Boy, You've Had To Carry That Weight - A Long Time
THE SUNDAY AGE
Saturday July 22, 1995
Now it can be revealed. John Lennon's decline can be traced to an Australian and his pair of clogs. Andrew Dyson 'fesses up.
I'M NO kiss and tell merchant, but when the remaining Beatles pad their already respectable bank balances by dubbing their ailing voices on an old John Lennon demo it's time for me to cash in, too. Only my good woman's prowess with the crochet hook prevented my children from freezing this winter, and I've yet to see the McCartney, Starkey and Harrison offspring wearing sweaters wrought from pea-straw.
Yes, I'm spilling the beans on my intense physical relationship with John Lennon and if Ms Ono doesn't like it, tough sashimi.
Like many feckless young Australians in the early seventies, I worked the West Australian nickel mines to buy a passage to London.
Swinging London had been well and truly murdered by this stage and I spent most of my time being sneered at in employment exchanges by snooty types with faulty dental work.
I soon found the only way to meet people was to attend demonstrations, and I attended them all, whatever the cause. Feminist, Black, Vegetarian, Nazi I was that gawping figure at the edge of the crowd, mouthing (never shouting) that week's slogan.
Number One Cause at the time was the `OZ' trial, and we dutifully paraded around Marble Arch for the benefit of Richard Neville, the latter day revisionist and Ray Martin ``personality". Suddenly London's Finest charged us with batons. Always protective of the noble profile I still bear today (with minor modifications under the chin), I vaulted the railings of Hyde Park and landed on something squashy.
``Get off!" shrieked a Merseyside accent from beneath my seventy kilos of flailing colonial brawn. ``Get off! You're f. . . . . .
crooshing me!" Righting myself, I discovered the voice came from a small man with sharp features, rimless spectacles and a very silly hat. ``Bloody awful demonstration this is" said the dwarf. ``Yes" I replied cannily, ``we have much better ones in Australia." At this point Mr Lennon was set upon by American autograph hounds, one of whom magically produced a Double White album for signature. We never met again.
Reflectively munching a Wimpyburger after the fracas, I felt I'd made an impression on the man. A size-ten impression over the left kidney to be exact for I'd been wearing those serviceable clogs that did so much to ruin the posture of my generation. Little did I know that I had also crushed his spirit, for soon afterwards Lennon emigrated to America and began producing some of the worst work of his career. Remember `Attica State'? That was my fault.
In fact I now feel responsible for the tragedy that occured in the forecourt of the Dakota Building on 8 December 1980. Did not Lennon flee England in fear of falling Australians? Did he not move to the most dangerous city in the world to be free of them? And if you play `Starting Over' backwards at 78rpm do you not hear the words ``Get off my back, you fat bastard" repeated over and over? Well, I do, and I haven't abused any substances for over twenty years.
Why didn't I stay in Australia? Why didn't I slake my wanderlust running down the Great Ocean Road in my olf FC? If I'd just had the sense to stay home, get a job in a bank and raise kids, the world would have so much more to cherish from this prolific genius. Just imagine another 15 years of co-productions with Yoko featuring windchimes interspersed with sudden yelps . . .
Yes, I did the world a favor. He was all played out by 1980 anyway it would have been demeaning for him to continue to abuse his muse.
Besides which he was a rude bastard, none of the graces, never a please or a thank you, he would have been an awful old man. And while we're at it, who does that McCartney geek think he is, peddling that sop? Paul McCartney LIVE? You must be joking! Harrison? Don't waste my time. Ringo! RINGO! Living proof you don't need brains to make money.
Not that I'm bitter. Oh, no. I appreciate that weak minds still find solace in the ramblings of those old fools, the sort of minds that switched off when they first heard `Anarchy in the UK' and haven't functioned since. These people need help, and endless repeats of `Strawberry Fields' on easy listening stations are a good substitute for Prozac. ``Living is easy with eyes closed . . ." You bet! And don't you forget to air down your sheepskin underblanket before you toddle down to the DSS to complain about your pension.
And I touched him! You didn't! I fulfilled your wildest dreams while you were lolling around on velour sofas smoking dope. And let me tell you sonething else. John Lennon was short. Really short.
© 1995 THE SUNDAY AGE