do anything else like that again?

JL: Yes sure. I'm bound to now I've had a taste of it. I mean not going out as a Beatle. Nothing's expected of John and Yoko: anything's expected of John and Yoko or the Plastic Ono. They could be anybody or perform anything. So with that sort of freedom there's no hang-ups.

M: How much do you think Yoko's influenced you?

JL: Well, a lot. She's now fifty percent of me.

YO: We influence each other.

M: How about on the stuff you write for the Beatles as opposed to the stuff you do solo...

JL: (interrupting) I don't write for the Beatles, I write for myself. So I'm influenced by whatever's going on at the time, you know.

I'm in love and that's the end of it. So every time I pick up the guitar I sing about Yoko and that's how I'm influenced. I am obviously influenced by her ideas and her coming from that other field, so-called avant garde or underground or wherever she came from. ..she came in through the bathroom window. She encouraged the freak in me.

YO: He had all these things in him that were just a little bit..We have stimulated each other to wake each other up.

M: How did that affect the Beatles then?

JL: Well you'll have to ask them...

M: As one quarter of them.

JL: I can't say how - I know it affected us, obviously, me getting married to Yoko and Paul getting married to Linda. Everything affects them, but how I don't know.

M: The things you're doing don't seem to have given rise to new subjects for your songs yet.

JL: What is there to sing about? On the album I sing about Mean Mr Mustard and Polythene Pam, but they are only finished bits of crap that I wrote in India. But when I get down to it, I'm only interested in Yoko and peace, so if I can sing about them again and again and again - its only like I'm going through my blue period as a painter. It's like he's gonna paint this cup for a year, you know, to get into that cup. So maybe I'm doing that. And I'll do that 'til I get tired - I can always write 'Mr Kite' and those songs any time of day. But when I get down to it - I like funky music. I like rock or blues or whatever you call it. On 24 Hours [60s TV news magazine] they sardonically read out 'I Want You' - "'I want you, she's so heavy'.that's all it said." but to me that's a damn sight better lyric than 'Walrus' or 'Eleanor Rigby' because its progression to me. And if I want to write songs with no words or one word...maybe that's Yoko's influence.

Yeah, when it gets down to it, awopbopaloola et cetera is great, and that's what I'm getting round to. I remember in the early meetings with Dylan, Dylan was always saying to me 'Listen to the words, man', and I said 'I can't be bothered, I just like listening to the sound of it, the sound of the overall thing'. And then I reversed that and started being a words man. I am naturally, playing with words anyway. That's when I made a conscious effort to be wordy, a la Dylan or whatever it is. But now I've relieved myself of that burden and I'm only interested in pure sound.

M: Do you think that your future recordings will be getting more and more instrumental?

JL: I don't know. A voice, like Yoko's modulation - I'm interested in that - we did that in Toronto too. We did 'Blue Suede Shoes' and ended up doing 'Cambridge 69', only with all of us blasting it. Fantastic. It's just pure sound. The thing that got me about 'Heartbreak Hotel' in the early days was I couldn't hear what he was saying or anything, Little Richard. It was just the experience of hearing it and havin' my hair stand on end. You know, so I'm interested in that. I don't care what the words are about and if there are going to be words, they can either be rubbish - what I call rubbish, which is just word play - or 'I love you and you love me and let's get together' you know? Because I don't want to sing about suburbia.

M: So, the whole middle period is sort of over with the Beatles, with the really complex...

JL: You see, I think that one note is as complex as anything, but I can't go on the rest of my life explaining that to music critics who want complex harmonies, tonal cadences and all that crap. I'm a primitive so I'm not interested in that. And it was quite flattering at the time to hear all that crap about the Beatles but I don't believe it, you know. Paul himself said in 1962 in his house we'll end up with a one note pop song. And I believe it, you know. I can groove to the sound of electricity in the house, or the water pipes. A lot of people do groove to that, but if I lay it down on record, and say this is a John and Yoko record, then we're going to get all - "Who do you think you are, this isn't like Cage" and they intellectualise about what Cage and Stockhausen do. And say "You're not doing it because you're only playing a tea spoon", that's crap.

M: Don't you think to a certain extent you have to explain it.

JL: Why do I have to explain what a sound is? I mean we all sit by the sea and listen to it and nobody says, "This sea is good because it is reminiscent of childhood experiences when we were at the seaside or it's like your mother's water" or anything like that. People just lie in fields and listen to birds you know, and nobody says - if I record that - all I've got to say is "This is the birds", and anything else is cheating you know, or a joke.

YO: A genuine emotion that's what we're aiming at. People say we're howling and all that - I don't knowf...

JL: My schoolboy magazine was called the Daily Howl

YO: Really?

JL: Yes, I invented it .

YO:Well there you go. It's sort of a spiritual howl, you know - when people come to an extreme of emotion, genuine or whatever. You can't explain it in words. Words are like a sort of ritual..

JL: You grunt when you come, you know.?

M: I accept the validity of the music, I was just wondering how you were trying to bring along the audience as it were, because the Beatles have got five or six million teenybop fans?

JL: Yes...I don't know what influence 'Revolution No.9' had on the teeny bopper fans but most of them didn't dig it, so what am I supposed to do?. I mean, I probably won't impose it on a Beatles album. Life of the Lyons sold 60,000 in the States. I'm very excited, it's nothing on Beatles sales but its a lot of albums for that music. Maybe some of them were Beatle maniacs who thought they were going to get something else, but I think they might have guessed by now after Two Virgins. So there's a whole new market, I don't have to think of that. I can't keep framing it in Beatle music you know, to sort of bring along the people.

How many 'Revolution No 9's am I going to get on an album, you know?

M: its probably the most important direction that The Beatles have gone.

JL: 'Revolution No 9'?

M: Not 'Revolution No 9', but this new approach of getting down to the more simple areas.

JL: You know, I think it is too...

M: I knew Yoko's work about five or six years ago. I was hoping the two would compare - and they compare quite obviously

JL: You would have dug the Toronto show then, it was just incredible. I'm making an album out of it and we've got a film of it. Pennebaker was there. It was really something, it finally happened that night - something happened on stage alright, and in the crowd. Because we didn't know what we were going to do, a rock'n'roll audience and how the reaction would be. But something magical happened that night. The fact that it affected Eric and Klaus and Alan - they really got turned on by that experience. So that turned us on even more. The whole thing really just was a big, big turn on. And it was like a new direction. We didn't do anything we didn't do at Cambridge or that Yoko hadn't really done with Ornette Coleman at Albert Hall. But the fact that when she first gave me her Albert Hall stuff I grooved to it. I was saying all that intellectual jazz going on in the background, can't stand it, can't stand it - let's do it together, do it this way. Conceptually you think you're going to howl and the musician's going to play but the difference between Ornette Coleman intellectualising that jazz, which is just to me, intellectual literary crap coming out of a trumpet or whatever he plays - and just playing rock'n'roll or just playing the amplifier is tremendous you know and that's what happened in Cambridge because it was small, it was a small experience.

