The one John Lennon album Ringo Starr hated, and the one Ringo Starr album John Lennon loathed
John Lennon being an absolute shit stirrer? No, it was only a hobby he partook in on days ending in Y.
There’s a lot to be said for the fact that although he might have been the most prolific Beatle, he was also possibly the fieriest, and that trait showed its ugly head more and more often as the future of the band fell into the flames. After all, nothing says ‘fuck you’ more to your bandmates than getting fully naked on a solo album cover.
While 1968 was marked by the seismic release of The White Album, Lennon was becoming increasingly aloof as he headed to the bedroom with Yoko Ono, stripped bare, and created Two Virgins. I mean, relations within the band were beginning to intensify, but surely they weren’t that bad? It’s fair to say it left the rest of them less than impressed.
Of course, the avant-garde sound of the album was its own issue to contend with, but it was more the eyeful of a cover that Ringo Starr took umbrage with. “Oh, come on, John,” he later recalled saying, “You’re doing all this stuff – it may be cool for you, but we have to answer. It doesn’t matter whichever one of us does something, we all have to answer for it.”
To be fair to him, he did kind of have a point. On top of the fame and mania they were all experiencing, there’s ultimately only so many questions one man can answer about another man’s dick, before it all gets too much. But what was probably seen as a mild chastisement to most was viewed as the utmost offence to Lennon, and was something he stored in his arsenal until it was time to sling it back at Starr.
Because the next few years were obviously all sunshine and rainbows for the band… not – it was fair to say that by the time 1970 rolled around, nobody was on the best of terms with each other. In this sense, no matter what each Beatle released in the immediate aftermath of the band’s break-up, it was inevitably going to be met with animosity, which was exactly the case that played out for the drummer.
Starr’s solo debut, Sentimental Journey, was only intended as a reminiscent exploration of the sounds that shaped his childhood, and yet he was faced with hurls of abuse when he released it. “Sub-par,” “Not experimental enough,” but the most stinging insult of all? “Embarrassing,” as snarled by Lennon.
It’s difficult to say whether he truly had this absolute level of ire towards his bandmate’s work, or if he was just playing a simple game of tit for tat in terms of getting back at someone whom he viewed as a sworn critic. Yet whether it was dislike, or hatred, or even loathing, it was clear during that moment in time that relations between The Beatles had a lot of storms still to weather before they became sweet again.
In all honesty, it was pretty stupid that things got so sour and tense between a band who inherently knew that they had managed to change the world. Once the claw marks had healed over, of course, things did begin to get better, but the scar and the memory would always remain: of the pain, of the hurt, and of Lennon’s dick.
