In 1971, John Lennon He moved to New York to try to leave behind a life in which he was the constant center of attention and in which the press watched his every move. His nine years of residence in the metropolis, where he raised a family and gave free rein to his creativity, led him to fall in love with a city that nevertheless saw him die assassinated 40 years ago.
“He always said that New York is the best city in the world”, said a few weeks ago Sean Ono Lennon, the son of Yoko Ono and John Lennon, during an event where the iconic Empire State Building paid tribute to the musician on what would have been his 80th birthday.
“As everyone knows, New York is a city where you don’t have to be born here to be a New Yorker, you just have to fall in love with her. So my father was a New Yorker at heart, “he added shortly before lifting the lever that illuminated the skyscraper with a peace symbol on a blue background.
Although Lennon was born in the British city of Liverpool, during his stay in the Big Apple he proclaimed from the rooftops his love for a metropolis that he considered his home, where his only son was born and where his messages of love and peace solidified. These are the places that marked his passage through New York:
St Regis Hotel
This historic and sumptuous hotel in the heart of Manhattan, which opened in 1904, was Lennon and Ono’s first New York residency, from where they watched the success of the album Imagine and where they began their passage through the city of skyscrapers, although they only resided there from August 1971 until the end of October of that same year.
The Hit Factory
A few avenues from the St Regis, at 48th and Ninth Avenue, was the recording studio Lennon went to frequently. In it, the most famous member of the Beatles collaborated with Ono on the album Double Fantasy, a place that now occupies Sear Sound for about 3 decades, and where the Japanese has gone on several occasions to record her music.
105 Bank Street
It is the address of the West Village loft where the couple moved after their brief stint at the St Regis, and which at the end of 1971 they rented from the group’s drummer. The Lovin’ Spoonful, Joe Butler. While they were living in that apartment, which featured a back room with a huge skylight in which they both spent a lot of time, Ono and Lennon released the album Sometime in New York City, in 1972.
The residence, however, began to be monitored by the FBI when the US authorities began their efforts to expel Lennon from the US, who insistently called for the end of the Vietnam WarAnd when someone broke in, they decided to move to a safer building in February 1973.
The Dakota
Located next to the west side of Central Park, it is the luxury apartment complex in which the artist and musician lived from 1973 until Lennon was assassinated outside the building on December 8, 1980. In fact, 40 years later, Ono still resides in the spacious residence.
This was also where the revered Annie Leibovitz took, just hours before her death, the iconic photo in which a naked Lennon kisses and hugs Ono on the floor of his apartment, on one of the rare occasions when the former -Beatle allowed a photographer to enter her home.
Strawberry Fields (Central Park)
It is an area of Central Park that was a few meters from The Dakota, and which Lennon liked to visit because of its serene and calm character. The city of New York decided to baptize it with the name of Strawberry Fields, a song by Lennon and Paul McCartney, in October 1985, when he would have turned 45.
Madison Square Garden
One month after releasing the album Walls and Bridges (1974), which included their only single to reach number one, Whatever Gets You Thru the Night, Lennon sang live at the legendary Madison Square Garden on November 28, 1974, in what is described as his last great live performance. Along with his compatriot Elton John at the piano, Lennon sang, in addition to Whatever Gets You Thru the Night, Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds Y I Saw Her Standing There.
The Record Plant
Established in New York in 1968 and located on 44th Street in the heart of Manhattan, this was the last place Lennon recorded his music. In fact, the artist was returning from this studio with Ono when he was shot dead outside his residence by Mark Chapman, a young American who had been a fan of the Beatles but that he disagreed with some of the British’s political and religious claims. The Record Plant sold the studio in 1987, and it is now an office building.
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