Previously unreleased footage of John Lennon and George Harrison recording “How Do You Sleep?” together during the Plastic Ono Band sessions for Lennon’s Imagine album has been unveiled. The footage, subtitled “Takes 5 & 6, Raw Studio Mix Out-take,” is included on the upcoming Ultimate Collection reissue of the 1971 effort.
According to a statement accompanying the video, “The Imagine Raw Studio Mixes place you in the center of Ascot Sound Studios with John Lennon and the Plastic Ono Band all around you. No reverb or echo, no effects, no strings, just live, unvarnished and raw. Available in stereo and exclusively in 5.1 Surround Sound in the Ultimate Collection Box Set.”
The 4-disc Imagine: The Ultimate Collection boasts previously-unreleased demos, outtakes and raw mixes, as well as archival visual material and a 120-page book on the making of the album.
Lennon, who wrote “How Do You Sleep?” as a criticism of his former Beatle band mate Paul McCartney, is quoted on the song in the 120-page book: “Somebody said the other day ‘It’s about me.’ You know, there’s two things I regret. One is that there was so much talk about Paul on it, they missed the song. It was a good track. And I should’ve kept me mouth shut—not on the song, it could’ve been about anybody, you know? And when you look at them back, Dylan said it about his stuff, you know, most of it’s about him.
“The only thing that matters is how he and I feel about those things and not what the writer or the commentator thinks about it, you know? Him and me are OK. So I don’t care what they say about that, you know? I’ve always been a little, you know, loose. And I hope it’ll change because I’m fed up of waking up in the papers. But if it doesn’t, my friends are my friends whatever way.”
Check out the “How Do You Sleep?” raw footage above, and pre-order Imagine: The Ultimate Collection here.
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