Latest / DISGRACELAND / John Lennon (Pt. 2): “The phony must die, said the catcher in the rye.”

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John Lennon (Pt. 2): “The phony must die, said the catcher in the rye.” · DISGRACELAND

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: John Lennon, his state of mind in the 1970s, and.
• 0:03
  Speaker 2: The circumstances surrounding his death, are so complex that two
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: episodes are needed to properly tell this story.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: If you're just getting hip to this now, I suggest
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: you hit pause and go back to Disgraceland episode 13,
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: or part one of the John Lennon story, where we
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: discuss the voices in Mark David Chapman's head, his obsession
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: with Lennon's rival, the musician Todd Rundgren, John and Yoko's
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: drug bust, and May Pang. In this episode, we finally
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: get around to some great solo John Lennon music. Unlike
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: the music played at the top of the show, that
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: wasn't great music. That was a preset loop from my
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: Mellotron called Bolero Clarinets Low MK1. I played you that
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: loop because I can't afford the rights to Midnight Train
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: to Georgia by Gladys Knight and the Pips. And why
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: would I play you that specific slice of leaving train cheese,
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: could I afford it? Because that was the number one
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: song in America on October 31st, 1973. And that was
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: the day that John Lennon found himself hungover in Los Angeles,
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: estranged from his wife, and subconsciously trying to drink himself
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: to death before an assassin would complete the job seven
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: years later. On this episode, a lost weekend, leaving trains,
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: a determined assassin, and a dead beetle. I'm Jake Brennan,
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: and this.
• 1:50
  Speaker 3: In October 1973, John Lennon and his rambling concubine, May Pang,
• 2:20
  Speaker 3: landed in Los Angeles and quickly took to the town.
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: A squad of hard-partying rock and rollers was pulled together
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: for John to pal around with. Among them, the notorious
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Keith Moon of The Who, Rolling Stones sax player Bobby Keys, a.k.a.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: the only man alive who could keep up with Keith Richards,
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: songwriter Harry Nilsson, who at the moment looked as if
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: he'd spent more time swimming laps in a pool of
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: Brandy Alexanders than he did writing songs in a recording studio.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: And of course, the notorious record producer, Phil Spector, who
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: was lording over the scene in his capacity as producer
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: of Lennon's newest project, an album of early 50s standards
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: that had influenced John in his Teddy Boy days called
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: Rock and Roll. The recording sessions were a violent drug
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: and alcohol-fueled mess that eventually ended with a gun-wielding Phil
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: Spector and his goons literally taking John Lennon hostage blindfolding
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: him and tying him up in one of Spector's bedrooms
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: to allow Phil the time necessary to steal away the
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: session's master recordings, which would then not surface for years
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: to come. And when not recording, things weren't much different.
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: Lennon drank himself into a stupor daily. Nights were spent
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: either trashing the homes of celebrity friends who had generously
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: allowed John and May to crash, or out on the
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: town looking for trouble. Orgies with strangers. fights with loud-mouthed fans,
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: and drugged out late-night jams with any number of the
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: top-tier pop stars in town. Most notably, an impromptu cocaine-fueled
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: session with Stevie Wonder, Paul McCartney, and Ringo Starr. Accounts
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: of the session have Paul playing drums and Ringo, the drummer,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: playing the coke spoon. The party in Los Angeles for
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: John Lennon never stopped, but he longed for Yoko. When
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: he wasn't busy drinking himself to death, he was on
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: the phone begging Yoko to take him back. But she
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: wasn't having it. New York City without John was just
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: too much fun. She was putting together new music and
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: was eager to let John know that her new guitar player,
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: David Spinoza, was an ace in the studio and in
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: the sack, and that she'd been properly shagged by the
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: Axeman in a way that John hadn't been able to
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: manage in years. John couldn't take it. He dove into
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: the deep end of the Brandy Alexander pool with Harry Nilsson,
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: and the two took to the town with May in tow.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: The destination was Doug Weston's famous Troubadour nightclub, where on
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: this evening, a celeb-filled crowd was taking in the Smothers Brothers'
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: triumphant return to the stage. So naturally, John entered the
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: crowd with a Kotex sanitary napkin stuck to his forehead
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: and made a spectacle of himself. Someone in the crowd
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: yelled out, Where's Yoko? And John replied, Sucking Ringo's cock.
