Speaker 1: Blood on the Tracks is a production of I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio and Double Elvis. John Lennon was a musical genius
Speaker 1: and one of the most beloved cultural figures of the
Speaker 1: twentieth century. His songs inspired dreamers to imagine, his search
Speaker 1: for the truth gave power to the people. But some
Speaker 1: thought he dreamed too much. Others thought he was too powerful.
Speaker 1: So he was followed, he was threatened, he was declared
Speaker 1: a danger to the United States, and in night he
Speaker 1: was assassinated. This is his story told by his so
Speaker 1: called friends. This is Special Agent Jim Steele with the
Speaker 1: Federal Bureau of Investigation work in case number double oh
Speaker 1: nine's zero eight zero four nine one. Case subject is Lennon,
Speaker 1: John Winston oh No. This information pertains to a period
Speaker 1: ending December. Interview subject as the Jones David Robert a
Speaker 1: k A. David Bowie Interview number nine Dash nine three
Speaker 1: day zero eight four day zero one Recall number two
Speaker 1: December twenty two. John was the omnique pistle I got
Speaker 1: to know. Unfortunately it was near the end of his life.
Speaker 1: I must have made young Americans. It was one of
Speaker 1: those associations that lost at about the length of the
Speaker 1: recording sessions, and then we didn't see each other for
Speaker 1: about a year. But when we didn't reconnect, we started
Speaker 1: to pick up a woman was quickly becoming a very
Speaker 1: instructive and deep relationship. He was from an art school,
Speaker 1: and a lot of our conversations were about the world
Speaker 1: of the arts and my an artist wants to do
Speaker 1: things in the first place, very dramatic and philosophical two
Speaker 1: o'clock a morning conversations, that sort of thing. He would
Speaker 1: rifle through the avant garde, look for ideas that were
Speaker 1: on the outside, on on the preferey of the mainstream,
Speaker 1: and then he'd applied those ideas in a functional manner
Speaker 1: to something that was considered populist and make it work.
Speaker 1: Can take the honest idea and make it work for
Speaker 1: the masses. That was like making old work for the
Speaker 1: people and for the elite. And the people responded some
Speaker 1: with adoration humanity, and then they were those who thought
Speaker 1: the John was the elitist, that he was bamboozling with them.
Speaker 1: In the response to those people of one person in particular,
Speaker 1: Al that's the reason why there's so much blood in
Speaker 1: the tract m Yeah, chapter seven, John Lennon and Deep
Speaker 1: at Bowie was a monumental year for me because perhaps
Speaker 1: the most important year in my professional life. Many people
Speaker 1: don't know this. You see, most people think I had
Speaker 1: my act together from day one and it was all
Speaker 1: calculated that I'm morphed and evolved with ease Major Tom
Speaker 1: to Ziggy Stardust, Ziggy Stardust to a lad Insane. But
Speaker 1: I was winging it. I was making chance look calculated.
Speaker 1: What does it do say in America? Fake it till
Speaker 1: you make it right by n I couldn't keep faking.
Speaker 1: I had to make it. So that year everything changed,
Speaker 1: and it changed because I met John Lennon. Unfortunately it
Speaker 1: was near the end of his life. John Lennon took
Speaker 1: one look at me and new I had something to give.
Speaker 1: I had to tear it all down start over. So
Speaker 1: I killed Ziggy Stardust and I drew the curtain on
Speaker 1: a lad Insane. But the best lesson John gave me
Speaker 1: it wasn't it just about the music or the character
Speaker 1: I was playing. It was about the business of arts
Speaker 1: and the people I was working with. Instructive John looked
Speaker 1: me dead in the eyes and said, you're being shafted
Speaker 1: by your present manager. He was talking about my manager,
Speaker 1: Tony de three, of course main main management. My relationship
Speaker 1: with Tony had deteriorated over the years. I had become
Speaker 1: increasingly concerned that I was being taken advantage of. John
Speaker 1: knew of all about these sorts of concerns and paranoias,
Speaker 1: after all that business with the Beatles and Alan Klein
Speaker 1: philosophical And it was just a month earlier, in December
Speaker 1: of the Beatles officially dissolved, each of them, untangling himself
Speaker 1: from the acrimonious web that Alan Klein had spun. Derek
Speaker 1: is a true Are the Beatles really finished? No, not
Speaker 1: until they die. As long as they live and as
Speaker 1: long as they like each other, anything could happened. And
Speaker 1: so John saw tony stranglehold on my career is unhealthy.
