‘Live in New York City’: John Lennon, Madison Square Garden and the best music since The Cavern
By the time The Beatles ended, it seemed like none of them wanted to go back to the live stage ever again. It was already pandemonium when they retired from the road in 1966, but when they played their final show on the roof of Apple Corps, it felt like watching them close the chapter on their time as a performing entity. None of them wanted to stop working, though, and there were occasional moments when John Lennon felt the call to get back into the public eye for a couple of shows.
Then again, Lennon seemed only to be interested in taking the stage if it was for the right reasons. He had dove headfirst intot he world of political songwriting, so if he had a platform, he figured that he would use it to call for change in the world, like on the back half of Some Time in New York City or marching in the streets trying to enact change in the promotional clips for ‘Power to the People’.
And looking at his non-political songs, it makes sense why he would never want to return to the old way of playing live. Plastic Ono Band was one of the rawest albums that any pop artist had released at that point, and even though it had plenty of fans, it was going to be impossible to ask him to relive his childhood trauma on songs like ‘Mother’ and ‘Working Class Hero’ for a massive tour.
If he wasn’t going to go on massive runs of shows, Lennon figured that he could pick and choose when he wanted to show his face onstage. And while his performance with Elton John was shellshocking to every single person in Madison Square Garden in 1975, the trademark show of Lennon’s solo career came from when he played his own tunes live with Yoko Ono in 1972.
“That Madison Square Gardens gig was the best music I enjoyed playing since the Cavern or even Hamburg.”
John Lennon
Outside of featuring some fantastic performances from everyone, this was the first time that people got to hear many of Lennon’s solo hits live. The audience was bound to be captivated by tunes like ‘Imagine’ in a live setting, but ‘Cold Turkey’ proved that he could still push his voice to the limit when he wanted to. But outside of the technical sides of the show, Lennon finally looked like he was having fun again onstage.
Looking back on it, Lennon said that he hadn’t felt that kind of rush from playing live since the early days of The Beatles, saying, “That Madison Square Gardens gig was the best music I enjoyed playing since the Cavern or even Hamburg… It was just the same kinda feeling when The Beatles used to really get into it.” And judging by his behaviour onstage, he was like a fish in water working off the band.
Despite not playing in years, Lennon hadn’t lost any of his chops, and he certainly hadn’t lost his sense of humour. Even when he screws up a handful of the lines, he’s more than happy to plough through like nothing happened, even hamming it up for the crowd during the chorus of ‘Come Together’.
Lennon might not have been comfortable enough to continue making these kinds of appearances, but it was enough for people to see him finally happy with playing to a crowd again. Anyone in The Beatles’ position would have been too scared to go out and play their tunes, but Live in New York City is another reason why Lennon was absolutely fearless with his work.
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