Help Yourself (Julian Lennon album)

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Help yourself
Studio album by Julian Lennon

Publication
(s)

1991

Label (s)

Format (s)

LP , CD

Genre (s)

skirt

Title (number)

12

running time

58:22

occupation
  • San Fernando Valley Girl Scout Troop 592

production

Bob Ezrin

Studio (s)

  • Amigo Studios
  • The Enterprise
chronology
Mr. Jordan
(1989) 		Help yourself Photograph Smile
(1998)

Help Yourself is the fourth music album by the singer Julian Lennon . It was released in August 1991 by Atlantic Records in the US and Virgin Records in the UK. The single Saltwater reached the top of the Australian charts and became a top 10 hit in the UK.

Emergence

After Lennon had released his album Mr. Jordan in 1989 , he found himself in an emotional low: “I had to come to terms with myself first. In the past I never wanted to be compared to my famous Beatles father , I had real depression because of it, and even received psychological treatment for a short time. Now I stand by my origins and am just who I am. “Lennon parted ways with his producer Patrick Leonard and instead hired Canadian Bob Ezrin . Ezrin and Lennon decided, in contrast to the titles of the first three albums Valotte , The Secret Value of Daydreaming and Mr. Jordan, to address less relationship problems.

“It was time to write about other things that interest me. [...] It was a kind of exorcism. There were some problems that I had to solve. Mental, emotional difficulties that made me very unhappy. […] You won't find any answers or solutions on the album. It was just about letting all these things out - self-help therapy. "

- Julian Lennon 1992

Lennon retired to a former gas station in the San Fernando Valley , where he wrote songs for the new album every day for eight months. In total, the work on the album took 18 months.

The cover shows a simple sketch of a winking, smiley- like face. The right eye in the picture was replaced by a photo of an eye with a tear flowing out of it. The photo is from Mark Hanauer .

title

  1. Rebel King - 5:51 (Julian Lennon / Anthony Moore / Bob Ezrin)
  2. Saltwater - 4:07 (Julian Lennon / Mark Spiro / Leslie Spiro)
  3. Get a Life - 4:17 (Julian Lennon / Glenn Martin Tilbrook / Scott Humphrey)
  4. Would You - 6:20 (Julian Lennon / Anthony Moore)
  5. Maybe I Was Wrong - 4:27 (Julian Lennon)
  6. Help Yourself - 4:41 (Julian Lennon / John McCurry)
  7. Listen - 5:04 (Julian Lennon)
  8. Other Side of Town - 5:34 (Julian Lennon / Paul Buchanan / Robert Bell)
  9. New Physics Rant - 4:49 (Julian Lennon / Anthony Moore / Bob Ezrin / Scott Humphrey)
  10. Take Me Home - 4:27 (Julian Lennon / Bob Ezrin / Justin Clayton)
  11. Imaginary Lines - 5:12 (Julian Lennon / Anthony Moore / Justin Clayton / Bob Ezrin)
  12. Keep the People Working - 3:36 (Anthony Moore)

Lennon also played guitar, keyboard, mandolin , percussion, bass and drums on the album . On the Other Side of Town he sings in a duet with The Blue Nile front man Paul Buchanan. The guitar accompaniment of Saltwater took over George Harrison .

Chart successes

Help Yourself was Lennon's first album that did not make it into the US charts. In addition, none of the album's singles -  Saltwater , Help Yourself and Get a Life  - made it into the US Billboard charts .

In the UK charts the album reached number 42 on the charts, while the single Saltwater came in at number 6. In Australia , Saltwater , today the Greenpeace anthem , topped the charts for four weeks.

Singles in the charts

year title
 Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements
(Year, title, , Placements, weeks, awards, comments) 		Remarks
DE DE AT AT CH CH UK UK
1991 Saltwater DE58 (10 weeks)
DE 		- - UK6 (13 weeks)
UK
Help yourself DE53 (11 weeks)
DE 		- - UK53 (2 weeks)
UK
1992 Get a life - - - UK56 (3 weeks)
UK

criticism

The youth magazine Bravo described Help Yourself as Lennon's “previous masterpiece. [...] Julian pulled out all the arranging registers. "

Rolling Stone described Help Yourself as a "big step forward" in Lennon's musical development. The album is "Beatlesque" both in terms of Lennon's voice and individual tracks, the beginning of Saltwater as Strawberry Fields Forever and the content of Imagine , while Maybe I Was Wrong seems toborrow from Penny Lane . On the other hand, pieces like Rebel King , New Physics Rant and Keep the People Working are much more experimental and unconventional. In terms of content, the album ranges from private confessions to global politics and Lennon masters the balancing act between the two extremes.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Depression because of Beatles father: Julian Lennon . In: Bravo , October 2, 1991.
  2. ↑ a b Hannsjörg Riemann: Bravo Talk Show - Julian Lennon: Yoko is sitting on my coal . In: Bravo , March 26, 1992, p. 27.
  3. ↑ Mal Reding: Julian Lennon Profiled! Radio interview 1991.
  4. ↑ Patrick Heidmann: My father's name continues to have an effect . In: Berliner Zeitung , January 12, 2008.
  5. ↑ Help Yourself (Julian Lennon album) in the German album charts
  6. ↑ Help Yourself (Julian Lennon Album) in the Official UK Charts (English)
  7. ^ Julian Lennon: Help Yourself . In: Bravo , October 10, 1991.
  8. ↑ "... an album that will be remembered as a great leap forward for him" Julian Lennon Help Yourself Album Reviews ( Memento from July 6, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
  9. ↑ Julian Lennon Help Yourself Album Reviews ( Memento from July 6, 2008 in the Internet Archive )