Most likely the song I hate the most in all the world. If WEF (World Economic Forum) had Satan to sing the opening song this would be the one he would choose. But to see the dept of its Nihilistic darkness we need the lyrics, which is surprising were not given here, as they are pretty much the whole point:
“(from “Imagine: John Lennon” soundtrack)
Imagine there’s no heaven
It’s easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today… Aha-ah…
Imagine there’s no countries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion, too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace… You…
You may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will be as one
Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world… You…
You may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will live as one”
So the abandonment of the concepts of and good and evil, just live for self. No loyalties, nothing worth fighting for.
Claus Schwab summed this song up at the WEF conference, likely after Satan finished singing, before the opening speech:
“”You’ll own nothing and you’ll be happy.“”
And the crowd cheered wildly, George Soros draining his champagne and smiling for the first time in fifty years…..
.
Christopher Gelber
2 years ago
Lennon was many things: a sardonic wit, a fine composer, a tremendous vocalist and an all-round creative talent of real depth. But a deep thinker he wasn’t. He was ultra-naive, a babe in the woods, ready and willing to be used by any and all who saw his utopianism as a useful tool, from Yoko through to fans of totalitarian regimes and nasty hard-left causes around the world. At least Yoko loved him. And I never want to hear Imagine again. It’s a pretty melody tied to stupid lyrics, and has become a by-word for cheap virtue-signalling by those who can’t be bothered to make an effort. Which he would not have wanted.
One thing which most people do not know about Lennon was he was startlingly violent. He beat a large number of men up, he loved to fight after drinking, and had a strong violent streak so was very good at it. Also a number of women said he violently sexually assaulted them, young, naive, fan girls gotten high, on a regular basis.
I would strongly advise any Beatles fan to not read Cynthia Lennon’s book about their relationship (can’t remember the title). I couldn’t bear to play my in car CDs for at least a year after I read it.
Jon Redman
2 years ago
It’s a potting of hypocritical, utopian socialism into 3 minutes of abject don’t-do-as-I-do-do-as-I-say vacuity, and it is this I think that makes it so unpleasant. The dreary piano finger exercise accompaniment does not help.
It’s essentially a list of things which the writer objects to other people having in small quantities – religion, faith, possessions – while himself having them in gluttonous excess. Observed in other people, any appetite for any of this is dismissed as greed, but meanwhile it’s fine for him to be arguably the most up-himself Scouser in history. He’s like a motorist in a traffic jam complaining about other people’s cars causing the jam.
I wouldn’t puke harder listening to a Diane Abbott dirge about racism, or a Julie Bigot tune about sexism, or an Al Gore movie about climate change.
He had a gluttonous quantity of possessions certainly. But how can you say that Lennon had huge amounts of religion, faith, or, I would add, patriotism?
Brendan O'Leary
2 years ago
I heard Imagine a few times at funerals and always wondered what the priest made of the “no religion” lyrics.
Yes! You’ve picked the two songs that are on top of this Licensed Lay Minister’s (Reader’s) hit-list. As for “My Way” — I imagine(!) Adam singing it to Eve as they walked out of the Garden of Eden.
Mikey Mike
2 years ago
Maybe having a conversation about the hyperbolic love and hatred of “Imagine” by worshipers and critics is also more than the song deserves. We can “imagine” a lot of stupid things (it’s easy if you try). It feels really weird discussing the legitimacy of John Lennon’s Theory of Everything when John Lennon never really gave us a serviceable theory of anything.
Francis MacGabhann
2 years ago
Ah, the 1960s. The rise of the boomers and the birth of mass, debilitating, paralysing narcissism. And right at the centre of it, the biggest narcissist of the lot, John Winston Lennon and his anthem to self-regard, Imagine. One of the handful of better efforts from a so-so songwriter, an indifferent pianist, a mediocre guitarist and a voice so reedy it had to be double-tracked on every recording he ever made. Just the man to represent that generation.