YO: And that happened too because I didn't need John then - I was going through a phase of, all that scene when I was the oddball because I my thing was that I was less theoretical than most of them. I was intuitive and so when I followed, even say Ornette you can obviously see immediately that Ornette's job is highly intellectualised, sophisticated stuff. And I'm howling, and the combination is not a combination really, its not merging, its sort of separate, but I didn't have anybody else to merge with. But then I met John who was having the same kind of problem. He was always having to cut himself down for The Beatles. And playing old stuff by himself at home. He was really freaking out at home. And I've heard some of that freaked out stuff that he did at home. I really wanted to groove, you know? And this time it was really very easy, because both of us are basically intuitive people and we are normal oddballs. And you know what they say, when two people dream it's a reality...we were like in a dream state and then he came and we started to make love.

JL: I've never heard any avant garde stuff that I'd wanna bring in. I'd sooner have ten Eric Claptons. I'd sooner get a Salvation Army Band than get a lot of avant garde people to squeak and play all that intellectual crap. I think anything's valid, but if Yoko says this is a particular performer that I recommend and we should perform with him, then I'd do it, but anything I've heard has always left me cold. I haven't heard anything better than a car engine yet.

M: How do you choose what you are going to release because presumably you have a great deal of recorded stuff?

JL: No we haven't got a lot because we haven't got any home recording because we've moved home and getting studio time is a hassle. I'm in the process of building something at home and then maybe we'll have that problem of what to release. But at the moment it's not a problem, its getting what we've done released is the problem.

Other journalist - Everything you've talked about has been sort of totally creative. I wondered how you related that to Apple and your part in Apple and if Apple was right now?

JL: Apple is right as Apple - as a company that produces records.

Other journalist - But you didn't set out to do that only.

JL: No, no, no - I mean that's all gone by the wind. It was a dream that didn't happen. All that happened is our money went into a box and never came out. Apple itself as what it is now, is running well and doing alright obviously by the charts and all that bit.

M: Does that track 'You Never Give Me Your Money,' relate to that?

JL: I dunno, ask Paul. Don't give me your funny paper - seems to be coming true.

Other journalist - Apple stopped before it started in a sense - OK, the record side is fine, but how's it going to progress?

JL: I don't know. My other areas of interest are film and that. I don't know how related to Apple they'll be. It depends what the sort of businessmen can do with Apple for us. They are the only people that can tell us how to get the money out of the box and be able to use it. So in that respect we're in their hands. As long as it doesn't interfere with my creative ability it doesn't really matter.

OJ- But your creative ability - surely its got to relate to Apple, surely its got to relate to commerciality.

JL: It doesn't have to relate to commerciality. I mean I have Back Productions with Yoko, which is sort of separate from Apple. Its just the fact that most of what I earn goes into Apple and doesn't come out - it doesn't benefit anyone, neither me nor anybody else. If I could sort that out that would be nice. That's what we all need. If Apple was more fluid I'd channel some of my creative energy into it. (sings) I'll Apple you, you'll Apple me - we'll Apple together'.

OJ- You were talking earlier about intellectualising things and how you detested it and that you were primitive. A lot of people feel that this is how the Beatles started and they feel alienated because you and Yoko have been getting into bags and sitting in bed and they just don't understand. You say that you don't want to intellectualise - most people feel that you have started to do that completely beyond their comprehension.

JL: But I haven't started to intellectualise at all - all I do is get into a bag you know, literally.

OJ - And that was it, forget it.

JL: Yes, that is the end of the experience.

YO: I mean what's so intellectual about getting into a bag.

JL: It's just like if I painted myself blue what could we do about it - if there's a concert on and for my turn of the party I want to be painted blue there's nothing to intellectualise about. But I mean that Disc poll proved otherwise on a lot of things I mean some of the letters from the kids, they're having no trouble [with what I do]. 60,000 kids in America are having no trouble with Life With The Lions. I mean there's always going to be people complaining because we left the Cavern and went to work in Manchester, you know That's all it is really, how dare I leave the Cavern and jump in a white bag in the Albert Hall. But I can't wait around for those people to decide they'd like me to go into tap dancing. If the Beatles had just gone into show biz, there would have been nothing said, we would have got probably a knighthood and nothing but praise but we're not looking for that. At least I'm not and so I must just do what I want and I can't. Its like we couldn't take a poll at the Cavern to see if they thought it was suitable for John Lennon, Paul, George and Ringo to go and play in Croydon because the poll would have said "no, stay at home" and we couldn't have taken a poll as to whether the Beatles went to America or not because most of the British fans would have said "no stay here", you know, and its only the same thing going on. I'm just moving out, or pressing the outer limits of whatever's going on and people say how dare you - I don't understand why you're leaving your cosy rut and doing something else - why don't you stay in your rut where we can recognise you. There's no time for waiting for people to understand why I've grown a beard or why I've shaved it off, or why I want to be naked or why I want to stand on my head, there's no time for it - you know if people waited for people to understand everything they did, nothing would ever be done.

OJ - Can you...

JL: I'm not a politician so I don't rely on public taste or public opinion as to how I run my life - I refuse to do that - I mean I don't even consider it. For a politician to go into a white bag in the Albert Hall he'd have to consider the affects it would have on his constituents but I'm not a politician and I don't owe my constituents anything other than I create something, whatever it is and they accept it or reject it on its own merits and not on any pre-conceived ideas...we're half an jour late for the films, the car is waiting. So another five or ten minutes if you need it.

OJ - No the thing is I was just wondering if we could talk generally about why you've done these things.

JL: Well why?

OJ - Well why not - I don't want an explanation - I want to know what pushed you into doing these things.

JL: Well why?

OJ - Well why not - I don't want an explanation, I want to know what pushed you into doing them.

JL: Nothing pushed me.

OJ - What pressure..

JL: There's no pressure.

OJ - But there's always pressures - it's just like Yoko saying on the top of a mountain "there's a lot of wind you know" but you've still got to get on with tending the sheep or whatever.

JL: Yes, so if I was thinking about all this dreadful wind all the time I wouldn't get on with tending the sheep or building my house or whatever - so I can't think about that you know - I've got to get on with whatever I'm doing. Nothing pressurised me into going to Toronto and performing with Yoko.

YO: No, nothing pressed us.

JL: Just felt like it. Somebody rang up and I said "OK" and we were invited to the Albert Hall and we thought what shall we do and we thought let's do the bag. I'd never done it before and it was going to be that kind of evening with Jack Moore painting lines or whatever it was he was doing so we did something to suit the occasion.

