YMMV / John Lennon

• Awesome Music: Choose any album and you'll find plenty, except perhaps on his first three experimental albums.
• Black Sheep Hit: If you didn't already know "Whatever Gets You Thru the Night" was a Lennon song, you wouldn't guess it on first hearing. It's more R&B sounding than his usual work, and you can't pick out his voice because the song is for all intents and purposes a full duet with Elton John. And it was his only US #1 solo hit during his lifetime.
• Broken Base:
  • You'll be hardpressed to find a lot of people who like any of Lennon's first three albums, especially Unfinished Music No. 1: Two Virgins, which is basically Noise Rock (with more emphasis on noise) and a Leave the Camera Running recording. Those who do appreciate these recordings point to their belonging to Sound Collage and avant-garde experimental music traditions, and that John was doing this stuff as far back as Revolver, besides containing some of his best guitar work.
  • "Imagine". Anthem to a brighter future or Glurgey ode to a meaningless and empty life?
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • He mentioned guns a lot. He got shot. Notable examples include "Happiness Is a Warm Gun", the lyrics "First you must learn to smile as you kill" in "Working Class Hero" from Imagine and the "shoot me" in "Come Together." He also spoke in interviews about one of his fears while playing onstage was that someone might shoot him.
  • His observation regarding the Dead Artists Are Better phenomenon in the song "Nobody Loves You When You're Down and Out" has a bitter irony to it considering his enduring popularity following his murder.
  • "Beautiful Boy" ends with John whispering "Good night, Sean. See you in the morning." John would be killed mere months after the song's UK release. Sean was only five.
  • Possibly the fastest turnaround time for one of these — the last track on Milk and Honey is an interview recorded on December 8th, 1980, which contains a conversation on how John would like to be remembered "when I'm dead and buried, which I hope is a long, long time from now." This was recorded the day he died.
  • John had some close calls with Gun Nut Phil Spector. After Phil shot inches from John's ear while Rock 'n' Roll was in production, John told him, "Phil, if you're going to kill me, kill me. But don't fuck with my ears. I need 'em."
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Lennon wrote "How Do You Sleep?" as a musical "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Paul McCartney, the Trope Namer of Silly Love Song. Over thirty years later, a completely different singer with the same surname did a silly love song called "How Do You Sleep?". How's that for dramatic irony?
  • "I Don't Want to Be a Soldier" features the line "Mama, I don't wanna die!"
• Older Than They Think: While "Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy)" popularized the line "Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans," it was an adage that had been in circulation for a while. The earliest citation for the line is a 1957 magazine article.
• Posthumous Popularity Potential: He had more than his share of critical and popular recognition during his lifetime. Nonetheless, the years following his murder saw his less positive traits, and the unevenness of his post-Beatles career output, largely forgotten in favor of the mythical image (strongly, but not solely, cultivated by his widow) of Lennon as a gentle, saintly prophet of peace.
• Signature Song: As a solo artist, "Imagine". Its universal message of peace has kept it above all his other songs in terms of fame.
• Sweet Dreams Fuel:
  • "Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy)". Justified in that it's supposed to be a lullaby.
  • "#9 Dream" has an ethereal, appropriately dreamy atmosphere to it.
• Unintentional Period Piece: As the Beatle most in tune with the zeitgeist of his era, much of his work has a dated quality these days, particularly the psychedelic later-period Beatles songs, the arts material with Yoko, and his fondness for the Protest Song in his solo career. It's been suggested that this is a big reason why younger generations who get into The Beatles seem to gravitate more toward Paul McCartney (and George Harrison).

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