Plastic Ono Band

The Plastic Ono Band is the band John Lennon formed after he left the Beatles.

Shortly before the Beatles disbanded, John Lennon collaborated with his newfound companion Yoko Ono on the experimental album Unfinished Music No.1: Two Virgins. With the release of Paul McCartney's solo album McCartney, the Beatles were officially disbanded, and Lennon began work on his own solo projects.

The Plastic Ono Band's first album, Live Peace In Toronto, was recorded during the Toronto Rock and Roll Revival Festival in 1969, and some of the stars that performed in this event were Little Richard, Bo Diddley, Jerry Lee Lewis, and others from the early years of the genre. The crowd attending was first surprised and then delighted as they learned that Beatle John Lennon (the band hadn't broken up yet) was actually going to play for them, not only because The Plastic Ono Band was not announced on the bill, but also because this first incarnation of the group consisted of Eric Clapton, who was a well known and most respected guitar hero of the era, Klaus Voorman, a bass player and old friend of Lennon from Germany, who was famous for the art of the Beatles' Revolver album, a then-unknown drummer, Alan White, who came to prominence some years later with Yes, and Yoko Ono, who stayed quiet beside Lennon for most of the band's performance. Following the spirit of the festival, The Plastic Ono Band played old rock and roll numbers like "Blue Suede Shoes", "Money" and "Dizzy Miss Lizzie", but also interpolated their recently released singles "Cold Turkey" and "Give Peace a Chance", as well as "Yer Blues", a song from the Beatles' 1968 White Album. For the second part of their show, Yoko took the microphone and along with the band performed what has been considered to be one of the first massive expressions of avant-garde and experimental music in a rock scenario. The composition "Don't Worry Kyoko (Mummy's only looking for her hand in the snow)" consisted of a simple repetitive riff played by the group, while Yoko improvised the least fashionable notes a singer could produce. Just before the audience knew what was going on, "John John" was offered to these young Canadians. They surely were expecting more early rock songs, but this original by Ono was an absolute breaking of whatever song standards there existed previously, the band playing as noisily and as incoherently as the amplifiers made it possible, all in a sea of feedback, and Lennon's wife screaming her guts out for more than half an hour. Taking into consideration that Yoko Ono had been already an avant-garde artist, and the volatile state of mind of John Lennon during these years, this performance could be considered as "typical" of the couple.

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The second album, John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band was meant as an exercise in personal therapy. Lennon poured his personal feelings and troubles into a series of songs that he considered "primal scream" therapy; this is reflected in a number of songs on the album in which Lennon literally screams. The result of his work was an album considered by many to be one of the predecessors of modern-day "grunge" and punk rock, as Lennon lashed out at the world and exorcised his inner demons.

The album was highly controversial because Lennon chose to include profanities in two songs: "I Found Out" and "Working Class Hero." The record label refused to print the actual lyrics containing these expletives. Even more upsetting to fans was the song "God," in which Lennon shuts himself away from the Beatles with the lyric "I don't believe in Beatles."

The song "Mother" is a dirge starting with a knell and covering Lennon's relationship with his family: from what Lennon perceived as his mother's abandonment of him and his continuing grief over the loss; to his father's abandonment of him and his indifference towards John's need; to an entreaty to Lennon's son Julian not to act like his father. The song closes with the repeatedly screamed lines "Mama don't go; Daddy come home."

"Hold On John" is a Beatles leftover from the White Album, and features Lennon mimicking Cookie Monster (then a new television character), saying in a gravelly voice during the bridge, "cookie!"

"I Found Out" covers Lennon's disgust with "freaks on the phone" bothering him as well as his disillusionment with Christianity ("There ain't no Jesus going to come from the sky") and the International Society for Krishna Consciousness ("Ole Hare Krishna got nothing on you // just keeps you crazy with nothing to do") and his anger over his relationship with his mother and father, as well as a perhaps ironic encouragement to avoid drugs and "feel your own pain."

"Working Class Hero" is about Lennon's disaffection with what he perceives as exploitation of the working class : "They keep you doped with religion and sex and TV // And you think you're so clever and classless and free // But you're still fucking peasants as far as I can see."

"Isolation" is a piano ballad about John and Yoko, their efforts towards social change, and the criticism they received because of it. Part of it serves as a recrimination of their critics, though tempered with sympathy: "I don't expect you to understand // After you caused so much pain // But then again you're not to blame," etc.

"Remember" is a song about many of the themes covered in the other songs on the album: worker exploitation, escape to a better place, Lennon's mother and father. It ends dramatically with a reference to the Gunpowder Plot and the sound of an explosion, Lennon's ironic attempt to express a disavowal of social activism.

In "God," Lennon refers to God as "a concept by which we measure our pain," and follows that description with a list of things he does not believe in: magic, the Bible, Kennedy, Buddha, Mantra, the Bhagavad Gita, Yoga, kings, Elvis Presley, Tarot cards, Jesus, the I Ching, Robert Zimmerman (aka Bob Dylan), the Beatles, and Adolf Hitler (the last one a reference to Lennon's wish to have Hitler appear on the cover of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band--an idea that was scuttled after controversy erupted over Lennon's "bigger than Jesus" comment). Lennon concludes that what he believes in is himself and Yoko Ono, and that his fans will have to carry on after The Beatles' breakup.

"My Mummy's Dead" is a muted acoustic guitar song about John Lennon's mother. The song lasts 59 seconds.

Track listing

1. "Mother"
2. "Hold On"
3. "I Found Out"
4. "Working Class Hero"
5. "Isolation"
6. "Remember"
7. "Love"
8. "Well Well Well"
9. "Look At Me"
10. "God"
11. "My Mummy's Dead"

A remastered 2001 re-release of the album on CD also included the tracks "Power To The People" and "Do The Oz."