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John Lennon's Last Recording Session

marcush

Gone But Not Forgotten
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I read somewhere on the night of lennon's last recording session at the record plant, he said some prophetic things, which freaked out the producer at the time. After he was murdered the tapes were erased.

Is this a myth?
 
I know his last interview conducted with Andy Peebles hours before he died has some rather final pronouncements, are you getting mixed up with that? That interview wasn't erased, though.
 
Alan Douglas was the producer of the session (Yoko's Walking On Thin Ice, I seem to recall) and he did indeed later reveal in an interview that he'd subsequently wiped the tapes because of some things Lennon said which were unsettling in the light of his murder - I don't think he went into any further detail, though.
 
douglas

Cheers Whistling Jack. Close it was Jack Douglas.I have been always fascinated about what was spoken by lennon that night. Douglas has never spoken about it.

Even at the dying embers of the beatles Lennon was asked how he might die. Lennon said, I'll probably be popped off by some loony.
 
Jack Douglas? Alf Ippititimus himself?? :shock:

Over on the 'Paul Is Dead' thread, I suggested that there's a strong case to be made for Lennon having foretold his own demise in some Beatles lyrics, e.g. Happiness Is a Warm Gun and Come Together.
 
I remember seeing Arthur Lee of Love, before he died. Forever Changes is a bit of an apocalyptic, end-of-an-era kind of an album, and I remember reading him talking about how he was convinced he was about to die (he was in his early twenties at the time, IIRC). Of course, he didn't, until much later. But his subsequent incarceration for firearms offences made all of the repeated lyrics about imprisonment (spiritual, mainly) and guns seem a little eerie when he sang them...

As for a genuinely spooky case of someone predicting their own death, how about Mark Twain? He was born when Halley's comet was in the sky, and predicted he'd die the next time it was. He did.
 
I remember seeing Arthur Lee of Love, before he died. Forever Changes is a bit of an apocalyptic, end-of-an-era kind of an album, and I remember reading him talking about how he was convinced he was about to die (he was in his early twenties at the time, IIRC). Of course, he didn't, until much later. But his subsequent incarceration for firearms offences made all of the repeated lyrics about imprisonment (spiritual, mainly) and guns seem a little eerie when he sang them...

As for a genuinely spooky case of someone predicting their own death, how about Mark Twain? He was born when Halley's comet was in the sky, and predicted he'd die the next time it was. He did.

I also saw him perform soon after he release and he was really good. The only thing I have ever listened to by Love is Forever Changes and it's a haunting album in places.

I suppose that almost lifelong imprisonment is a 'death' of sorts.
 
Another strange thing is that one of the tapes Yoko gave to McCartney to Beatle-ise in 1994 was actually dedicated to Paul by John.

From Wiki: "In January 1994, Paul McCartney was given two tape cassettes by Lennon's widow Yoko Ono that included home recordings of songs Lennon never completed or released commercially. The songs on the tape included the eventually completed and released "Free as a Bird" and "Real Love", in addition to two other songs was a tape with the words "for Paul" scrawled hastily in John's handwriting, which included "Grow Old With Me" and "Now and Then"."

I have never quite understood why this was the case.
 
Jack Douglas? Alf Ippititimus himself?? :shock:

Over on the 'Paul Is Dead' thread, I suggested that there's a strong case to be made for Lennon having foretold his own demise in some Beatles lyrics, e.g. Happiness Is a Warm Gun and Come Together.

He also wrote (Living On) Borrowed Time and the unreleased Life Begins At 40.

And there is the 68 White Album photoshoot where he feigns being dead with all the other Beatles around him.
 
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Even at the dying embers of the beatles Lennon was asked how he might die. Lennon said, I'll probably be popped off by some loony.

Considering that they spent some years expecting to be ripped apart by a brigade of teenage bachantes, it seems to me like a routine thought...

There is another story, that I read directly from the magazine where it was published, about a reporter of the "Musician" magazine, interviewing Captain Beefheart. The interview was going smoothly until a moment when Mr. Van Vliet freaked and said "Something horrible is happening, Right now!". Later, both found out that it was exactly the time when Lennon was being shot in NY.

Doing some googling, I found this :

https://dangerousminds.net/comments/captain_beefhearts_eerie_premonition_of_john_Lennon

"In the middle of an interview, at eight or nine o’clock as I remember, Don said, “Wait a minute, man, did you hear that?’ He put his hand over his ear, but we didn’t hear anything. He said, “Something really heavy just went down. I can’t tell you what it is exactly, but you will read about it on the front page of the newspapers tomorrow.” We said, “Well, what?” and he said, “I dunno.” Then the guy left and another journalist came. We were in the middle of another interview and about eleven, the first guy called me and said, “Did you hear the news? Something just happened, John Lennon was shot.” And I couldn’t believe it. It really seemed like Don predicted this. So I told him and he just looked at me and went, “See? Didn’t I tell you?” That was really eerie."
 
I vaguely recall some years ago an interview with the chap who lived in Lennons old house in Surrey at the time of his murder. Apparently on the day that it occurred there were a number of ‘strange goings on’ happening in the house, but infuriatingly I can’t remember what they were!
 
Ringo Starr bought that house (Tittenhurst Park) from John Lennon. His son, Zak Starkey, has been living there for years (I think Ringo now lives somewhere else). One of my old school mates knew Zak pretty well.
 
My mistake, I should have pointed out that it was the house he lived in with his first wife and not Tittenhurst Park. Kenwood I think it was called?


Ringo Starr bought that house (Tittenhurst Park) from John Lennon. His son, Zak Starkey, has been living there for years (I think Ringo now lives somewhere else). One of my old school mates knew Zak pretty well.
 
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