Looking through the tomes of John Lennon‘s interviews, you will find a common theme. Lennon, through all his misgivings and unwanted behaviour was, if nothing else, an extremely honest person. He was honest with himself when facing his abusive behaviour, he was honest with the fans who came to him looking for a prophetic touch he simply didn’t possess and he was, perhaps most brutally, honest about the legacy of The Beatles.
An evolving artist, Lennon was rarely caught staring wistfully back at the music he made with the band. His work alongside Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr may be so iconic that we are still enjoying it over six decades later, but for Lennon, and likely the rest of the band too, the tracks were simply that: just songs they had written and recorded together.
It meant that when looking back over his work in comprehensive interviews with Rolling Stone and the infamous retrospective with David Sheff, Lennon was far more likely to criticise the Liverpudlians’ records than herald them as great pieces of art. It means that when he does land on a tunre he truly liked that it is worth paying attention to why.
‘I’m So Tired’ will unlikely be in the top ten of most beloved Beatles tracks. But, for Lennon, it ranked among his favourites, explaining to Sheff: “‘I’m So Tired’ was me, in India again. I couldn’t sleep, I’m meditating all day and couldn’t sleep at night. The story is that. One of my favourite tracks. I just like the sound of it, and I sing it well.”
It’s not the only track focused on getting 40 winks that Lennon would write. ‘I’m Only Sleeping’ is generally considered one of his better efforts. Journalist Maureen Cleave once said of Lennon in 1966: “He can sleep almost indefinitely, is probably the laziest person in England. ‘Physically lazy’, he said. ‘I don’t mind writing or reading or watching or speaking, but sex is the only physical thing I can be bothered with any more’.”
“‘I’m So Tired’ is very much John’s comment to the world,” explained McCartney to Barry Miles in Many Years From Now, “And it had that very special line, ‘And curse Sir Walter Raleigh, he was such a stupid get.’ That’s a classic line, and it’s so John that there’s no doubt that he wrote it. I think it’s 100 per cent John. Being tired was one of his themes; he wrote ‘I’m Only Sleeping’. I think we were all pretty tired but he chose to write about it.”
Herein lies why Lennon perhaps loved this track more than many others. Aside from the vocal performance, which is a wonderful reminder of the warm yet scything tone Lennon could bring to the mic, the song is utterly authentic. Turned off by the actions of the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, whom Lennon had found to be a fraudulent abuser, the bespectacled Beatle had found little in the way of salvation in India. His spiritual trip had ended with disappointment and, it would seem, tiredness.
Whether it is Sir Walter Raleigh catching a stray bullet in the famous line or simply Lennon’s lyric pleading, “I’ll give you everything I got for a little peace of mind,” it is clear that Lennon is at an emotional brink, bearing his authentic soul and laying it all down into one single track. It is this connection to his own emotions that made Lennon a powerful songwriter and just about the only thing he ever truly enjoyed recognising in his work as valid.