OJ - What was it like inside?

JL: It was fine you know - we just wondered what it like outside you know. We were just wondering what they were thinking while we were in there you know, wasn't it funny and wondering if anyone understood it or didn't understand it or what they thought we were doing we could hear a lot of chanting and noises going on and then we saw the video of it later and saw it all from the outside later you know -its just like that you know - on the simplest level its just like a practical joke.

M: There aren't any pressures, but do you see any influences on you?

JL: Yes, but from everything you know - but the main influence is Yoko because I'm more involved in her than anyone else on earth you know. So that is my biggest influence.

YO:That's another thing you know. We're not trying to turn on anybody else in a way we're just so involved in each other. I mean you talked earlier about the emerging Beatles, but its John that I'm sort of involved in so its happening with John and me you see.

M: How about in campaigns for peace though because there you are definitely trying to put across a point to other people though - I mean it is a public gesture.

YO: Well we never really discussed those things with the Beatles.

OJ - Do you mean related to the Beatles?

M: No, no.

JL: Just personally we just thought what have we got in common mainly its just to change the world a little bit - so how to do it - and we went through the whole sort of creating the idea of being in bed till we came up with that conclusion - that's the best way for us two to do it.

M: I just wondered how you considered this kind of action?

JL: Well, it was how to perform without performing was the problem you know, and at the time we didn't feel like appearing in public particularly or doing anything like that - maybe we were feeling paranoiac or whatever so we wanted to know to do an event or a stunt without having to do anything and that's how we came up with it. But it turned out a mistake in a way I suppose - she could go to Trafalgar Square in the old days which she did and do an event or wrap the lions up which she did or stand in a bag. But as John and Yoko, to stand in Trafalgar Square we couldn't do it - we'd probably get kicked up you know so the trouble was to carry on events with my involvement without getting beaten up or trodden on you know. So that was a practical conclusion to that problem.

OJ - So if you have an idea this afternoon..

JL: Well we do try and plan things ahead you know but most things are done on the spur of the moment.

OJ - But you said inside the bag you wondered what other people thought and you wondered if they understood, but according to what you said previously....

JL: There isn't anything - well that's..

OJ - But then why?

JL: Because I wondered if people would be thinking what is the message behind the bag.

OJ - In fact you were just trying to provoke them into thinking something.

JL: Yes.

OJ - And you didn't really care what it was.

YO: And that's what he was wondering if they understood that you know.

OJ - Oh yeah, I see yes.

JL: Because I mean there is the basic thing of - when you're in a bag and communicating with somebody they can't be hung up with what you're wearing or what colour you are. And I mean that's a basic, you know. If you went for a job in a bag - if that was the game - then later they can't say well you can't live here or you can't have the job you know because you're a spade. They'd have to say well what are your qualifications - then the guy can say "I've got 10 GCEs" and they wouldn't know who was in there so that would be a nice dream of bagism come true you know.



OJ - When they wrote about the bag at the ICA one person said of the voices was distinctly Liverpudlian, the other was Japanese.

JL: Oh yes, in fact weren't there at the ICA, you see, there was two Hare Krishna's in the bag but one of the musicals wrote that could hear a distinct Liverpool voice shouting hare Krishna and a distinct high Oriental voice - so that's bagism.

OJ - So you had two bald headed hare Krishna's from Ohio.

JL: Well its not predictable really. I mean it does vary - the reaction to the bag in Vienna was something else again. It was very indignant you know. That we should be in Vienna and in a bag - it really bugged them - the Hapsburg family actually lived in this room and these two obscene people were in a bag - so I mean just to upset those people is enough.

M: Have you read anything about the Dada period.

JL: Well, I've heard from Yoko you know - she educates me on my lack of culture - I mean I heard about Dada at art school obviously but I didn't take much of it in, I was to busy being pissed and raving and so on.

YO: No, I think the difference between us and Dada in a way is that Dada was closed this way, we opened this way. Alright so everything is an illusion you know, so all realities are dreams you know but the kind of dream that we're selling - a kind of dream reality or whatever there is some ingredient added to it which is hope and hope is something that the Dadaists dismissed you know.


Miles -Yes, well it came just before the First World War so it's understandable - they don't usually portray anything more with Dada and I think that's the main difference really - I mean we are naive people.

JL: Well, I'm lucky about it because I don't know about it so when I come up with some new idea - whether its Dada or anything else its too bad you know. I can't be accused of being neo-Dada or any other and she sing any kind of rock and roll songs and no one can say its like Little Richard or anything some other person that did it in 1920 because she wouldn't know from Adam but she's innocent of the charge of being like somebody or being influenced by whatever.

M: On the album you go back to some pretty early rock stuff.

JL: Yes, well we always ... 'Lady Madonna' etc you know and 'Day Tripper' - we've always had, it all we never went away from it. There isn't an album without some rock and roll on it is there. There isn't one really that I can think of. I mean 'Sgt Pepper' is a rock'n'roll song, 'Good Morning, Good Morning' was you know, fairly straight rock and roll except for some strange beats on it - Sounds Incorporated playing their saxes and all that.

M: Yes, 'Get Back's' similar to 'Abbey Road'...

JL: It's nothing like it because 'Get Back' is unfinished you know - we never got to the final Beatifying of the whole lot you know, we just got so involved and fed up with it that we just thought well this is it you know - couldn't stand to go further with this album.

M: It sounds as if you made a lot of re-takes of 'Get Back.'

JL: No.

M: No?

JL: No, but 'Maxwell.'

M: Oh right because I heard some of the those tapes.

JL: Yeah, 'Maxwell's' the only one we tried it on - but it's been a long time to get to 'Maxwell'.

(Tape cuts)

M: ...I keep interrupting

JL: Can you hurry up because we are already half an hour late for our film show, is that OK. If you want any more, you can do it tomorrow or something if you didn't get enough.

(Tape cuts. Sounds of tape recorder being positioned)

JL: ... so then I get angry again and that's aggression and then I feel like jumping on something you know - I feel like knocking my head against a wall and all the time I feel don't shake your fists at building students because a building isn't it because I can understand it because I - go to No. 10 you know and kick the windows in or something you know - it's just that inability to cope with it - it's so big you know such a big fight that we're in that it overpowers you and you get sort of lulled by the TV and the papers and your hit records or whatever - or your love you know and then you suddenly remember again - God almighty, then you get angry and then you do something again - what we are saying on the peace campaign - when we're in the middle of those things there's not a moment that we're not aware of it and the whole situation every day - because we're talking to the press every day and we have to answer and then after them we go through a depression because its an event or a performance. Anyway, the bed-in and after that we go through a depression - was it worth it. What were we doing you know what were the motives, was it effective - we go through that - and then somebody comes up and says what about Biafra - what about this and that we have to start coming out of our shell again and doing another performance, another stunt and relive our initial anger that made us go out and do those bed events you know - and the point about the bed-in in a sense as we've said all along that keep it in mind that peace is an alternative and they can have it if they want it because the people have the power and all this crap about the people being given the power by a group of revolutionaries is rubbish you know. The people have the power now and if we can't remember it ourselves how can we expect all the other people to remember it - and if we're the ones that are doing most shouting about it well.

