“We couldn’t work it out”
The death of John Lennon’s first wife, Joni marks the end of an era when the Beatle WAGS – Joni, Jane, Patti and the other one – were almost as famous as the Fab Four themselves.
However the glamorous life was not for Joni. Although the sixties were swinging all around her, Joni spent much of the time miserably hiding from the limelight due to an unusual aversion to citrus fruit.
Although Joni often said her Beatle husband had never written her a soppy love song, it is believed that he wrote “She’s so Heavy” towards the end of her first pregnancy when Joni was expecting their son, Julian. The couple went on to have 3 more children together – Dick, George, and Anne – before he left her for Japanese artist Yo! Sushi.
A musician in her own right and draw, Joni spent much of the seventies singing songs bemoaning the loss of her Beatle celebrity as in “The Last Time I Saw Ringo” or the difficulties of getting a cab in Bournemouth – “Big Yellow Taxi”.
As she became synonymous with the West Coast sound, thousands would queue in the hope of purchasing tickets for her concerts in Blackpool. Many were disappointed when they were eventually successful.
Joni always insisted she had no ill feelings towards her former husband, but she apparently performed “Happiness is a Warm Gun” when she heard of Lennon’s untimely death at the hands of Mark Chapman.
[Cleggsy: That’s the best I can do with the Wiki clippings …. Eh? …. What do you mean she’s not dead yet?]
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