John Lennon Solo Albums Poll

Lennon was a fan of "Coming Up."

Can't remember where I read this but apparently "Coming Up" and the music video are what inspired Lennon to start writing songs again

He was writing songs throughout his "house husband" period, though!

was he? i thought he was pretty dormant creatively, busy "baking bread"... wasn't all of Double Fantasy/Milk & Honey written in 1980?

'Free as a Bird' was written in 1977, for one.

I mean, if anyone thinks a songwriter with instruments lying around the house can just switch off their creative impulses for five years, then y'know, that's just naive.

you're just talking metaphysical nonsense

https://i.imgur.com/y4YErKh.jpg

I understand what you mean and agree in a way but it is totally possible for a songwriter to go through a long period in which, for whatever reason, nothing gets done.
I mean, not comparing, but I have always made songs but at some times (personal issues, work, family, whatever), you can really spend years without making songs although there are instruments and all available.

Free as a Bird is not on Double Fantasy or Milk & Honey.

yeah obviously he probably noodled around but he was busy "breaking bread." i'm pretty sure he wrote most of if not all of DF & MH in 1980

No, but 'Free as a Bird' was still written in 1977, as was 'Now and Then', not to mention numerous other demos from 1975-1979 that have been heavily bootlegged and are out there if you can be arsed to seek them out.

But even though proof of Lennon writing songs during his "house husband" days exists, you're quite welcome to believe the mythology of him baking bread for five fucking years.

lol you realize that's a euphemism right? he was blasted on smack for many of those years. besides, the question was when he was inspired to make a new record, and it was the "Coming Up" video, and none of those bootlegged songs (to my knowledge) made it onto Double Fantasy or Milk & Honey.

idgi what's the basis for assuming he was "blasted on smack" while raising Sean

There was no "question", you out-and-out stated "apparently "Coming Up" and the music video are what inspired Lennon to start writing songs again", and I pointed out, correctly, that he'd never stopped writing songs. You're now changing this (because you're wrong) to "making a new record" which is something completely different.

(x-post, obviously)

The fact that the likes of 'Free as a Bird', 'Now and Then' and 'Real Life' didn't make it onto Double Fantasy or Milk and Honey is neither here nor there. They still got written.

it's fairly well documented, Jann Wenner says as much in his new bio, there's Robert Rosen's Nowhere Man (sourced from Lennon's diaries). even the Philip Norman bio has allusions to it. obviously the truth lies somewhere between the baking bread myth and the nightmare that Albert Goldman concocted. anyway the question is when did he write the songs on DF & MH - I don't know of any songs on those records written before 1980.

& should've been clear initially: it inspired him to start writing songs for a new record, with the intention of releasing it, not puttering about writing a song every six months or something

I can't imagine raising a baby while smacked out but I guess ppl do

Kurt & Courtney

also they obv had help, nannies, etc.

and what a bang-up job they did

How can you be sure that he wasn't intending on doing something with those songs when he wrote them? How can you be sure they weren't in contention? How do you even know how frequently Lennon was writing songs between 1975-1979? The answer to questions of course are: you can't be sure and you don't know.

We can only go off the evidence that exists, which is that he was still writing songs during his "house husband" days.

Now, Lennon might very well have heard 'Coming Up' and thought "hmm, I'd better get back in there and make a record", but that's something different. We know he hadn't made a record for years.

He'd let his record contract lapse- and signed a new one with Geffen for Double Fantasy, which was seen very much as comeback record:

PLAYBOY: "The word is out: John Lennon and Yoko Ono are back in the studio, recording again for the first time since 1975, when they vanished from public view. Let's start with you, John. What have you been doing?"
LENNON: "I've been baking bread and looking after the baby."

"baking bread" "looking after the baby"

https://i.imgur.com/TMLjbG8.gif

Yes, he'd let his record contract lapse and so what? He was John Lennon! I don't think he would have had a problem getting another record deal when he felt the need to look for one, and I'm pretty sure he knew it.

Even Stiff Records tried to sign Lennon.

Ha, right, they sent him a message saying, "$1000! And that's our final offer!" Lennon briefly (thought probably jokingly) entertained taking them up on it.