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: The three were quickly ushered into the VIP section, where
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: a group of annoyed celebrities, including Pam Greer and Peter Lawford,
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: did their best to ignore them. Orders were placed for
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: triple milkshakes, a.k.a. Brandy Alexander's, with three times the cognac.
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: And when they arrived, John shot his down in one gulp,
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: looked up at Peter Lawford, who was glancing down at
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: him with that uppity faux Kennedy stare, and John grabbed
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: Lawford's drink out of his hand and downed that in
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: a single gulp. And then he ordered another round. And
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: when the Smothers Brothers began their act, John and Harry
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: started singing their own competing tune from the VIP section. Loud,
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: like drunken sailors from the Liverpool docks. And Luffer told
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: John to cool it. John's response, fuck you. I'm John Lennon,
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: he screamed out to no one and everyone at the
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: same time. And the crowd started booing Lennon. The Smothers
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: Brothers soldiered on. Lennon, a natural heckler, yelled to the stage,
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: Hey Smothers Brothers, fuck a cow! A waitress was dispatched
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: to try and get hold of the situation. And when
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: she did, Lennon asked her, Do you know who I am?
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: And she replied, Some asshole with a Kotex on his head?
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: That sealed it. Lennon and Nilsson erupted in song again.
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: More boos from the crowd. More profanity from Lennon. Club
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: security descended and grabbed hold of John to escort him out.
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: And he resisted and started swinging his fists blindly. One
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: of them caught Smothers Brothers manager Ken Fitz in the chin.
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: And Peter Lawford, who having made his bones in drunken
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: celebrity melees like this with his BFF Frank Sinatra and
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: brother-in-law Teddy Kennedy, knew exactly what to do. Grab the
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: little bastard by the neck and get him the hell
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: out of there. Fast. So that's what happened. Lawford and
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: a group of club security and waitstaff grabbed Lennon and
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: pulled him. kicking and screaming through the pissed-off crowd who
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: rained punches down on the ex-Beatle as he was dragged
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: past them and eventually thrown out onto Santa Monica Boulevard,
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: where he continued to blindly and violently lash out at
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: anyone who came near him. Eventually, John, Harry, and May
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: found their way into the back of their limousine and
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: took off for the Rainbow Bar and Grill, where... Upon
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: entering the now iconic L.A. hotspot, John Lennon, the ex-Beatle, Mr.
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: Goo Goo Gachoo, the counterculture voice of a generation, Mr.
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: Give Peace a Chance, drunkenly and violently stumbled into none
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: other than Todd Rundgren. And Rundgren was eager to connect
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: with his hero, but Lennon, true to form that night,
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: rudely blew him off. Todd Rundgren, dismayed. watched John Lennon
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: harass the waitstaff in between sips of his brandy Alexanders
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: until he eventually slouched into his booth and passed out.
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: Rundgren couldn't believe his eyes. The John Lennon he was
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: watching was no rock and roll deity. He wasn't even
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: a working class hero. He was thick and ordinary. What
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: a fraud. The sun broke above Central Park West and
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: shone brightly into the kitchen window of the Ono Lennon
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: home in Manhattan's Dakota Apartments. John was up early, making
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: breakfast for his five-year-old son, Sean. Mornings with Sean were sacred.
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: Afternoons were a different story. While Sean was being tended
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: to by his governess and the Ono Lennon fortune was
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: being tended to by Yoko in her office downstairs, John
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: locked himself in his bedroom with his cats. And he
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: watched television, smoked tie stick, tried not to snort heroin,
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: chain smoked cigarettes. He binged on sweets and obsessed over
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: his weight. He read his horoscope, ignored Paul McCartney's calls,
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: and masturbated out of boredom. Usually to the thought of
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: journalist Barbara Walters. Or if he was feeling nostalgic to
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: his old flame, the young May Pang. Or if it
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: was a Wednesday... his masseuse Kimmy would come by and
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: lay one of her patented two-minute house call handjobs on him.
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: But today wasn't a Wednesday, and it wasn't yet afternoon either.
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: John and Sean sat at their kitchen counter, eating, goofing off,
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: and listening to the radio, which almost always played music
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: or classical, never pop. But this morning was different. One
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: of the servants had left the dial tuned to WLIR
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: the night before, so when John flipped on the radio
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: in the morning, what he heard had him shook, rattled,
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: and rolling inside with jealousy. The hell was this? Fucking Springsteen.
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: This little bridge and tunnel rat was beating Lennon at
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: his own game. Heavy-hearted romantic cynicism dressed up as pop.
