John Ono Lennon, born John Winston Lennon 9 October 1940 in Liverpool and murdered on 8 December 1980 in New York , is an author, composer , guitarist , pianist and singer , founder of the Beatles , a leading group of the 1960s and Culture pop / rock, which he left in September 1969 . Following the demise of the group, he devoted himself to various actions for peace with his wife Yoko Ono and record several solo albums, including the famous Imagine . Both his son, Julian , and Sean Lennon , are also singers and musicians.
Nearly thirty years after his death, he embodies deep commitment and outstanding movement pacifist Peace and Love in 1970 , and a rally in his memory continues to be held in New York every December 8th .
Biography
Childhood and Adolescence (1940-1957)
John Lennon was born on 9 October 1940 at the maternity of Oxford Street , in Liverpool , during a raid of the German air force in the midst of the Blitz . His father, Alfred "Freddie" Lennon, is a sailor and left home frequently, and then permanently in 1945. He will not see his son until Beatlemania . His parents separated soon, John leaves to live in Woolton, another district of Liverpool , with his aunt and uncle. He spent the rest of his childhood.
During his childhood, John was a child shows a very curious and good at literature . He invents songs from nursery rhymes that he learns at school. It then creates a universe close to his novel favorite Alice in Wonderland . Soon, he is nevertheless also a child of humor exacerbated at the stroke of sharp pencil and fine analysis.
Her mother, Julia Stanley, reappears at the time of adolescence to disappear permanently 15 July 1958 , reversed the car of a drunken policeman. Under his leadership, during that brief period when he sees her from time to time, he began playing the banjo and ukulele . The death of his mother plunged into silence and apparent irony will become his "trademark". It becomes Teddy Boy , wearing leather jackets, a sort of local rebel, known to everyone in Liverpool and disreputable. He never recovered from this loss, dedicating several songs: Julia in 1968 and Mother in 1970, where he literally screams his sadness (these cries are part of an exercise therapy, invented by Dr. Arthur Janov , well vogue called primal scream ).
With the Beatles (1957-1970)
The genesis of the Beatles
John Lennon attended the Art College in Liverpool, befriending with artists like Stuart Sutcliffe . Simultaneously, he began to play skiffle in small parish celebrations. Inspired by the rock and his idols Buddy Holly , Chuck Berry , and Elvis Presley , he founded a group called the Quarrymen , Pete Shotton, Nigel Walley and Ivan Vaughan. It was he who, 6 July 1957 , introduced Paul McCartney to John: it is the meeting of two talents who will therefore constantly mutual emulation. Another strong point in common between the two young men is that they will meet every two motherless children: Mary McCartney, died of cancer in 1956, Julia Stanley, the mother of John, was crushed by a car driven by a Policeman drunk in 1958.
John Lennon has a certain authority over the four members, because of his age as its excesses. The look of Lennon at the time was very influenced by Elvis Presley and Marlon Brando . He named his band the Silver Beetles in allusion to the movie The Wild One , then in 1960, the Beatles , the second E is changing in A on an idea by Lennon, in reference to the Beat Generation . It is very influenced by the repertoire rock and roll at the time, and his playing is very aggressive. The success came, the group left Liverpool and made his debut in the boxes of light district of Hamburg in Germany . John, full of jokes during his concerts ("My name is John, I play the guitar. Sometimes I play the fool too." - "I'm John, I play guitar. Sometimes I play fools too. "), became the" rebel "of the band.
John Lennon imposed for that "getaway" Germany's best friend Stuart Sutcliffe. Though very talented painter, Stuart reveals a poor bassist. Sutcliffe left the band to live his love affair with Astrid Kirchherr , author of the first official pictures of the Beatles. John Lennon saw a second tragedy when Stuart died of a brain tumor shortly after.
In 1962, John married Cynthia Powell met at the Art College (School of Art) in 1958 and with whom he has a son, Julian , born April 8, 1963.
