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John Lennon - Anthology Audio CD

A fair review of the John Lennon "Anthology" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all John Lennon reviews here, or go back to the John Lennon tabs.

John Lennon Band: John Lennon
Title: Anthology
Rating:
Release Date: 1998-11-03
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Working Class Hero 2: God 3: I Found Out 4: Hold On 5: Isolation 6: Love 7: Mother 8: Remember 9: Imagine 10: "Fortunately" 11: Baby Please Don't Go 12: Oh My Love 13: Jealous Guy 14: Maggie Mae 15: How Do You Sleep 16: God Save Oz 17: Do The Oz 18: I Donít Want To Be A Soldier 19: Give Peace A Chance 20: Look At Me 21: Long Lost John 22: New York City 23: Attica State (live) 24: Imagine (live) 25: Bring On The Lucie 26: Woman Is The Nigger of The World 27: Geraldo Rivera - One to One Concert 28: Woman Is The Nigger of The World (live) 29: It's So Hard (live) 30: Come Together (live) 31: Happy Xmas 32: Luck of the Irish (live) 33: John Sinclair (live) 34: The David Frost Show 35: Mind Games (I Promise) 36: Mind Games (Make Love, Not War) 37: One Day At A Time 38: I Know 39: I'm The Greatest 40: Goodnight Vienna 41: Jerry Lewis Telethon 42: "A Kiss Is Just A Kiss" 43: Real Love 44: You Are Here 45: What You Got 46: Nobody Loves You When You're Down And Out 47: Whatever Gets You Through the Night (home) 48: Whatever Gets You Through the Night (studio) 49: Yesterday (parody) 50: Be Bop A Lula 51: Rip It Up/Ready Teddy 52: Scared 53: Steel And Glass 54: Surprise, Surprise (Sweet Bird of Paradox) 55: Bless You 56: Going Down On Love 57: Move Over Ms. L 58: Ainít She Sweet 59: Slippiní And Slidin' 60: Peggy Sue 61: Bring It On Home To Me/ Send Me Some Lovin' 62: Phil and John 1 63: Phil and John 2 64: Phil and John 3 65: "When In Doubt, Fuck It" 66: Be My Baby 67: Stranger's Room 68: Old Dirt Road 69: I'm Losing You 70: Seans "Little Help" 71: Serve Yourself 72: My Life 73: Nobody Told Me 74: Life Begins At 40 75: I Don't Wanna Face It 76: Woman 77: Dear Yoko 78: Watching the Wheels 79: I'm Stepping Out 80: Borrowed Time 81: The Rishi Kesh Song 82: Sean's "Loud" 83: Beautiful Boy 84: Mr. Hyde's Gone (Don't Be Afraid) 85: Only You 86: Grow Old With Me 87: Dear John 88: The Great Wok 89: Mucho Mungo 90: Satire 1 91: Satire 2 92: Satire 3 93: Sean's "In The Sky" 94: It's Real

O'Boogie, Oh so fine!
Afforded independence to do what he wanted, one gets a feeling of honesty which one rarely hears from major artist. John Lennon is shown here in this box set as a true individual that he was. On the other hand, if your not a complete Lennon nut like myself, I wouldn't buy this set. I would try a "greatest" CD first then if it's to your liking, come back
and get this Box set. To me, this set was just what the doctor order. . . I needed a little of Dr. Winston O'Boogie to get me through the "Holidays". .


Wonderfully raw.
However, I really enjoyed this set. I'm more of a "casual fan" like the kind mentioned in Annie Van Auken's review. It's a nice collection of live tracks, alternate takes, and pre-production, stripped-down versions.

Some of the major highlights:
1. Love (which doesn't have the almost too quiet to hear opening like the album version)

2. Remember (which shows that, even when something has him tickled, John still has a powerful voice despite giggling in parts of the song,

3. John Sinclair and the audio of the quote prior to the song which is on the previous track (Apathy isn't it, and we can do something. Ok, so flower power didn't work, so what. We start again. )

4. Two nice alternate takes on Mind Games.

5. Stranger's Room - which is a wonderful early cut of I'm Losing You

6. The Hank Williams-esque Life Begins at 40, which is very eerie to hear now for obvious reason.


These and some superb in home and live recordings of old favorites, including three versions of Imagine, and a nice rendition of Come Together.


Hold that line... hold that line... hold that line....
Whether or not you should buy ANTHOLOGY really depends upon which side of that line you're on. This album presents the potential purchaser with an imaginary line. For completists, LENNON * ANTHOLOGY is a godsend or revelation; for the casual fan, this collection is a jumbled rough-cut head-scratcher. If you don't own all of John's solo albums, you probably won't want this one.

More so than the BEATLES ANTHOLOGY series, this set is replete with fragments, false starts, incomplete demos, slight or off-key vocals and silly chatter. If John was still alive, he never would have released most of this stuff, and with good reason. There's something to be said for specifically detailed Last Wills.

TOTAL RUNNING TIMES --
DISC ONE (Astor) -- 65:41
DISC TWO (New York City) -- 65:01
DISC THREE (The Lost Weekend) -- 63:25
DISC 4 (Dakota) -- 72:52.


Why did I wait so long?
I finally gave in and bought it and I'm really glad I did. I've looked at this set for many years, but never could bring myself to pay the premium price for it.

It's a fantastic set, both in content and packaging. It's refreshing to hear different versions of the songs we're all used to hearing. And there's plenty of music that I had not heard previously.

Overall, the sound quality is very good, but some songs do suffer the limitation of being home recordings but are still very listenable. I actually prefer John's solo "Real Love" over the doctored up Beatles version.

I could have done without Sean's contributions, but as he was an important part of John's life, I can accept them.

Like Johnny Cash's "Personal File" this is an intimate look at the performer; kind of like having him sitting in your living room and playing a private concert just for you.

Yoko often gets criticized for her handling of John's material, but this is a quality offering in every respect and shows us John the Man vs. John the Beatle.

Highly recommended.
.


It's John - what more needs to be said?
I really don't need to hear Lennon talking. The only knock on this excellent box set is that there is a little too much chatter. The music does the talking here.

5 stars - excellent amazon purchase.


You can see a complete list of all John Lennon discography, or go back to the John Lennon tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.

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