John Lennon: Unplugged
----------------------
Pine Apple [pna-011]
01. Working Class Hero [studio demo (JLA)] 3:45
02. Look At Me [studio demo (JLA)] 2:49
03. Love [studio demo (JLA)] 2:30
04. Happy Xmas (War Is Over) [home demo (Od1)] 3:18
05. New York City [home demo (ND)] 1:47
06. Call My Name [home demo (Od1)] 3:47
07. Woman Is The Nigger Of The World [home demo (Od1)] 2:05
08. Say It Again [home demo (Home)] 3:36
09. Luck Of The Irish [home demo (acetate)] 1:36
10. Here We Go Again [home demo (Od1)] 2:58
11. I Know (I Know) [home demo (Od1)] 3:08
12. Mucho Mungo [home demo (MT)] 2:50
13. What You Got [home demo (Od1)] 1:57
14. Surprise, Surprise (Sweet Bird Of Paradox) [home demo (LTT)] 3:11
15. Nobody Loves You (When You're Down And Out) [remix (W&B)] 4:55
16. India, India [Dakota/Bermuda demo (Sig)] 3:03
17. Watching The Wheels [Bermuda demo (Home)] 3:02
18. Dear Yoko [Bermuda demo (LBT)] 4:01
19. Grow Old With Me [Bermuda demo (Home)] 2:48
20. I'm Stepping Out [Bermuda demo (Home)] 2:57
21. Woman [remix (ac.guitar + vocal overdub)] 3:23
22. Borrowed Time [Bermuda demo (JLA)] 3:35
23. My Life [Dakota demo (Home)] 2:50
24. Girls And Boys [Dakota demo (FAAB)] 4:03
--- [total runnnig time ~ 74 mins]
SOURCE NOTES:
FAAB = Free As A Bird: The Dakota Beatle Demos [Pegboy PB-1001 (bootleg, 1996)]
Home = At Home [HMC 008 (bootleg, 2009); 2 discs]
JLA = John Lennon Anthology [Capitol/EMI (1998); 4 discs]
LBT = Living on Borrowed Time [HMC 009 (bootleg, 2010); 2 discs]
LTT = Listen to This [VT 175/77 (bootleg, 1998); 3 discs]
MT = Miscellaneous Tracks [Orange 18 (bootleg, 1995)]
ND = News of the Day [Vigotone VT-CD 02 (bootleg, 1990)]
Od1 = Oddities vol.1 [HMC 015 (bootleg, 2012); 2 discs]
Sig = John Lennon Signature Box [Capitol/EMI (2010); bonus disc "Home Recordings"]
W&B = Wall & Bridges [Capitol/EMI (remixed ed., 2005); bonus track]
***
Back in November 2004, Capitol released without much fanfare a compilation titled "John Lennon: Acoustic". Culled mostly from informal home recordings, the album attempted to present a disc's worth of acoustic renditions of Lennon compositions. Despite the best of intentions, many people familiar with John's recordings, we included, found the release something of a disappointment, to say the least. While the idea was good, its execution left much to be desired, with track selection and mastering being the worst offenders. In many ways, the best thing about Acoustic was its artwork, which relied mostly on David Spindel's photographs of John laying down acoustic guitar overdubs in a studio session for Double Fantasy. But surely a vastly better audio representation could have been compiled from the Lennon archives, which contain countless guitar based demos, many much better suited for this purpose, even after weeding out ones of sub-par sound quality? As for the mastering of the disc, suffice it to say that several of the songs -- some already released earlier in perfectly fine quality -- had been ineptly tampered with, the intention apparently having been to sweeten the sound of the unprofessional demo recordings. The result is merely a horrendous mock stereo phasing and delay effect that sounds worse than the original cassette masters, as is testified by the appearance of the same tracks on John Lennon Anthology, which stuck to usually acceptable levels of noise reduction. Reportedly, the compilation had originally been intended only as a special Japanese pressing to coincide with a Lennon tribute concert, with Yoko Ono approving Capitol's sensible request of a full-scale release. Perhaps this accounts for the apparent lack of thought betrayed by its superficial and incongruous song selection, as well as the needlessly truncated representation of tracks flown-in from Anthology.
