If John Lived:

[chet]

What do you think he'd be doing now?

Do you think he'd still be playing music and what would it be like?

He'd be over 60 now. Would he still be healthy?

[garytelecastor]

I think that John would definitely be recording, but probably more of a family man. By the time he died he was pretty much done with the fame thing. He was really trying to concentrate on his wife and kids.
I do believe though that he would probably be involved in some social activist stuff. Seemed to be his forte.
I think that he and George both would be using their circumstances to advance their personal social issues.

[F1rocco]

Dont think he would have made it through the 80's....Notta Chance....

With his son putting out music in the 80's there coulda been some Partridge Family thing with Yoko...MTV and Head Bangers Ball wouldnt have let it slide.....Or worse 1 more good bust and it would bedtime for bonzo for John coming to the States.....Ronnie woulda snuffed the hippie Englishman.......

Reply was an 80's thought/era....Not meant to be political....

[studio1087]

He would be fed up and very vocal about it. He would drive politicians nuts. I miss him. I can only guess that he would be very healthy. I would always picture Paul and John as being healthy people.





Recent shot of my son & I.

[chet]

I'm watching the Beatles Anthology and just thought that John might still be here if not for the nut case.

[chet]

Originally Posted by F1rocco

Dont think he would have made it through the 80's....Notta Chance....

With his son putting out music in the 80's there coulda been some Partridge Family thing with Yoko...MTV and Head Bangers Ball wouldnt have let it slide.....Or worse 1 more good bust and it would bedtime for bonzo for John coming to the States.....Ronnie woulda snuffed the hippie Englishman.......

Reply was an 80's thought/era....Not meant to be political....

Never understood what he saw in Yoko.

All the sexy babes he had at his beck and call...

[chet]

Originally Posted by studio1087

He would be fed up and very vocal about it. He would drive politicians nuts. I miss him.





Recent shot of my son & I.

Is that in NYC? I've been here almost 15 years and have never been there.

[studio1087]

Central Park right across the street from the Dakota Apts. We always walk through there with the kids. It's beautiful and people are always gathering by the Imagine mosaic.

[chet]

The reason I probably haven't went there is that the memories of when he was killed was such a bummer for me. I remember that we were looking foward to him making music again and that had to happen.
I stayed up watching the coverage and also the next day. I couldn't believe it. It didn't seem real.

[Mark Davis]

Originally Posted by chet

Never understood what he saw in Yoko.

All the sexy babes he had at his beck and call...

What he got from Yoko was a mothering experience.

She is 74 John would be 67 today if he was still living.

Lennon and McCartney will always be one of the best songwriting teams ever.

[wierdOne]

Alright.. I happen to have a flux capacitor.... so I went back to see what would have happened if John had lived....

1. In early 1981 he would have sobered up and realized what he had let Yoko do to the band..

2. By mid summer he would have hired a hitman to take her out, and recorded an album of McCartney's tunes as a public apology...

3. By 82 the Beatles would have reunited..

4. By late 82 they would have released their reunion album.... promptly entitled "Not so fast EVH"..

5. That album is single handedly responsible for steering popular music away from 80's hair band butt rock...

6. With no hair bands, there's not GnR.... with no GnR... there's no Grunge... With no Grunge... there's no Candlebox.. with no Candlebox, then no one ever records "Far behind"..... and the world is a MUCH better place....

That's the good side...

The bad side, is that instead of the testosterone driven hair bands.... testosterone free Boy Bands rise to world domination... in order to follow the trend, the majority of American males , not only dress like George Michael, Don Johnson, and Donny Walburg but begin taking Michael Jackson's brand of over the counter hormones to circumvent puberty.... by the early 1990's, this testosterone free American society largely loses the ability to breed... Without young to fuel the Video Game industry, Nintendo turns to weapons development and by the early 2000's releases their highly acclaimed WWiii... This "easy to use" Weapon of Mass Destruction, designed for the "not so trained Terrorist" becomes all the rage on the black market.... with demand out growing supply, it becomes impossible for world governments to control the growth of homegrown terrorist cells... by then, there's little choice left... so... nukes start flying, and Steve Jobs never gets to release the iPhone Nano...

so... you see... John died for all of us... we must never forget him...

Merry Christmas....

[Durtdog]

Originally Posted by wierdOne

Alright.. I happen to have a flux capacitor.... so I went back to see what would have happened if John had lived....