Speaker 1: Naturally he over my eyes to the fact that it
Speaker 1: wasn't just Tony, you see, was the concept of managers
Speaker 1: in general. There's too much powerful one person. In John's eyes,
Speaker 1: there was no such thing as good management. All management
Speaker 1: was shit. Well, I have one person control every aspect
Speaker 1: of my career when I could simply in ploy individuals
Speaker 1: is needed to help me with specific wants. Well, that
Speaker 1: was the question to talk of the morning conversations. John
Speaker 1: had been through all that. He was wise, He was
Speaker 1: like an older brother. Really. He completely changed my perspective
Speaker 1: on the business of art. And then we made a
Speaker 1: song out of the whole atle deal like a middle
Speaker 1: finger of a song that was directed not just at
Speaker 1: people like Tony d'free and Alan Klein, but at the
Speaker 1: intequated notion that an artist must be controlled by someone
Speaker 1: with business since and we arrived at that song entirely
Speaker 1: by chance. It was January. I was in New York
Speaker 1: City Electric Lady Studios. Sessions had resumed for my new album,
Speaker 1: Young Americans. I've been introduced to John not long before,
Speaker 1: I Believe in Los Angeles by Elizabeth Taylor Rule People.
Speaker 1: She was trying to get me to start in a
Speaker 1: movie Villa God bless John's on me. Be sure, I
Speaker 1: want to know. That's another story entirely. I knew that
Speaker 1: John lived in New York, so I reached out to him.
Speaker 1: I told him I was planning to record a cover
Speaker 1: of Across the Universe, that beautiful song of his from
Speaker 1: Let It Be. I asked if he wanted to come
Speaker 1: by the studio and play on the track. It was
Speaker 1: during the session for Across the Universe that we hit
Speaker 1: upon this other song. By chance, my guitarist Carlos Alamar
Speaker 1: was fooling around with this old R and B riff.
Speaker 1: I think it was called foot stomping, one of the
Speaker 1: riffs he perfected when he played with James Brown, but
Speaker 1: he slowed it down, made it something new. I heard
Speaker 1: him keep playing it, repeating it, and before I knew it,
Speaker 1: John was shouting aim in this falseesso hook over the guitar,
Speaker 1: and that's how fame began, completely organic, out of thin
Speaker 1: air and rifle through the avant guls. Of course, it
Speaker 1: wasn't out of thin air. I know that now we're
Speaker 1: on the outside. We've been talking about bad managers and
Speaker 1: bad business deals and the whole bloody concept of being famous.
Speaker 1: John and I those conversations, along with my change perspective
Speaker 1: on what became my new reality as an artist and
Speaker 1: a businessman, there was all fuel that went into the
Speaker 1: creative engine. Who part those ideas in a functional manner.
Speaker 1: Carlos was the perfect collaborator. Like I said, he played
Speaker 1: with James Brown back in the late sixties, and so
Speaker 1: he had his own personal history with this sort of
Speaker 1: controlling figure that John and I wanted to rail against.
Speaker 1: He left James Brown after James doctors paycheck for missing
Speaker 1: one of his musical cues. Carlos said, fuck this, I'm gone.
Speaker 1: Last fame. Funk this, We're gone. That was like making
Speaker 1: old work for the people and for the elite, because
Speaker 1: what is fame? After all? Was it good for a
Speaker 1: good seat in a restaurant? That's about it. People who
Speaker 1: don't have fame are the ones who wanted. People who
Speaker 1: have fame are always looking for our way to get
Speaker 1: rid of it. It's worth noting that a half year
Speaker 1: after we released Fame, James Brown himself borrowed Carlos as
Speaker 1: lick for his song hot I Need to be Loved, Love, Love, Love,
Speaker 1: and the Carlos ever saw a dime off that as
Speaker 1: far as the song Fame goes, this would prove to
Speaker 1: be my first number one hit in America and the
Speaker 1: people whisper It also redefined who John was as an artist.
