Posted on 10/17/2008 6:34:24 PM PDT by ETL
"Power to the People"
The Lost John Lennon Interview
By TARIQ ALI and ROBIN BLACKBURN
Editors Note: It was twenty-five years ago today that John Lennon was murdered outside the Dakota building on Central Park West in New York City. We doubt many CounterPunchers have read the following 1971 interview with Lennon done by CounterPunchers Tariq Ali and Robin Blackburn. Its a lot more interesting that the interminable Q and A with Lennon done by Rolling Stones Jann Wenner. Tariq and Robin allowed Lennon to talk and spurred him on when he showed signs of flagging. Lennon recounts about how he and George Harrison bucked their handlers and went on record against the Vietnam War, discusses class politics in an engaging manner, defends country and western music and the blues, suggests Dylans best songs stem from revolutionary Irish and Scottish ballads and dissects his three versions of Revolution.
The interview, which inspired Lennon to write Power to the People, ran in The Red Mole, a Trotskyist broadsheet put out by the Internation Marxist Group, a British appendage of the Fourth International. The Mole had popped up after its predecessor, The Black Dwarf, went to ground. As youll see, those were different days. The interview is included in Tariq Alis Streetfighting Years, recently published by Verso. AC / JSC
Thursday 21st January 1971
John Lennon and Yoko Ono talk to Robin Blackburn and Tariq Ali for the left-wing newspaper Red Mole
Two excerpts:
TA: When did you start breaking out of the role imposed on you as a Beatle?
JL: Even during the Beatle heyday I tried to go against it, so did George. We went to America a few times and Epstein always tried to waffle on at us about saying nothing about Vietnam. So there came a time when George and I said 'Listen, when they ask next time, were going to say we dont like that war and we think they should get right out.' Thats what we did. At that time this was a pretty radical thing to do, especially for the Fab Four. It was the first opportunity I personally took to wave the flag a bit.
But youve got to remember that Id always felt repressed. We were all so pressurised that there was hardly any chance of expressing ourselves, especially working at that rate, touring continually and always kept in a cocoon of myths and dreams. Its pretty hard when you are Caesar and everyone is saying how wonderful you are and they are giving you all the goodies and the girls, its pretty hard to break out of that, to say 'Well, I dont want to be king, I want to be real.' So in its way the second political thing I did was to say 'The Beatles are bigger than Jesus.'
(snip)
TA: In a way you were even thinking about politics when you seemed to be knocking revolution?
JL: Ah, sure, 'Revolution'. There were two versions of that song but the underground left only picked up on the one that said 'count me out'. The original version which ends up on the LP said 'count me in' too; I put in both because I wasn't sure. There was a third version that was just abstract, musique concrete, kind of loops and that, people screaming. I thought I was painting in sound a picture of revolution--but I made a mistake, you know. The mistake was that it was anti-revolution.
On the version released as a single I said 'when you talk about destruction you can count me out'. I didn't want to get killed. I didn't really know that much about the Maoists, but I just knew that they seemed to be so few and yet they painted themselves green and stood in front of the police waiting to get picked off. I just thought it was unsubtle, you know. I thought the original Communist revolutionaries coordinated themselves a bit better and didn't go around shouting about it. That was how I felt--I was really asking a question. As someone from the working class I was always interested in Russia and China and everything that related to the working class, even though I was playing the capitalist game. ..."
Lots more:
Power to the People
The Lost John Lennon Interview (1971)
http://www.newsocialist.org/index.php?id=614
“Why post a song by a far left wing group?”
Because many consider the Bealtes’ music to be quite good if not excellent and, love him or hate him, John Lennon was a fascinating character and talent.
Of course, I could just respond to your question with a question: Why not?
"Poor pathetic people like Lennon" influence millions of people worldwide and help promote the bogus "peace" movement, which, to this day, is led by communist organizations which seek to undermine the US. In fact, ALL of the major "anti-war" coalitions around today (United for Peace and Justice, A.N.S.W.E.R. and World Can't Wait--Drive Out the Bush Regime) were founded by communist orgs and/or individuals.
UFPJ: Communist Party USA
ANSWER: Workers World Party
WCW: Revolutionary Communist Party
ANSWER=
Anarchists
Nazis
Sociaists
Weirdos
Extremists and
Racists
...except in his dealings with Paul...
I like the Beatles music a lot too, but mostly their earlier stuff. '8 Days a Week' was one of my favorites. Hey Jude was one of the few later ones I liked.
You say you got a real solution
Well, you know
We’d all love to see the plan.
You ask me for a contribution....
Calling Obama...Calling Obama
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.