TL;RD:
- “Happy Xmas (War Is Over)” by John Lennon was designed to stop people being complacent.
- It was initially surpassed by a cover of “Jingle Bells”.
- John felt that the song was not released properly in the United States.
John Lennon‘s”Merry Christmas (The war is over)” had a message about collective responsibility. She had problems with the release of the song. Subsequently, the track was initially not as popular as he wanted it to be.
‘Happy Xmas (War Is Over)’ was supposed to remind people of their power and responsibility
The book Everything We Say: The Last Great Interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono includes an interview from 1980. In it, John was asked about the Plastic Ono Band’s “Happy Xmas (War Is Over).” For context, the song was from the Vietnam War era.
“Yoko and I wrote together,” he recalled. “She Says: ‘The war is over if you want it.’ It was still the same message: the idea that we are only as responsible as the man who pushes the button. As long as people imagine that someone is doing it to them and they have no control, then they have no control.”
John Lennon was upset when The Singing Dogs’ ‘Jingle Bells’ beat ‘Happy Xmas (War Is Over)’
The book Lennon about Lennon: Conversations with John Lennon features an interview from 1972. In it, someone told John that “Happy Xmas (War Is Over)” wasn’t as popular as “The Singing Dogs.”jingle bells.”
John had a theory as to why the single didn’t do any better. “Well, they should have released it a little earlier than two weeks before Christmas,” he said. “You need at least four weeks in the United States.” In fact, the record label released the song more than three weeks before Christmas 1971.
John discussed the way the label reacted to the track. “They held it up, trying to make believe that Yoko didn’t write it and that it’s actually a Beatles record and all that jazz,” he said.
John Lennon spoke about the songs that impacted the reception of the Plastic Ono Band
John said that people only started to see the Plastic Ono Band as The Beatles after the success of “Instant Karma!” That song came out the year before “Happy Xmas (War Is Over).” “Suddenly they decided that the Plastic Ono Band is The Beatles,” he said.
“In the early days, when we were doing Two virgins and even ‘Give peace a chance,’ they were saying, ‘Well, it’s one of John’s crazy things, fuck him: they can have a different relationship, different treatment,’ and they let us have a different treatment,” he said.
John had problems with the release of “Happy Xmas (War Is Over)” by the Plastic Ono Band. Despite this, it remains one of the band’s most popular tracks.