Post by lovinlennon on Apr 23, 2010 2:23:34 GMT 1
Okay. I'm sure you've all seen, or heard of this concert. It was the Plastic Ono Band, as well as Eric Clapton, and Alan White on drums. If any of you haven't seen it, I have a link for the video on youtube, Ill post them on here if you guys want.
So, I was reading Clapton's autobiography (great btw), and he accounts to how he ended up going to the concert, and what happened there. It doesn't sound as interesting as it seems, but it is. It was the funniest thing ever, so I thought I would type the story out of the book, I would love to hear your reactions.
"The last Blind Faith concert took place in Honolulu on August 24, and I then returned to England and Hurtwood (his house). I had barely settled in, however, when one Saturday morning, September 13, the phone rang, It was John Lennon. ""What are you doing tonight?"" he asked me.
""nothing,"" I replied.
""Well, do you want to do a gig with the Plastic Ono Band in Toronto?"" he asked.
""Yeah, sure,"" I answered, because part of the thing in those days was doing stuff like that, hopping on a plane on the spur of moment without giving it a second thought. ""great!"" he said, ""Meet me as soon as you can get there in the BOAC first-class lounge at the London airport. I'll explain everything then.""
I drove to the airport, where I found John and Yoko with Klauss Vorman, the bass player of the band, and the drummer, Alan White. John was going through his white suit phase and had long hair and a beard. He told us that we were going to play at the Toronto Rock and Roll revival festival and that we could rehearse on the plane. We carried out semi-acoustic electric guitars on board and settles into the first-class cabin among a number of other passengers, including the man who owned the Schick razor company. He was sitter in the same row of seats as us and tried to humour us by saying we could all make good use of his razors to shave out beards and mustaches.
He didn't get very far since, as soon as we were airborne, we were concentrating on running through the numbers for the show, sons like Be-Bop-A-Lula,Yer Blues, Dizzy Miss Lizzie, and Blue Suede shoes. We just played sitting in our seats. No one complained, which, looking back on it, was not surprising since John was one of the biggest stars in the world, and the other passengers were probably just astonished to be in the same space with him. Curiously enough, I don't recall Yoko getting involved at all. She just sat quietly in the background.
When we arrived in Toronto it was raining, and we were standing around waiting for the luggage when a huge limo rolled up, and John and Yoko jumped into it and drove away, leaving the rest of us standing there without a clue of what to do next. ""Well, thats nice,"" I thought. In the end we got in the van with the luggage, which I deemed a bit sad, as I felt we deserved a little more respect than that.
When er arrived we found that we were all staying together in this very grand house belonging to Cyrus Eaton, one of the richest men in Canada, and that a press conference had been called. Loads of journalists turned up, but John and Yoko steadfastly refused to come out to talk to then. So I spoke to them instead, and they were very complementary, saying how eloquent I was for a musician. I bathed in that glory for a while, and then we all went to the show.
We found out that we were going on between Chuck Berry and Little Richard, and John was terrified, overwhelmed I think by the fact that he was going on stage with all his heroes. Backstage, John and I did so much blow that he thew up, and I had to lie down for a while. Luckily we had Terry Doran with us, who was John's personal assistant, and he made sure that John was fit to go on stage.
The Plastic Ono Band went on at midnight and played a tough hard-core set of standard rock'n'roll numbers. Considering that we had never plated together before we rehearsed on the plane, I thought we sounded good. At the end John told us to take off our guitars, turn them up, and lean them against the amplifiers. He did the same thing, and the amps and guitars just started howling in feedback while we either stood to one side or got off stage. Yoko started to sing along with this, a song she had written called "Oh, John." It sounded pretty strange to me, more like howling than singing, but that was her thing. John thought it was all pretty funny, and that's what closed our set. Then we all piled into four cars that had been organized by Cyrus Eaton's son and drove back to spend what was left of the night at the sprawling estate. The following afternoon we flew back to England. My payment for the gig consisted of a few of John's drawings, which over time I have unfortunately lost."
