Flashback: John Lennon murdered in New York City | KSHE 95
News > Real Rock News > Flashback: John Lennon murdered in New York City
Flashback: John Lennon murdered in New York City
Dec. 08, 2016
Comments
Share
Today (December 8th) marks the 36th anniversary of John Lennon's death. As is the custom every year, several hundred fans are expected to stand vigil for Lennon across the street from the Dakota building in Central Park's Strawberry Fields. The triangular patch of land was designated by the city of New York in 1984 to celebrate the former Beatle's life and work.
In the fall of 1980, the 40-year-old Lennon had re-entered public life after a self-imposed five-year hiatus to spend time with his young son Sean, travel, and recharge his creative batteries. On November 17th, 1980, Lennon and wife Yoko Ono had released their "comeback" album Double Fantasy, which included such future Lennon standards as "Woman," "Beautiful Boy," "Watching The Wheels," and the album's lead track and single "(Just Like) Starting Over."
In 1980, John Lennon was asked if the personal freedom that New York City afforded him convinced him he needed to stay in America: "Yeah, that’s what made me stay here. It wasn’t a conscious decision, I just found that I was going to movies, going to restaurants. . . The five years, you think it was just baking bread and the baby -- no, because I went to Hong Kong and walked around. And people could not appreciate what it was to. When I left England, I couldn’t go on the street. It was still Carnaby Street and all that stuff. We couldn’t walk around the block, ‘couldn’t go to a restaurant, unless you wanted to go with the business of ‘the star going to the restaurant’ garbage. I’ve been walking the streets for the last seven years."
On the night of December 8th, 1980 -- with "(Just Like) Starting Over" sitting at Number Six on the singles charts -- Lennon and Yoko returned home to their apartment building, the Dakota on Manhattan's Central Park West. They had spent the evening at the Record Plant East recording studio mixing a tune of Yoko's called "Walking On Thin Ice." Mark David Chapman, who had been stalking Lennon for several days and had received an autograph from Lennon earlier that evening, lay in wait for his return. Chapman, who was living in Honolulu at the time, had made an unsuccessful trip to New York the previous October with the intent of killing Lennon, but couldn't find him.
Lennon and Yoko returned from the studio at around 10:50 p.m., with their limousine dropping them off in front of the building on 72nd Street, rather than pulling into the building's courtyard as usual. As the couple walked in, they passed Chapman who called out "Mr. Lennon?" and fired five shots from a .38 caliber handgun, with four bullets entering Lennon's neck and back. Officers were quick on the scene, arresting Chapman and rushing Lennon in a squad car to nearby Roosevelt Hospital, where doctors worked on reviving the musician, who died from the severity of his wounds.
Dr. Stephan Lynn, the director of Roosevelt Hospital's emergency room, recalled Lennon's injures to The New York Post, saying that, "We made an incision in the left chest and separated the ribs and found a very large amount of blood. We looked for an injury to the heart or to the blood vessels. But what we discovered was that all of the major blood vessels leaving the heart were simply destroyed. There was no way that we could repair them."
The news of Lennon's death was broken by a reporter for New York's WABC-TV, who by coincidence was in the same emergency room after a motorcycle accident. The news was first reported by Howard Cosell during the Monday Night Football telecast.
Yoko returned home and called "the three people John would have wanted to know" -- his aunt Mimi Smith, who raised him; his 17-year-old son Julian, from his first marriage; and Paul McCartney. Within hours of the news, thousands of fans had flocked to the Dakota to stand vigil for Lennon.
Radio executive Andy Denemark recalled getting the news of Lennon being shot: "On the night of the 8th of December, I was at home, I was in bed, I wasn't interested in the Monday Night Football game that night, and my phone rang -- it feels like it was 11 o'clock, 11:30 at night, something like that. And it was a friend of mine who was a huge Beatle fan, and I could hear her shaking over the phone, that the news story had just broke that John Lennon had been shot. And it felt so surreal when she uttered those words to me that I kind of calmed her down and said, 'Don't worry, I'm sure it'll be fine,' and 'don't sweat it,' and 'I'm sure it's just a crazy rumor.' It just didn't feel real at all."
