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John Lennon and the Plastic Ono Band: Sweet Toronto 6 August 05
Section: article
Categories: Film / dvd-mine
Der Spiegel 31/2005 1 August 2005
The exact number of victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki can never be determined. What is certain is that to this day, every year thousands are still dying from the insidious long-term effects of the radiation poisoning. [...] Even the children and grandchildren of the survivors are meeting the same atomic fate — their genetic makeup is often so damaged that they are stricken by leukemia, breast cancer or diseases of the nervous system.
Die genaue Zahl der Opfer von Hiroshima und Nagasaki wird sich nie klären lassen. Sicher ist, dass sogar heute noch jedes Jahr Tausende an den Spätfolgen der heimtückischen Strahlung sterben. [...] Noch die Kinder und Kindeskinder der Überlebenden ereilt das Atomschicksal — ihr Erbgut ist oft so geschädigt, dass sie an Leukämie, Brustkrebs oder Nervenleiden erkranken.
Yoko Ono was 12 years old during the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. She was living in Tokyo on the other side of Japan, where in March of the same year she had survived the firebombing of that city in which over 100,000 people were incinerated to death in the firestorm, a firebombing which was planned by Robert McNamara.
Yoko performed the last couple of songs in this concert, which took place at the height of the Vietnam War. Her pieces were Don’t Worry Kyoko (Mummy’s Only Looking For Her Hand In The Snow) and John, John (Let’s Hope for Peace), accompanied by Lennon, Clapton, Voormann and White. The latter piece — one of the most powerful avant-garde rock performances I have ever seen — ends with Lennon, Clapton and Voormann leaning their guitars faced against the speakers in a sustained feedback, waving goodbye and walking offstage with Yoko. Lennon at one point playfully mimics a wide–winged plane swooping towards Yoko at the mike. The audience is left for minutes in the feedback’s sonic darkness with an empty stage.
I love John Lennon and I believe he was the only "white" hero I ever had. For me, the essence of his political stance and courage was not in any explicit message — if anything, their messages rang with the false, though heartfelt, hope of appealing to the leaders of this system for change — but in his utilizing his celebrity and prestige to oppose the establishment.
Some links
Live Peace in Toronto (the 1969 album)
John Lennon and the Plastic Ono Band: Sweet Toronto
Estimate deaths in Hiroshima and Nagasaki after the atomic bombings
Title: John Lennon and the Plastic Ono Band: Sweet Toronto
A film by: D. A. Pennebaker
Performers: Bo Diddley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, John Lennon, Yoko Ono, Eric Clapton, Klaus Voormann, Alan White
Concert: Sweet Toronto Peace Festival
Year: 1969
- Title: John Lennon and the Plastic Ono Band: Sweet Toronto
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