The Beatles provided the soundtrack to my teen years. The whole was very much greater than the sum of the parts.
michael stanwick
2 years ago
I remember 1st listening to ‘Imagine’ and ‘My Sweet Lord’ back in the early 70s in NZ when I was gathering money for Uni by hay-making on a farm in the blazing heat. There were three of us taking hay bales and kneeing them up onto the back off a truck and I could hear these songs playing on the truck radio. The farmer’s wife would bring a large ‘billy’ of hot black tea for us down in the valley, and hearing these songs and drinking the tea was a divine moment in time. But then I was young and only interested in the tunes.
Then Tubular Bells came out …. but that is a different story.
Last edited 2 years ago by michael stanwick
Jon Redman
2 years ago
The idea of the anti-chart is a very funny one.
Years ago, probably about 40 years ago in fact, I read an interview with the famously paranoid Gary Numan. He was banging on about all the security he’s got everywhere (“Here in moi car / Oi feel sifest of aw“) and how as a last resort, under his bed he kept shotguns and a great big baseball bat. That way, anyone coming in there knew they were going to get a good pasting.
After what one sensed was probably a strained pause, the interviewer asked him why he thought all this…necessary. The reply was that if you’re Number One, 250,000 people bought your record and like you, but 55 million more didn’t and don’t. So they must hate you and might be coming for you.
If we’d had a Bottom 40 countdown every week it might have reassured Gazza that, really, nobody gave a stuff…
Lesley van Reenen
2 years ago
It’s just a really good song. Pity it has been hijacked as since when do we pick apart the lyrics of every song. All this hoo-ha.
Agree – it’s a beautiful pop song. The lyrics don’t make sense any more than those of Bohemian Rhapsody – try analysing that! (50 in a couple of years).
I suspect the antagonism is more against Lennon and his politics than the song. When Cameron chose Eton Rifles for Desert Island Discs a load of The Jam fans were up in arms – “how dare he?” I’ve a sneaking suspicion most of the people who grew up listening to the anti-Thatcher bands of the 80s are Tories now!
Tony Taylor
2 years ago
Get back – ho ho – to me on 1 November 1975, when the world is celebrating the 50th anniversary of my favourite ex-Beatle song, Magneto & Titanium Man.
Most likely the song I hate the most in all the world. If WEF (World Economic Forum) had Satan to sing the opening song this would be the one he would choose. But to see the dept of its Nihilistic darkness we need the lyrics, which is surprising were not given here, as they are pretty much the whole point:
“(from “Imagine: John Lennon” soundtrack)
Imagine there’s no heaven
It’s easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today… Aha-ah…
Imagine there’s no countries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion, too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace… You…
You may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will be as one
Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world… You…
You may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will live as one”
So the abandonment of the concepts of and good and evil, just live for self. No loyalties, nothing worth fighting for.
Claus Schwab summed this song up at the WEF conference, likely after Satan finished singing, before the opening speech:
“”You’ll own nothing and you’ll be happy.“”
And the crowd cheered wildly, George Soros draining his champagne and smiling for the first time in fifty years…..
.
Lennon was many things: a sardonic wit, a fine composer, a tremendous vocalist and an all-round creative talent of real depth. But a deep thinker he wasn’t. He was ultra-naive, a babe in the woods, ready and willing to be used by any and all who saw his utopianism as a useful tool, from Yoko through to fans of totalitarian regimes and nasty hard-left causes around the world. At least Yoko loved him. And I never want to hear Imagine again. It’s a pretty melody tied to stupid lyrics, and has become a by-word for cheap virtue-signalling by those who can’t be bothered to make an effort. Which he would not have wanted.
One thing which most people do not know about Lennon was he was startlingly violent. He beat a large number of men up, he loved to fight after drinking, and had a strong violent streak so was very good at it. Also a number of women said he violently sexually assaulted them, young, naive, fan girls gotten high, on a regular basis.
I would strongly advise any Beatles fan to not read Cynthia Lennon’s book about their relationship (can’t remember the title). I couldn’t bear to play my in car CDs for at least a year after I read it.
It’s a potting of hypocritical, utopian socialism into 3 minutes of abject don’t-do-as-I-do-do-as-I-say vacuity, and it is this I think that makes it so unpleasant. The dreary piano finger exercise accompaniment does not help.