Denemark recalls how limited fans' options were in getting accurate news about Lennon's condition: "Radio was the only immediate medium. I did what I think everybody else did at that time, was you turn to the radio. Because any news source -- CBS, NBC, all the big networks at the time -- and don't forget, 1980 was pre-MTV, pre-the expansion of a lot of cable, so you would turn to the radio because that's where you would get news about rock bands."
Julian Lennon and Ringo Starr made immediate plans to head to New York, with George Harrison issuing a statement saying, "After all we went through, I had and still have great love and respect for him. I am shocked and stunned. To rob life is the ultimate robbery." McCartney also issued a statement, saying, "I can't take it at the moment. John was a great man who'll be remembered for his great contributions to art, music and peace. He is going to be missed by the whole world."
During his 2008 appearance on ABC's The View, McCartney spoke frankly about Lennon's murder: "It was. . . horrific. It was, yeah. 'Cause suddenly, your best friend's snatched away, and then as you say, it's kind of scary, y'know, just the personal security thing. I think -- it wasn't just me, it was the other guys in the group -- everyone in entertainment suddenly thought 'Wait a minute, we better get security.' Which I think all of us did. I think I did it for about a week, it was like 'I can't live like this, just forget it."
Legendary bassist Stanley Clarke was recording with McCartney in the West Indies in the weeks following Lennon's murder and told us that McCartney was unable to escape the madness which followed his former partner's killing: "Y'know, we went to some island somewhere, I think it was. . . the Tug Of War record, that was right after or during the John Lennon (murder) -- 'cause I remember those interviews, when they interviewed Paul McCartney, I think we were recording at that time. Yeah, 'cause I remember we were on this island and then the secret service came in and they wanted us to wear some (bullet-proof) vest, 'cause some people were saying -- y'know, there was pranks, they were saying 'We're gonna bomb the island,' this is 'Kill a Beatle week,' and all that kind of mess, y'know? And he was cool. It's like, there's a price when you're really famous, y'know? Like that kind of fame."
Out now is author Keith Elliot Greenberg's latest book, December 8, 1980: The Day John Lennon Died. Greenberg, who is renowned crime writer and producer for America's Most Wanted, recalls just how different the security around the events of Lennon's murder were from how things are handled today: "Yoko Ono goes down to Roosevelt Hospital, and she leaves the hospital and Paul LaRosa -- who worked for The Daily News at the time -- points out; the police didn't even know how to handle a situation like that this -- not because they were incompetent, they just never encountered it before. So fans are coming up right to her, where they can touch her. When Ringo Starr arrives at the Dakota, people are pulling his hair! They're pushing him and jostling him. Now, there would be a barricade around the block."
There was no funeral for Lennon, who was cremated almost immediately in Hartsdale, New York in Westchester County. Instead, tens of thousands of mourners gathered in New York's Central Park the following Sunday (December 14th) to observe ten minutes of silence at 2 p.m. The event was broadcast globally, with many radio stations ceasing all airplay during the memorial.
The Aftermath:
By December 8th, 1980 -- the day Lennon was murdered -- the album's first single, "(Just Like) Starting Over," had reached Number Six on the singles chart and Double Fantasy had just cracked the album charts. Less than three weeks following the tragedy, on December 27th, 1980, "(Just Like) Starting Over" topped the Billboard Hot 100 for the first of five weeks, while Double Fantasy went on to top the album charts for eight weeks.
After Lennon's death, two other singles were released from Double Fantasy -- "Woman," which went to Number Two, and "Watching The Wheels," which peaked at Number Ten.
Double Fantasy went on to receive the 1981 Grammy Award for Album Of The Year. The ceremony marked five-year-old Sean Lennon's first public appearance, when he accompanied his mother to the podium to collect the award.
In 1984, Yoko released Milk And Honey, which included the additional songs she and Lennon had recorded during the 1980 sessions. The album peaked at Number 11 on the charts, with the single "Nobody Told Me" hitting Number Five and becoming Lennon's final Top Ten solo hit.
Both Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr contributed to George Harrison's 1981 Lennon tribute "All Those Years Ago," which hit Number Two in the spring of 1981.
McCartney's solo tribute to Lennon, called "Here Today," appeared on his 1982 album Tug Of War, and has been a part of McCartney's live set since 2002.
