Around late summer/early fall of 1980, I remember being excited to read the Random Notes section of ROLLING STONE and discovering that John Lennon was ending his long (or so it seemed then) retirement to record a new album.
That album, DOUBLE FANTASY, appeared a couple of months later. A DJ for the now-long-dead Top 40/AOR hybrid station KKQV-FM in Wichita Falls, TX played the album in its entirety--and pronounced it "Double Nightmare"; presumably, she didn't like John and Yoko forsaking activism for chronicling adventures in ordinary living.
And then, on the night of December 8, 1980, I came home from a foreign film appreciation class to find out that John Lennon had been murdered.
A few weeks before, Lennon gave an interview to NEWSWEEK. He mentioned not wanting to be "Elvis Beatle" and made a chillingly prophetic comment: "The King is killed by his courtiers."
Days after Lennon's death, I remember reading a letter in the editorial section of a Wichita Falls newspaper. It came from what I presumed was an elderly woman in Burkburnett. She ranted that all four Beatles should have been shot.
Angered by this stupid, malevolent outburst, I quickly turned the page.
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