Showing posts with label John Lennon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label John Lennon. Show all posts

The Beatles 1968


In 1968 The Beatles issued their penultimate Christmas disc for the fans. It includes these two poems by John Lennon

Once upon a time, there were two balloons called Jock and Yono.
They were strictly in love, bound to happpen in a million years.
They were together man.
Unfortunate timetable, they seemed to have previous experience which kept calling them one way or another.
You know how it is.
But they battled on against overwhelming oddities, including some of their beast friends.
Being in love, they clung together even more man.
But some of the poisonous monsters' outdated boss, lordy ape claws did stick slightly, and they occasionally had to resort to the dry cleaners.
Luckily, this did not kill them and they weren't banned from the Olympic Games.
They lived hopefully ever after and who could blame them.

Once upon a pool table there lived a short-haired butcher's boy by the way of Ostergrad.
It comes in scented cesspool or be careful.
Her father was in a long story cut short in the middle of this life sentence.
We're indebted to the colloquial office for its immediate disposal of her honorwitz, including, I might add, half a fell of her twotem.
On the other handbag, I mean to say l'amour nous sommes toujours realistic, strictly speaking.
For this film is about an hourglass houseboat.
The full meaning of Winchester Cathedral defies description.
Their loss was our Gainsborough nil.
The sound of a manservantile defectively lasting barred
Up in a love-dizzy gar-di-dell time.
How close can you Gettysburg and ever underly council ya originally a Birdbath feeling ...
Cut!

For a transcript of the wholedisc try here
https://genius.com/The-beatles-the-beatles-1968-christmas-record-lyrics

Musical Christmas Gem 10


10. Happy Xmas (War is over) by John Lennon with Yoko Ono.
One of my Christmas rituals is to praise this song and to moan about Paul McCartney's execrable attempt at a Christmas number (Wonderful Christmas time). Actually as songs they are equal. The real difference is in the production and the sentiment. McCartney's features a tinny eighties synthesizer and sleigh bells and is all about having a nice time at Christmas. Lennon, on the other hand, has got Phil Spector in to do a massive production number with mandolins and children and choirs and who knows what else and with the genuine if naive aim of bringing the Vietnam War and indeed all wars to an end. As is apparent already I like a bit of seriousness in my holiday music (cf Greg Lake, The Pogues, also Jackson Browne's The Rebel Jesus on the Chieftains album I mentioned) and this one gives it in bucketfuls. Even Yoko Ono is bearable on this track. Here on wikipedia there is some more info, including the fact that at the beginning of the song the whispered words are not "Happy Christmas, Yoko. Happy Christmas, John" as I'd always assumed (giving it a rather self-indulgent flavour) but "Happy Christmas, Kyoko. Happy Christmas, Julian" ie to their kids.