Speaker 1: Fame saved him from becoming some old time rock and
Speaker 1: roll nostalgia peddler and lifted him into the upper echelon
Speaker 1: of the New York City avant garde. The honest idea
Speaker 1: and make it work for the masters a moment in time,
Speaker 1: the song, the session, the wisdom might gleaned from John.
Speaker 1: And that was my turning point. I took the young
Speaker 1: Americans masters and I locked them in a bankful I
Speaker 1: didn't want Tony too free touching them. And then I
Speaker 1: told our CIA that I wanted to go separate ways
Speaker 1: with Tony, and then I needed the complete support, which
Speaker 1: I got. People responded, you know what our CIA said
Speaker 1: to Tony when they asked him why they were siding
Speaker 1: with me over him in the split because Tony, they said,
Speaker 1: you can't see the details of mar Setselman with Tony
Speaker 1: have been and will always be confidential. You see. But
Speaker 1: everything that lay ahead for me, station to station, low heroes, Lodger,
Speaker 1: scary monsters, that was all made with an autonomy and
Speaker 1: a confidence that I never would have had if it
Speaker 1: were not for John Lennon, very instructive and deep relationship. Now,
Speaker 1: unbeknownst to me, John was continuing to struggle with his
Speaker 1: own concept of fame. Have fame affected every single as
Speaker 1: fact of his life, Even in New York City where
Speaker 1: he could walk down the street and remain relatively unbothered.
Speaker 1: Fame got to him, It got to others close to him.
Speaker 1: Another song says fame can take you over, drive you
Speaker 1: to crime, and even make you the target of others.
Speaker 1: One very tangible thing that fame almost always leads to
Speaker 1: is cocaine. My own daily diet around was coffee, four
Speaker 1: packs of kit Hans, Bell peppers, milk straight from the carton,
Speaker 1: and cocaine. John and I shared an affinity for this stuff.
Speaker 1: It's funny you get access to all these drugs when
Speaker 1: you become famous, but then it begins to feel as
Speaker 1: if the reason you're taking the drugs is to forget
Speaker 1: the fact that you are famous. Cocaine help me cope.
Speaker 1: It helped me disappear into whatever role I was playing
Speaker 1: at the time. It helped me to adjust to the
Speaker 1: increased pressures, the NonStop schedules, the attention from mainstream. And
Speaker 1: then when you get used to the pressures and schedules
Speaker 1: and attention, you don't want it anymore, any of them.
Speaker 1: That's when cocaine comes in head you once again, when
Speaker 1: it's lonely at the top. Drugs make you forget that
Speaker 1: you're famous, the fact that you have the very thing
Speaker 1: you thought you wanted only to find it's not at
Speaker 1: all how you are may and it would be personally.
Speaker 1: I was entering into what the medical community would probably
Speaker 1: refer to as cocaine psychosis around this time, not that
Speaker 1: I knew what there was or that I was experiencing it.
Speaker 1: I think I called Hitler, the world's first rock star,
Speaker 1: said that I love fascism, so my analytist wants to
Speaker 1: do things. I seriously thought that one of my business
Speaker 1: advisors was secretly a CIA agent, and that one of
Speaker 1: my backing singers was actually a vampire. John's grash course
Speaker 1: in how to take control of my career was invaluable,
Speaker 1: but I still didn't have control over myself, and John
Speaker 1: had no control over himself either. Now in John had
Speaker 1: a lot to be happy about. He had a brand
Speaker 1: new son, Sean, who stole his heart. His fight against
Speaker 1: the United States had come to a positive conclusion, which
Speaker 1: would directly lead to his green card and citizenship. But
Speaker 1: good news doesn't tame the beast. You don't walk into
Speaker 1: a hotel room stuck to the guilt with cocaine and
Speaker 1: champagne and think, now you know what, I've got a
Speaker 1: new son and new lease on life. I'll pass now
Speaker 1: you say I'm up, I've gone next to and pock
Speaker 1: of the morning, and then you roll up a dollar
Speaker 1: bill and you make a count. When faced with a party,
Speaker 1: John party just as hard as the rest of us.
Speaker 1: He went as hard as some of them notorious figures
Speaker 1: who didn't survive the party from law school. But it
Speaker 1: could have been any of us who didn't survive the party.
