Julian Lennon - The Lennon Legacy
By Colin Irwin
Melody Maker
October 13, 1984
Four years after a madman took out his father, Julian Lennon launches his own career in music. In his first major interview, he tells Colin Irwin all about the agony and ecstasy.
The tea is cold. It's that appalling, stewy, curdled kind of coldness, with layers of skin hatching on top, and rigor mortis setting in underneath. Tea that died of frostbite. Julian Lennon stares balefully at it for a second or two. Takes a purposeful, but apparently satisfying gulp, and eyes his interrogator --the merest hint of a sigh.
"The chimney fell down into my bedroom that night. There wasn't a wind or anything. It just fell straight in. It was all very strange, one of those nights, y' know, when you have that feeling that something's happened?
"I had a certain feeling that night. I came down at like, eight in the morning and saw all the press outside the window and thought, 'What the hell's going on here?' I came downstairs, and the blinds were closed. I sat down, and my stepdad told me, I just said, 'Are you sure he's dead?' He said, 'Yeah.' I said, 'Yes, but are you sure?'"
The same day, Julian was on a plane to New York to the Dakota Building, to the scene of his father's murder, it was, he says, now, pure instinct. He wasn't sure why, but he knew his place was with his young stepbrother [sic]and his father's widow, Yoko.
"She was a wreck. I went over there because, well, I felt sorry more for Sean than for Yoko, because he was so young. It's hard to tell a kid, y' know? And she didn't know how to tell him. She really didn't know. She asked me for advice. I said, 'Listen, tell him straight. It's the only thing you can do.' So we were sitting there, and she couldn't tell him. She was cracking up all the time. So I was there, edging her on, helping her out a little bit. And Sean wasn't quite sure what was going on. She couldn't explain it, so I was helping her along.
"The thing that bugged me --- well, it wasn't a big thing, but the next day in the New York Times, or whatever it was, she had a whole page on how 'I told Sean', you know, which is like, pathetic. You don't need to do things like that."
Journalism being what it is, every time Julian Lennon sits down with a reporter and a cup of cold tea, he'll be asked the same questions. Which is why he won't be doing many interviews, which is why his first stab at making records will be greeted with abnormal curiosity and cynicism. Which is why, for all his outward bravado, he's as nervous as a kitten.
Today, Julian is nursing a mild hangover, still overcoming the remnants of jet lag, and is clearly apprehensive about his first encounter with a music paper. He talks in a strangely lethargic, yet hypnotic voice -- adenoidal and a hint of Liverpool -- and as he thaws, the anecdotes become more engaging and the wit more scathing. He tries hard not to be bitchy about Yoko, but fails miserably, laconically referring to her as "Hokey Cokey", and maintains a wry, down-to-earth outlook on life that, given the reflected glare with which he's grown up, is astonishing.
He seems admirably equipped for the torrid upheaval that's about to occur in his life. At the age of 21, Julian Lennon is finally ready for His coming out ball. His debut single, "Too Late for Goodbyes", is just out and already helping keep the good people of Gallup going, and will be followed by an album, Valotte. Then there's the matter of getting a band together, then the World Tour, then writing some new material, then the second album that takes him well into 1986.
He spent 10 years of his childhood without seeing or even hearing from his father, yet both on and off record, the resemblance is spectacular. Musically, he pitches in at the latter end of John's solo career, a long, long way from the man's artistic peak. It must be said, though Julian insists that Double Fantasy was one of his dad's greatest work (the stuff he did on it anyway).
The voice in particular has that pungent edge always identified with Lennon senior, and the songs, all except one written by him, carry familiar echoes in the structure and phrasing. The more up-tempo material, including the single and the liveliest track, "I Don't Know Which Way to Turn", is undeniably Beatle-ish, yet he seems to favor the moodier ballad style of "Lonely", which could in fact be the long-lost twin brother of "How Do You Sleep" -- John's early '70s taunting at Paul McCartney.
Produced by Phil Ramone, it is a curiously unfashionable album for a 21-year-old to make, and soft focus arrangements clearly aren't the order of the day in Britain. At least the music press certainly will crucify him. Sounds have already waded in ---hobnail boots flying, whacking out the predictable accusation that if it wasn't for blah blah, he'd be in the dole queue with all the other urchins.