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: Lennon's double fantasy, his first record of real creative consequence
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: since The Beatles, was an earnest, hard-on-his-sleeve ode to family
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: and wholesomeness. Initial reviews were mixed, and its first single,
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: Just Like Starting Over, was stalled on the charts at
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: number eight. And here comes Jersey's own wannabe Zimmerman, barreling
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: up the charts with his excellent single Hungry Heart from
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: the deeply rooted double album, The River. John was second-guessing himself.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: He thought that maybe he shouldn't have made Double Fantasy
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: the sugary concept album that it was. Or shit. Maybe
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: he shouldn't even have included the Yoko songs. It was
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: like pulling teeth from a pit bull trying to get
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: her to sing in key anyway. He left Sean to
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: his cereal, picked up the phone, and dialed up his producer,
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: Jack Douglas. Have you heard this? He held the phone
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: to the kitchen radio speaker. It's incredible, Jack. What am
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: I doing? Dicking around with songs about milk and honey.
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: It's 1980, Jack, and we're going to L.A. Book a studio.
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: We're going to make a real record. A real John
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: Lennon record. Call the guys in Cheap Trick. I'll call Ringo.
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: I got a great song for him. Nobody told me
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: there'd be days like these. And Jack, we're going to
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: re-record Strawberry Fields. You hear me? We're going to re-record
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: Strawberry Fields the way that it was meant to be recorded.
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: John slammed the phone down, looked at Sean, took his
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: peace fingers to the insides of his outer lips, and
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: pulled his mouth apart wide like a big fish while
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: crossing his eyes. As Sean laughed so hard, milk spurted
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: out of his nose. We'll be right back after this word, word, word.
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: John Lennon eyed the stack of morning papers and magazines
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: on the chair in the corner of his kitchen. Ah,
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: it's here, he thought to himself. He pushed aside the
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: New York Times and the National Enquirer and pulled up
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: the latest edition of Esquire magazine. In it, a hit
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: job that he knew was coming. An article entitled, John Lennon,
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: Where Are You? In which the frustrated writer, unable to
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: corner John for an interview during his recent house dad years,
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: used public record information to piece together a picture of
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: John's life in the latter half of the 70s. And
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: the result was a scorching article detailing the Ono Lennon
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: $ 150 million largesse and an unfair depiction of John as
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: a middle-aged businessman more concerned with tax loopholes for his
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: real estate holdings than he was with peace and love
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: or making music. And John really didn't care. After all,
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: it was Yoko who took care of the business. The
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: article at least made it seem like he wore the
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: pants in the family. But someone else did care. 5,000
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: miles away, Mark David Chapman read the same article and
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: burned with rage. The article confirmed everything he already suspected
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: of his former hero, John Lennon. That he was a fraud.
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: A phony. It's easy to imagine no possessions... Yeah, no shit,
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: Jocko Ono. It's easy for you. You have everything. I
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: have nothing. I'm a nobody. I mean nothing. Yet I'm
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: the one who really cares, giving all my clothes to charity.
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: I'm the one who's living an authentic life, not like
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: the phonies. I'm not the fucking hypocrite here, man. The
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: voices in Mark's head started to gather. The phony must die,
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: said the catcher in the rye. Mark felt himself moving, finally,
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: with a purpose. It was time. He bought a one-way
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: plane ticket to New York City and packed light. Last night,
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: the wife said, poor boy, when you're dead, you don't
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: take nothing with you but your soul. Think. Where did
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: you put those hollow points? The phony must die, said
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: the catcher in the rye. And on the plane, Chapman
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: read and re-read the catcher in the rye, J.D. Salinger's
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: classic tale of teenage angst and alienation. It was the
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: only thing that comforted Mark these days. In his mind,
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: the book was hardwired to the idea of murdering John Lennon.
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: And just like the book's author, J.D. Salinger, Mark David
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: Chapman would call out the phonies of the world, but
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: he'd do it with a bullet, and in his mind,
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: he thought he'd bring attention to the book that spoke
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: so deeply to him, and thus make the world a
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: little better of a place, a little less phony, a
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: little easier to take. It was one of the rare
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: thoughts that calmed him and quieted his internal strife. The
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: gnawing notion that he was a loser A nobody. And
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: killing the world's biggest phony would make him a hero.
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: It would make him a somebody.
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: And it would.
