To Christie’s auction house, it was:
"A rare first working draft of the lyrics for I’m Only Sleeping in John Lennon’s hand… This
draft showing considerable deletions, alterations and variations to the
text as Lennon worked out the song’s wording and title, providing an
invaluable insight into the artist’s creative process."
To most other people it was a bunch of scribble on the back of a letter. Either way, nobody wanted to buy the handwritten first draft of I’m Only Sleeping lyrics by John Lennon yesterday.
On paper, it looked so desirable. The first
burst of creativity from the most iconic member of The Beatles for
Revolver (CDs), often cited as the best album of all time; the first seed of
an idea for a song that’s been analysed within an inch of it’s life as
being the first premonition John Lennon had of his death.
Christie’s was so confident that that the handwritten lyrics were going to bring
the house down at auction that a £200,000 reserve was put on the lot. But nobody wanted to pay that much. Why?
Maybe
because it’s a lot of money for a few words scrawled in blue felt-tip pen
on the back of a final demand notice that a long-dead scouser wrote
about having a bit of a kip, for an album that shares a name with a
crappy gangster film. And anyway, the Suggs ragga version was better. That had a rap in the middle and everything.
Read more:
Handwritten Lennon Lyrics Fail To Sell – ABC News
[story by Stuart Heritage]
Joe Compton says
Can somebody tell me what JOHN LENNON song had a LYRIC with the words GERMAN MAIL?
What is the NAME and YEAR of that song?