Beatlemania
At first, John is the lead singer of the group. His songs are often funny show or pessimistic ( There's a Place , If I Fell , I'm a Loser , a happy exception being I Feel Fine ) versus those over laughing, but not always and sometimes burlesque, Paul McCartney which, as "brilliant second" John, is gradually becoming the dominant group is harmonic. The opposition erupted in 1965 , during the preparation of the 45s with We Can Work It Out (Paul McCartney) and Day Tripper (Lennon). Either the song singers think is much better than the other and therefore deserves the A side, one passing on the radio. Unable to agree, for the first time, a spell with two 45s sides A and weekly charts and pass one another, alternating each week.
Bob Dylan John Lennon recognizes a talented writer. This recognition will be born a respect and an exchange between the two icons of pop. For the Beatles, Lennon and mainly, become icons. He saw very little this madness around them and took refuge in sarcasm and food (he speaks of time "big Elvis" in an interview with Rolling Stone). In this period, where it repels itself, born the song Help! , genuine call for help launched the world. However, the namesake movie shows a corpulent John Lennon perfectly normal.
"We're more popular than Jesus now"
After writing A Spaniard in the Works in March 1965, five months before the third summer U.S. tour (the first two took place in 1964 and 1965), John Lennon gave an interview to Maureen Cleave, a journalist friend. It runs: "The Christianity disappears. It will evaporate, shrink. I need not argue about it. I'm right, it will prove I'm right. We're more popular than Jesus now. I do not know what will disappear first, the rock and roll or Christianity ... "<ref> (in):" Christianity Will Go. It Will vanish and shrink. With That I Need not argued, I 'm right and I Will Be Proved right. We're more popular now Than Jesus, I do not know Which Will go first - rock and roll or Christianity. "</ ref>, <ref> full text of the interview </ ref> As soon distorted, reduced, these statements provoke a wave of hatred, of the southern United States, against the group and Lennon in particular. This period also marks the last concert of the Beatles, who no longer know how to reconcile the musical innovations and mob violence.
<ref> Hommage du Vatican aux Beatles pour les 40 ans du "White Album" sur swissinfo.org , 21/11/2008. In 2008 , in an article celebrating forty years of the White Album , L'Osservatore Romano , the official newspaper of the Vatican , is back with indulgence this gap by describing it as "a sentence that provoked outrage but now sounds like a joke of a young working class English overtaken by an unexpected success "<ref> Tribute to the Beatles to the Vatican 40 years of the "White Album" on swissinfo.org , 21/11/2008. Accessed on 23/11/2008 </ ref>.
Lennon also runs a film called How I Won the War . His sense of irony and nonsense are all the rage . [citation needed] , although there not take the lead. During filming of this movie by Richard Lester , to Almeria in Andalusia , Lennon made one of its flagship titles, Strawberry Fields Forever .
The group burst
Lennon goes further and plunged into the psychedelia , with major efforts in drug and complex sounds. It looks more and more inner peace, and after following the precepts of time a guru in India, he turned to an artist of avant-garde Japanese he met at an art exhibition , Yoko Ono . His love life is a long troubled history. Its mainly the result of the divorce on Yoko Ono, who became his second wife and who has great influence on the rest of his career (she is also criticized for being held responsible for the separation of many Beatles fans ).
His compositions are very dense and ambitious show ( Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds , Love Is All You Need , I Am the Walrus , A Day In The Life , Strawberry Fields Forever ). Yet the presence of Yoko Ono during sessions registration, from the month of May 1968, causing discomfort, resentment and animosity. All this leads to the White Album which enshrines the breakup of the Beatles, everyone, it was argued, using no other than as a studio musician. Abbey Road will be their last real work of communal harmony, as Let It Be will be released a year after its registration, through the work of editing and mixing of Phil Spector . The same year, moreover, the solo album of Paul , where he plays all instruments himself by re-recording, is already out, quickly followed by the triple album All Things Must Pass to George Harrison . In fact John Lennon that ends Beatles, by announcing his final departure in September 1969 shortly after recording sessions at Abbey Road disc. The news was initially kept secret, given the many commercial imperatives, and that Paul McCartney will formalize the separation seven months later, in April 1970. "I founded the Beatles and I have dissolved, it's as simple as that," says John Lennon then.