In early 1981, Chapman pleaded guilty to second degree murder, and is currently serving a 25-years-to-life sentence in New York's Attica State prison. Chapman, a devout born-again Christian who is allowed conjugal visits, has refused all offers of psychotherapy since the murder. He has been turned down for parole six times.
Yoko has kept Lennon's legacy alive by consistently issuing previously unreleased recordings and videos along with reproductions of his artwork as lithographs, mugs, tee-shirts, baby clothes, and other items -- to the chagrin of some Lennon fans.
30 years after Lennon's death, he now has had far more posthumous releases than he had solo albums by 1980.
In 1995, with Yoko's blessing, McCartney, Harrison and Starr teamed up to complete two of Lennon's unreleased demos -- "Free As A Bird" and "Real Love" -- for The Beatles Anthology project.
Family, Friends, And Fans Remember John Lennon:
We asked Yoko how she was able to carry on after watching her husband die so tragically in front of her eyes: "Well, it was very hard for me, really. I don't know how I managed in those days, y'know? I think that one of the reasons I survived was because I kept telling myself that I have to survive for Sean."
Yoko feels that Lennon's status as a public artist pushed conventional boundaries and ultimately had its consequences: "He was meant to do it, I don't know. . . I think he was an inspired artist -- he could not control himself about it, he just dished out all the things he was inspired to dish out, but also he was aware that it was very, very dangerous. I knew that he knew that he was playing a dangerous game. 'Gimme some truth' is what he was thinking, y'know? And so he was pushing that, to the point that it might have been dangerous -- and yes it was, I mean, y'know. . . I think that probably he was too daring for his own good."
Yoko says that she thinks Lennon would've embraced most of the artistic and cultural changes that came into place after his death: "Internet, website -- all that would have driven him crazy, but also he would have said, 'I told you so. It was gonna be a global village, and this is it!' Y'know, that kind of thing. But also, I think he might have gone to rap music -- y'know, the first white rapper kind of thing -- because he was a real, y'know, real rocker -- and a funky one at that."
Julian Lennon says that the fact that he never truly became close with his father still weighs heavily on his mind: "We saw each other on and off. . . I saw him, probably, maybe 10 times before he was killed, y'know? And I think it would have been nice to find some resolve between us eventually, but unfortunately that was never going to be, y'know? So, there will always be that unresolved point in my life, whether I like it or not. Yes, there is forgiveness, but there is still bitterness, and still anger there as well. But, it's not something I think about on a day-to-day basis."
Lennon's first wife Cynthia Lennon says that during her decade-long relationship with Lennon, she tried desperately to provide a stable home for him after dealing with a childhood during which both his parents abandoned him: "That's all you can do. You can only give him what he needed. What more can you do? You can't change the man's psyche, his nature, his history, his past, his pain."
Cynthia says she was thrilled when she heard he was coming out of retirement in 1980 to begin making music again: "He was writing. He started to write again which was fantastic, y'know, Double Fantasy. I thought 'Thank God, he's coming back into the real world.'"
George Harrison was able to take a more spiritual view of Lennon's murder than most: "I know John was, um, y'know, he knew who he was a soul that happened to be in this body for this period of time, and. . . Its just the method by which you die; y'know, I think its nicer if you can consciously leave your body at death, as opposed to some lunatic shooting you on the street, or having a plane crash -- something like that. I think it's unfortunate the way he went out, but it doesn't really matter -- he's okay, and life flows on within you and without you."
Pau McCartney says he looks back on his partnership with Lennon with great affection: "We had a great collaboration. I mean, I don't think there's any doubt about that. Certainly from my point of view, John was like a great person to work with. He must've thought I was a great person to work with 'cause we stuck together for all that time. We'd grown up together."
Pattie Boyd met Lennon in 1964 on the set of A Hard Days Night, and throughout her years married to George Harrison, she spent more time with Lennon then she did with her own family: "I adored John. I thought he was tremendous fun to be with. He was exciting -- but also sometimes he'd make me quite nervous because he was very witty, very sharp. He wouldn't let anything go. He was very observant."
