John Lennon-Imagine (1971)

Artist: John Lennon

Title: Imagine

Label: Apple

Format: LP

Cat #: SW 3379

Year of Release: 1971

Country and Year of Edition Issue: US 1971 early Winchester pressing

Sold Price: $14.99

Listed Condition: VG+/VG+, no inserts, cover in original shrink

Sell Date: 

Discogs Last Sold: 11/20/20

Low: $2.00

Median: $9.45

High: $70.24

Current low price: $6.00 VG/G, $8.95 VG+/VG+

Current Number on Sale at Discogs: 86

Have/Want: 2393/378

Where Sold: South Lake Tahoe, CA

Time it took to sell: 4 years

Where and When Bought: Al-Bums Worcester early 80's

Gwiz-gau Letter Grade: A+

Sad To See It Go: Yes

"You're a dreamer!" was shouted at John during the 1975 performance of the title track on the legendary Salute to Sir Lew Grade performance.   "Imagine" gets a lot of criticism nowaday from short haired yellow bellied grandsons of Tricky Dick for the rare utopian vision in elevators across the world.  They must be crippled inside!  They don't have to worry, it will be banned soon enough, as all utopian visions ultimately succumb to the Truth Lennon spoke of.  These truths come in the form of ballots, bullets and breakups.

I had a nice Apple copy of Imagine sans the inserts but still in the shrink wrap it was bought in.  It fell to $15 somehow and finally sold.   I gave it a blasting spin a few Sundays ago.  I'm no vinyl fetishist, but I wanted to hear a loud ambient listen of the original mix before the new fangled one gets restamped into the digital realm for all eternity.

Imagine being one of the great albums of not only Lennon's solo catalog, but the music itself deserves to be heard as originally intended without some idiots modern day sensibilities "adding" to it.

The important thing to note about Imagine is that it is a song cycle in total.  The opening utopian vision is a calculated ruse,  coming out of the primal scream Plastic Ono Band the year before.  Strings and things.  But has Lennon been lulled into post-Working Class Hero civility?  No.  The well rounded asshole comes out in "How Do You Sleep?," a dig at Beatle Paul and his Ramified domestic bliss.  They probably had a chuckle over this at the Maclen board meeting.  

Alternating between love songs and grumpy missives was a commercial renaissance of sorts.  You can't really argue with any of it.  Every track is memorable and works as a whole.  No moon, spoon, june for him.

The album worked for quite a while as mass media reflective psychology.  This holds true whether it is  "Oh My Love" on the Little Darlings soundtrack or "I Don't Want To Be A Soldier" in the background, as machine gun fire rakes and a disembodied deep voice intones "Vietnam....."

It's a sick world after all.