Beatles Browser 2 (cont.)
   

The Beatles in 1964 (Parlophone)John’s song ‘Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds’ produced a dilemma for him. He explained how the song came about, but people didn’t believe him. Simply because the initials of the song could possibly coincide with those of the drug LSD, which John had admitted taking, several radio stations refused to play it, convinced that the song advocated taking drugs. Ever since, people have believed that John was cleverly promoting LSD.

In fact, Lucy is a real person. She was a schoolmate of John’s son Julian at Heath House infant’s school in Weybridge in 1967. John had drawn a picture of her and brought it home. When he showed it to his parents, John asked him what it was supposed to represent. He said, “It’s Lucy in the sky with diamonds.”

Ringo was to confirm this, saying, “I have seen the drawing made by Julian. A real child’s drawing with floating people. It had nothing to do with LSD.”

Paul also said, ““I went to John’s house in Weybridge. When I arrived we were having a cup of tea, and he said, ‘Look at this great drawing Julian’s done. Look at the title!’ He showed me a drawing of a little girl with lots of stars and right across the top there was written, in very neat child handwriting ‘Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds’. So I said, ‘What’s that mean?’ thinking, Wow, fantastic title! John said, ‘It’s Lucy, a friend of his from school. And she’s in the sky.’ Julian had drawn stars, and then he thought they were diamonds. They were child’s stars, there’s a way to draw them with two triangles, but he said diamonds because they can be interpreted as diamonds or stars. And we moved it and she was in the sky and it was very trippy to us. So we went upstairs and started writing it. People later thought ‘Lucy In The Sky with Diamonds’ was LSD. I swear we did not notice that when it came out, in actual fact, if you want to be pedantic you’d have to say it is LITSWD, but of course LSD is a better story.”

Once Cynthia left Kenwood, the house she’d shared with her husband John, Yoko moved in with him and the house was transformed to suit the couple. An Evening Standard reporter was able to gain access to the property and was to write:

“It is an experience I shall never forget. The first hint of what lay within was the front door knocker. It was shaped like a naked woman. Freudian? Just you wait! Behind the door, assaulting the eyes, was a picture of the two of them. Yoko, as we have come to expect her, in bed in a nightdress. John lies asleep on the floor, looking exhausted and abandoned. Beside it was another picture – this time in black and white – depicting the famous couple surrounded by London bobbies.

“Down the hallway, past piles of parcels, boxes, packages, floppy black hats, a model crib from the National Canine Defense League (exhorting the passerby to ‘Please help a Homeless dog’) and a smattering of such books as ‘The Geography of Witchcraft’ and ‘The Vampire’, was the strangest room I have ever entered. And why? It was made up of halves. Half a chair, half a table, half a radio, and even half an ironing board. Half a bookcase carried half pots, half pans and half kettles. The half-witted ‘decorator’ had even cut a single shoe in half. Nearly everything in the room had been painted white. Four white hammers were suspended above the fireplace, before which stood a vast white disc. The chessmen on a chess board were white. Both sets.

“Dominating the room at one end was a huge picture of John and Yoko in the nude. Beneath it was the slogan: ‘John and Yoko forever.’ But strangest of all was a collection of slim transparent plastic tubes about the height of a large table. On one stands Yoko’s ‘Eternal Time Clock’ and nearby is a stone several inches across which they’ve dubbed ‘a Ringo.’ Nearby was another tube, this time with a shriveled apple on top. Beneath it, on the floor, was a small grey coloured picture. It was labeled, ‘A painting to be stepped on…’ another tube had a sphere on it inscribed: ‘This sphere will be a sharp point when it gets to the far corner of the room in your mind.’ Moving upstairs past a knight in armour to John and Yoko’s carpetless bedroom, I came upon a bed about eight foot square with a canopy partly covering it. Around the bed were piles of books, a colour television, a film projector, a tape recorder and a film screen. Pictures of the naked couple and headlines from newspapers adorn parts of the wall. Other nude pictures of John and Yoko were scattered about various parts of the house.”

In 1963 the Beatles equipment comprised Rickenbacker guitar (£200), Gretsch Country Gentleman guitar (£265), Hofner violin bass guitar, special left hand model (£50), Ludwig drum kit (3300), Vox amplification units ($3,000)

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