James Taylor, who was originally signed to the Beatles' Apple Records, and maintained a relationship with Lennon up to the time of his death, feels that Lennon's murder was inevitable: "I was in the building uptown from the Dakota in New York City -- a building called the Langham -- the night that John was shot. I heard the shots. I couldn't believe it. I have always thought that there was something almost inevitable about it. I often have the feeling that -- I'm not sure exactly where this comes from -- that too much exposure, or too much celebrity, too much of a sort of public profile, is toxic and dangerous. In John Lennon's case, he was so well known, so universally known and loved, that I almost felt that it was statistically inevitable that someone was gonna. . . he was so accessible, y'know?"
U2's Bono says that Lennon's artistic integrity was the blueprint for all that came after him: "Well, he wrote the book for us. Y'know, you're talking about Rubber Soul, other albums -- we've had, y'know, The White Album in the back of our head. He's the one who was ready to take the pratfalls -- to make an idiot out of himself to make a point -- if that's what it took to make a point -- to take the jeers and the sneers to sing his life. I think the courage to be uncool, in music and in art, is everything."
Heart's Nancy Wilson, along with older sister Ann, saw the Beatles at their third-to last public concert on August 25th, 1966 at Washington's Seattle Coliseum. She told us that in addition to his music, it was Lennon's passion for social issues that helped shape an entire generation's outlook on freedom and justice: "He was really screwed up in so many ways and so dark, but he really believed that he could help change things and change the big political system and change the money grubbing, all-mighty dollar aspects of politics, and he could put love first, and he could help lead his generation -- our generation -- and the next ones to a better place. And so he did. And so he and Paul McCartney and the Beatles did, and they rubbed off on us all so much."
The Ronettes' Ronnie Spector, who was married to Lennon's record producer Phil Spector, said that the world will never get over the loss of Lennon's talent: "He was the nicest guy. And then when I found out he was dead; I couldn't get out of bed for three days. I was stunned. Because he was heavy. Now here's a guy. . . Talking about writing -- there will never be another John Lennon."
David Leaf, one of the directors of the critically acclaimed documentary The U.S. vs. John Lennon, says that more than anything else, the film shows the former Beatle's absolute bravery in trying to stop the war in Vietnam: "What John Lennon did was fearless. He was willing to put it all on the line in the campaign for peace starting in '69, and he did not consider or care what the consequences were. He was willing to make a fool of himself and he was willing to be mocked if it would save lives. He and Yoko should have won the Nobel Peace Prize."
Fred Seaman, who was Lennon's assistant from early 1979 until his death, recalls that Double Fantasy was originally conceived as solo Lennon project: "In 1980, he started thinking about recording. And then the question was, what kind of record would this be? And originally John was going to do a solo record -- that was his idea. And he thought about it for a long time. He didn't think of it in terms of a 'comeback,' but in terms of an update on what he had been doing. And he had been writing songs throughout the '70s."
Dennis Ferrante, Lennon's main engineer during his New York years, was working a session for the Four Tops that night when he first heard that Lennon had been shot. He immediately called Lennon's ex-girlfriend May Pang for confirmation: "So I went inside and I said, 'I don't believe it.' So I called May, and I got her on the phone, and I said 'Hello,' and she started screaming. And I said 'It's true?' And she was hysterical. I said 'Oh my God.' And I just dropped the phone, I turned around, I took my bag, and I walked out (of the session). I left everything on the machine, I left the lights on, the mic's up, I just walked out. I didn't even say goodbye. I was totally destroyed."
Ferrante, who worked closely with Lennon throughout the '70s on such classic albums as Imagine, Some Time In New York City, Mind Games, Walls And Bridges, and Rock 'N' Roll says that Lennon's death absolutely leveled him: "I cried all night. And I just couldn't get over it, it was like they shot my father, or my mother, or my brother. And I was so distraught, I didn't go back to work for almost a week. I stayed home. And it's funny because nobody called. 'Cause they knew that I had worked with him."
Ferrante told us that he resented the fact that he and many other of Lennon's close friends were denied the opportunity to pay their last respects to him: "Yoko stole John from everybody because she had him cremated that night, or the next morning. And nobody got to pay our last respects to him -- we never got to see him. She just cut everybody off from that. And I thought that was heartless on her part -- and I still think it was heartless. Because, y'know, it's not that it was just her husband, he had a lot of friends that wanted to be there to at least pay respects, and she stopped it from everybody -- she stopped everybody from doing that. Her claim was that she didn't want to put everybody through it, and I don't believe it."