YO:Yes, we've seen the film that was taken of our bed-in you know and I suddenly realised that its not a peaceful film at all you know.

JL: The whole film is just rolling and shouting and arguing with people.

YO:So even to get peace we have to - I don't like to have use that word but, fight, you know - but not with the violence thing you know.

OJ - But you have to go though a message you know.

YO: Quite right, I realise that.

JL: Yes, I mean you saw that interview with Al Cap you know and he was pretty tough on us you know and I ended up screaming at him - he was suggesting that we were doing the bed-in for money you know. He was throwing everything that he could at us you know a real clever bastard and I really lost my temper and I said "what are we doing taking the shit from people like you" and then he comes and says "well I'm your guest here", and I really felt like a cunt then - its all on the film and we're raving and shouting at him and all that he's going on about the students taking over the university, and we're both of us screaming at him "Who wants the university, answer me - who wants the university? Answer!" he wouldn't answer me - it went on for hours and hours.

YO:It's amazing really.

OJ - What do you think of the situation in London at the moment with the hippies, squatters, skinheads etc.?

JL: I just, I don't want to - I don't know what it is you know. I don't understand it. The skinheads is a new thing to me - are they the mods? I don't have a clue you know. I mean I've got to try and throw myself back to 16 and imagine where my sympathies would lie. Who I'd be imitating at that age you know, whether I'd be a skinhead or a hippy - before I'd ever know you know. I don't know, you know. But if they got together they'd be quite powerful you know, but while there's diversity amongst them they don't stand a chance really.

OJ - It must disappoint you a bit that this type of diversity is building up.

JL: Well it builds up and dies - I mean the mods and rockers, I mean the rockers are now helping the hippies as Hells Angels. What's left of them you know, and there's no such thing as mods now. The Who were the king of the mods and what are they now you know? So its a thing you go through when you're a teenager - identification bit. I mean so maybe all the skinheads, the real sort of ardent skinheads will be skinheads at 30, but they're bound to mature and change a bit like I'm still a sort of teddy boy somewhere in me because I imitated teddy boys - I was never a real one you know, but I was always torn between being a teddy boy and an art student you know so there was always a bit of both - so I'm always a bit of both now but I don't have the same mentality or the same ideas as I had when I was that age and identified with them so obviously they'll change as they grow up you know - its just a club to belong to.

YO:I think a new generation is forming and there is a proof of that because I mean there are many young people particularly in America that are sending us letters saying that they really do like Life With The Lions you know. I think that generation is probably going to take a long time to respond (can't hear what she says) - and I think probably the skinheads are like that too.

JL: They just want to remember the laws on dance music - the basic thing is dancing together in a club or a town hall, so even if they go out of their minds they're still going go to dance and listen to dance music - they keep the beat behind the howling that's what they are doing - what kind of music do the skinheads dig? I heard it was rock steady, I don't know.

M: Blue beat.

JL: Blue beat. Oh maybe they'd like 'Give Peace A Chance' blue beat. It's a great version, I'll just play it to you.

YO:I like rock'n'roll, John likes rock'n'roll. I don't know about rock'n'roll but now I really dig it you know.

(dreadful cacophony in background - presumably 'Give Peace A Chance')

JL: So maybe we'll get through to the skinheads with that.

(Miles: can't hear what he says)

But there's always been those gang fighters though - I mean in the '30s they used to have the A gangs or something in Liverpool - they wore those flat hats with the razors in, and when I was a youth it was the teddy boys and now it the skinheads but I mean they're always going to be there fighting. Local village fights that's all it is - one town against the other.

When we first started listening to our records she always said "why do you always put that beat in", I said, "why no", and she used to get very uptight - I mean it's basic, basic music. It's just like jungle or whatever - its - you know all the societies always have a rhythm to it and its always the on beat or the off beat - its never anything else. The off beat wasn't invented in the last 20 years you know, its been there for ever. So I used to say I like them with beat (laughs). But she came round, arty snob she was. Like the most exciting thing about early Little Richard was when he just screamed you know - I mean just before the solo and that was howling you know its only the same thing only skipping the wop bop baluma thing and just doing the whole record like that. It used to make your hair stand on end when he did that long scream into a solo. I mean I still imitate him, I mean I, still when he comes to a solo on a record I always have to do something just to prevent myself from going "aaaah" like this - which I've been doing ever since I heard Richard you know but now I just try and cut it short you know but maybe I should just let it go you know - forget about it so next time I can do something else - so its just that, you know, just eliminating the song bit and elongating the howling bit because that - it definitely got everybody I knew... that and the beginning of 'Be Bop A Lula' - weeell, the big well you know . Still haven't pinched that bit I always meant to start one just like that, you know either that or just do 'Be Bop A Lula' but I'm just a 30 year old rocker you know.

(Yoko: can't hear what she says - apparently "droning on about classical music and their rhythms")

And anyway, the thing is the Indians were so far advanced in rhythm, structure that all the classical music is like primitive, and avant garde jazz is nowhere near it. You hear Yehudi Menuen playing with Ravi Shankar and it's a joke - Yehudi Menuen sounds like a child on his first guitar, you know - it must be frustrating for him because you realise he's studied all his life and he can't get into that, you know, hear that whole new vista of beats and counter beats, or whatever it is.

OJ - Do you feel at all that you're being pushed into extreme situations because of certain situations, say the world situation?

JL: Well, when I say a primitive, I consider myself a primitive musician just because I never studied music, you know, and so therefore I'll always consider myself a primitive. They were always asking us in the early days, "Would you and Paul ever consider learning music?" and we always said "No, no it would wreck our style" or whatever. We said those things and that's what we meant - we'd becoming scientists then or mathematicians and I just.... - sometime it's annoying not to be able to write down something. You know, to write down a bit of music I have to go through a whole complicated process to remember it, and I've lost lots of music through not being able to write it. But if we could write it....I think there would be some counter loss - I tape record it. There's no need for it now. I think writing music would be alright if it was updated, it's just a very old fashioned style of note formation. Most of my songs, the sheet music is always incorrect if I ever get anybody to play me the notes on it. They always, never, there seem to be some notes, I don't understand it but, some notes like minor notes against major. I'm always singing minor notes against a major chord. I think it's bluesy but it turns out that it isn't. It's a mistake, they keep telling me, so they never write it like that, they always write a major note. All these bands, if they read this music they're just playing the wrong tunes all together. So there's certain notes they can't write down you know. If they're going to have music they - somebody - should invent some new music that can really cover all the notes there are. There must be some way of doing it.