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: Provide an escape from this hellish world. Once Lennon was dead,
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: Chapman would be a hero. And he believed because of this,
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: he would literally be sucked into the pages of The
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: Catcher in the Rye. And a new chapter would be
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: written about him. Chapter 27. His problems would be over.
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: He would no longer be Mark David Chapman, the loser,
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: the overweight nerd who couldn't get a real job, who
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: couldn't get laid, even by his own wife, who couldn't
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: even properly kill himself. Killing Lennon meant killing Chapman. Mark
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: David Chapman would cease to exist. He would finally become
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: Holden Caulfield. Or so went the voices in his head.
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: The phony must die, said the catcher in the rye.
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: After arriving in New York City, Mark David Chapman eventually
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: took his place outside the Dakota apartments at West 72nd
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: Street and Central Park West, alongside the regular rabble of
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: London autograph seekers. Clad in a black trench coat and
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: a red scarf, clinging to a sealed copy of Double
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: Fantasy under his arm and a dog-eared copy of The
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: Catcher in the Rye in his one hand. Happiness warmed
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: his other hand from the touch of his gun, a snub-nosed.
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: 38 in his pocket. Bang, bang, shoot, shoot. At 5 p.m.,
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: John and Yoko exited the Dakota for their waiting limo.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: The sidewalk lit up with excitement. The voices in Mark's
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: head exploded. He was paralyzed. Here was his moment. He
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: prayed to Satan to give him the strength to go
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: through with what he came there for. But the sight
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: of the John Lennon approaching diminished him, for a moment anyway,
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: to a teenage Beatlemania fanboy. Chapman silently held the copy
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: of Double Fantasy out in front of John and John
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: grabbed it without making eye contact and signed John Lennon, 1980,
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: on its cover. He then looked up at the fat-faced
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: fan and with a smile handed him the album and said, Here,
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: is this what you want? Chapman had no words, so
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: Lennon bounded away into the limo and took off for
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: a recording session with Yoko. Mark was beside himself with excitement.
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: For a moment, the thought of killing Lennon was completely gone.
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: John Lennon had spoken to him. John Lennon had asked him,
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: Mark David Chapman, a question. He felt, for a second anyway,
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: that he was somebody. But the feeling quickly evaporated. The
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: voices in his head were too strong. And the phony
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: must die, said the catcher in the rye. And Mark
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: prayed to God to give him the strength to not
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: do what he had come to New York to do.
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: And then, again, he prayed to Satan to give him
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: the strength to do what he had come to New
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: York to do. And the voices grew louder. and Mark
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: settled in outside the Dakota and played the waiting game.
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: He knew John would be back sooner or later, and
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: this time, that's when Holden would make his mark. At
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: 10.50 p.m. on December 8, 1980, John Lennon's limo pulled
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: up outside the Dakota. Yoko hopped out first. As she
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: passed Mark David Chapman, he gave her an innocent, hello,
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: and Lennon gave him a suspect look, one that said,
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: Who are you, you big, fat, greasy meatball? And why
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: are you still hanging around outside my house? Don't you
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: have a life? Fucking loser. And the voices came to life. Big, bold,
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: loud inside Mark's head. The phony must die, said the
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: catcher in the rye. The phony must die, said the
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: catcher in the rye. The phony must die, said the
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: catcher in the rye. The phony must die, said the
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: catcher in the rye. And as John Lennon passed by
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: and headed under the Dakota's archway, the coward Mark David
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: Chapman In a fury, clumsily crouched into a combat stance
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: and whipped the thumb-nosed. 38 out of his pocket. He
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: took aim with two hands at John's back and squeezed
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: off five shots in rapid succession. When the first two
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: bullets hit John's back, the force of them swung him
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: around toward his assassin, and the next two pierced his
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: shoulder and flung him backward into the door of the
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: Dakota's outdoor security station where he turned around again and
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: staggered helplessly toward a shocked security guard, collapsed, and began
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: to bleed out. Police arrived quickly, and it was immediately
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: clear how grave the wounds were, so the two uniforms
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: hoisted Lennon onto their shoulders, carried him out onto the sidewalk,
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: then to the curb, and crammed him into a squad
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: car taking off for nearby Roosevelt Hospital. Once in the car,
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: they realized he was dying in their backseat, and one
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: uniform asked the soon-to-be martyr, Do you know who you are?
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: By the time they arrived at the hospital, he'd lost 80%
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: of his blood. John Lennon died just before midnight.
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: He didn't put up.
