The following is a fictional story about an interview between myself and the late John Lennon. The purpose of this work is not intended to misrepresent Lennon or speak on his behalf; rather, it is intended to celebrate the life of John Lennon on the 30th anniversary of his passing.

 

The interview began after midnight in New York City on December 14th, 2010, in Central Park near the Museum of Natural History. In the distance, I see a long, lanky figure in a long black overcoat coming out of the fog.

"Hello, Carlos," he greeted me in his Liverpool accent. "Como esta?"

"Bien, Senor Lennon," I said to him, smiling as I usually do when I hear a native speaker of English speak Spanish to me. "Y usted?"

I then shook his hand. He had quite a handshake. He had a most firm grip, and I could feel the guitar calluses on his fingers and the roughness of his inner palm. You would think he would have smooth hands, given his status. Again, he seemed so long and lanky in person. He looked almost a bit too skinny and scruffy-looking for someone such as he, and he had a slightly awkward stance. Then there was that stare, that stoic expression I had seen for so many years, as if he had the whole world on his mind. Perhaps English reserve created that stare. In his voice you heard that stern patrician tone, yet at the same time it had this easy-going cavalier lilt, like it was all a game. This was trademark of Beatle charm that answered every question intelligently, but never took any question too seriously.

We exchanged pleasantries and agreed that this would be a walking interview. We would talk as we walked through the cold and vacant park. After he agreed, I began to study him. Here he was, a forty year old English Caucasian male and rock 'n roll legend. Here was I, younger and from a different generation, a failed musician, a freelance writer, and an aging grad student. The formal interview commenced:

Me: It is quite an honor to meet you at last, Mr. Lennon.

Lennon: (A roll of his eyes) Please call me John--and I hope this will not be some kind of benefit for me. I feel as if I have been benefited to death. (Long pause) So to speak.

Me: You will understand you were an idol of mine. Tray gosh to fawn, but I am a great admirer of your work.

Lennon: Thanks.

Me: And please call me Carlos.

Given this unprecedented opportunity, I had so many questions to ask Mr. Lennon. What was I to ask him first? How has he been? That would be a most inappropriate question to ask, given the circumstances. I decided to start the interview by asking about music.

Me: There is really no way to start this interview, Mr. Lennon, without asking about music. What do you think of the music scene today? How much has it changed?

Lennon: Music changes, but the scene always stays the same. There is a dominant style of music recognized by mainstream society as 'the music,' and then some other music usually by the poorest and the most disenfranchised class comes out of nowhere and makes its way in. Then it has some hero of that sound come out and sets precedent and all kinds of bands and performers follow suit. After it goes mainstream and the suits make money off it, it all peaks and goes downhill till another music comes along that the kids love and the parents hate. The cycle repeats itself. We knew this in The Beatles, so we were always watching for what was coming next.

Me: Okay, so what is your opinion of rap?

Lennon: It's got its place. Like I said, it is the dominant form. It's nothing like we did, but if you consider that gangster rap stuff, I was just as pissed off if not more than they were at that age. I grew up without a dad or a mom. I was raised by an auntie. I knew about how shitty things could be early on. We were the ones who got shitted on Liverpool. Nobody wanted to book us at first. We were a 'bum' group. That's what we got called. When we were trying to get signed, the moguls in London didn't want to know anybody from the provinces.

Me: Decca didn't want to sign you, I read.

Lennon: Decca was shit. What did they know? When they passed on us and we hit, we pointed the Stones in their direction, and they still didn't want to sign the Stones at first.

Me: You spoke before about what was coming on the horizon, what about that story about you hearing the B-52s "Rock Lobster" and telling Yoko that you were doing New Wave years before?

Lennon: A lot has been made about that. I'm not saying me and Yoko invented New Wave, I was saying we were watching music trends and we experimented more than most. If you look at that woman who was doing Yoko's chants, what was her name?

Me: Kate Pierson.

Lennon: Yeah, her, she was influenced by Yoko. She said it in interviews, and they said they were influenced by 60's beach music, and we knew that stuff. Nobody really invents a type of music. It is just waiting to happen.

Me: What about the theory that the song "Fame" was your attempt at disco?

Lennon: Like I said about music. Disco was always there really in some way, but we never did it or even would attempt it. Just like blues. When we did it, it sounded wrong. "Yer Blues" on what everybody called The White Album was as close to blues as we got. I would have not tried disco, but "Fame" was definitely an attempt at pop funk. Keep in mind the music business was getting more rhythmic and more producer-driven at that time with the technology and the money. "Fame" was not an attempt at disco. We had that guitar player also named Carlos, [Finger point]. I had a title and some lyrics, and David had the rest. We just went with it.

Me: Journalists have come to Paul and George decades later in interviews and have asked them, "Do you still believe that 'All you need is love'?" I am not sure if you have heard their answers. What is your take on that question?

Lennon: It's fucked up that all these pundits in suits are trying to take what we wrote years ago and hit us with it acting like we have to apologize for what we put out. We wrote what we wrote. It was what we felt when we wrote it. Who knows, it might true.

I then smiled and Mr. Lennon drew me out.

Lennon: You probably got another question about some lyric I wrote, yeah?

Me: Yes, I do.

Lennon: Go ahead.

Me: What about the line in "Across the Universe"? Do you believe that there is such as thing as "limitless, undying love"?

Then Mr. Lennon stopped to face me.

Lennon: I'll say this about that line. I was really proud of what I wrote with that one. That was one of most creative things I ever put together. Like I said before, I wrote it because it felt right. Works you create can become bigger than you are sometimes.