So, I was reading Clapton's autobiography (great btw), and he accounts to how he ended up going to the concert, and what happened there. It doesn't sound as interesting as it seems, but it is. It was the funniest thing ever, so I thought I would type the story out of the book, I would love to hear your reactions.
"The last Blind Faith concert took place in Honolulu on August 24, and I then returned to England and Hurtwood (his house). I had barely settled in, however, when one Saturday morning, September 13, the phone rang, It was John Lennon. ""What are you doing tonight?"" he asked me.
""nothing,"" I replied.
""Well, do you want to do a gig with the Plastic Ono Band in Toronto?"" he asked.
""Yeah, sure,"" I answered, because part of the thing in those days was doing stuff like that, hopping on a plane on the spur of moment without giving it a second thought. ""great!"" he said, ""Meet me as soon as you can get there in the BOAC first-class lounge at the London airport. I'll explain everything then.""
I drove to the airport, where I found John and Yoko with Klauss Vorman, the bass player of the band, and the drummer, Alan White. John was going through his white suit phase and had long hair and a beard. He told us that we were going to play at the Toronto Rock and Roll revival festival and that we could rehearse on the plane. We carried out semi-acoustic electric guitars on board and settles into the first-class cabin among a number of other passengers, including the man who owned the Schick razor company. He was sitter in the same row of seats as us and tried to humour us by saying we could all make good use of his razors to shave out beards and mustaches.
He didn't get very far since, as soon as we were airborne, we were concentrating on running through the numbers for the show, sons like Be-Bop-A-Lula,Yer Blues, Dizzy Miss Lizzie, and Blue Suede shoes. We just played sitting in our seats. No one complained, which, looking back on it, was not surprising since John was one of the biggest stars in the world, and the other passengers were probably just astonished to be in the same space with him. Curiously enough, I don't recall Yoko getting involved at all. She just sat quietly in the background.
When we arrived in Toronto it was raining, and we were standing around waiting for the luggage when a huge limo rolled up, and John and Yoko jumped into it and drove away, leaving the rest of us standing there without a clue of what to do next. ""Well, thats nice,"" I thought. In the end we got in the van with the luggage, which I deemed a bit sad, as I felt we deserved a little more respect than that.
When er arrived we found that we were all staying together in this very grand house belonging to Cyrus Eaton, one of the richest men in Canada, and that a press conference had been called. Loads of journalists turned up, but John and Yoko steadfastly refused to come out to talk to then. So I spoke to them instead, and they were very complementary, saying how eloquent I was for a musician. I bathed in that glory for a while, and then we all went to the show.
We found out that we were going on between Chuck Berry and Little Richard, and John was terrified, overwhelmed I think by the fact that he was going on stage with all his heroes. Backstage, John and I did so much blow that he thew up, and I had to lie down for a while. Luckily we had Terry Doran with us, who was John's personal assistant, and he made sure that John was fit to go on stage.
The Plastic Ono Band went on at midnight and played a tough hard-core set of standard rock'n'roll numbers. Considering that we had never plated together before we rehearsed on the plane, I thought we sounded good. At the end John told us to take off our guitars, turn them up, and lean them against the amplifiers. He did the same thing, and the amps and guitars just started howling in feedback while we either stood to one side or got off stage. Yoko started to sing along with this, a song she had written called "Oh, John." It sounded pretty strange to me, more like howling than singing, but that was her thing. John thought it was all pretty funny, and that's what closed our set. Then we all piled into four cars that had been organized by Cyrus Eaton's son and drove back to spend what was left of the night at the sprawling estate. The following afternoon we flew back to England. My payment for the gig consisted of a few of John's drawings, which over time I have unfortunately lost."
I've read about the concert before, but I haven't read Clapton's autobiography so it's interesting to read about it from his point of view! Thanks so much for taking the time to type this out for us.