In any case, he vigorously insists it's not true. The tapes were originally touted around his record label, Charisma, anonymously, and he never particularly wanted to make a record in the first place. He just wrote songs at home for his own amusement and never dreamt they would end up on a record. "Oh, I don't really care what people say about it. I love the record. It does seem to be unfashionable alongside what else is happening in Britain right now. But I think the British have a different attitude to music than everyone else anyway. They're more cynical."
He was five when his parents split up. Paul McCartney drove to see him and his mother, Cynthia, to lend moral support just after it had happened. On the way, McCartney wrote a song for him designed to give him strength and courage. It started off as "Hey Julian," transmuted to "Hey Jules", and wound up as "Hey Jude". Julian never did get strength or courage from the song. He only found out a couple of years ago "Hey Jude" was about him, but nevertheless, he admits he gets a little thrill if he hears it now.
In any case, those days are pretty much a blur to him. They tell him he was taken on the road with The Beatles a few times, but he doesn't recall. "All I can remember is just a little time when they were doing Magical Mystery Tour. You know the coach in it? I remember being on that coach. That's about it."
Subsequent years were spent in a variety of homes in Liverpool, London, and Wales, with his mother and, a wicked exaggeration, "a succession of stepdads." He says he wasn't properly aware of his rather special pedigree until he was seven. "I didn't really get through; still doesn't, in a way. It's a weird feeling, sort of unexplainable. I suppose it really happened when I was 13 or 14, growing up, and people find out it's like, you go to a new school, and the headmaster would say, ' Here we have. ' And everybody go,' Boom!' And from that day, everybody knows. They point their finger and go, 'Ooh.' It's hard trying to make friends with someone who already knows you from being the son of someone else; you don't know what their interest is, friendship, or just up for grabs.
Meeting Julian is quite a revelation. His years at public school, along with constant media interest and his generous fondness for booze, suggest all sorts of nasty preconceptions. My own had been the soundtrack of a spoiled little brat trading on his father's name, his ego matched only by his wealth. It's an image fostered by a series of gossip column items following his father's death, which documented his progress around London nightclubs --stories about his supposed plans to form a band named the Lennon Drops, or even worse, Lennon Kittens, didn't help to deflect the image of a privileged layabout.
The reality, naturally, is somewhat different. "Listen, everybody goes out to clubs and everybody goes out to drink, and just because something happened that's related to me, I was someone to pick on. So even if I did go to a club four nights a week or whatever. So did a lot of other people, you know, it was like a 'let's pick on him' situation, because they had nothing better to do. I'd read all this 'Playboy Lennon out boozing again' stuff. I just thought, 'Fuck you. Everybody goes out drinking.' I was really pissed off about all that."
The inference was that you were this poor, little rich kid, more money than sense.
"Oh, listen, it was a question of scraping the money together. I could get into places through my name or whatever, which is nice, y' know, take what you can within reason. It's great getting into places without paying. Which happens, but just because I was out. Well, it only takes a couple of beers to get pissed. You get into a nightclub free, and you pay five or 10 quid and you're ratted. It's not like spending hundreds every night, is it?"
You're saying you don't have much money?
"No, I didn't. Still haven't. Never have had. I've had as much as anyone else." An odd eyebrow raised at this. "Really, even less than most people. At times when I was in Wales, if I wanted to go out for a drink, I'd go up to me mum and say, 'Look, it's Mike's birthday today. Can you lend us a fiver so we can go and have a drink?' Used to do this about twice a week."
Everyone imagines there's this bottomless fortune you dip into now and then.
"Yeah? God knows where it is. Old 'Hokey Cokey' over there has got something to do with it. I know that for sure. But I don't really care about that side of it. It's great if you've got money. And eventually something will come through to me, I imagine."
But is it in a trust or something?
"Oh, I don't know what she's doing. She's selling or making her own Foundations or ... I've no idea. Me? I would have just liked to have had a guitar of his, or some clothes, y'know? Things that mean more to me than money. I think I got a jumper out of it. I had a guitar of my dad's, but she wanted it back, so she got a guy to come over and pick it up and take it back. It was a beautiful black Yamaha acoustic guitar with a gold inlaid dragon. A guy gave it to me and said, 'This is from Yoko.' And I said, 'Great. Thanks very much.' But this guy had apparently been working for Yoko and stole it. I had no idea of this whatsoever, but she got it taken back anyway, and that's the last I've seen of it.