Me: So what about your more controversial song off your solo album Shaved Fish? Do you still believe that "Woman Is the Nigger of the World"?

Mr. Lennon smiled, and with a slight grimace he then turned to walk on as he responded:

Lennon: Next question!

Me: When MTV first came on the scene in 1981, many argued that the early film clips you did for "Strawberry Fields" and "Penny Lane" made The Beatles the forerunners of music video. Would you agree?

Lennon: If you believe all those people who write great things about us, then, yeah, we were the forerunners of everything. We did some great work and we experimented. [Then he looked at me with a nod and wink. Ha ha ha.] Truth is we experimented with film like a lot of other big acts did. We had means and we had the pressure from the label to put out as much material as we could. If you're from my generation you saw those machines that showed movies in a screen above a juke box, what were they called?

Me: Scopitones.

Lennon: Yeah. I seen a few of them. They promoted the artist or they have beach scenes. Lots of cleavage. Stuff young guys would put change in to see. Then there were the Elvis movies that were mostly one musical number after another with a loose plot. That "Jailhouse Rock" number he did sliding on a pole was basically a video. I think that's the best thing on film he ever did. There is too much out there 'visual wise' to give us that much credit.

Me: What about Magical Mystery Tour? Some have called those short films of "Fool on the Hill" and "I Am the Walrus" modern music videos.

Lennon: Well, with "I Am the Walrus," that was just us playing in costume, but "Fool on the Hill" as I remember was more artsy with close-ups and more of that montage editing stuff, so I guess you could say that. That was Paul's baby, though. I give him the credit for that. The whole thing was meant to be a movie directed by The Beatles (He then looked at me with a big eye wink.) But that one was all Paul.

Me: What are your feelings about the theory that Magical Mystery Tour was one of the first Reality television programs?

Lennon: Someone out there has a theory like that?

Me: Well, you did put yourselves on a bus with a bunch of friends, relatives, and carnival performers and filmed whatever happened as you toured the English countryside. And it aired on Boxing Day on television in England in 1967.

Lennon: So much of that was an accident. It was intended to be a film for television shot in colour and they aired it in black and white. When it aired, it looked like crap. There were problems from the beginning without a real script. People bitched about it. There was some kind of script, but it was mostly adlibbed. When it came out, the critics hated it. It all looked like me, George, and Ringo disowned it and blamed Paul, but Paul was making a lot of home movies before we did that thing. He was on the set more. It was an example of an experiment we all went into together, and it came out bad. There was no plan to invent anything. We went with a concept and it came out as a failed project of Paul's.

I wondered at this point in the interview if I had gained some of his confidence and whether I could ask a question about his famous collaborator.

Me: May I ask a specific question about Paul?

Lennon: [A deep breath I could see as he exhaled and the street light caught the steam. He then sighed as we walked on.] Yes, you can.

Me: By now you have to have heard about Paul's reaction when he heard the 'news.' He was criticized for being cold and distant.

Lennon: Yeah, well, you have to understand that was a lot to drop on a person and plus some people express emotion different ways. Remember, we both lost our moms at an early age so we got conditioned to go numb when we got bad news. Plus, since our early twenties we have had microphones and cameras stuck in our faces and press asking us everything about everything. Sometimes you just want to be left alone, and you types don't get it. Look at me. I gotta lot of people wanting to talk to me. Even now I can't really be left alone."
Sensing the conversation was taking a more emotional turn, I then decided to ask a bold question.

Me: So what do think of all the people through the years who try to claim you, Mr. Lennon?

Lennon: Like what people? [Brief smile]

Me: The odd filmmaker, musician, social scientist, pundit, performer?

Lennon: [Long pause] What you mean, people like you? Why do think you are writing this story, Carlos? To see what I will say if you pose these questions to me. How they relate to you. If I tell what you want to hear, will it make you feel a certain way, like you knew me all along? A lot of people try to claim me and nobody can. If I belong to anybody, I belong to me, me wife, my family, and the people I care about. You try having a bunch of strangers think they claim you all the time and see how you feel!

Me: I, like so many people, Mr. Lennon, wanted to be like you. To be you.

And then he stopped and faced me.

Lennon: Well, we've met now, Carlos. Do you still feel the same way? You have waited what 30 years? You must be pretty let down by now. That's what usually happens when you meet your idol. Let me ask you a question: who do you wanna be now? If you can't answer that for yourself and fast, you're going to be pretty depressed from here on in.

And then we came within a short distance from the Strawberry Fields Memorial.

Lennon: If you don't mind, Mr. Mendez, I would like to walk this last part myself.

Me: The Strawberry Fields memorial is very close by. I wanted to end the interview right there.

Lennon: I bet you did to make it seem so dramatic. Me standing over me own memorial or something, but I think I'll just snatch that bit of drama from you. I did enjoy chatting with you, though, Mr. Mendez.

Me: I enjoyed the chat as well. Any last words for your fans or for anybody?

Lennon: "Live life! Live life to its fullest. [And then he paused.] I went from being a 16 year old trouble maker in a rough seaport town to getting a job playing rock 'n roll. Somewhere in the middle of that we were some kind of phenomenon. When it was over, I married the woman I loved and raised a family. Even with all that … it all went too fast. Love the people you care about. Watch the idol worship (and he gestured to me). And laugh a lot … laugh a lot."

We shook hands and he bid me a Buenos Noches. I decided I would not watch Mr. Lennon walk away. A man's death is a private thing.