1. In early 1981 he would have sobered up and realized what he had let Yoko do to the band..

2. By mid summer he would have hired a hitman to take her out, and recorded an album of McCartney's tunes as a public apology...

3. By 82 the Beatles would have reunited..

4. By late 82 they would have released their reunion album.... promptly entitled "Not so fast EVH"..

5. That album is single handedly responsible for steering popular music away from 80's hair band butt rock...

6. With no hair bands, there's not GnR.... with no GnR... there's no Grunge... With no Grunge... there's no Candlebox.. with no Candlebox, then no one ever records "Far behind"..... and the world is a MUCH better place....

That's the good side...

The bad side, is that instead of the testosterone driven hair bands.... testosterone free Boy Bands rise to world domination... in order to follow the trend, the majority of American males , not only dress like George Michael, Don Johnson, and Donny Walburg but begin taking Michael Jackson's brand of over the counter hormones to circumvent puberty.... by the early 1990's, this testosterone free American society largely loses the ability to breed... Without young to fuel the Video Game industry, Nintendo turns to weapons development and by the early 2000's releases their highly acclaimed WWiii... This "easy to use" Weapon of Mass Destruction, designed for the "not so trained Terrorist" becomes all the rage on the black market.... with demand out growing supply, it becomes impossible for world governments to control the growth of homegrown terrorist cells... by then, there's little choice left... so... nukes start flying, and Steve Jobs never gets to release the iPhone Nano...

so... you see... John died for all of us... we must never forget him...

Merry Christmas....

Did you pull another all-nighter?

[geddins]

Originally Posted by wierdOne

Alright.. I happen to have a flux capacitor.... so I went back to see what would have happened if John had lived....

1. In early 1981 he would have sobered up and realized what he had let Yoko do to the band..

2. By mid summer he would have hired a hitman to take her out, and recorded an album of McCartney's tunes as a public apology...

3. By 82 the Beatles would have reunited..

4. By late 82 they would have released their reunion album.... promptly entitled "Not so fast EVH"..

5. That album is single handedly responsible for steering popular music away from 80's hair band butt rock...

6. With no hair bands, there's not GnR.... with no GnR... there's no Grunge... With no Grunge... there's no Candlebox.. with no Candlebox, then no one ever records "Far behind"..... and the world is a MUCH better place....

That's the good side...

The bad side, is that instead of the testosterone driven hair bands.... testosterone free Boy Bands rise to world domination... in order to follow the trend, the majority of American males , not only dress like George Michael, Don Johnson, and Donny Walburg but begin taking Michael Jackson's brand of over the counter hormones to circumvent puberty.... by the early 1990's, this testosterone free American society largely loses the ability to breed... Without young to fuel the Video Game industry, Nintendo turns to weapons development and by the early 2000's releases their highly acclaimed WWiii... This "easy to use" Weapon of Mass Destruction, designed for the "not so trained Terrorist" becomes all the rage on the black market.... with demand out growing supply, it becomes impossible for world governments to control the growth of homegrown terrorist cells... by then, there's little choice left... so... nukes start flying, and Steve Jobs never gets to release the iPhone Nano...

so... you see... John died for all of us... we must never forget him...

Merry Christmas....

However long that took....time well spent!

I think if JL had lived he'd pretty much just be an older version of what he was when he died.....living quietly and reclusive....not really doing anything.

And Ditto on Mark Davis' comment about JL/PM songwriting team....the best

[pango_twango]

Originally Posted by wierdOne

Alright.. I happen to have a flux capacitor.... so I went back to see what would have happened if John had lived....

1. In early 1981 he would have sobered up and realized what he had let Yoko do to the band..

2. By mid summer he would have hired a hitman to take her out, and recorded an album of McCartney's tunes as a public apology...

3. By 82 the Beatles would have reunited..

4. By late 82 they would have released their reunion album.... promptly entitled "Not so fast EVH"..

5. That album is single handedly responsible for steering popular music away from 80's hair band butt rock...

6. With no hair bands, there's not GnR.... with no GnR... there's no Grunge... With no Grunge... there's no Candlebox.. with no Candlebox, then no one ever records "Far behind"..... and the world is a MUCH better place....

That's the good side...