John Lennon Fast Facts:
John Lennon's full birth name was John Winston Lennon. In April 1969, he legally changed his middle name to "Ono."
Lennon was raised from the age of four by his maternal aunt Mimi and her husband, milkman George Smith. Lennon's uncle, who served as a loving surrogate father to him, gave him his first musical instrument -- a harmonica -- died of a liver hemorrhage when Lennon was 14.
Growing up, Lennon was in steady contact with his mother Julia, but never lived with her. She was killed by a drunken off-duty policeman speeding in front of Lennon's home in 1958. She was 44 years old.
His father, Freddie, a merchant seaman, abandoned the family when Lennon was three, only making contact with Lennon again in 1964.
Lennon had sporadic contact with him over the next six years before cutting him off financially in 1970. Lennon made peace with his father on his deathbed in 1976 when Freddie was dying of stomach cancer. He was 63 years old.
Although Lennon is often said to be an only child, he in fact has five half-siblings. Julia and Jacqui Dykins are half-sisters on his mother Julia's side, and another sister, named Victoria, was adopted at birth; and in the mid '70s, Lennon's father Freddie had two sons, named David and Robin Lennon, born in 1973 and 1975, respectively.
Lennon's mother taught him his first song on the guitar -- Fats Domino's "Ain't That A Shame."
John Lennon and Paul McCartney made a handshake deal in late 1957, agreeing that all compositions written by either one of them -- solo or in collaboration with each other -- would be credited to "Lennon-McCartney."
The Beatles performed Lennon's first original composition, titled "Hello Little Girl," at their unsuccessful Decca Records audition on January 1st, 1962.
After the Beatles' breakup, both Lennon and McCartney gave separate interviews detailing who wrote what within the duo's partnership. They two agreed on everything except two songs -- Lennon claimed that he wrote the majority of the lyrics to McCartney's "Eleanor Rigby" and McCartney claimed that he wrote the melody to Lennon's "In My Life."
Although uncredited, Lennon helped write the lyrics to George Harrison's song "Taxman" from the Beatles' Revolver album and "Piggies" from The White Album. On bootlegs of the band's seemingly endless Let It Be sessions, Lennon can be heard helping Harrison develop the structure to his Abbey Road classic, "Something."
Lennon's lucky number was nine. The number popped up in several of his songs, including "One After 909," "Revolution #9," and "#9 Dream."
Although primarily a rhythm guitarist, Lennon played bass on several McCartney-written Beatles classics, including "Back In The U.S.S.R.," "Helter Skelter," "Let It Be," and "The Long And Winding Road."
Lennon played keyboards on "I'm Down," "Tell Me What You See," "The Night Before," "We Can Work It Out," "Penny Lane," "The Being For the Benefit Of Mr. Kite," "All You Need Is Love," "Hello Goodbye," "I Am The Walrus," "Hey Bulldog," "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da," "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," "Because," and others.
Lennon also played lead guitar on a number of Beatles tracks too, including "Get Back," "You Can't Do That," "Honey Pie," "Yer Blues," "For You Blue," "The Ballad Of John And Yoko," and "I Want You (She's So Heavy)." He swapped guitar solos with George Harrison on the band's cover of Little Richard's "Long Tall Sally," and traded licks with Harrison and McCartney on the Abbey Road closer, "The End."
Lennon published two books of short stories and prose during the height of Beatlemania -- 1964's In His Own Write and 1965's A Spaniard In The Works. In 1986 a novel written in the late-'70s, titled Skywriting By Word Of Mouth, was published posthumously.
Although Lennon performed live many times after the Beatles breakup, his only full-length, fully rehearsed and promoted concerts took place on August 30th, 1972 -- a matinee and evening show -- at New York's Madison Square Garden. The "One To One" shows benefited the mentally retarded patients of Long Island's infamous Willowbrook Institution.
Excerpts from the shows were released as an album and on video in 1986, as John Lennon Live In New York City.
The only three albums which Lennon fully produced himself were Harry Nilsson's Pussycats, and his own Mind Games and Walls And Bridges.
Lennon had many legendary nicknames throughout his life, and was most fond of the moniker "Dr. Winston O'Boogie."