Speaker 1: That could have been John Lennon in Bonzos shoes. Right,
Speaker 1: Fate rolled the dice, and Fate decided that Bonham will
Speaker 1: be the one who left the proverbial building. Before that happened, however,
Speaker 1: the two John's found themselves in the same room in
Speaker 1: the same way, both equally tempting fate. In six John
Speaker 1: and his friend Jesse A. Davis, the guitarist who was
Speaker 1: so great in taj Mahals Band, walked into led Zeppelin's
Speaker 1: hotel suite at the Plaza in New York, only to
Speaker 1: find the greatest rock drummer in the world up to
Speaker 1: his sinus cavity in Heroin Well. Technically, when John arrived,
Speaker 1: Bornom was on his knees, hands desperately clutching the cold,
Speaker 1: damp toilet, absolutely puking his guts. Out. Johna found himself
Speaker 1: in similar positions throughout his life, though he didn't have
Speaker 1: the same herculean stamina as Bonhom. Barnham was a heavyweight
Speaker 1: in that regard, a man who could take three, four,
Speaker 1: even five times more than what the average rock star
Speaker 1: could take before he found himself praying to a porcelain
Speaker 1: guard on the outside. Bonhom, they've been doing China White
Speaker 1: that night. China White was no joke. It was Bonhom
Speaker 1: great junk, forty to pure rather than the usual ten
Speaker 1: percent pure smack you'd find on the streets. But even
Speaker 1: for Bottom it proved to be too much. Every time
Speaker 1: he'd snort the stuff, he'd be back puking into the toilet.
Speaker 1: The fact that one of rock and roll's most undefeated
Speaker 1: imbibers was having a rough go of it didn't face John,
Speaker 1: though one bit reply those ideas. In a functional matter,
Speaker 1: John thought himself invincible, which is another side effect of fame,
Speaker 1: and no sooner did he snorts of bottom sized snorts
Speaker 1: of China White that he too was on his knees
Speaker 1: pushing Bottom out of the way. The two Johns sick
Speaker 1: as dogs in Zeppelin's suite of the Plaza. We're fighting
Speaker 1: for air and jockeying for position of the toilet. Instructive
Speaker 1: and deep relationship. They made it through that moment and
Speaker 1: through the night. Bonzo probably walked out of that room
Speaker 1: and played a show at masin Square Garden in front
Speaker 1: of thousands. He wouldn't always be that lucky. Lifestyle caught
Speaker 1: up with him in the end. There he caught up
Speaker 1: with me too. Across I was seeing things, imagining things,
Speaker 1: believing things that weren't to be believed. One thing I
Speaker 1: still believe is that there is an evil in this world.
Speaker 1: And I'm not talking about shady managers. You don't need
Speaker 1: to be in cocaine psychosis to know that evil walks
Speaker 1: among us. An evil is what would eventually catch up
Speaker 1: to John, long before his rock and roll lifestyle ever.
Speaker 1: Could We'll be right back after this world word word.
Speaker 1: It was the summer of n when I ran into
Speaker 1: John again Hong Kong. Why I was in Hong Kong,
Speaker 1: I can't quite remember. Was I on holiday touring? Maybe
Speaker 1: I was touring with Iggy. Actually, that's all we did
Speaker 1: for the idiots. His first solo record are produced after
Speaker 1: the Stooges broke up. Comical, that's not important. But John
Speaker 1: was there too, It turns out, in Hong Kong, vacationing
Speaker 1: with his son Sean, who was only a few years
Speaker 1: old at the time. They'd stop to explore the city
Speaker 1: for a few days before they meet up with Yoko
Speaker 1: in Japan, and so we quickly picked up where we'd
Speaker 1: left off and bonded over being two Englishmen in Hong Kong.
Speaker 1: We started to pick up. John continued to teach me
Speaker 1: so much without even trying to teach me. I don't
Speaker 1: even know that he realized what he was doing, but
Speaker 1: he was continuing to get me free lessons in fame.
Speaker 1: We'll be walking down the street and someone would stop
Speaker 1: us and say to John, excuse me, but aren't you
Speaker 1: John Lennon, And John will give them this confused look,
Speaker 1: absolutely straight faced, like he'd never received that question before
Speaker 1: in his life and never in a million years expected to.
