Starting Over: The Making of John Lennon and Yoko Ono's Double Fantasy Hardcover – October 19, 2010

Over the years, dozens and dozens of authors have penned books trying to explain who John Lennon really was. Many of them fail miserably and are wildly off the mark due to their own inept analysis of John, often colored by their own biases. This book by Ken Sharp is dead on target. It captures so vividly who John Lennon really was. The reason Sharp gets it so correct is because there isn't the scholarly analysis of his thoughts or actions or lyrics, but instead you get the first hand reports of those who spent hours, months and days with the man during the last precious months of his life. His daily interaction with them without the media spotlight enables them to tell us who the real John Lennon was. It is through these unbiased remembrances that reveal a picture of John as a warm, witty, down to earth talent that he really was. It is through these words that you realize how unique this man was. This is such fascinating reading that you really are transposed to those Double Fantasy sessions with the stories and observations of the musicians, engineers and producers who surrounded this man in late 1980. This is a must read for anyone who wishes to know who John Lennon really was.

Wow, as I've said a number of times in my reviews, you think you know an artist after many years of reading about them. You think "There's nothing about The Beatles, (feel free to add your favorite artist here) that I've not read!" Well guess what, you don't know squat. I didn't know squat about John and Yoko. All I knew was (in my opinion) she was untalented as a musician, and I could never understand what John saw in her. But I also knew that it was really none of my business. Even back in 1980. What I didn't really appreciate at the time, was how much the two of them loved each other, and how excited they were to be back in the recording studio. Nor did I know how down to earth they were with the people in their lives whether as friends or (in this case) professional musicians. How can you be in the biggest band ever, loved by millions, and be just a regular, funny, and unassuming fellow musician in the recording studio?Excellent read. I loved John before reading this book, but I love him (and Yoko) as much or more after seeing this side of the great man, and the woman who changed his life for the better. I should be so lucky. I plan on rereading it in a year or so. It was that good. Its not often that I read a book about a musician that's actually heartwarming.

STARTING OVER is a fine, fine book with all sorts of new information and is a fabulous read. Beatles fans have so many book choices, and there's so much repetition throughout the many tomes that keep coming out (I'm thinking of FAB, the new McCartney bio; or last years John Lennon tome, for instance), that it's really something when a new book appears that is, in fact, full of new information and insight. STARTING OVER is such a book. It's a first-hand account of the DOUBLE FANTASY sessions as told by the participants. Yeah, it's all upbeat and not a bad word is cast, but the reader really gets a sense of what happened. It's absolutely essential for any John Lennon or Beatles aficionado ... and there are less and less new books about those subjects that can make that claim after all this time. And like I said at the top of this post, it's a great read, too.

An excellent oral history, not just of the making of the album Double Fantasy, but really of the last few months of John Lennon’s life. It feels like a pretty complete picture, with input from all the musicians on the record, producers, assistants, photographers, interviewers, and Yoko, as well as excerpts from interviews Lennon gave to promote the record. This style of oral history, where the whole book is made only of short interview snippets, is a great way to present a story like this, and makes for a fun, focused, fast-paced read.My favorite part of the book is when some of the studio musicians found out they were being hired to work on John Lennon’s new album, five years after his last record – their surprise and joy of getting to make music with one of the most important pop stars of all time. You do get a sense of how motivated everybody was working on the record, and how Lennon seemed in a really good place and somewhat at peace. I also enjoyed the section where some reviewers of the album reflected back on how their opinions of it changed, or didn’t change, over the years.

Brilliant

La sortie de cet album fut malheureusement occultée par le décès de l'un de ses co-auteurs, le Beatle John.Ken Sharp rend justice à ce album en décrivant le sessions, ou plus précisement recueillant des témoignages de première main pour décrire l'enregisterment de cet album, que ce soit les musiciens, le producteur Jack Douglas, et surtout Yoko Ono, comme des témoignages de John Lennon avant sa disparition. En plus, l'ouvrage est aéré par de nombreuses photos prises lors des sessionsSi vous avez aimé Double Fantasy, vous adorerez ce livre.

As a fan of John Lennon, I was looking forward to reading this book. It describes the recording sessions that took place during late 1980, as John and Yoko worked on their  Double Fantasy  album. This was the first studio album of new and original material that Lennon had worked on since 1974 (see his  Walls And Bridges ) - and there was worldwide interest in this new release. Ken Sharp (who is described as this book's 'author' - but who might more accurately be described as an editor) has entered into conversation with numerous people who were involved in the making of 'Double Fantasy' - from recording engineers to musicians. Each person gets an opportunity to recollect and reminisce on what these sessions were like ...For anyone interested in Lennon, this sounds like an fascinating book. However, it's very poorly assembled. It consists of nothing more than a series of quotes from the various persons involved. There's no guiding narrative or overview, nor any commentary on (or analysis of) what's said. It's just quote after quote ... Yes, the thoughts and memories expressed in this one-way dialogue are mildly interesting. But this jumble of quotations needed to be engaged with. In the hands of a good writer, all of this material could form the basis of a chapter of book concerning the making of Lennon's final work. As it is, it lacks clarity of purpose. It's too diffuse and abstract. There's only so many times that it's alright to read 'yeah, that was a great recording session' and 'I really enjoyed working with John and Yoko'. Notwithstanding such weaknesses, the book does present some fantastic (black and white) photos of John in the studio in 1980 - and it's a joy to see these images.No doubt others - who, at some future point, write biographies on Lennon - will make some use of the quotes presented in this book, so as to allow for an exploration of the 'Double Fantasy' recording sessions. Yet as a standalone text, this is a rather mediocre book. I recommend it only to the most enthusiastic of Lennon fans. Double FantasyWalls And Bridges

I was hugely disappointed by this book. The basic premise seems to be a load of sycophants wondering why the main subject(John Lennon)couldnt walk on water.Did nobody have a bad word to say about the man or have any criticism about the making of "Double Fantasy"? I cannot believe that so many people can look back 30 years and have such detailed memories about the daily minutia of the various recording sessions. One of the main contributors,Andy Newmark,rattles on for pages about what went on then tells us his memory is not what it was - really? There are contradictions on almost every page and several glaring errors ( ie: "Walking On Thin Ice" appears on Double Fantasy) A good attempt but it falls short.Also,if you actually read between the lines,Yoko doesnt come up smelling of roses either. As this book came out around the same time as the celebrations for Lennons 70th birthday, the phrase cash-in springs to mind.