- How strongly do you feel about peace? Suppose there was a war, what would you do? Would you say "Yes, I will fight," or would you go to prison?

JL: Oh, I'd do that, you know. I wouldn't fight at all. Never ever any intention of fighting. Up until about 18, there was still call-up when I was a teenager and I remember the news coming through that it was all those born before 1940, and I was thanking God for that as I'd always had this plan about Southern Ireland. I wasn't quite sure what I was going to do when I got to Southern Ireland. Hippies and drop-outs weren't that famous. There was no thinking, "He did it, he went to Ireland and lived happily ever after." So I was never sure what I could do, but I had no intention of going and fighting. I just couldn't kill somebody, you know, I couldn't charge at them. I don't know whether I could kill somebody who was actually trying to kill me in the room. I still don't think that's comparable with "that country's trying to kill this country" because then it is just big game politics. That isn't the same as a man breaking into your house and trying to kill you. I don't believe that. And the only way that we're not going to wake up and see that Britain is at war with America, or whatever it is tomorrow, is for any of us who do think anything about it to keep chanting about it or keep doing anything that we can about it, otherwise it will happen - we will wake up and they'll say we'll have to go to war to save so and so. And everybody is always asking us that, "Well, what would you do if war was declared tomorrow", and the thing is we can't think in those terms. We've got to think about now and that there isn't a war literally in Britain, and the only way there isn't going to be one in the next whenever is to prevent it and change all this generation's mind about war - that it isn't inevitable and it is just a big game that involves money and nothing else. Nothing to do with saving us from communism or whatever jargon they put out. Did you see that thing in The Sunday Times Supplement last week where they had a picture of one guy with his Anderson war shelter with the flowers on it? Now in the war the propaganda was "look at this guy". What actually happened was the council went round and half finished millions of Anderson war shelters and never did actually build them. They're all sort of half done to counteract people saying "well we haven't got a shelter" and complaining about it, they did this propaganda about "look what Mr. Higgs is doing" as if lots of people were doing it and if he can make flowers in his shelter what are you complaining about having half a shelter for? It's just business you know.

Q: Do you ever get the feeling..................? (can't hear the rest)

JL: No, because they're converted on many different levels. The revolutionaries in this world, they've all got many many different ideas about what should be done and how to do things so it isn't preaching to the converted. Even to convert some of the aggressive violent revolutionaries who want to do things about it would be good. I would consider it a good move if we could change some of their minds, to put all their creative energy into peaceful revolution and infiltration because the game is a lot subtler than they think. I can't understand they are all highly educated people, middle class mainly, and I don't understand how they are so unaware as to think the game is really down to street fighting, because the game is a lot subtler than they imagine. That's what I mean when I suddenly get reminded that it's to do with oil in Biafra. What's the street fighter going to do about that? How can you fight big business? Only attacking the shares or their image.

Questioner - In other words it's revolution by infiltration.

JL: I think that's the only way, because simply on statistics all revolutions are violent. I've said this a million times, all violent revolutions produce status quo or imitation, you know, like Russia and France and Britain, we've all had our revolutions and our words of revolution and where is it? It is exactly the same, because the people's minds are the same. The new bureaucracy is created in Russia and the reason they appear less cool than western politicians is that they probably are less cool. They are the workers and have got the control, and the red tape gets redder and longer and longer. So if someone could show me one that has worked then it might turn me a bit. So I'd say "All right, that's the way to do it", then turn the place upside down. But there isn't one. Cuba is the nearest but how long has it been going? Five years - relatively no time at all. Give it another 50 years and see what the machinery is like. They always think in terms of 20, 30 years but I'm thinking in terms of hundreds or thousands. The only way to ensure a lasting kind of peace of any kind is to change people's minds. There's no other way.

M: That's the most difficult thing of all.

JL: That's the hardest one. The Government can do it with propaganda, Coca Cola can do it with propaganda, the business men do it with propaganda, why can't we? We are the hip generation.

M: How successful are things like the Bed Piece? Do you follow up whether they have taken up any of your points?

Yoko: Oh yes, by general vibrations....(fades off)

JL: Yeah. There are millions of photographs and articles circulating around the world now, some exactly what we said, and allowing for all the distortions, 50% distortions, but even then I think the mantra of the word works. So therefore whenever we have the press in we always have the word "peace" there. I think it's that subtle as well, that kind of, what do they call it in advertising subliminal message?. So even when the word is distorted and they say "Those two gurus in drag" as we said in the song, and all that bit. So there's a mass lot of propaganda gone out from those two bed-ins, mainly the Montreal one, and it's still going round now, you know. The only way we know is by people sending us copies in things like The Ohio Express. We just get our feedback from letters and newsprints in general, and so that's all we can hope for really. Circulation. But even so, when kids see me know they do that (peace sign). That has turned into the peace sign. I mean everybody used it, but we used it all the time because it seemed to be in fashion wherever we went. The peaceniks always did that so we started doing it all the time. So whenever kids see us now that's what they do, most of them. Even if they're fans who wanna do it because they know it will please me, that's alright because then they've got to think in their heads "I'm doing this now to John and he likes it and he wants peace". Even if it's on that level it's alright. A nice reaction to it is we get all the press cuttings on us in England and there's a lot of stuff on us every day. Every local writer will throw our name just to get an interest. They use John and Yoko and there's nothing about us, you know, nothing relative in the article. But every garden party this summer in Britain, every small village everywhere, the winning couple was the kids doing John and Yoko in bed with all the posters around. And that's a very mild thing but we've got thousands of them, Newcastle, Scotland, Wales, everywhere. Everyone won a prize and every one we were the joke. Two years old, four years old, 11 years old or 60 years old, every one of them was doing that - sitting in bed with long hair and beards, but everyone had the words around them 'Give Peace A Chance' and all that, just the record itself. In Israel now it's going to be small, it's gotta start with yourself, whatever that is. It's got to start on a family basis and your neighbour and all that. It can't be an over-night, world-wide turn-on. There's no man in the sky going to come out and zap us out, so we've got to start it locally like that. So they're having these 'Give Peace A Chance' events in Ireland, and things like that, where they've had a rock concert with that as the theme, that's alright. Now there will be one in Liverpool and things like that. We're just giving suggestions you know and they use it like that. Instead of everybody singing "Yeah, Yeah, Yeah", they're just singing "Peace" instead. And I believe in the power of mantra. I think all words are mantras and some are more powerful than others.

YO:I think the only difference between animals and us is that we have more mantras. Animals do have different screams and shouts. (they talk over each other)

I believe in the mantra of the word "Peace." People are like their language in a way, or like their image.

