The John Lennon Song Bob Dylan Said He Can’t Relate to, ‘I Can’t Imagine That’

Much of John Lennon’s music is influenced by Bob Dylan. While Lennon blurred the line between inspiration and imitation, he learned to hone his songwriting style and avoid almost ripping off Dylan’s style. Lennon’s music became more introspective and personal in his solo career, but Dylan said there was one song by the former Beatle he struggled to relate to. 

Bob Dylan can’t relate to John Lennon’s ‘Mother’

“Mother” debuted on Lennon’s first solo album, John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band. The lyrics address both of Lennon’s parents. Lennon’s father abandoned him as an infant, and his mother was deemed unfit to care for him alone. The “Imagine” singer was raised by his aunt Mimi, but his mother still had daily contact with him until she was killed in a car accident when Lennon was 17. 

Lennon’s complicated emotions toward his parents were expressed in “Mother” as the track begins with funeral church bells and ends with the line “Mama don’t go, Daddy stay home.” In an interview with Spin, Bob Dylan said he found connecting to “Mother” hard since he had a healthy relationship with his parents. 

“I never had that kind of problem with my parents,” Dylan said. “Like John Lennon, ‘Mother’: ‘Mother, I had you, but you never had me.’ I can’t imagine that. I know a lot of people have. There are a lot of orphans in the world, for sure. But that’s not been my experience. I have a strong identification with orphans, but I’ve been raised by people who feel that fathers, whether they’re married or not, should be responsible for their children, that all sons should be taught a trade, and that parents should be punished for their children’s crimes.”

Lennon understood that ‘Mother’ was a heavy song to open the album with

Bob Dylan may not be the only person thrown off by John Lennon’s “Mother”. It’s a five-minute song that starts the album on a rather somber note. It’s a heavy track inspired by Lennon’s experience with primal therapy. In Lennon Remembers, Lennon told Jann Wenner that he understands that “Mother” will turn people off the first time they listen to it. 

“Many, many people will not like ‘Mother’; it hurts them,” Lennon said. “The first thing that happens to you when you get the album is you can’t take it. Everybody reacted exactly the same. They think, ‘F***!’ That’s how everybody is. And the second time, they start saying, ‘Oh, well, there’s a little…’ so I can’t lay ‘Mother’ on them. It confirms the suspicions that something nasty’s going on with that John Lennon and his broad again.”

‘Mother’ did not perform well on the charts

“Mother” was later released as a single in the United States in 1970, with Yoko Ono’s “Why” as its B-side. It was an edited version, almost two minutes shorter than the original version. Still, its shortened length wasn’t enough to attract a significant audience, as it peaked at No. 43 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100. Lennon used “Mother”s commercial flop as a sign of what he needed to do to create hits. 

“See, I keep thinking ‘Mother’ is a commercial record because all the time I was writing it, it was the one I was singing the most, and it’s the one that seemed to catch on in my head,” he told Wenner. “I write singles. I write them all the same way. But ‘Mother’ – you’ve got to take into account the lyrics, too. If I can capture more sales by singing about love than singing about my mother, I’ll do it.”