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1969

Wedding Album

‘Our wedding was public, so we’re sharing our diaries and our feelings with the world.’

– John Lennon, 1980

John Ono Lennon & Yoko Ono Lennon
Produced by John Ono Lennon and Yoko Ono Lennon

Track Listing

  1. 22:44

  2. 25:00
The marriage certificate of John Ono Lennon & Yoko Ono Lennon

Originally released in 1969, John Lennon & Yoko Ono’s Wedding Album was the couple’s third experimental, album-length record, following Unfinished Music No. 1: Two Virgins (1968) and Unfinished Music No. 2: Life with the Lions (1969), and one of the most remarkable of the duo’s testaments to an intense romantic and artistic partnership that would last fourteen years, until Lennon’s tragic passing in 1980.

'The John Lennon Diary 1969' (1969) by John Lennon

As Lennon later recalled, the two artists first met in late 1966, when Ono was preparing an exhibition of her conceptual art in London. On March 20, 1969, John & Yoko were married in a civil service in Gibraltar. To celebrate the event, in lieu of a conventional honeymoon, the newlyweds spent a week in bed at the Hilton Hotel in Amsterdam, inviting members of the press into their room for interviews and photo sessions, and using their fame — as one of the Beatles, Lennon was one of the best-known musicians in the world — and the publicity generated by their “Bed-in” to call attention to their campaign for world peace.

Later, Lennon told Rolling Stone: “We decided that if we were going to do anything like get married that we would dedicate it to peace.”

With Wedding Album, Lennon & Ono created an enduring snapshot of a vibrant pop-cultural moment, with the hostilities of the Vietnam War as its bracing backdrop. Featuring “John & Yoko,” a call-and-response duet (John & Yoko calling out each other’s names seductively, playfully, and longingly over the sound of their own heartbeats); Yoko’s “John, John, Let’s Hope for Peace”; snippets of interviews with reporters; and John’s a cappella version of the Beatles’ song “Good Night,” Wedding Album captures the humor, earnestness, and spontaneity that marked the early years of the “Ballad of John and Yoko” era.

John & Yoko on their wedding day in Gibraltar, 20 March 1969 Photo by David Nutter ©1969 David Nutter

“In our way, we’re just announcing [that] we’re open to all invitations or suggestions to work for world peace,” Yoko says in Wedding Album’s side-two sound collage, “Amsterdam.” “We’re doing it in our way,” she says. When a reporter notes that some observers were “suspicious” of Lennon & Ono’s very public actions, she responds, “Let them criticize us.” But in their own ways, she adds, others should “do something” to encourage peace, noting, “All you need is courage.”

Wedding Album’s innovative, original packaging, created by graphic designer John Kosh, included a box filled with souvenirs of John and Yoko’s nuptials: photographs, a copy of the couple’s marriage certificate, Lennon’s & Ono’s own drawings of their wedding and Bed-in honeymoon event, a picture of a slice of wedding cake, and more. Years later, Lennon told the BBC: “It was like our sharing our wedding with whoever wanted to share it with us.”

'The Wedding,' two sided poster from the original boxset artwork of 'Wedding Album'

A faithful recreation of Wedding Album in limited-edition, white-vinyl LP; compact disc; and digital-download formats, Secretly Canadian and Chimera Music are making one of the most unusual and emblematic recordings of the Sixties available again — fifty years after John & Yoko were married — to mark the golden wedding anniversary of two of the 20th century’s most emblematic cultural figures.

Recorded: Abbey Road studios, UK: 22, 27 April 1969
Recorded: Hilton Hotel, Amsterdam: 25-31 March 1969
Released USA: 20 Oct 1969
Released UK: 14 Nov 1969

Sleeve notes

John & Yoko
John Lennon: vocals, Guitar, Heartbeat
Yoko Ono: vocals, Heartbeat
Recorded 22, 27 April 1969

Amsterdam
John Lennon: vocals, acoustic guitar
Yoko Ono: vocals
Recorded 25-31 March 1969

Produced by John Ono Lennon & Yoko Ono Lennon

 

Versions Available

1969 – Original LP, 8-Track, Cassette

1997 – RykoDisc CD Remaster

 
1997 RykoDisc Remaster:
Includes Bonus Tracks ‘Who Has Seen The Wind?,’ ‘Listen, The Snow Is Falling’ and ‘Don’t Worry Kyoko (Mummy’s Only Looking For A Hand In The Snow)’
Who Has Seen The Wind?
(B-side to ‘Instant Karma! (We All Shine On)’)
Yoko Ono with Plastic Ono Band
Yoko Ono: Vocals
Backing musicians are unknown.
Produced by John Lennon.
Recorded at Trident Studios, England, 1970.

Listen, The Snow Is Falling
(B-Side to ‘Happy Xmas (War Is Over)’)
Yoko Ono: Vocals
John Lennon: Guitar
Klaus Voormann: Guitar
Hugh McCracken, Nicky Hopkins: Piano, Chimes
Produced by John and Yoko, and Phil Spector
Recorded at Record Plant

Don’t Worry Kyoko (Mummy’s Only Looking For A Hand In The Snow)
Yoko Ono: Vocal
John Lennon: Guitar
Recorded on 1/4” tape by John Lennon, 1968
From the same tape as ‘Song for John’ & ‘Mulberry,’ released as bonus tracks on the 1997 edition of Life With The Lions.

Re-release produced by Yoko Ono and Rob Stevens

Remastered by George Marino and Rob Stevens, Sterling Sound, New York City

Rykodisc Catalog Number: 10413.
First released: 20 October 1969

℗ 1997 Yoko Ono