Defend the Indefensible: "Sometime in New York City"

In defense of Elephant's Memory, they did released an amazing debut album in 1969 (self-titled), a decent follow up in 1970 (Take It To The Streets) and even with some major changes in the band's lineup, their work on Yoko's solo album, Approximately Infinite Universe is flawless, so they didn't fit well with John and his more traditional way of writing and performing, but they were perfect, on the pocket, as Yoko's backing band.
John was better fitted with studio players, not with a real band (except that one from Liverpool, of course).

 

Not sure about the rest of the band but at the very least Stan Bronstein did a few sessions as well, that's his sax on "Same Old Song And Dance" by Aerosmith, for example.

 

I had a supposedly unreleased picture made into a poster from this JL era, given to my mother who was a travel agent by the photographer

 

I like the studio album. I've listened to it when I was like 14 and it stuck in my head, so it brings nice memories. I even had some kind of erotic arousal about Yoko (at 14 everything was exciting...). The scheme was: a) John is my idol b) he does things with Yoko c) so Yoko must be super-hot. Some kind of a transfert thing. 'We're all Water', for me, was hotter than Love To Love You Baby.

 

I still have my original vinyl but probably haven't played the studio album since the 1970s or early 1980s. It didn't move me much at the time and would be the last Lennon album I would buy until after his death. I played the Live Album a LOT.

Never owned the full album on CD but did find just the Live Album on CD which I play often.

 

I liked bits of this album when I was a kid, a number of years ago I was staying at someone's house and they had a copy and I thought I'll play this when they go to bed.... it was truly horrific... it's dated dreadfully and the songs and subject matter are beyond bad, production is terrible as well......

The live version of cold turkey which I used to like was the only thing even listonable and that wore thin pretty quickly....

 

I think it's decent start to finish. Yoko's wailing on some tracks are annoying and even when she's singing normally she's not always exactly in tune... but the songs are decent by both John and Yoko. I also think the first track is brilliant and the common criticisms of its' lyrics are shallow-minded and petty. The production is pretty terrible but I actually don't mind it that much... it's not good enough for me to really care whether it sounds crap or not, and as a result it actually gives it a bit of charm.
That being said, I'm only regarding the studio stuff. The live stuff I've never bothered with.

This is from the perspective of a white male, pre-20s who first heard the album last year.

 

Here's mine:
If John likes Zappa, maybe I should give him a try.....
That's enough....

 

It was always my favorite of Lennon's solo LPs actually; about a year ago, I finally found another vinyl copy (used) to replace one that was purloined years ago.

 

A lot of ex-Beatles solo albums that were slammed by critics in the 70s really did not deserve the drubbing they received.

This one and Extra Texture both deserved it

 

It's definitely better left sealed.

(and more valuable)

 

Inspired a poll
Worst ex-Beatle album of the 70s

 

Having sold the EM LPs back in the mid-70s for financial, not musical, reasons, I've recently been wondering what they sound like once again; I do recall liking them at the time, but "something had to go," at the time and they were it.

 

It's certainly not a bad album. The themes on the album are somewhat dated. I think it gets a lot of hate because there are Yoko songs and boy do people hate Yoko, for whatever reason. There are still those who think she broke up The Beatles. I play it more than I do Mind Games.

 

Skipping the live stuff and adding Happy X-Mas and Listen the Snow is Falling, makes it a nice album.

 

I think it is an ok album. I don't love it, but it isn't a complete right off

 

The best songs on STINYC are the worst things Lennon ever did. Yes, I do mean to include the "experimental" crap with Yoko.

 

I've always loved it. In simplest terms; Some of us love it for exactly the reasons others hate it.

 

Well, being a Beatle fan from the beginning, I can say that I really liked their solo albums, and I didn't have to compare them to past glories. The Beatles were done with, and that was the past. Expecting them to be the same would have been a big disapointment to my listening pleasure. So, I came to their solo work with open arms, and I found that I enjoyed it all.

There is no other album like STINYC as far as immediacy and gut and that "heavy" sound captured on that vinyl. Geez, my original vinyl record STILL sounds great on my turntable. Must have been the pressing. The CD sounds not so good. John was singing with passion about something that he cared about, and the fact that he didn't make it some fruity-watered-down Imagine to appease the critics or fans, even made me like the album more.

