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Post by acebackwords on Jul 7, 2012 16:08:04 GMT -5
I'm probably in the minority position here but I found the Goldman book an interesting read. Though he certainly threw in some unneccessary cheap shots and groin kicks.
I think one reason the book caused such an uproar was because it was published at the peak of the period when Lennon was being deified as the great peace and love guru who was martyred in the name of truth and beauty. "Saint Martin Luthor Lennon" as McCartney wryly put it (a put down that never bothered me -- considering all the crappy things Lennon said about McCartney over the years you gotta' give him this one bon mot).
The thing I disliked about the book was that Goldman seemed to go out of his way to list everything he disliked about Lennon, but he rarely touched on the one thing that made Lennon great. The music. He even mocked Lennon's musicianship, pointing out that Lennon's rhythm guitar was often "buried in the mix" -- implying that his guitar playing was so mediocre it was unfit for human ears. When in fact Lennon's rhythm guitar was the very foundation of a lot of the greatest Beatles music.
The only Lennon music that Goldman seemed to like was 1.) "Tomorrow Never Knows" and 2.) the "Primal album." Which he rightly praised as brilliant art and powerful cultural statements. In fact, those two things might well be Lennon's most powerful music, so at least Goldman got that right.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 7, 2012 23:35:30 GMT -5
I really need to re read that book, i read it when it first came and it has sat on the same shelf of the bookcase ever since.
He certainly gave Lennon a whack in some areas, it was a real eye opener whether it was all true or not...
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Post by John S. Damm on Jul 8, 2012 10:37:30 GMT -5
The only Lennon music that Goldman seemed to like was 1.) "Tomorrow Never Knows" and 2.) the "Primal album." Which he rightly praised as brilliant art and powerful cultural statements. In fact, those two things might well be Lennon's most powerful music, so at least Goldman got that right. He loved "Come Together." I remember being surprised at the praise he heaped on it. It is a great song but Goldman said it was a song that helped salvage the end of The Beatles career from all the ballads they were otherwise doing. There is a lot of wild speculation and conjecture in that book that ultimately deprives Goldman of credibility. It is still the far extreme on one end in the writings on John Lennon. There are far extremes on the other side too that John was virtually a saint: the prototype modern father, husband, peace advocate and brains behind the Beatles. By reading all of these books, from both extremes and some in the middle, I try to forge a more balanced portrait of John in my mind. That's all I care about. I am just worried though that John has been gone so long and was taken away before he could create an archive similar to Paul's that his legacy is vulnerable to either extreme position: that he was Saint Lennon or just Paul's sideman who did all of those extreme things Goldman and others allege. John was murdered right on the brink of the data storage and transmission revolution. When John was murdered, very few homes even had VCR's yet. Film footage of John in 1980(or even in the years back to 1975) is "precious and rare" and not of good quality. In fact, from 1970 through 1975 we must rely on mostly grainy film and video of limited, often nonmusical, events in John's life(although there is a lot of high quality film on the making of "Imagine" but that is it) whereas Paul has been blessed to leave an amazing archive whereas we will always get to see him in musical action, concert halls or the studio, decades after he is gone, all in high definition like he is right in our room! Think of all the concert films, studio album documentary films and all the media interviews we have for Paul in HD! John's legacy is more vulnerable to revisionists on both ends of the spectrum I am afraid because we must rely on the retelling of John's history based on things that happened off the camera. It was said that John and Yoko filmed every aspect of their life but other than the Imagine sessions, where is proof of that? Where is the film of John recording POB, STINYC, MG, WAB, RnR, or DF?
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Post by OldFred on Jul 8, 2012 13:01:34 GMT -5
From Wikipedia page on Goldman's book:
"Despite Goldman's praise of him in the book, Paul McCartney did not return the favor, and condemned Goldman's account of his old bandmate, telling fans and the press "Look, don't buy it." He also called it "a piece of trash" and claimed Goldman made up "any old bunch of lies he sees fit"[20] Singer-songwriter Harry Nilsson, whose friendship with Lennon peaked during his 1974 separation from Ono, told Rolling Stone that Goldman "got me drunk" while interviewing him, probing Nilsson for "dirt" about Lennon, and Nilsson would not cooperate. (Nilsson gets a chapter in the book, "Harry the Hustler", which credits him with having better confidence-man skills than singing talent.)
In Ray Coleman's Lennon: The Definitive Biography, there appears the following quote from The Beatles' record producer George Martin: "I think it is iniquitous that people can libel the dead. If John was alive, that book would not have come out. It is largely untrue, but, sadly, if mud is thrown it tends to stick." Martin also labeled the book as "codswallop"."
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Post by acebackwords on Jul 9, 2012 11:52:34 GMT -5
John's legacy is more vulnerable to revisionists on both ends of the spectrum I am afraid because we must rely on the retelling of John's history based on things that happened off the camera. who knows how future revisionists will remember the beatles . . . my hunch is that paul will be remembered as the greater commercial talent, and absolutely brilliant in virtually every facet of art, music and performing . . . whereas john will be remembered as a genius, the leader and the driving force behind the beatles. paul summed it up nicely in the anthology book . . . 'we were all in love with john. . . it was like having our own elvis in the group.' . . . thats probably how john will be remembered. . . as the elvis of the beatles.
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Post by acebackwords on Jul 9, 2012 12:46:57 GMT -5
Singer-songwriter Harry Nilsson, whose friendship with Lennon peaked during his 1974 separation from Ono, told Rolling Stone that Goldman "got me drunk" . . . ha ha . . . something tells me that wasn't too hard to do.
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Post by Panther on Jul 10, 2012 6:03:31 GMT -5
Goldman was low and evil, but very smart. He knew that if was going to write and publish large tomes about Elvis and Lennon and throw mud at them, he would have to do a great deal of original research in order to justify (in some people's minds) his books. So, he did. There was a dearth of research on John's house-husband years by the mid-80s, and so Goldman capably did a great deal. He managed to turn up details and events that no one else had, which then gave him the image of being a "real writer" of merit. Nonetheless, his ultimate purpose, of course, was to tell lies in order to shock and get attention, and then money.
Unfortunately, the media gave him exactly what he wanted.
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