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: Much of a fight. After shooting John Lennon in the back,
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: the coward Mark David Chapman simply sat on the sidewalk
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: and took in the developing chaos around him. He fingered
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: his copy of The Catcher in the Rye and waited
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: to be transported into the pages of the book. And
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: when that, of course, didn't happen, he simply sat calmly,
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: waiting for the police to take him away. The voices
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: were all gone now, or at least quieted for the moment.
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: When the police brought him in and started to process him,
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: the heat of the packed 20th Precinct station house on
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: Manhattan's Upper West Side began to get to Mark. He
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: was allowed to take off his jacket and sweater, and
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: so he did. And he sat, awaiting his uncertain future,
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: handcuffed to a desk, sweating in his greasy dungarees and too-tight,
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: food-stained Todd Rundgren Hermit of Mink Hollow promo t-shirt. Still,
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: very much the fat, pathetic loser that he was before
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: he senselessly shot and killed John Lennon. But by murdering
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: John Lennon, Chapman had accomplished one of his objectives. He'd
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: managed to claim an identity for himself. He may have
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: still been a fat and pathetic loser, but he was
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: forever the fat, pathetic loser who killed John Lennon. The irony,
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: of course, is that he killed John Lennon at the
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: exact point in time when Lennon himself was starting to
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: finally reclaim his own identity and and settle into his 40s.
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: He'd become less reclusive, less dependent on Yoko, and after
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: a decade of bad behavior, missed creative opportunities, excess, and paranoia,
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: John Lennon was quite literally starting over and downright buoyant
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: with the thought of what the 80s might bring. By 1980,
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: John Lennon had locked into a creative voice that suited
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: his authentic self. He'd managed to find some balance between
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: being a family man and an international pop star. Who
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: knew what the future held for him and Yoko? All
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: he knew was that his love for his son Sean
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: was deep, true, inspiring, and helped him focus. It put
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: everything in perspective. Who he was as a man, an artist.
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: It even helped him refocus the love he had for
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: his oldest and sometimes estranged son, Julian, from his previous
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: marriage to Cynthia. And so, there were more records to make.
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: Double fantasy proved to him that he still had it.
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: He was inspired, confident. Running and hiding was no longer
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: an option. No more running off for lost weekends in Hollywood.
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: No more lost years running away to hide out in
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: the Dakota. Running, hiding, and getting lost were no longer
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: tenable lines of defense for John because the pressure of
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: constantly running away from himself had taken its toll. John
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: ran from the game because he knew he wasn't good
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: at playing it. The game where celebrities let the public's
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: perception of them define them and win the day no
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: matter what. No, John Lennon couldn't truck with that. He
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: needed to tell people exactly what he was feeling at
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: that moment, no matter how much it may have contradicted
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: his prior actions or statements. Hypocrisy be damned, authenticity, truth,
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: in the moment, it was everything. And to many, before
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: he was murdered anyway, this was confusing. It certainly was
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: to Mark David Chapman. who interpreted all of John's conflicting
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: behavior as being disingenuous or fake. It's a simple interpretation.
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: It's the interpretation of an adolescent, an interpretation that an
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: angsty teenager might have. An angsty teenager like Holden Caulfield
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: from The Catcher in the Rye. The phony must die,
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: said The Catcher in the Rye. But when John Lennon
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: and Mark David Chapman finally ran into each other, for John,
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: there was no need to run anymore. No need to
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: run from the press. No need to run from his
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: own celebrity. He'd found himself. He knew who he was.
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: He was John Lennon. The Beatle. The Raconteur. The Revolutionary.
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: The Husband. The Father. But he was dead. I'm Jake Brennan,
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: and this is Disgraceland. Disgraceland was created by yours truly
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: and is produced in partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: this episode can be found on the show notes page
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: at disgracelandpod.com. If you're listening as a Disgraceland All Access member,
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: thank you for supporting the show. We really appreciate it.
• 24:11
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• 24:13
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• 24:18
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• 24:22
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• 24:27
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• 24:31
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• 24:36
  Speaker 1: and follow us on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and Facebook at DisgracelandPod.
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: And on YouTube at YouTube.com slash at DisgracelandPod. Rock and
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: roll up. He's a bad, bad man. All right, Discos,
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: what did you think of these two John Lennon episodes?
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: Let us know. Give us a call, 617-906-6638. Voicemail and
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: text at DisgracelandPod on the socials. Coming up next in Disgraceland,
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: our new episode on Happy Mondays. Don't go anywhere.