As good as the Paul McCartney solo efforts I posted yesterday were, they don’t compare to the John Lennon tunes I’ll be discussing below. John Lennon remains one of my heroes – a true artist in every sense of the word. Flawed, passionate, fractured, depressed, alcoholic, redemptive at the end. In 1975, spiralling out of control and detached from everything he had connected his life with, he turned his back on the industry, got his life back together, and was prepped for an incredible resurgence only to be cut down by the assassin’s bullet. Dude laid it all out, all the time – something I respect in an artist. The day he was killed a part of me died with him, and I know a lot of other people feel the same way.

Here are my top 6 Lennon must-haves:

6. “New York City”, from Sometime In New York City. Pure, hard-driving rock and roll. Great tune. It doesn’t get better than this. Elvis could have sung this.

5. “Aisumasen (I’m Sorry)”, from Mind Games. Very bluesy, the solo by session guitarist Jesse Ed Davis is one of the top ten favorite lead solos of all time. This song makes me think of fall, and frost, and gray skies, and brown leaves, and feeling lonely even though I had a girlfriend at the time. This song has that kind of vibe, and it doesn’t get a whole lot better than this.

4. “Give Peace A Chance” (single). A fun tune. Brings back memories of driving back from Lake Ossipee in 1969 with my grandfather at the wheel.

3. Nobody Loves You (When You’re Down And Out)” from Walls And Bridges. Here, in 1975, Lennon sounds both weary and detached. Separated from Yoko at the time, his life was completely out of kilter and the work on this album shows it. Still, it’s a great tune; the next time we would hear from him would be five years later…

2. “Isolation”, from Plastic Ono Band. Very bluesy. I can remember hearing this song played over the speakers on the school bus back in 1970. People would try to talk to me, but if this song was on, I tuned them all out, it sounded so great. Got me a reputation for being kind of a freak, which wasn’t the worst thing in the world. John would have understood.

1. “Imagine”, from Imagine. Forget about all its radical socialist lyricism, it remains John’s signature tune. Phil Spector’s incredible production skills are on display throughout this song and the entire album. The sound is understated, very clean, and no one – and I do mean no one – could record strings like Phil could. I love the video – light and darkness co-existing. Look at the pain in Yoko’s and John’s eyes, it’s pretty amazing for two people to lay themselves out so bare like they do.

Tomorrow: George Harrison