“That Madison Square Garden gig was the best music I enjoyed playing since the Cavern or even Hamburg,” John Lennon raved, shortly after his matinee and evening concerts with Yoko on August 30, 1972. Last year’s Power To The People boxset provided the tumultuous context to these benefit shows for the Willowbrook School for mentally impaired children.
This parallel release concludes a 20-year project to restore and re-edit what would remain Lennon’s sole full-length gigs since 1966, a fact made all the more tragically remarkable by his exuberant vocal and guitar attack, clearly relishing every second.
Director Simon Hilton has reimagined the footage in Woodstock-style multiscreen format and Atmos-ready sound. Far from being a hit-packed show, the setlist is torn instead from a career in rapid motion – “Trying to shake our image/Cycling through the Village,” as Lennon sings in “New York City”. Jim Keltner doubles up on drums with Elephant’s Memory’s Rick Frank, while Lennon slashes alongside guitarist Wayne Gabriel. “Boogie, baby!” Lennon yells, summoning the updated, primal rock’n’roll he’s chasing.
“Cold Turkey” is sung through gritted teeth, his body jerking. In many ways, Lennon seems better attuned to New York’s coming punk storm than to the softer, more settled work that followed later in the decade. Ono, meanwhile, is a formidable rock frontwoman – glamorous and ferociously controlled in the harrying ululations of “Don’t Worry Kyoko”.
The sole visit Lennon permits “back in the past”, “Come Together”, gains extemporised lyrics as he forgets actual ones. “I’ll have to stop writing them daft words, man,” he laughs. “I don’t know what I’m saying. Getting old…” The camera holds tight on his lean, aquiline face for the howls of “Mother” and again for “Imagine”. It sounds anything but saccharine here; we see the clarity in his eyes behind those blue Lennon specs, and the warmth with which he kisses Ono afterwards. It’s hope, rather than nostalgia, that carries the day.