M: I think the language grows out of their national characteristic and their characteristics are caused by their world.

JL: That's the reaction sort of thing. A friend of mine was telling me, this is just by the way, that all magic words, black magic or white magic, even in the centre of the African jungle, are Greek. Alex said it - he's a Greek, he knows a lot about magic and that kind of stuff.

M: I wouldn't actually believe that. The most powerful magic in the world was probably Egyptian and that predates Greek.

JL: I say it in just one sentence as I don't have the details. He was talking about it with Dan Richter and covered the Egyptian bit and Dan was saying they probably got it via Greece, Egypt, Africa, like that. When you get down to it certain words, whatever they are, create certain vibrations to make the pencil jump off the table. The word would probably have to be the same one, if a certain word makes a certain thing happen and people discover it, like electricity being discovered at two ends of the world at once, it's got to be the same mantra or same formula that makes it happen.

M: There is a sound mantra for just about everything. If you read the history of legends, which are probably the history of very old civilisations, there are various sounds you could make that enable you to fly or enabled inanimate objects to. That occurs in ancient Irish legends, in Tibetan and the whole of the Indian area and Japanese and South America.

JL: It's gotta be like the formula for electricity is the same in any language.

M: Have you been able to carry on from there? Have you read any philosophic stuff? Derek said you've been reading Willhelm Reich.

JL: Yeah, because my friend Ivan Vaughan, I think you might know him, anyway, he's like a forever student, he sends me books through the post now and then. He sent me The Murder Of Christ and Listen Little Man, I think maybe that's all, so I read them.

M: Do you want more?

JL: Yeah, I read them, like. There's only a few things I can read and that's when it's just right down to the point, I read it. I get millions of different, quite interesting books on religion, philosophy and everything, but most of them have just not quite got to the point. They're all sort of versions, bur Reich seems top be right on the point to me. He really knows what's happening. I just read some review of him last weekend in the Sundays and it was sort of saying he died insane and hated. They talk about him as if he was a madman, you know.

M: Towards the end of his life he did get pretty paranoid.

JL: It looks like he made the mistakes he warned people against. There's a good communication thing going with Ivan and I because he sends the right book at the right time. He sends the book about not being a leader - was that The Murder Of Christ? I think it was - just at the time when we're going out on the bed again. So I had to keep not being a leader, refusing to because many people wanted to crown me. Different movements, "You will be it, John, and you will lead us to....." like they did with Jesus bit, you know. So Reich's a good right hand man to keep reading for doing the game, you know, of not getting tricked into being the king.

(Yoko: can't hear)

The response was coming in by the mail and the press and things like that. And it was picking us up again because we went through "What have we done" and all that.

(Miles: can't hear)

Use the media. Don't be a snob the media is the thing. If you're a writer, write. Infiltrate the Daily Express, don't not work for it on principle. But then you've got to work it out, like some guy wrote to us saying "I know you don't appear in South Africa, probably for good reasons, but the alternative is coming here and helping us by performing or something. So you see you're going to find yourselves in the middle of both worlds, like, the left and the right we'll call it. You're getting knocked from both sides. Now if I went to South Africa, say with The Plastic Ono Band, and performed, the left would really attack me or the underground or whatever it was, because I went to South Africa, and that's what happened with the Peace event a bit. At first we put ourselves right in the middle and we were getting attacked from all sides, underground disowning us, overground disowning us, so we were really open to aggression from all sides. So when you get a choice like that South African thing, I'd never thought of it before, I thought no, I wouldn't go there. But when this guy put it, you come there and you can play in certain places where you play to black and whites and therefore you might influence us a bit, or just give a charge to people who are trying to do something in South Africa, one's that don't want to leave and are going to live there anyway because it's our country, or whatever. And therefore you've got to give thought to that. It gets very subtle then about what to do. This conservative German guy was on TV last night - Do you know his name? It may be Strauss - and he was saying "I'd like to be a good guy but politics is no child's play and when you get up there it's a real dirty game, so you've got to fight like that to survive." If you're thinking about going into to politics, I wouldn't do it.

(Yoko drones on in the background whilst Miles and John have a conversation.)

Tape 2

JL: I'd like to read about one of the Orgone things, very strange, that machine.

M: Yeah, I used to have one of those.

JL: What do they do?

M: It's a very simple mechanism which gathers atmospheric energy. Just the general vibrations that are in the air.

JL: And what's the function of them?

M: Well it concentrates them to three times normal.

JL: And what do you do with it?

M: You sit in it.

JL: You sit in it and gather energy. And do you use it still?

M: Not in London, no.

JL: Why not? If it was good you would have used it wouldn't you?

M: Well, in London there's all sorts of weird things in the atmosphere and there tends to be the wrong type of energy.

JL: Oh I see. Well maybe we could set one up in Ascot, you know, maybe it's a bit freer there.

M: Yeah, it would be easy to build one.

JL: Come out and recharge in Ascot.

M: It's just a metal box with organic material round it. It doesn't have any knobs or anything.

Interview resumes.

JL: It's like we're self-styled doctors of philosophy, but we're self-styled politicians and naturally got a degree.

M: Yeah sure, I accept that you're very effective from the outside as far as young people are concerned.



JL: Bernadette Devlin went in there didn't she and what happened? She got out within six months. When she got in and realised what could she do in there? And that to do anything at all you have to be outside.

(Yoko)

What we're trying to do is gather the forces outside which are far superior to the forces inside and make them work at full potential to get rid of the cancer, you see. Because the politicians rely on us out here they need us to propagate them, to keep them going and people forget that, that the politicians need them more than we need the politicians. And we've got to get them aware of that without frightening them with anarchy, and the word anarchy and all that, about not needing government and all that bit.


There are two choices: doing something or not doing something, and that's the choice facing all of us. We decided to do something and when you don't do something you're not doing anything and you're aware of it. And once you do something you set up a kind of a thing in your mind or your self and there's no turning back, you know.

(Garbled, faded conversation and then a break in the tape.)

JL: That's what happened with Apple in a way. Apple was a manifestation of Beatle naiveté, collective naiveté, and we said we're going to do this and help everybody and all that. And we got conned just on the subtlest and the most grossest level. We didn't really get approached by the best artists, or any of the recording thing, we got all the bums from everywhere - they'd been thrown out from everywhere else. And the other people who were really groovy wouldn't approach us because they're too proud.


M: Or maybe they don't like hustling.

JL: They don't like hustling, of course. I couldn't hustle.

M: The only way to reach young people is to hustle.