Having said that, we don't entirely disapprove editorial methodology when producing a compilation of this sort, in order to make a coherent collection of an album's worth of performances gathered together from various sources, most of them not intended for release at any point and being sonically challenging in various ways. Our idea first arose from the disappointment with the official contender and the realisation that it could have been done so much better; but it lay dormant and unfinished for a long time, as certain key tracks were not available in acceptable quality. Lately, the release of a number of new Lennon bootleg CDs -- apparently culled from a cache of recordings that seems to originate with the Anthology project -- has, however, provided us with the means of belatedly completing the undertaking of replacing Acoustic with our hopefully more satisfactory version. To be sure, unrestricted access to the Lenono archives would likely have yielded some gems that in the event cannot be included, as we have been forced to overlook a number of songs that logically should be part of an offering like this -- but beggars can't be choosers. To differentiate it from the official album, Pine Apple has elected to title it "Unplugged". In tribute to the ill-fated if well-meaning authorised attempt, our own artwork has been carefully (if not entirely) modelled after Acoustic, although we have dispended with the guitar chord positions for the songs in the booklet.
In compiling this single disc collection, we have attempted to follow one or two ground rules, although not so much absolute directives as guiding lines, if you will. First, only recordings of sufficiently good sound quality could be included. To achieve this, some judicious restoration techniques have at times been used to make a smooth overall listening experience where individual imperfections don't stick out like sore thumbs. We hope that the compilation succeeds better than Acoustic in this regard. There is still some variance in the sonics that cannot be avoided, with "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)" perhaps passing the criteria only just. (Fortunately, HMC did us a favour with putting out a version that appears to have been more or less professionally noise reduced for an Anthology short-list. There is not much high-end to speak of, but the untreated recording would seem to be quite rough and worn. In contrast, the demos of "God" and "One Of The Boys", for example, were dropped from consideration as being too poor sounding.) Related to this, we also haven't shied away from some minor -- or even not so minor -- editing, with a mistake or two on the original home recordings here left on the proverbial cutting room floor. (Folks intimately familiar with the sources will notice more drastic cuts in the case of "What You Got", originally a somewhat meandering composing sequence.) It's also worth noting that even though the version of "Nobody Loves You (When You're Down And Out)" here is the same isolated mix of guitar and vocal overdubs that was originally included as a bonus track on the reissue of Walls & Bridges, it has been subjected to some additional smoothing, to get rid of minor bleed through of other instruments at a couple of points. Throughout, songs that are pseudo-stereo (whether due to azimuth error of tape head or other reasons) on our sources are here presented in their true mono form. Where the same or a similar version of a song has been released multiple times, an attempt has been made to locate the most natural sounding source. Thus we have utilised the Anthology version of "Love" rather than the (inferiorly mixed) outtake included on the bonus disc of the John Lennon signature box; the bootleg version of "Call My Name", for instance, is used in preference to the Mind Games reissue bonus track which has been modified, even though they both apparently derive from the same digital transfer. Additional equalisation has also be resorted to in general, especially to bring out the vocals more.
Secondly, our criteria were very strict for only including only pure guitar based recordings. In other words, drum machine demos were ruled out, as were by and large any double tracked recordings -- in our view, an almost completely unnecessary practice by John. Like Acoustic, we might have elected to tack on a bonus track of the live, full band version of "Imagine", had we had access to a dry mix of that performance in reasonable quality (as opposed to the reverb-heavy version on Anthology and Acoustic). As it is, Unplugged features just John and a guitar -- with Yoko joining in for a short run though the then newly composed "The Luck of the Irish" -- as well as providing harmony on the coda of "My Life". (The version of the former here comes from what appears to be an acetate recording. Our restoration of it removes a multitude of clicks and ticks plaguing the source; admittedly there may be some slight artefacts as a result.) As we did not wish to use any of the Bermuda demos of "Woman" for the above reasons, that song is here instead represented by a special remix of the guitar and vocal overdubs that were originally heard in episodes of the Lost Lennon Tapes program. Although a somewhat artificial creation, we hope that it can be approved in the circumstances, as we don't have access to the multitracks to make a true remix -- another lost opportunity on Acoustic.
Finally, CD length limitations imposed on us a very practical time constraint -- really of almost double LP length -- while for the ordering of tracks, a mostly chronological approach seemed the best solution. Some thought has, however, been put in arriving at a sequence that flows naturally instead of rigidly adhering to a recording timeline (as far as that could be ascertained); with this in mind, "Cold Turkey" has been by-passed, even though quality-wise it would have passed the muster. At the time Acoustic was originally issued, there were reports that the disc was also scheduled to include John's house-husband era cover of "I'm A Man" (previously aired in Lost Lennon Tapes). If that is true, the track may ultimately have been dropped due to publishing royalty considerations. For Unplugged, we have not included any cover versions, just Lennon -- or in a few cases, Lennon/Ono -- originals. While we are aware that other attempts at bettering the official Acoustic disc have been made (and our namesake bootleg actually preceded it by many years), it is hoped that this Pine Apple compilation will represent the most cohesive listening experience relying on this concept so far.