Speaker 1: And then he'd say, no, I'm not John Lennon, but
Speaker 1: I wish I had his money. And then the person
Speaker 1: asking if John was John would realize, well, ship, of
Speaker 1: course it wasn't John. It was like John had this
Speaker 1: mind control to make a person doubt their own belief
Speaker 1: with mere words. So of course I stole that line.
Speaker 1: It was. It was just too good. It deflected any
Speaker 1: and all unwanted attention you received out in public. And
Speaker 1: I swear to God that this happened. Just months later
Speaker 1: in New York City. I was walking down the street,
Speaker 1: so I believe, when someone passed me by and shouted,
Speaker 1: are you David Bowie, to which I gave the reply, well, no,
Speaker 1: but I wish I had his money, You lying bastard.
Speaker 1: The voice shot back of me, you wish you had
Speaker 1: my money. I thought, wait a minute, I know that voice,
Speaker 1: so I looked up. Bloody Yeah it was John, honest
Speaker 1: to God. But back in Hong Kong things got weird
Speaker 1: more often than not. We had fame to thank for that,
Speaker 1: not the not the song, but the fact that we
Speaker 1: were famous. Because as much as we like to actively
Speaker 1: try to disassociate ourselves from the spotlight, fame gave us opportunity,
Speaker 1: like the opportunity to be in Hong Kong at that moment.
Speaker 1: John would dote on Shaun during the day, showing the sights.
Speaker 1: At night, you'd often leave him with a nanny who
Speaker 1: was traveling with them, and then John and I would
Speaker 1: go and get ripped roaring drunk, obnoxiously drunk, really and
Speaker 1: a functional on it. The kind of drunk you get
Speaker 1: in public only when you're famous, because the fame or
Speaker 1: the money, whatever it is, it provides a safety net,
Speaker 1: or an illusion of a safety net. And what's the
Speaker 1: worst thing is going to happen? We get tossed out
Speaker 1: of a strip club for being too rowdy? This this
Speaker 1: is It's not like we're going to lose our jobs
Speaker 1: because of some drunken shenanigans. We weren't going to cease
Speaker 1: being famous. Now have we known we were being tossed
Speaker 1: out of strip clubs by members of trying gangs. Yeah,
Speaker 1: maybe we would have minded our men as a bit more.
Speaker 1: But your most oblivious to the world around you when
Speaker 1: you yourself are on your way to oblivion. One of
Speaker 1: those nights, oblivion came calling on the property of the mainstream.
Speaker 1: John got a hankering to try monkey brains. I think
Speaker 1: the whole thing is a myth, perhaps an urban legend,
Speaker 1: not to mention downright ghastly, But I was both curious
Speaker 1: and drunk, and I was hanging out with John Lennon
Speaker 1: after all, so of course I was going We went
Speaker 1: trotting drunkenly around these backstreets looking for a place that
Speaker 1: served monkey brains. And we found a place, but it's
Speaker 1: been late in the evening. They overclosed, which was probably
Speaker 1: for the best because we looked in through the windows
Speaker 1: and saw all these small tables with holes cutting them,
Speaker 1: and my stomach just knotted up. John was pointing at
Speaker 1: the tables and explaining how they would put the monkey
Speaker 1: under the table and stick its head up through the hole.
Speaker 1: And while my imagination was just running away with me
Speaker 1: and I was thinking about what supposedly happens next once
Speaker 1: you get the monkey up through the table in the
Speaker 1: hole you want, these two guys in the restaurant walked
Speaker 1: towards us and unlocked the door. Well, they knew it
Speaker 1: was John Lennon, and unlike those other times that he
Speaker 1: denied it, John fessed up. Yes, of course he was
Speaker 1: that John Lennon. People were sponded their motioned for him
Speaker 1: to come inside. I tried to follow, but they shut
Speaker 1: the door in my face and made me wait. They
Speaker 1: were talking to John, but they were speaking in Cantonese,
Speaker 1: and I know for a fact that John didn't speak Cantonese.
Speaker 1: He was nodding along as if he understood, and then
Speaker 1: he followed them back into the back of the restaurant,
Speaker 1: the kitchen. I imagine a few minutes went by. I
Speaker 1: started to panics. I didn't know who these men were.
Speaker 1: I didn't know what their plans were, their intentions. I
Speaker 1: didn't know why they wanted John, if he was being
Speaker 1: that to safety or danger. They'd locked the door behind them.