Solo career (1968-1980)
Following separation of the Beatles John dedicates himself to his companion, the artist's movement Fluxus Yoko Ono and her family. His solo career sawtooth - because the music is not his only concern - is still rich and fruitful. Throughout the 1970s, J. Lennon moves between styles, adopting a look always different: a real hippie , a militant pacifist , rocker follower of meditation, etc..
In early 1970, it will be the provocation, the Plastic Ono Band with bassist Klaus Voormann , the stunts, the quips to Paul McCartney songs and committed pacifists and especially the fight Ono him to exorcise a its old demons: the death of his mother. He becomes the embodiment of the activism of his generation and uses his fame in a lot of happenings for Peace ( Give Peace a Chance ). Among his famous Imagine , with universal overtones, one of the most popular songs ever written.
In the summer of 1973, John and Yoko moved away from Los Angeles with May Pang , his young assistant and new companion. This will be his rocker-period homecoming (J. Lennon speaks of a "lost weekend" or "lost weekend"). With producer Phil Spector , it saves others from Walls and Bridges and Rock 'n' Roll , it consists of covers of rock'n'roll classics as Be-Bop-A-Lula or Peggy Sue.
In early 1975, J. Lennon back in the arms of Yoko Ono. On October 9, 1975, the day of 35th anniversary of John, was born his second son, Sean . Lennon withdrew from the public eye and concentrate on music for his son.
Murder
He is a man reconciled with itself and income from the throes of surnotoriété who signs the album Double Fantasy in November 1980 . An album full of freshness and tenderness with songs sung alternately by Yoko and John. He was assassinated <ref> INA.FR JA2 20H: Issue of December 9, 1980 </ ref> in New York on 8 December 1980 , after an evening's work in the studio and when he returned to his apartment in the Dakota Building near Central Park . Under the eyes of Yoko, Mark David Chapman , a deeply religious man, and completely unbalanced, the slaughter of five balls of gun (38 gauge). A few hours earlier, Lennon had given an autograph .
The reasons for the murder remain unclear. Some see the sense of betrayal Chapman would have approved, accusing his idol does not have kept its promise of peace and equality of wealth that he communicated in his songs.
Worldview
Although John Lennon is best known as singer-songwriter , the vision he showed the world - although at the time, she could still shock - its openness and its insistence on the issues Peace and love have made him a popular icon.
In his song "God, John says that God is a concept which man was created in order to bear its own suffering, or to gain extra strength to help the believer to survive. He recalls a vision expressed by many writers (Sade, Marx, Nietzsche, ...) the American public does not necessarily know much more than names. Furthermore, he explains his dream ("You May Say I'm a dreamer") of a world without war, religion without suffering where all people could live in the love , the peace and unity.
» . In everyday life, man will not always show as Olympian detachment: if one of his photos where he pastiches the cover of Ram , his old friend Paul McCartney may be regarded as a mere joke, the words of the song How Do You Sleep are very hard toward it: "Those freaks Was you right When They Said Was Dead.
His album with Elephant's Memory , Some Time In New York City , which is almost every song or protest, will not have a comparable success to those who had preceded him.
Respects
- A film, Two of Us, a tribute to both John and Paul in imagining a meeting between them during the transition from Wings in New York.
- In 2002, the Airport Liverpool , renovated, was renamed Liverpool John Lennon Airport . A bronze statue of the agent is installed in the lobby registration, the motto "above us only sky" (from the lyrics of Imagine ) is painted on the ceiling, while outside, a Yellow Submarine giant welcomes Motorists ...
- The City of Music has dedicated an exhibition, as a tribute. John Lennon Unfinished Music, from October 20 to 25 June 2006.
