John Lennon: John
Lennon/Plastic Ono Band
Mobile Fidelity UDCD 760
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| Recording Quality |
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Mobile Fidelity UDCD 759
| Musical Performance |
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| Recording Quality |
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| Overall Enjoyment |
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 I would have thought that 30 years after its release,
John Lennon's first true solo outing, John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band, would have lost
its ability to surprise me. Boy, was I wrong!
Released a scant year after the heavily arranged, complexly
interwoven Abbey Road, Plastic Ono Band was raw and naked. The Beatles, at
least as displayed on Abbey Road, seemed to be masters of the universe; the John
Lennon revealed on Plastic Ono Band was struggling with the most basic issues that
could possibly confront any man -- love, loss, religion, and his own place in the cosmos
and society.
Lennon admitted that the album's confrontational
disassembly of his star persona was the direct result of his involvement in Walter Janov's
primal-scream therapy. Actually, Lennon wasn't revealing any secrets there, since the
first song on the album, "Mother," culminates with the singer's anguished
screams of "Mama don't go/Daddy come back." (The original LP ended with Lennon
singing "My mummy's dead" to the tune of "Three Blind Mice" -- the
Mo-Fi reissue adds two bonus tracks, disrupting the emotional symmetry of the original.)
"Working Class Hero" is a stark jab at the way
society marginalizes the "common man." Lennon, typically, didn't offer a pat
answer; he just urged his listeners, "If you want to be a hero, well just follow
me."
"God" is possibly Lennon's greatest triumph. He
starts with the simple declaration that "God is a concept/By which we measure/Our
pain" and concludes with "The dream is over." Between those manifestos,
however, he creates a list of things he no longer believes in (including magic, Jesus,
Elvis, and The Beatles) and the assertion that, "I just believe in me/Yoko and me/And
that's reality." I find it fascinating that people got more upset over Lennon's
assertion that he no longer believed in The Beatles than his loss of faith in Jesus.
Mobile Fidelity has utilized Yoko Ono's "personally
supervised" 2000 remix of the original, which will undoubtedly outrage some Beatles
purists, but the sound is honest and direct, so I have no complaints. In fact, the sound
is a breath of fresh air -- Lennon's guitar is rough-edged and full-bodied. It doesn't
have that signature George Martin airiness of The Beatles' Abbey Road recordings, but that
sound wouldn't have suited the material. Phil Spector's restrained, honest sound is
completely at odds with the fussiness of his Let It Be sessions -- thank goodness.
Imagine sounds smoother and more polished,
production that again suits the material.
The title track, Lennon's most famous solo recording, has
become so commonplace that it's hard to, ummm, imagine how revolutionary its
instructions really are. To clear one's mind of all received ideas in order to imagine a
new reality -- now, that's revolutionary, not just warm'n'fuzzy.
"Crippled Inside" and "Jealous Guy" are
confessions of Lennon's shortcomings that highlight his struggle to be a better man.
But it's the rockers on Imagine that sound brand new
on Mo-Fi's new version -- "I Don't Want to be a Soldier, Mama" jumps out of the
speakers like a locomotive, while "It's So Hard" features a King Curtis sax solo
that rocks so hard it could even blow out my birthday candles.
These two Lennon albums sound reborn, and they represent
the very best of The Beatles' solo recordings. Buy 'em with confidence.
Now, if only Mo-Fi could perform the same sonic magic on
Lennon's wretched-sounding (but wonderful) Rock'n'Roll.
...Wes Phillips
wes@onhifi.com
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