#elephant's memory

[drmorbius12]

Millionaire Big Game Hunter Trampled To Death by Elephants

(recent headline, April 25, 2026)

[youngnnaiive]

I'm starting to get the jemily ship.... I'm on 3x16

[elfleccy]

Out Today: John & Yoko/Plastic Ono Band With Elephant's Memory And Special Guests - Power To The People

[greensparty]

Album Review: John Lennon & Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band with Elephant's Memory and Special Guests "Power to the People"

Here at Green’s Party, I’ve been luck enough to cover John Lennon and Sean Lennon quite a bit! Today of all days happens to be the birthday of John Winston Ono Lennon was born on this day in 1940 in Liverpool, England! John’s son Sean Taro Ono Lennon was born on this day in 1975 in NYC, NY, on John’s 35th birthday. Happy 50th Sean!

In 1980, John brought his young son Sean to the Hit Factory recording studio he was recording at!

In addition to covering John Lennon's work with The Beatles a ton, I’ve gotten to cover a number of documentaries about him  (24 Hours: The World of John and Yoko, The Lost Weekend: A Love Story, John Lennon: Murder Without a Trial, and Revival69) and last year I got to review the Mind Games Ultimate Collection box set. But earlier this year I got to review the documentary One to One: John & Yoko about John and Yoko Ono’s 1972 One to One charity concert for special needs children. Now a new box set explores those concerts and time period for John and Yoko. Sean Ono Lennon is among the producers of this album. The release of this on Friday is exactly one day after what would have been John's 85th birthday. So it's fitting I'm reviewing this on John and Sean's birthday. Power to the People box set drops today from UMe. The box set comprises 12-discs, 9 CDs and 3 blu-rays [NOTE: for this review I did not get to view the blu-rays].

album cover

The year is 1972. It was a few years after The Beatles break-up. On August 30, 1972, John and Yoko, The Plastic Ono Band along with NYC rock band Elephant's Memory did the historic One to One benefit concert at Madison Square Garden. It raised more than $1.5 million (today’s equivalent of $11.5 million) to support children with intellectual and developmental disabilities, including the children from the Willowbrook State School in Staten Island, N.Y. CD1 is a Hybrid "Best Of" Show, CD2 is the afternoon show, CD3 is the evening show, all from the Aug. 30, 1972 shows. CD4, CD5 and CD6 are from New York City in John and Yoko's early era in the city in 1971 showing them and Plastic Ono Band with Elephant's Memory in the Ultimate Mixes, the Evolution Documentary, and a Studio Jam with Elemental Mixes. CD7 is a concert they did on Dec. 15, 1969 at the Lyceum Ballroom, The Strand, London to benefit UNICEF, as well as a concert they did on June 6, 1971 at Fillmore East in NYC with Frank Zappa and The Mothers (that portion appeared on the 1972 Some Time in New York City album). CD8 is a concert they did with David Peel and The Lower East Side on Dec. 10, 1971 at the John Sinclair Freedom Rally, Crisler Arena, Ann Arbor, Michigan; a benefit concert they did on Dec. 17, 1971 at Apollo Theater, Harlem, NYC; a performance they did on Dec. 16, 1971 on the David Frost TV Show, The Little Theatre, 240 West 44th Street, NYC; and a performance on Sept. 4, 1972 on Jerry Lewis Muscular Dystrophy Telethon, Americana Hotel, NYC. CD9 is Home Jam of home recordings on Sept. 10, 1971 at the St. Regis Hotel, New York; home recordings on Oct. 27, 1971 at the St. Regis Hotel; home recordings on Dec. 10, 1971 at Campus Inn, Ann Arbor, Michigan; and that same day/location with Phil Ochs.

all the bells and whistles of this box set

I am a huge fan of Sir John Lennon, so it's no surprise I enjoyed this. But here is the thing with this box set - boy is it long!!! I didn't even get to view the blu-rays, but the music discs alone are about 9 hours. This definitely felt like it's going into For Fans Only territory with some of the mixes. The music itself is great, but I think this could've been a much stronger album if they had just the One to One concerts as one set (that alone would be multiple discs) and then another album of the live performances from around that era. As a big box set it just felt super long and started to meld together if you listen in one sitting. But there's no denying the treat it is to here this concert and some of the home recordings (especially the Phil Ochs recordings with Lennon) in this high-quality mix.

For info on Power to the People

4 out of 5 stars

[thecoparoom]

Horror Rock at Fillmore East, 1969

[thecoparoom]

Horror Rock with a screening of Frankenstein

1969, NYC

[ceofjohnlennon]

John Lennon, Yoko Ono and The Elephant's Memory Band in Chinatown, July, 1972. ㅡ From the book "Listen To These Photographs of John Lennon" by Bob Gruen.

[longforyesterday]

Elephant’s Memory had a number of songs they’d have happily performed [at the One To One concert], but Lennon would not relent. “We wanted to do ‘Day Tripper’, and we’d have done a whole set of Beatle songs, but he wasn’t keen on it. He wanted to do ‘Imagine’, and he did ‘It’s So Hard’ and ‘Cold Turkey’. He wanted to keep it to solo stuff. He was very aware of trying to build a solo career: ‘I wanna make sure people realise this is me.’” “That’s another thing that puts me off playing live – the fact that you’ve got to do the same thing over and over again every night, and the audience wants to hear the songs you’re associated with,” Lennon told Melody Maker the following year. “I remember I sang ‘Imagine’ twice in one day when I was rehearsing it, and that bored me. I’ve nothing against the song, in fact I’m quite proud of it, but I just can’t go on every night singing it. I’d try and vary it, but then I don’t like to see that myself. If I go to watch an artist I’d expect to hear the things I know. I understand it from both points of view.”

Richard White, Come Together – Lennon and McCartney In The Seventies