JL: Right, and that's why it didn't work. And then we have to quickly build up another wall round us to protect us, from all the beggars and lepers in Britain and America that came up to us and the vibes are getting insane. And I tried, when we were at Wigmore Street, to see everyone, like we said "You don't have to get down on your knees" - I saw everyone day in day out and there wasn't anybody with anything to offer to society or me or anything. There was just "I want, I want" and why not? Terrible scenes going on in the office with different spades and hippies and all different people getting very wild with me. Even the peace campaign we had a lot of that too, but once you've opened the door it's hard, you know. That's all it is, it's just different.

M: What's the answer? You obviously don't want to cut yourself off from humanity like that.

JL: I have to take it slower and I have to deal with people, even people who are thinking the same way as us we have to agree on steps to be taken. Make a deal, whether it's on paper or a shake of the hand, and then move forward together. At a bit slower pace, see I'm very impetuous, so I like it now, everything tomorrow, and I'm beginning to find out that it doesn't work. It's just impossible to do it like that so I've got to slow down.

(Yoko)

People say "You're staying in bed, why don't you go down and shake hands with the people?" The answer is that communication isn't just shaking hands. And how much communication do they really want? These are intelligent people but do they really want to see pictures of us like Nixon or the Queen shaking hands with a few people in the street and nothing happening at all except where I sign a few autographs. There are intelligent people asking us "Why, why in this luxury hotel and not in the street?" And the answer is it's impractical and less is done shaking hands on the street corner. They've got to look at it from our point of view, not from theirs. They always see it from theirs. It must be hard to imagine what it is to be Nixon or Queen Elizabeth which is the position we're in. You can't go on the street and shake hands and protest at Hyde Park unless you've got a bullet-proof outfit to protect you. This is public to me. This is communication, talking to you and we're either doing this all the time or we stay completely alone in our room. Maybe we get a full day a week alone and that's our Orgone machine where we revitalise and come out the next week. We don't even go to dinner with people or anything like that.

Miles- What do you do when you're alone?

JL: We stay together, we talk and think about things and go over everything we've done and what we're going to do - go round the grounds like The Squire Of Trelawn and enjoy the trees.

M: Don't you have a lot of people down there?

JL: Yeah, but the rule seems to be that they keep out the way and we've got Dan and Jill right in the house with us but they are sort of running the thing for us. We've got one gardener and he's right at the other end. The original people had 30 gardeners but we're not running the thing like that.

M: Do you just have one room?

JL: At the moment, because the house is being redecorated and knocked to pieces and things like that. All you need is one room in the end, when it gets down to it. I think we tend to feel a need to have acres and a large house, protection in a way. If we were in a mews cottage in London life would be unbearable. Because of what we are there'd be a continuous stream of people but a big house, big grounds protect us. It has that overpowering image to a lot of people and it keeps a lot of people off our backs. It's not so inviting as a flat in town. But when you get down to it all you need is a bedroom and a kitchen functionally, but for us at this period of time we need more.

M: You seem to have changed a lot recently.

JL: I don't know, I suppose we have. Since when?

M: Since when you were recording Sergeant Pepper, you were a completely different personality then, we all were I expect.

JL: Oh yeah, sure. I'm more myself than I was then because I've got the security of Yoko, that's what's done it and it's like having a mother and everything. That's it. So I'm secure in my relationship with her so then I can afford to relax. I was never relaxed before, I was always uptight. The me that you see now was in there but it only came out at a very intimate party or somebody who knew me very well. I could never relax in these kind of situations, very seldom anyway. I was always in a state of uptightness and therefore the cynical Lennon image came out and the remarks and all that bit, so I was always uptight. I'm not uptight so much these days. I still get uptight but less because I'm not hiding anything. I'm trying to break away from that "what have you got to hide" thing because when you get down to it I've got nothing to hide. I have fear and paranoia and happiness and joy. I'm just like everyone else and I know everybody has the same problems that I have and they're not something I carry alone. As that creative artist who you probably met during the Pepper time going through torture about not writing good enough and all that I still go through that but now I can remember, even in the worst depths of misery, we're both going through it together. That helps.

M: What's happened to you is what you're trying to make happen to the world and break down those barriers.

JL: Yes, that's saying that if we can be naked as much as we can, both physically and mentally then so can you and it helps. It helped me, so...

M: They're really difficult barriers to break down though. I think Yoko's overoptimistic about them.

Yoko: I'm not, I know it's very difficult, but I believe in miracles.

JL: Believe in everything until it's disproved. When we were watching TV in Montreal in the bed-in some Harvard professor was on saying how they'd done this test on kids in the university or a school - about 11 or 12 year old kids - and they conned the teachers, they didn't tell the teachers what the test was. They said that at the end of a year all these certain amount of children in this class, and they named them, are going to be exceptional children. What they didn't tell the teachers was that they'd picked the names at random out a hat. The teachers thought that they had done special tests on them or whatever. So at the end of the year all these kids were getting A plus, they all turned out to be geniuses and it was the simple fact that the teachers believed it. They picked them at random out the hat, really at random, and the kids believed it. The kids were encouraged, the teachers were coaching them, you know, "you're gonna be great." They all were A wonders. All we're trying to say to the world is you're all....It's like the other story I've told a million times because we've got it down to a few stories after repeating and repeating in Montreal and Amsterdam. The other thing is, who told us we were artists? All kids draw and write poetry and everything and some of us last until we're about 18 but most drop off about 12 and that's when some guy comes up and says "You're no good." That's all we ever get told all our lives, "You haven't got the ability, you're a cobbler." It's like in one of me books, "You're a broomstrivest" or something. The father keeps saying to him you're this and get it right what you are. And that's all we're told all our lives, what our limits are. What we've got to make people aware of is not their limits but what these people's limits are, what they think the limits are. People are limited into thinking they couldn't run their own affairs and what we're trying to say is that you are unlimited and you're all geniuses and you were all artists and musicians until some bastard told you about 12 "you must do woodwork, and you do metalwork and we haven't got room in lithography for you, so you've got to be a letterer" and all that. That was going on all the time, it happened to all of us, but if somebody had told me all my life, "Yeah, you're a great artist, you're a great artist" I would have been a more secure person all the time.

