Julia (song)

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Julia
The Beatles
publication November 22, 1968
length 2 min 54 s
Genre (s) Folk , ballad
Author (s) Lennon / McCartney
album The Beatles

Julia is a song by the Beatles that appeared on November 22, 1968 on the double album The Beatles as the last track on the first LP .

It is one of the songs that John Lennon composed during the Beatles' visit to India . The copyright is Lennon / McCartney . As with Dear Prudence , Lennon accompanies himself on the guitar in the fingerpicking style that Donovan had only recently learned in India . In the text John also sings about an "ocean child", which means Yoko Ono . The Japanese first name Yoko translates as 'sea child'.

The recordings for the piece took place on October 13, 1968 in London's Abbey Road Studios . Only John Lennon was involved in these recordings, who played the acoustic guitar and sang the title. Using overdubbing , he also added the extra vocal parts. It is the only Beatles track that exclusively features John Lennon. The song was produced by George Martin .

An alternative version of the song is included on the 1996 Anthology 3 album. Paul McCartney can also be heard there, giving advice to Lennon from the control room of the recording studio .

In an interview with Playboy magazine in 1980, John Lennon confirmed that he had written Julia for his mother Julia Lennon and for Yoko Ono:

Playboy: “Her name was Julia, wasn't it? Is she the Julia of your song of that name on 'The White Album?' ”

Lennon: "The song is for her - and for Yoko."

  (Source: Playboy interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono; January 1981 US edition)

After Lennon's parents separated early, his mother gave him to his aunt Mimi, so that he rarely saw his mother. As he was building a stronger relationship with her as a teenager, she was run over by a drunk police officer. This was a serious turning point in Lennon's life, which shaped his cynical and sometimes depressive personality, and which he later tried to deal with with Arthur Janov's primary therapy .

Lennon: “That was another big trauma for me. I lost her twice. Once when I was moved in with my auntie. And once again at seventeen when she actually, physically died. That was very traumatic for me. That was really a hard time for me. It made me very, very bitter. "
  (Source: Playboy interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono; January 1981 US edition)

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Steve Turner: A Hard Day's Write: The Stories Behind Every Beatles Song . New York, HarperCollins, 2005, ISBN 0-06-084409-4 , p. 163.
  2. ^ Mark Lewisohn : The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions . London, Hamlyn, 2004, ISBN 0-681-03189-1 , p. 161.