- John Lennon Wall in Prague, Czech Republic. It is a wall covered in graffiti, including lots of drawings of John Lennon. There was a time when it was cleaned every day but not anymore.
Discography
For the Beatles discography, see The Beatles .
Studio albums
- 1968 : Unfinished Music No.1: Two Virgins (with Yoko Ono ) - U.S. # 124
- 1969 : Unfinished Music No.2: Life with the Lions (with Yoko Ono) - U.S. # 174
- 1969: Wedding Album (with Yoko Ono) - U.S. # 178
- 1,970 : John Lennon / Plastic Ono Band - UK # 8, # 6 U.S.
- 1971 : Imagine - UK # 1 U.S. # 1
- 1972 : Some Time In New York City (with Yoko Ono) - UK # 11, # 48 U.S.
- 1973 : Mind Games - UK # 6, U.S. # 9
- 1974 : Walls and Bridges - UK # 6, U.S. # 1
- 1975 : Rock 'n' Roll - UK # 6, U.S. # 6
- 1980 : Double Fantasy (with Yoko Ono) - UK # 1 U.S. # 1
- 1984 (posthumous): Milk And Honey (with Yoko Ono) - UK # 3 U.S. # 11
Live albums
Compilations
Singles
- 1969 : Give Peace a Chance (with The Plastic Ono Band) - UK # 2 U.S. # 14
- 1969: Cold Turkey "(with The Plastic Ono Band) - UK # 12, # 30 U.S.
- 1970 : Instant Karma! (with The Plastic Ono Band) - UK # 4, U.S. # 3
- 1971 : Mother - U.S. # 43
- 1971: Power to the People (with The Plastic Ono Band) - UK # 6, # 11 U.S.
- 1971: Imagine - U.S. # 3
- 1971: Happy Xmas (War Is Over) (with Yoko Ono, The Plastic Ono Band and The Harlem Community Choir) - U.S.
- 1972 : Happy Xmas (War Is Over) (Yoko Ono, The Plastic Ono Band and The Harlem Community Choir) - UK
- 1972: Woman Is the Nigger of the World - U.S. # 57
- 1973 : Mind Games - UK # 26, # 18 U.S.
- 1974 : Whatever Gets You Through The Night - UK # 36, # 1 U.S.
- 1975 : # 9 Dream - UK # 23, # 9 U.S.
- 1975: Stand by Me - UK # 30, # 20 U.S.
- 1975: Imagine - UK # 6
- 1980 (Just Like) Starting Over - UK # 1 U.S. # 1
- 1980: Happy Xmas (War Is Over) (Yoko Ono, The Plastic Ono Band and The Harlem Community Choir) - UK # 2 (Back)
- 1980: Give Peace a Chance (with The Plastic Ono Band) - UK # 33 (Back)
- 1980: Imagine - UK # 1 (Back)
- 1981 : Woman District - UK # 1 U.S. # 2
- 1981: Watching the Wheels - UK # 30, # 10 U.S.
- 1981: Happy Xmas (War Is Over) (Yoko Ono, The Plastic Ono Band and The Harlem Community Choir) - UK # 28 (Back)
- 1982 : Love - UK # 41
- 1984 : Nobody Told Me - UK # 6, # 5 U.S.
- 1984: Borrowed Time - UK # 32
- 1984: I'm Stepping Out - # 55 U.S.
- 1985: Jealous Guy - UK # 65
- 1988 : Imagine / Jealous Guy - UK # 45
- 1988: Jealous Guy - U.S. # 80
- 1999 : Imagine - UK # 3 (reissue)
- 2003 : Happy Xmas (War Is Over) (Yoko Ono, The Plastic Ono Band and The Harlem Community Choir) - UK # 32 (reprint)
Collaborations
Bibliography
Filmography
"John Lennon" on other Wikimedia projects:
References
Beacon extension "references" Unknown
References
