After the hectic tour of 1966, could you blame any of The Beatles if they never wanted to go on tour again? They had already cut their teeth playing some of the biggest squats around Liverpool, but by the time they became the biggest act in the world, it felt like the crowd had started to swallow them before they got a note out of their instruments at most gigs. Each of the Fab Four eventually found themselves back on a stage during their solo careers, but John Lennon admitted that he was far from happy performing one of his first major gigs at the Toronto Rock ‘n’ Roll Festival.
It’s not like things were all sunshine and roses for Lennon at the time, either. The Beatles were still on a high, but his and Paul McCartney’s differences started to drive a wedge between them, especially when it came time to decide on different business ventures for Apple Records.
Although Lennon only had a few experimental albums to his name as a solo act, The Toronto Rock ‘n’ Roll Festival seemed to be the one gig that could introduce him to the world as his own man. No more having to rely on Paul, George and Ringo. This would be something new, but maybe a bit too new by the sounds of it.
When putting together a makeshift Plastic Ono Band, Lennon ended up getting whomever he could find at the last minute, eventually securing bassist Klaus Voorman on bass and Eric Clapton on guitar for the show. Since they barely had enough time to rehearse, half of their chemistry was honed down at the back of the plane that they were en route to the concert.
In the background, Lennon was also starting to fall apart physically. He had been taking heroin for the past few months to get away from his personal troubles, and his new single ‘Cold Turkey’ was one of the first times that people went to hear just how low he had felt. So naturally, that song was going to be a whole different animal when they performed it live.
Outside of the sounds of Yoko Ono during her thing singing various ‘whoops’ in the background, Lennon is completely strung out at the show, telling in Lennon Remembers, “We were full of junk too. I just threw up for hours till I went on. I nearly threw up in ‘Cold Turkey’ – I had a review in Rolling Stone about the film of it – which I haven’t seen yet, and they’re saying, ‘I was this and that.’ And I was throwing up nearly in the number, I could hardly sing any of them, I was full of shit.”
Since the song was completely new, the change in arrangement is also a lot more indicative of what was going on that day. Whereas the studio version would later have that demented guitar line playing throughout the verses, hearing Lennon just play chords and have a slight shiver to his voice before he sings the line ‘I wish I was dead’ paints the picture of a man slowly falling apart.
After making it to the other side on the album Plastic Ono Band, though, that gig serves as a document of one of the darkest times of any former Beatle. Lennon was still a god at this point, but that one gig is a sharp look at how quickly someone can go from an icon on one day and look like they’re on the verge of falling apart the next day.
