So the other night -- i.e., the sad 30th anniversary of the death of John Lennon -- I was chatting via the intertubes with a certain frequent commenter about the relative merits of John's Beatles stuff versus the solo work, a subject we needn't get into here for a number of reasons. In any event, I did allow that "Real Love," the John tune from his Dakota house husband period that the surviving Beatles finished for Anthology in 1995, was one of my favorites among the later stuff, and that the Beatles version is something I genuinely cherish. Seriously -- I think it stands up very nicely against anything that they did as a group back in the day.
Anyway, by chance, later that evening I stumbled across this radically different acoustic guitar version John did of the song -- from the sound of it, quite a bit earlier than the piano demo the Fabs overdubbed. Which I hadn't heard before.
Not epochal by any means -- in fact, pretty ragged, actually -- but by the time John started whistling I must confess to kind of losing it.
9 comments:
Real Stuff!
I can't help wondering where Lennon's music would have gone had he lived the past 30 years?
ROTP(lumber)
Poor John Lennon was (for whatever psychological reason) bent on self-annihilation, and found the perfect partner in the evil Ono. Songs like this lovely version of "Real Love" pop up among the tapes like flowers out of cracks in the pavement. A sad tale.
Gotta agree with Steve about the Anthology version: I first heard coming from behind the counter at a coffee shop, and it stopped me dead in my tracks. "That's the best Beatles pastiche I ever heard," I thought. "And the song is good enough to be by the Beatles themselves!"
Steve -- what source are you using to distribute somgs these days?
My browser finds the artwork, but no music.
I'm sure it's my end here, but it will help me track down the problem if I know where you've lodged the tune.
Thanks!
I am still quite stunned, all these years later, that the commercial release of 6 CDs worth of stellar Beatles' rarities was received so tepidly.
Even Beatles' lunatics, of which I am one, hadn't heard a good portion of this stuff.
And yes, "Real Love" is absoultely something to cherish.
That is so pure and straightforward. A real joy.
Trey
Mister Muleboy:
I'm using DivShare, as always. It doesn't show up on iPads or other portable Apple devices because Steve Jobs has issues with Flash.
If you're on your home computer, you shouldn't be having a problem. If you are, e-mail me.
I never knew Thurber did any drawings of Lennon...
steve -- that entire CD is a wonder and a revelation. I consider it the "lost" John Lennon album.
The original silver CD came with an excellent booklet with notes on each track as well as more photos and John's drawings.
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