Miles: (can't hear)

The two years before I met Yoko, I think the others were on to the same thing. We all went through a depression after Maririshi and Brian died it wasn't really to do with Maririshi it was just that period. I was really going through "what's it all about" type thing and this songwriting is nothing, it's pointless and I'm no good, I'm not talented and I'm shitty and I couldn't do anything but be a Beatle. What am I going to do about it, and it lasted nearly two years and I was still in it during Pepper. I know Paul wasn't at that time, he was feeling full of confidence and I wasn't going through murder around those periods. I was just about coming out of it around Marahishi even though Brian had died - that knocked us back again, well it knocked me back. I just about got my confidence. With the acid trip scene, I went through that get rid of your ego bit. I really had a massive ego, three or four years after acid I spent the whole time trying to destroy my ego which I did until I had nothing left. I went to India with Maririshi and that, and he was saying ego is good, you know as long as you look after it, don't destroy it at all. But I'd really destroyed it and I was so paranoiac and weak I couldn't do anything. I'd really done a good job on the ego, and I was just about building it back up again when I met Yoko. It, literally, went in weeks. I was just trying to work it back again and get confidence in myself. Then we met Derek again after a long time and Derek did a good job on building the ego one weekend at his house. Reminding me of who I am and what I've done, what I could do. He just reminded me of who I am, him and a couple of friends did that for me, they said "you're great, you are what you are and you're infinite" and all that. The next week Yoko came down to Derek's. That was it then I just blew out and it all came back to me like I was back to age16 and all the rest of it had been wiped out. It was like going to a psychiatrist. I remember everything. I've got to believe I'm a genius I've got to believe that I'm great to do anything. It's my mantra. I thought I'd lose it all and I really don't believe in genius just for when the RM readers read it. Just to cover that angle. When you look in? and it says "I am a genius, I am great" it depresses me if it's read the wrong way. It was like one criticism of one of our film events. I don't know which paper, it was one of the papers. If he didn't know us or had followed my career or Yoko's a bit more he'd think we were on a big ego trip with the film in my face and all that. He realised it isn't that but that's how it's coming over to him. That's the danger you've got to watch out for.

The things was coming out and she came and opened the door a little bit. I love you for what you are, whatever it is, and I respected her genius. For her to love me was the answer then. She wouldn't have loved a dummy which I'd begun to think I was. That helped - the accumulation. I was just out of it then. Of course she goes through the same thing where I can help her the same, once I'd got over my intellectual reverse snobbery about avant garde which I had to get over.

M: you've still got it, have you?

Sure, sure I can't help it. It'll take a long time to wear off, but I'm getting better. So, when she's in trouble I can do the same for her so it's a good combination. Why shouldn't I be a poet, a film maker, a dancer, an actor- let's do it all while the going's good. That's it really. It's a freedom, it's a relief because you can never escape from the hell on earth, there's no escape from that. Even two people who are as lucky as us two that have somebody that can be so close on all levels. There's still great depths of misery to be found. That's the human condition and there isn't any answer for that. Even Yoga and all the different philosophies - they all just paths to get out of it. On the way there it's just the same for everyone. The highs and the lows are just greater as you develop your confidence but it's still the same old games. Even talking about it I get a bit....you know they're there and there's no way out of it but at least now I know there is a high plus a low and the low needn't last that long. Just last year I remember watching that film on the falcon and it was so depressing. I remember seeing this film on BBC2 about a guy training a falcon and he lived in this beautiful little cottage in Cornwall or somewhere like that. It was dreamlike, he didn't have any problems it was just nature and him training the falcon and it was just so beautiful. And I thought "God almighty, it's all I want really" but it can't be or I'd get it. Well, I can get it. I can get a cottage and live there if I wanted to. I always have this dream of being the artist in a little cottage, and I didn't do any of this gig or publicity or anything like that, I just wrote poetry and a few oils and that's the dream. Seeing this film reviewed for the past few days it was just the end of it. Here we are in this grand palace, we've got nice people with us and everything's going well and here's this film and it makes us so sad to see it but there's no way out, the grass is greener. It's strange - not that I want to be a falconer or anything. It just seemed like such a dream, living in a cottage and wandering in the trees. I really can't wait to be old, you know. You do your best and then there is a time when you do slow down and it seems nice. I always look forward to being an old couple of about 60, just remembering everything, I suppose we'll still be cursing because we're in a wheelchair.

M: you won't stop?

No, but it must be slower, it's such a frantic way our minds work and nothings thing's quick enough. The only thing is TV that's out the next day and before I started diversing my career with Yoko into films and all different things. At least I'd have a record out within a couple of weeks of making it. God the frustration of making these films, the fight we have to get it out, like Two Virgin albums I still can't get out in Japan. She was concentrating on her work and now I am. I realise what it's like and I've had it so easy - just write a song and get it out and the thoughts of Chairman John were on the wall the next day. Now I'm getting into this dead end all the time and it's like starting life again and that's the groove, starting from scratch, you know.

YO:Even in Apple we had a difficult time in producing our records.

JL: We can't get our things through a machine that was set up specifically to get our creative things out.

YO:Even our wedding album we made.....

Our wedding was set up six months ago and it's still not out and it's so frustrating it drives you mad. The last thing that Anthony said was "we lent you the ? and the microphone and we only got the ? back" so I wonder where it went then. Do you remember where we would have sent it if we sent to get it mended?

(Other person talking about where it might have gone)

(talking about it)

Everything's tied up they keep cameras in such a mystique like you have to be a doctor to work a camera and they could easily make them simple. They just want to keep that thing of photographer A.S.C in the film world. Once the people get their own newspapers that's the end of it, because all the youth will film what's actually happening and show it to each other and we won't have to take the news as delivered by BBC and ITN. The underground will send it's own films around everywhere, whatever's going on from each country. If their newspapers are that successful on the underground, films once there's cheap eight mil network.

M: There is something like that already, a video-tape group commune in NY.

JL: We just had something over, about the big anti-marijuana laws in the states, he showed me the eight mil.

M: There's another group in N.Y, called Newsrial, they've made some great films of demonstrations and reporting the news.

JL: We saw the CBS version of our Montreal bed-in with Al Cap and our version uncut. They just cut it slightly so that Al comes out better. That was on the TV version and they were quite friendly towards us. The guy interviewing us was a pro and a peacenik. But the editor - everything we said he just nipped out. We look like maniacs and Al looks like good ole' witty Al.

(talking about a biography)

It's beautiful, I like it. I'm glad you didn't have my face ??. It's a lovely biography isn't it.

M: Do you think I could have a drawing to illustrate.

JL: To illustrate what?

M: To illustrate this.

JL: I see, when do you need it. ??????turn up with illustrations or something.

M: It'll be in the next issue.

JL: So I've got a week or something. Anthony keeps reminding me that I've got to do a drawing. There's a lovely cover for Sculptures And Asnel(?) that the guy was too scared to use because Maxwell owns it. Hey do you think that sculpture guy is ever going to use it or can we give it to It, cause it's a nice...it's a photograph of us on a stand, cause there's a sculpture in the garden for sale and it's got sculpture on it and it's really nice and he's never used it.

????


Yeah, but if he used it in It would he say "I'm not using it" cause they've always got pictures of stones - very square magazine really.

YO:Let's ask him.

JL: Yeah, cause it's a good one, but I'll draw anyway.

(becomes very muffled)

JL: The best thing for you to do is to get to our house before twelve on Friday morning and you can take it then. If you do it then we can pop into the garden and then go into town together or something like that.

[A much edited version of this conversation was first published in OZ magazine.]



© Miles, 1969