By Madeline Bocaro ©
Take Me to the Land of Hell (September 2013) is a pure Yoko fest – including screamers, dreamers and free form rock/jazz/funk excursions to places we’ve never been before. Sean Lennon proudly proclaimed, “It sounds like the end of the world!”
The album’s opener ‘Moonbeams’ starts with a birdcall. Not the pleasant chirping of a sparrow, but a warning from nature to us all. Yoko speaks the first verses through ethereal sounds and the sweet twitter of birds. Our duality of good and evil is examined in this wild dance in a ‘cosmic club’ sound-tracking the changing seasons from winter to spring.
‘Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh…!!!!!!!!!’
Nature is at the root of this song, as in most of Yoko’s work. Yoko paints with nature, with parts of herself and mostly with her mind.
“What more does one want to create? It’s all here already.”
– y.o. Vogue December 1971
“We should have nature come into our lives and we go into the nature too.
This work is a very Asian or Japanese thing.”
– y. o. The Architecture Interview, Van Alen Institute, NY June 2008
Look at life in nature. Budding branches, a shining river.
The light that shines on everything shines on you, too.
– y.o. Twitter October 2016
Imagery of birds and the moon feature prominently in much of Yoko’s work, especially in ‘Moonbeams’.
Birds communicate with each other. It’s not singing. It’s their language. It’s so beautiful and different from ours.
– y.o. – Twitter 2016
“If I had to be reincarnated as an animal, I would choose a sparrow.”
– Yoko, People Magazine – 25 Things You Didn’t Know About Me
WATER PIECE
Steal a moon on the water with a bucket.
Keep stealing until no moon is seen on
the water.
1964 spring (Grapefruit)
SOUND PIECE VII
Autumn
Take the sound of the moon fading at dawn.
Give it to your mother to listen to when she’s in sorrow.
– y.o. Acorn, 2013
“I still remember the beautiful full moon that John and I kept looking at from the bed, after everybody went home. Did anybody think that a man and a woman, a man from Liverpool, and a woman from Tokyo, would do something crazy like that together to change the world? Maybe it was written already on a stone on the moon or something.”
– Yoko Ono, afterward – Give Peace a Chance – John and Yoko’s Bed-In for Peace, 2009 (Gerry Deiter/Joan Athey
Pray to the new moon, like ancient people use to do. It will make a difference in your days until the next new moon.
– Yoko Ono, Twitter, August 2016
Moonbeams spreading their wings
Shining my rings
I got from my three husbands *
who all made me housebound
*Yoko married her first husband, experimental artist and composer Toshi Ichiyanagi in 1956. They filed for divorce in 1962. Yoko married American avant-garde artist Anthony Cox on November 28, 1962. The marriage to Cox was annulled on March 1, 1963, since Yoko’s divorce from Ichiyanagi was not finalized. From November 1962 through March 1963, Yoko was in actuality married to both men. When her divorce from Toshi was finalized, Tony Cox and Yoko remarried on June 6, 1963. Yoko married John Lennon on March 20, 1969 in Gibraltar.
Moon-music: This is a well that is receptive to the moon-tide and makes music according to the tide. When we were fish, the sea-water surrounded us. When we came on ground, we carried the sea inside us. Our blood structure is 90% salt-water. There is a very strong tie between us and the moon-tide. They say that when you die a natural death it is invariably when the tide is low. You should have the moon-music in your house like you would have a clock. And when it sings, you will remember the connection.
(Some notes on the Lisson Gallery Show y.o. October ’67 London)
Also see: John & Yoko – White Wedding
By Madeline Bocaro ©
MOONBEAMS: Listen here:
AND here:
Live @ Bowery Ballroom NYC – September 15, 2013
(Camera work is shaky at first, but it gets MUCH better!)
Live @ Royal Festival Hall – 14 June 2013
Also see my album review:
Paradise in Hell
By Madeline Bocaro ©
AND
Yoko Ono: Birdsong
By Madeline Bocaro ©
MOONBEAMS
Yoko Ono
Moonbeams melting
Into my blood stream
In winter
The snow protected us
Covering our pain
Now I hear ice cracking
Slowly in my brain
My heart is ruminating your sweet words
While my hand’s strangling the birds
People are planets
Their souls are suns
Orbiting the dance floor
Of our cosmic club
Thought clouds were raining
But now they’re gone
My spirit appears like the sun at dawn
Moonbeams spreading their wings
Shining my rings
I got from my three husbands
Who all made me housebound
My heart is ruminating your sweet words
While my hands are skinning the birds.
Spring is here again
Your heartbeat is calling me
Plastic Ono Band is: YOKO ONO – Vocals, Yuko Araki – Drums, Sean Ono Lennon – Bass Drum programming, Synth, Guitar, Bill Dobrow – Percussion, Christopher Sean Powell – Percussion, Keigo Oyamada – Kaoss Synth, Nels Cline – Electric Guitar, Hirotaka “Shimmy” Shimizu – Electric Guitar, Yuka C. Honda – Rhodes, Sampler
3 thoughts on “Yoko Songs: Moonbeams – 2013 “Your heartbeat is calling me.””