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NOBODY’S PERFECT

Lennon’s Ego & Intransigence Irritated Those Who Knew Him

by Dave Dexter Jr.

LOS ANGELES – No pop artist since the early 1960s was more musically gifted than John Lennon .

And of the four Beatles, Lennon was – among those in the industry who worked with him – the most disliked.

His ebullient songwriting partner, Paul McCartney , was Lennon’s equal musically and, in retrospect, as responsible for the Beatles’ astonishing success as was Lennon. But the two were destined to clash from their early days in Hamburg and by the end of the 1960s decade the conflict was obvious.

And so the Beatles died.

When Capitol Records released “I Want To Hold Your Hand ” Dec. 26, 1963, the group’s first records (issued in the U.S. on the Vee Jay and Swan labels) had already failed. Capitol had rejected the six tracks and EMI London had placed them with Vee Jay and Swan in an effort to score in the American market as the Beatles were succeeding in England.

But “Hand” was a bell- ringer from its opening four bars. By New Year’s day 1964, Capitol’s production chief Dave Lawhon had every Capitol press and presses owned by RCA and a couple of independents working an unprecedented 24-hour schedule to meet the demand. Sales topped one million 10 days after “Hand” was released. The disk sold itself. Only minimal promotion was employed.

The Beatles suddenly were the most spectacular act in history, exceeding Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra and even Bing Crosby when he broke through in the ’30s.

Within the Capitol Tower, several of us hustled to rush a Beatles LP into the stores. When enough tapes arrived from England we spent hours adjusting the British Parlophone equalization and adding reverb to conform to Capitol’s standards.

Lennon and McCartney, from a hotel room in Miami where they were resting up at the time of their first U.S. visit to appear on the Ed Sullivan CBS -TV program in early ’64, telephoned me to praise the “fabulous” sound Capitol’s engineers had achieved on the American releases.

But all that euphoria changed swiftly.

Lennon advised Capitol’s management that he didn’t care for the album covers Captiol was devising. Lennon didn’t like the back covers, either. Nor did he approve the sounds of the Beatles tapes issued by Capitol, an abrupt 180-degree turnaround from his previous praise of Capitol’s eq and reverb adjustments.

McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr did not complain. Only Lennon.

And when Capitol’s president, Alan W. Livingston, hosted a cocktail party for the Liverpudlians in 1964, when they were appearing in concert at the Hollywood Bowl, 25 or 30 well-dressed, well-mannered little children, all neighbors of Livingston in Beverly Hills, stood outside Livingston’s property patiently, occasionally shouting for the Beatles to come to the window and be seen.

I asked Lennon, who was standing nearest the window facing the children, to move over a few feet and yell a “hello.”

“Why those bloody little b******s,” Lennon arrogantly replied, “they try to interfere with us constantly, try to deprive us of our privacy. We’ve had it with ’em, mate.”

It was an unthinkably rude response. But Ringo and Paul obliged the children.

Lennon became more intransigent as the Beatles successes pyramided. He demanded a different manager than the others after Brian Epstein died. He differed with his three colleagues violently in the operation of their disastrous Apple label. And it was Lennon who bitched the loudest about my choice of songs to be included in the group’s Capitol albums. Nothing we did at Capitol appeased him.

One can look back now and charitably conclude that the privations he suffered as a child, growing up without his mother and father, may have shaped him into the adult he became. His abnormal childhood made him an abnormal adult.

But for all the difficulties those who were associated with him experienced, Lennon will be remembered well for his musical contributions. Unlike himself, there was nothing eccentric or unlikable about John’s artistry. And that’s what all of us will remember.