As fans of artists (musicians/authors/film-makers, painters, etc), I find it interesting and fulfilling to follow the career arcs and sways and highs and lows of the work. If everyone was bland and all the same, how would one know what was what? Without any depth or different paths that the artists make, it would just seem boring and not worth anything.

True ART, is not made for the audience. Great filmmaking happens when the audience has to WORK at it, to put some effort into what the characters are feeling, and doing, and what the film-maker is trying to say or achieve. John Cassavette's films are not easy to watch sometimes. They take some effort on the part of the viewer. Because Cassavettes doesn't just tell you what to feel, what to think, how to respond, like most of the Hollywood money-factory films that are being made. That just one example of an artist doing his work without pandering to his fans/audience.

Now, STINYC is no Citizen Kane or Rear Window or Psycho, but it's John and Yoko in 1972, speaking and singing their feelings about the current state of affairs in the U.S. and around the world. I'll take emotion and seat-of-the-pants songwriting and jam-band musicianship by a former Beatle over any sterile top-40 or prog-rock symphony, any time. WITNOTW simply ROCKS? Angela is my all-time favorite J&Y duet. Beats anything on Double Fantasy. Luck Of The Irish and Sunday Bloody Sunday comes from John's Irish insides and personal opinions of those social issues going on then. Isn't that what made John so cool for us? That he spoke his mind honestly and told his TRUTH, without sugar-coating things? Isn't that what we EXPECTED of him, and loved him for? Feels somewhat flippant and ungrateful for supposed "fans" to turn on him, because he didn't do what they wanted: nice sounding "pop" songs, with sugar on it, for the conservatives who don't like to be challenged by music.

To sum it up---I think it is a blast and a real pleasure to have artists who put their craft and creative on the line during the course of their career. To be able to swing with the "high" points and the "low" points during those shifts of albums, and appreciating the different aspects of the artists continuing search, makes it all so interesting, and, really, why we really like them in the 1st place. Expectations are very much over-rated, in an artistic, creative sense.

And besides....it was just one year in the life of JL---relax!!!!..It's like the Beatles "fans" who complain about Let It Be, and how awful and unrehearsed the record is, and why couldn't it have been better, etc?..GEEZ---it was about 3 weeks worth of work on that one. How many other artists would have been able to do that? With that kind of quality? Just a few months after The White Album!. "Shut up--it's the bloody Some Time In New York City album. It was raw and gritty and came with a bonus album (that you can complain about as well)." And there was next year for Mind Games, for all you conservatives out there who don't like to be bothered with music that may take some effort on your part.

Besides that, 1972 was a somewhat quiet year for releases for Beatles/Dylan. And .."we're all water in this vast, vast ocean. Some day we'll evaporate together"

 

Agreed. It probably would have done fine if it had been the single instead of you-know-what.

 

Hear, Hear! What He Said! Spherical!

Context is everything. It was 1972 in NYC. John had just arrived last fall--Sept 71 (and would never return to England) and he was in a political mood in-sinking with the times and got sucked up and swept away by and by being in America: new people and places and politics and Nixon hot on his heels.

Is it as good as POB or Imagine (both recorded in the UK)? No, not by a country mile. But it is still John Lennon being John Lennon before the Lost Weekend and the Dakota Years, and as such is a fascinating docu-musical of a certain time and space---one which hasn´t aged well for many.

Myself, if I want to hear Lennon circa 72, I reach for the Black Triangle Cd of Live In New York City, a much better, shorter and well-balanced collection.

 

He's known as Spencer R now.

 

If it can be enjoyed at all it would have to have the Yoko nonsense removed.

 

The

Their epic "Old Man Willow" on the Midnight Cowboy soundtrack is my favorite track on that album, a wonderful jazz-psych epic. I'm thinking about checking out their first studio album

 

The cover is a newspaper, for Pete's sake! And that's just what it is, an historical snapshot in time. As big as a Beatles/Lennon fan as I am I stayed away from this record for a long time based on its poor reputation... And when I finally heard it, only a few years ago, I couldn't understand what all the complaining was about... it rocks!