The bad side, is that instead of the testosterone driven hair bands.... testosterone free Boy Bands rise to world domination... in order to follow the trend, the majority of American males , not only dress like George Michael, Don Johnson, and Donny Walburg but begin taking Michael Jackson's brand of over the counter hormones to circumvent puberty.... by the early 1990's, this testosterone free American society largely loses the ability to breed... Without young to fuel the Video Game industry, Nintendo turns to weapons development and by the early 2000's releases their highly acclaimed WWiii... This "easy to use" Weapon of Mass Destruction, designed for the "not so trained Terrorist" becomes all the rage on the black market.... with demand out growing supply, it becomes impossible for world governments to control the growth of homegrown terrorist cells... by then, there's little choice left... so... nukes start flying, and Steve Jobs never gets to release the iPhone Nano...

so... you see... John died for all of us... we must never forget him...

Merry Christmas....

I agree with your historical analysis, with the following exceptions or clarifications:

2. The public apology would not have happened, at least not once Lennon learned about the fate of the legal rights to the Beatles' songs, and how they ended up in the control of one Michael Jackson. The atonement you speak of would have been accomplished by John sending Yoko Michael's way, so that she could do to his career what she had done to the Beatles. They're both into dance music, so the attraction would have been immediate. John would then be (partly) forgiven for things like "Two Virgins," and public incidents such as letting Yoko "sing" on the Dirty Mac session during the Rock & Roll circus. Photos of Yoko with the Beatles during the White Album and Get Back Sessions would be altered (ala that communist guy whose name sounds a lot like "Lennon") so that Yoko was not visible.

5. It's unlikely that the Beatles, of all people, would have taken a dim view towards hair bands or hair anything. Rather, they would have pointed out to lawyers that they were largely responsible for the linkage between hair and rock-icon status (and they would have newspaper accounts of the "mop-tops" to support their claims). Once they were in control of the direction that hair-band rock would take, history would go on as before, but the bar would be set much higher for hair-band rock. Essentially, there would still be GNR, but no "Patience," Def Leppard, but no spandex, and so on.

6. The lack of male sterility in the U.S. would have corresponded with an alarming rise in the percentage of males who are at least 50lbs overweight, many of the former hair-band gods would be forced to appear on Reality TV shows (or play Indian casinos), Keith Richards would injure himself falling out of a tree, and the Beatles' catalogue would be "re-visioned" and used as background music for a circus performance in Las Vegas... No, wait, that actually did happen...

[Rasmuth]

He'd probably be doing a reality show on VH1...."Jam with a Beatle" or something like that...

Seriously...I don't care what he'd be doing...just wish he was still around...George too. The world isn't the same with only 2 surviving Beatles.

[sean79]

Originally Posted by Rasmuth

The world isn't the same with only 2 surviving Beatles.

Two? Didn't Paul die a long time ago? His replacement is doing well.

[beep.click]

He'd be following his instincts and surprising us all, as always. Taking us places we wouldn't think to go on our own.

[601210]

I have two theories.
First is he'd prolly give up music to focus on his family. (I read somewhere that on the night of his death, he wanted to go straight home to his kid.)

My second theory is that his body will be found in a locked up warehouse, with a shotgun in his hand. Then Yoko will come up with a signature guitar, complete with 12-string version, that no-one will buy because it's associated with her.

[fezz parka]

I miss Lennon, but I miss George more.

[Seanycaster]

I think John would be campaigning against poverty in africa or somesuch cause. Doing what Bob Geldof and Bono do but more successfully. The Beatles would have reunited for Live Aid and perhaps again at Live 8. Either that or he would shun any involvement in those things and emerge only from his quiet life in NY to deliver an acid tongued rebuke every time he saw Bob and Bono getting a bit high and mighty.

[Dave Hopping]

Woulda taken quite awhile-maybe not till the '90s-but they'd have played together some more.Maybe the way Simon and Garfunkel do.
Here's a thought....Considering the success of Pattie Boyd's book about George and EC,can you imagine what a Cynthia Lennon book would have had to say about a John Lennon who was alive and therefore not eligible for sainthood thru martyrdom?

[chet]

I think the last years of his life showed that he was no longer out to save the world so he wouldn't get involved in stuff dealing with the "P" word.

I think he was reinvigorated with the idea of playing and writing music. He was still deeply in love with Yoko judging by the songs on his last album. I think he would've went out on the road with a band sometime during after the release of the album.

I also think a Beatles reunion would've eventually been in the cards with all the proceeds going to a charity or charities. Remember how you'd hear all these lucrative offers for them to reunite?

I was personally fired up by hearing that he was interested in recording again. Like everybody else I kinda took him for granted while he was here.

[chet]