The timeframe probably doesn't line up, but imagine Lennon making the deal and then recording w/Rockpile* and/or The Attractions!

*Which reminds me of an anecdote from a recent Nick Lowe interview I read wherein he describes a scene from when Brinsley Schwarz opened for Wings. The Brinsleys were having an aftershow party and where singing Beatles songs when Paul shows. They were reluctant to continue because they were under the impression he was really trying to shake off "the Beatles thing", but he joined in, and Lowe noted that afterwards more and more Beatles songs started popping up in Wings sets.

Hard to reconcile his casual appreciation of “coming up” with “How do you sleep nightssssssss?”

Only a person who loved Paul could have written "How Do You Sleep?"

'How Do You Sleep?' and 'Coming Up' were released 9 years apart. That's more time than The Beatles' recording career from 'Love Me Do' to Abbey Road.

For what it's worth, here's the Fred Seaman account of John's reaction to hearing 'Coming Up':

We were driving past a vast shopping mall, near Walt Whitman's birthplace, when a familiar voice boomed over the four speakers.

"Fuck a pig!" John shouted. "It's Paul!".

Indeed it was Paul McCartney's new hit single, "Coming Up', a catchy tune built around a repetitive staccato riff. John frowned, turned up the volume, and began to nod to the beat.

"Not bad," he said at the end of the song, sounded surprised and even somewhat disappointed. When the announcer mentioned that Paul played all the instruments himself, John mumbled something to the effect that it made perfect sense as Paul had always wanted to be a one-man band. John turned down the volume and fell silent for a while. Then he asked me to get him a copy of Paul's new album and set up a stereo system in his bedroom.....

The next day at breakfast, John hummed the melody of Paul's new single, which he said he could not get out of his head." It's driving me crackers!" he exclaimed cheerfully. He said the album was uneven, but he acknowledged that it was an unusually adventurous effort by Paul, and far superior to his previous release 'Back to the Egg' which John had dismissed as "garbage'. He gave Paul credit for trying his hand at something new.

I mean, if anyone thinks a songwriter with instruments lying around the house can just switch off their creative impulses for five years, then y'know, that's just naive.

nah, not really. there is certainly a thing called "writers block". there is certainly a thing called "creative burnout". as a musician there is nothing more that helps the quality of my work than taking a break. it's not like being a creative person is this all consuming thing going at 100% your entire life. like anything, especially to do with creativity/emotional/imaginative intelligence there are rhythms, there are ups and downs, fluxuations. but you tend to have unrealistic demands from your artists.

There's no evidence to suggest that Lennon had writers block, though.

a five year gap between albums might be one piece of evidence, js

are we like required now to have an extremely stupid argument about the beatles on this board once a month

The timeframe probably doesn't line up, but imagine Lennon making the deal and then recording w/Rockpile* and/or The Attractions!

*Which reminds me of an anecdote from a recent Nick Lowe interview I read wherein he describes a scene from when Brinsley Schwarz opened for Wings. The Brinsleys were having an aftershow party and where singing Beatles songs when Paul shows. They were reluctant to continue because they were under the impression he was really trying to shake off "the Beatles thing", but he joined in, and Lowe noted that afterwards more and more Beatles songs started popping up in Wings sets.

I mean, I’ve heard the one about when The Basher was electrocuted more than once, so...

a five year gap between albums might be one piece of evidence, js

― FREEZE! FYI! (dog latin), Thursday, November 23, 2017 4:47 PM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This proves nothing other than he didn't release an album for five years, which of course everybody knows. Everything else is just pure speculation, but we do know he was writing songs during that period because evidence of that actually exists.

So, what, 20, 30 songs?

More?

Maybe he wrote 500 songs.

20, 30, 500 songs, still lazy. only if he had come up with an album concept singles release schedule and branding schema now we would be talking real creativity

Everything else is just pure speculation, but we do know he was writing songs during that period because evidence of that actually exists.

― Gholdfish Killah (Turrican), Thursday, November 23, 2017 6:39 PM (two days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

You never answered my question.

I did, it's above.

How many songs did he write in that period, is the question.

I genuinely don't know and you seem to.