It’s essentially a list of things which the writer objects to other people having in small quantities – religion, faith, possessions – while himself having them in gluttonous excess. Observed in other people, any appetite for any of this is dismissed as greed, but meanwhile it’s fine for him to be arguably the most up-himself Scouser in history. He’s like a motorist in a traffic jam complaining about other people’s cars causing the jam.
I wouldn’t puke harder listening to a Diane Abbott dirge about racism, or a Julie Bigot tune about sexism, or an Al Gore movie about climate change.
‘arguably the most up-himself Scouser in history’
-and that in itself is a remarkable accomplishment
He had a gluttonous quantity of possessions certainly. But how can you say that Lennon had huge amounts of religion, faith, or, I would add, patriotism?
I heard Imagine a few times at funerals and always wondered what the priest made of the “no religion” lyrics.
As a parish priest the only two songs I have ever banned from the funerals I conduct are ‘Imagine’, and ‘My Way’.
Same here. Both totally inappropriate for a Christian funeral.
Do you mean Frank Sinatra’s rendition or Sid Vicious?
Were you okay with Return to Sender?
No one’s asked me for it yet.
Or Highway to Hell?
Yes! You’ve picked the two songs that are on top of this Licensed Lay Minister’s (Reader’s) hit-list. As for “My Way” — I imagine(!) Adam singing it to Eve as they walked out of the Garden of Eden.
Maybe having a conversation about the hyperbolic love and hatred of “Imagine” by worshipers and critics is also more than the song deserves. We can “imagine” a lot of stupid things (it’s easy if you try). It feels really weird discussing the legitimacy of John Lennon’s Theory of Everything when John Lennon never really gave us a serviceable theory of anything.
Ah, the 1960s. The rise of the boomers and the birth of mass, debilitating, paralysing narcissism. And right at the centre of it, the biggest narcissist of the lot, John Winston Lennon and his anthem to self-regard, Imagine. One of the handful of better efforts from a so-so songwriter, an indifferent pianist, a mediocre guitarist and a voice so reedy it had to be double-tracked on every recording he ever made. Just the man to represent that generation.
The Beatles provided the soundtrack to my teen years. The whole was very much greater than the sum of the parts.
I remember 1st listening to ‘Imagine’ and ‘My Sweet Lord’ back in the early 70s in NZ when I was gathering money for Uni by hay-making on a farm in the blazing heat. There were three of us taking hay bales and kneeing them up onto the back off a truck and I could hear these songs playing on the truck radio. The farmer’s wife would bring a large ‘billy’ of hot black tea for us down in the valley, and hearing these songs and drinking the tea was a divine moment in time. But then I was young and only interested in the tunes.
Then Tubular Bells came out …. but that is a different story.
The idea of the anti-chart is a very funny one.
Years ago, probably about 40 years ago in fact, I read an interview with the famously paranoid Gary Numan. He was banging on about all the security he’s got everywhere (“Here in moi car / Oi feel sifest of aw“) and how as a last resort, under his bed he kept shotguns and a great big baseball bat. That way, anyone coming in there knew they were going to get a good pasting.
After what one sensed was probably a strained pause, the interviewer asked him why he thought all this…necessary. The reply was that if you’re Number One, 250,000 people bought your record and like you, but 55 million more didn’t and don’t. So they must hate you and might be coming for you.
If we’d had a Bottom 40 countdown every week it might have reassured Gazza that, really, nobody gave a stuff…
It’s just a really good song. Pity it has been hijacked as since when do we pick apart the lyrics of every song. All this hoo-ha.
There appears to be some dissent about the “really good song” thing.
It is the Tony Bliar of songs. The one that ALWAYS gets me reaching for the “off” button.
Agree – it’s a beautiful pop song. The lyrics don’t make sense any more than those of Bohemian Rhapsody – try analysing that! (50 in a couple of years).
I suspect the antagonism is more against Lennon and his politics than the song. When Cameron chose Eton Rifles for Desert Island Discs a load of The Jam fans were up in arms – “how dare he?” I’ve a sneaking suspicion most of the people who grew up listening to the anti-Thatcher bands of the 80s are Tories now!
Get back – ho ho – to me on 1 November 1975, when the world is celebrating the 50th anniversary of my favourite ex-Beatle song, Magneto & Titanium Man.