Another sad anniversary

i was 23, a young reporter in n.y. i heeard the news first from cosell, then spent all night listening to wnew-fm, the coolest, most progressive rock station around. geez, what a night.

later that week, an older reporter in my office made a derogatory comment about not understanding why all this fuss over "that commie bastid." i told him to stfu and everyone else applauded.

r.i.p., john. :'( :'( :'(

 

That sign still holds true today.

 

I once edited a columnist who called Lennon "the late drugnik John Lennon." On another column by the same old guy, the SE asked me what was the "nut graph." I said, "With him, they're all nut graphs."

 

classic response, frank. ;D ;D ;D

 

I was 11 years old. Don't remember how I heard about it. I know it wasn't on MNF.

That night in Philadelphia Springsteen & the E Street Band were playing the Spectrum. He didn't hear about it until after the show. There was brief talk of cancelling the next night's show in memory of John, but that was quickly put aside.
It was an emotional show on the 9th and Bruce opened with a brief spoken tribute to John:
"I’d just like to say one thing....I appreciate it....and it’s a hard night to come out and play tonight when so much’s been lost....the first record...the first record that I ever learned was a record called ‘Twist and Shout’ (cheers).....and if it wasn’t....if it wasn’t for John Lennon, we’d all be in some place very different tonight (cheers).... it’s....it’s an unreasonable... world and you have to live with a lot of things that are just unliveable .... and....it’s a hard thing to come out and play but there’s just nothing else you can do.” The show opened with Born to Run and the final encore was "Twist & Shout"

 

i thought he opened the show with, "twist and shout." i recall reading that as they played it, tears streamed down steve van zandt's face. i could be wrong.

 

I was only 10 and I heard it on the radio the next morning. Then everybody was talking about it at school. My first thought, which took a while to get past, was, "he just came back and now he's dead?"

 

And they were, in fact, together that night in New York, weren't they? Didn't I read that someplace?

 

Yes. From, ugh, Salon:

The Beatles didn't come together for "Saturday Night Live" (although George Harrison did appear in a skit on a subsequent episode trying unsuccessfully to claim his share of the $3,000). But in their book "Saturday Night: A Backstage History of 'Saturday Night Live,'" Doug Hill and Jeff Weingrad report that John Lennon and Paul McCartney at least gave Michaels' proposal a passing thought. The authors quote a Playboy interview with Lennon shortly before his death in which he confirms that he did indeed watch Michaels' original "Saturday Night Live" pitch -- with McCartney, who happened to be visiting him at the Dakota. Said Lennon, the two thought the whole idea was so funny, "We almost went down to the studio as a gag."

 

"A sign of how twisted life in the U.S. is that John Lennon was shot from point blank range in front of his apartment building while Yoko Ono, who was right next to him, didn't take one bullet." Dennis Leary

 

That's one mistake I intend to rectify as soon as I perfect my time machine.

Actually, if I were to have her killed in 1966 before he ever laid eyes on her, we'd be spared Revolution 9, Bagism and Primal Scream Therapy......hmmmm......

 

Yeah, but we might have a 250-pound John Lennon hosting Star Search, munching fried banana sandwiches, and auditioning for the open slot in Van Halen.