Lennon's 1974 Walls And Bridges album closes with a cover of Lee Dorsey's "Ya Ya" -- the only recorded performance of him jamming with then 11-year-old son Julian on drums.
Although it's usually believed that Lennon's final public performance was with Elton John on Thanksgiving night 1974, his last appearance in front of a live audience actually took place on April 18th, 1975 at New York City's Hilton Hotel. Lennon performed three songs, "Slippin' And Slidin'," "Stand By Me," and "Imagine," as part of the taping of the British special Salute To Sir Lew Grade - The Master Showman. Sir Lew Grade was a British entertainment mogul, whose company ATV owned a controlling interest in Lennon & McCartney's song copyrights, before selling them to Michael Jackson.
Prior to returning to Yoko Ono after their infamous 14-month separation in the early 1970s, Lennon was planning to travel to New Orleans to record with McCartney, who was then working on Wings' Venus And Mars album.
Lennon and McCartney last saw each other on April 24th, 1976, when they watched Saturday Night Live as producer Lorne Michaels offered the Beatles a whopping $3,000 to reunite on the show. They briefly considered heading to Rockefeller Center where the show was being performed, as a gag. The two last spoke on the phone in early 1980.
Before deciding to take a five-year sabbatical from recording, Lennon was composing material for a 1976 album tentatively titled Between The Lines.
In the months prior to his death, Lennon rang up his aunt Mimi Smith, urging her to send over family pictures and heirlooms he hadn't seen in years. He also asked her for his Quarry Bank high school tie, which he took to wearing in the last part of 1980.
In the years prior to his death in New York, Lennon usually woke up around dawn each day, and by mid-morning would walk over to the upscale neighborhood coffee house Cafe LaFortuna and read The New York Times, The London Times and several other international newspapers to get a world view of daily current events.
Lennon was also known to go out for drinks at his local watering hole, Malachy's Donegal Inn, only a block away from the Dakota.
At the time of his death, Lennon and Yoko Ono were planning a world tour to tentatively start in the spring of 1981 with a free show in Central Park, and eventually culminating with a concert in the Beatles' hometown of Liverpool.
Lennon was said to be considering performing several early Beatles numbers on tour, including reworked versions of "I Want To Hold Your Hand," "She Loves You," and "Help!"
About a half hour of videotape exists of Lennon performing live at the Hit Factory recording studios on August 19th, 1980, but it has never been aired publicly. In addition to then-current numbers such as "(Just Like) Starting Over" and "I'm Losing You," Lennon and his band perform covers of Eddie Cochran's "C'mon Everybody," Bobby Darin's "Dream Lover, " Maurice Williams & the Zodiacs' "Stay," and the Beatles' "She's A Woman."
Lennon and Ono recorded two Double Fantasy tracks -- "I'm Losing You" and "I'm Moving On" -- with Cheap Trick's Rick Nielson and Bun E. Carlos. Both versions were passed over for the final release.
According to author Keith Badman, Lennon last saw George Harrison on September 28th, 1980, when Lennon and Ono supposedly flew to Los Angeles to see the Monty Python troupe perform live at the Hollywood Bowl. Reportedly Lennon and Harrison exchanged tapes of their recent work. The meeting is disputed by a large number of fans and historians who believe that the pair's last meeting was in New York City in December 1974.
Lennon composed two songs for Ringo Starr in 1980, one called "Life Begins At 40" which remained unreleased until Lennon's demo was issued in 1998, and "Nobody Told Me," which was released posthumously on Lennon's 1984 Milk And Honey album.
Lennon and Ringo last saw each other on November 26th, 1980, when Lennon and Ono met up with Starr and future wife Barbara Bach over dinner at Manhattan's Plaza Hotel. Lennon made plans to meet up again with Starr in Los Angeles on January 14th, 1981, to begin recording the tunes for Starr's new album.
In the weeks prior to his death, Lennon was working on two new songs, "You Saved My Soul (With Your True Love)" and "Dear John." An edited version of "Dear John" appears on the 1998 John Lennon Anthology box set.
Photo by Fox Photos/Getty Images
Check it out: Howard Cosell on December 8th, 1980 announcing John Lennon's murder on ABC's Monday Night Football