In an interesting and detailed interview with the Daily Mail, Yoko Ono says her favorite photo of her and John Lennon is still the controversial "Two Virgins" photo that features the two of them naked. The album was sold in paper bags originally, but CD versions have been uncensored.
"I look at it now and it makes me laugh. We were coming from such a place of innocence and spontaneity. There was no retouching, no waxing – it was just us as we were and we weren’t ashamed. I was worried about how Sean would feel about it as he got older, but Sean loves this photo too."
She says putting John's bloody glasses on the cover of her "Seasons of Glass" album, which was heavily criticized at the time, was an easy decision.
"To me it was the natural thing to do. John had been shot, these were the glasses he was wearing when he was shot, this was the reality. John was a musician, he was my husband, he was a Beatle, but under all that he was an artist. I am an artist. As artists, neither of us wanted reality swept under the rug. This is what John would have wanted done.
She credits Paul McCartney with helping bring her and John back together after their "Lost Weekend" separation. "Paul brought us back together. He spoke to me, he spoke to John, he got John to come back and understand the door was open. It was a very big thing Paul did for us."
She also says the relationship between Paul and her isn't as divisive as tabloid reports make it look. "Paul has a very sweet side and he and I have made our peace. We are both business partners in Apple, and we speak and things are good between us. We know each other very well, and while we’ve had differences in the past, there was never a rift as people think. It was never so black and white."
It's well known that Yoko is an avid user of Twitter and Facebook. The roots of this may go back to when we first interviewed her in 1998. She told us in a phone interview she'd been thinking about exploring the internet and finally did.
"So one night, I did look into it. And when I finished, it was dawn," she said. "And I said, 'I'm not doing this, you know.' (Laughing) I don't want to be one of those people who gets obsessed with it. And I'm a very obsessive type. So, no, I have to sort of, like, leave it alone. At this point, I have to leave it alone. If I do get into it, I'll soon be there 12 hours a day or something...and I just don't want to do that."
And it's no surprise she thinks John would have been the same way.
"He’d be sending out pronouncements and messages and giving his opinion all the time on everything," she told the Daily Mail. "He would be 70 years old, but he’d want to know everything that’s going on. We share that curiosity and that energy. At 77, I can’t stop."
You can read the full interview here.
Comments
Love the LP cover, I remember one of my friends sneaking it into his high school locker and giving us a peek ! LOL ! Still have mine in the paper bag sleeve ! Fun times.... :)
Great article!
Not my favorite pic, but up there...I'd have to go with the Annie Leibovitz pic of John naked in bed with a fully cloth Yoko in late December 1980. To me it's the gentle look on Yoko's face of being satisfied and Johns look of happiness....A Double Fantasy so to speak.
But you have to give it to them because although I wasn't shocked by seeing them naked, it was certainly something I never thought I'd see......."everybody's got one" John and Yoko too.
Happy New Years
Steve
I think that's the whole idea. It was the whole backstory around its release that probably figures into why she likes it.
It certainly wasn't John's favorite pic. He had his assistant go to Beatlefest in the 70's and buy up all the copies he could find because he was embarrased by it by then.
Shelley Germeaux
John Lennon Examiner
May Pang was the assistant and told the story in "Instamatic Karma," but she told me that the comment was light-hearted and John wasn't being serious when he said it.
"He showed me this cover art, and I pointed to the Times, 'Oh...you've
even got the Times in there,' like his dick wasn't out [...]"
-- Ringo
Love it LOL; BOB
Nice article Steve! I remember when my mother bought me the Nicholas Schaffer "Beatles Forever" book (I was about 13 or so) she very sweetly cut out the photo of the Two Virgins cover. Ah, parental censorship... ;)
Ha, ha! Nice story! Great book, too!
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