Where were you when...?
There are those who know where they were when JFK was shot... or when Elvis died... or when Diana died.
For me it was John. In 1980 I was in 2nd year at UofA... and not doing so well - who would've thought that drinking for 4 or 5 days straight wasn't the same thing as studying!?
My sister had listened to the old Beatles... the moptops that lead the British Invasion. My brother listened to Abbey Road. So I had grown up with them.
But in high school I met a guy who ended up becoming one of my best friends ...still is to this day. Through him I got to learn a bit more about the Beatles and more significantly who is ascerbic lad named John really was. I hadn't know the sordid side of the history of the Beatles. I hadn't known that John loved to play with words and liked to draw.
I learned about how, unlike so many other 'rock stars' John had tread a dangerous path, took his lumps, and came out the other side a very real person. I saw him for the artist he truly was - in so many different media.
I respected the fact that to him his family came first. And that getting back into music was just because he enjoyed it. Coming back from 5 years of self-imposed exile during which he had immersed himself in domestic life. Double Fantasy release in 1980 was a window on those years... the domesticity, the removal from the 'mainstream', the settling into middle age! It was like he was saying, I don't have anything else to prove, I'm o.k. with being grown up now.
The album was far from perfect (even if you don't consider Yoko's, er, contributions
) but that too gave it a tremendous honesty. It was tentative and hopeful.
On Dec 08, 1980 I was - surprisingly - studying in my parents basement when the phone rang. It was my friend Steve calling to tell me that John Lennon had been shot. I was shocked... and outraged... and saddened.
John had chosen not to follow the path of so many others. His was a vision of the future. And his future was cut short.
- - - - -
"Instant Karma's gonna get you
Gonna knock you right on the head
You better get yourself together
Pretty soon you're gonna be dead"
- - - - -
For me it was John. In 1980 I was in 2nd year at UofA... and not doing so well - who would've thought that drinking for 4 or 5 days straight wasn't the same thing as studying!?
My sister had listened to the old Beatles... the moptops that lead the British Invasion. My brother listened to Abbey Road. So I had grown up with them.
But in high school I met a guy who ended up becoming one of my best friends ...still is to this day. Through him I got to learn a bit more about the Beatles and more significantly who is ascerbic lad named John really was. I hadn't know the sordid side of the history of the Beatles. I hadn't known that John loved to play with words and liked to draw.
I learned about how, unlike so many other 'rock stars' John had tread a dangerous path, took his lumps, and came out the other side a very real person. I saw him for the artist he truly was - in so many different media.
I respected the fact that to him his family came first. And that getting back into music was just because he enjoyed it. Coming back from 5 years of self-imposed exile during which he had immersed himself in domestic life. Double Fantasy release in 1980 was a window on those years... the domesticity, the removal from the 'mainstream', the settling into middle age! It was like he was saying, I don't have anything else to prove, I'm o.k. with being grown up now.
The album was far from perfect (even if you don't consider Yoko's, er, contributions
) but that too gave it a tremendous honesty. It was tentative and hopeful.On Dec 08, 1980 I was - surprisingly - studying in my parents basement when the phone rang. It was my friend Steve calling to tell me that John Lennon had been shot. I was shocked... and outraged... and saddened.
John had chosen not to follow the path of so many others. His was a vision of the future. And his future was cut short.
- - - - -
"Instant Karma's gonna get you
Gonna knock you right on the head
You better get yourself together
Pretty soon you're gonna be dead"
- - - - -
Del, you have too much free time sometimes.. 
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