1 Rock Star Said John Lennon ‘Had a Dark Side’

John Lennon was both the dreamer who wrote “Imagine” and someone with a dark side. One of his fellow 1960s rock stars discussed John’s “positively vitriolic” behavior at length. He still defended the former Beatle.

A rock star said John Lennon had a ‘dark side’ but Liverpool did too

Donovan is a rock star who evolved from Scotland’s Bob Dylan into a psychedelic mystic in a very short period of time. Donovan crossed paths with The Beatles several times during the 1960s. The Billboard Book of Number 1 Hits says he helped write The Beatles’ “Yellow Submarine,” which makes sense because many of Donovan’s songs feel like oddball nursery rhymes. In a way, Paul McCartney returned the favor by contributing vocals to Donovan’s own yellow-themed hit “Mellow Yellow.”

For some time, John has had a dual public image as both a troubled man and a saintly peace activist. During a 2018 interview with Goldmine, Donovan talked about the former. “John had a dark side, yes, but so did Liverpool itself,” the Hurdy Gurdy Man opined. “John was a lot like those swaggering sailors who’d dock and drink and cut you to ribbons with terse comments if they didn’t like you. They’d have a go at anyone. And so would The Beatles. Especially John.”

Donovan seemed to attribute John’s dark side to his parental issues. “Don’t forget, he lost his mom twice and nobody, but nobody, had the extreme fame and fortune experience those four guys had,” the “Season of the Witch” star said. “So when John let off steam — although he never did it with me — it became verbally cutting. He had a tongue on him that was positively vitriolic.”

Donovan thought that dark side had an upside

Donovan felt people didn’t always have a problem with John’s razor-sharp tongue. “You don’t mind it when it’s in his songs, do you?” he said. “Well, he was like that in private or with lots of people around. You remember American fans burning Beatles records, don’t you? Imagine you were in that position. People always expect you to be nice. John couldn’t be nice all the time.”

The “Mellow Yellow” singer still put up a defense for John. He felt that John’s wit was hilarious. He also noted that John treated him well and never saw him as a threat. Donovan saw himself as a member of a fraternity of folk rockers that included John, Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, and others.

What John Lennon thought of himself

While John wrote beautiful songs like “All You Need Is Love” and “Happy Xmas (War Is Over),” he knew he had a dark side. In the book All We Are Saying: The Last Major Interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono, the former Beatle said he had difficulty expressing himself during the 1960s. This caused him to get into physical fights with other men.

However, John didn’t see himself as a hypocrite. He sincerely believed in peace and love and sang about those topics because he knew how ugly violence was. In his opinion, the most violent people were the ones who embraced peace and love.

Donovan saw John’s dark and light sides, and so did many of John’s fans.