"When I was there, I saw a hat, and I picked it up and looked at it, and it's 'Put it back. Leave it alone. Don't touch anything.' Now it's all locked away in cupboards. God knows what's going to happen to it."
So you're still scraping a living?
"Well, my manager has been loaning me a couple of tenors every week, so I'm lucky in that respect. And there's a trust that dad set up years ago for his sons, which will be split between me and Sean. So I'll get half of that. It's about £200,000 at the moment, and I'm not supposed to get it until I'm 26 and my mom's a trustee.
"But we've been scraping around in flats ever since the word go, and it's like hell having to move every six months. So finally, I had a word and said, 'Mum, I need to settle down.' So hopefully I can use that money, some of it anyway. We're trying to get this flat in Kensington. So at least then I'll have my own home. Not that I'm ever home, because the bloody company keeps sending me all over the world. It sounds stupid, but I can't wait to sit back and watch BBC One or Coronation Street with a girl, a cup of tea, and a dog by my side. I'm a homely sort of person."
There was always a piano around the house. Julian dabbled a bit, flirted with the idea of becoming a drummer and learned the rudiments of the guitar. Far from being inevitable, the thought of turning to music as a career was a long way from his mind. Initially, he wanted to be an actor and then a recording engineer. "But you need O levels for that one. And I was never around a school to have O levels. I was always out with the lads downtown, boozing.
"Y' know, family connections made schooling a little unusual. Anyway, I was in a public school, and there was a comprehensive across the road, and I used to get flak from them. When I tried walking into town late at night to try and get some fish and chips, I get chased. And there'd be a couple of little fights here and there. It's a real pain in the arse sometimes.
"One time we were in one of the pubs in the town and one of the local yabos, he was a mechanic and six foot tall, and Welsh yakki da and all that. And he said, 'Do you know how Julian Lennon, he sticks £10 notes around his wall with pins?' So that got around town because, you know, rich little bastard. It's hard sometimes just having a drink, relaxing, because you have to keep looking over your shoulder. I was at a party once, and this guy came up to me, and he was massive, as big as big could be. And he said, 'Julian Lennon, you insulted my little brother at school.' And he went to take a swipe at me. This poor woman comes in front of me to try and stop him, and he hit her. It got very heavy at times."
When he was 14, his mother rang John Lennon in New York and suggested he might like to make the acquaintance of his son. John said, "Come on over." So they did. Their revived relationship was awkward at first, but they got on well enough, and the visits had started to become regular, and the relationship close at the time of his death.
"I still think about it all the time. There was one interview I heard the other day. He was commenting on death, and the thing he said was, 'It's like getting out of one car and into another', which I thought was wonderful. He wasn't scared of it. I think he's either resting away somewhere, or he's having a bloody good time with the lads up there, with ole Jimi Hendrix and lot of others jamming away or down the pub. I bet he's having a wonderful time."
A couple of years ago, Julian grew his hair long and became a heavy metal freak chasing round after Rush and AC/DC. Now he says he's been so busy he's lost touch a bit, but still listens in awe to Sgt. Pepper and his father's Plastic Ono Band work.
He also affectionately relates a story about going into a toilet and finding Eddie Van Halen in there swigging a bottle of scotch. The pair of them settled down with the Scotch still in the loo and got on famously.
He admits he's nervous about putting his own talents against some of the artists he hears on the radio and then full of admiration for Trevor Horn's production work with Frankie, but mourns the current obsession with dance rhythms.
"I still listen to my dad's stuff from time to time. I always felt proud of everything he did. I always had something against him, but I never knew what it was apart from him, leaving home and all that. It was because I went to visit him, but he never came to visit me. That's the only thing that got me."
He has no illusions about the business he's entering. He already come into the clutches of some sharks within no time at all, found he owed £6000 after signing some ludicrous contract. He had no money to pay it, but his present manager, Dean, bailed him out, and he's confident he won't get fooled again.
So far, he's got just two members for his band, both guitar players, one of them Justin Clayton, who he was at school with, wrote one of the best tracks on the album, "Jesse." While the other is Carlton Morales, the son of a preacher from North Carolina.
"The guitarists hate each other, but they complement one another when they play, so I'll just have to keep them apart until it's time to go on stage." Fights in the band before they're even started. Can't be bad.
Julian is whisked away into the sunset. His face is plastered on posters all over London. His single is getting as much airplay as the Culture Club's "War Song", and he's just successfully negotiated his first interview. His tea is still cold.
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