Speaker 1: Of course, I'm haste and chain smoked downside. What what
Speaker 1: else could I do? And then we didn't see And
Speaker 1: then just a few minutes later, John emerged from the
Speaker 1: back room. One of the men walked him straight to
Speaker 1: the front door, unlocked it, and led him outside. John
Speaker 1: was beyond drunk. He was terribly high. He was grinning.
Speaker 1: He was grinning, but there was a look of consternation
Speaker 1: behind his smile, almost as if he wasn't happy that
Speaker 1: he was happy. I asked him, what had happened? What
Speaker 1: did what they've done back there? He looked at me.
Speaker 1: We loved eyes philosophical two o'clock in the morning. His
Speaker 1: eyes were spinning, His lids were bobbing up and down,
Speaker 1: like they were on a bungee cord. The snake, he said,
Speaker 1: and his eyes went wild. They had me drink the
Speaker 1: bloods of a snake on the periphery of the mainstream.
Speaker 1: I admit I was a bit jealous about that monkey brains.
Speaker 1: Not interested blood of a snake. I mean, come on,
Speaker 1: sign me up. And as stones as he was, John
Speaker 1: could tell I wasn't hiding my disappointment. Well, be playing
Speaker 1: for it. He had returned with a gift. He told
Speaker 1: me to close my eyes, so I did, and then
Speaker 1: he told me to open my mouth, which I did.
Speaker 1: Why don't, he said, And then I felt something insund
Speaker 1: my mouth. It was cold and moist. I immediately regretted
Speaker 1: playing along from school. John's hand shoved the gelatinous oval
Speaker 1: down my throat, so I swallowed, and then I nearly
Speaker 1: vomited it all back up. Well the funk was there,
Speaker 1: I asked, opening my eyes. The taste of sulfur and
Speaker 1: dirt and ammonia coated my tongue. He of me it
Speaker 1: was a thousand day old egg. It was just the name.
Speaker 1: It wasn't actually one thousand days old. But it was
Speaker 1: an egg that had been cooked in horse urane, coated
Speaker 1: in manure, and buried in the fucking ground for a
Speaker 1: few days. Why someone would do. That is beyond me.
Speaker 1: And how John knew so many details about precisely how
Speaker 1: the egg was prepared for men speaking a language he
Speaker 1: didn't speak is also beyond me. But then John was
Speaker 1: beyond me. An artist wants to do things in the
Speaker 1: first place. I may have done well for myself in
Speaker 1: the years to follow, but I always felt the shadow
Speaker 1: of John Lennon Loomy over my shoulder, near my feet.
Speaker 1: Now that was fame, the kind of fame that can
Speaker 1: be immortal in your mind, even if in real life
Speaker 1: it rooves to be deadly. Los Angeles, January six. Mel
Speaker 1: Evans giant hands dwarfed the little value pills he held
Speaker 1: in his palm. They were so small, mau was so big.
Speaker 1: He wondered whether they would even make a difference if
Speaker 1: he swallowed them. How could something so tiny have any
Speaker 1: kind of noticeable effect on a man of his size.
Speaker 1: He'd find out soon enough. Mouth threw the pills into
Speaker 1: his mouth and chased them with whatever clear liquor was
Speaker 1: in the glass. And his other hand he felt woozy, groggy,
Speaker 1: and that was just the alcohol. Soon those little pills
Speaker 1: would make their appearance after all, and that would be
Speaker 1: when everything Mal thoughts said or did just felt gooey.
Speaker 1: Mal's girlfriend, Fran was worried. Mause seemed more despondent than usual.
Speaker 1: He wasn't making any sense. She called a friend. Mel
Speaker 1: picked up his thirty thirty rifle, walked upstairs and barricaded
Speaker 1: himself inside the bedroom of his rented duplex. That's when
Speaker 1: Fran called the police. Mal wasn't sure how he'd gotten here.
Speaker 1: He was a long way from London, years removed from Beatlemania,
Speaker 1: though he remembered those days like they were yesterday because
Speaker 1: he was there just about every day. People called George
Speaker 1: Martin the Fifth Beatle or Billy Preston, but wasn't Mal Evans,
Speaker 1: jack of all trades and master of none, the true
Speaker 1: fifth Beatle. He'd been the Lad's bodyguard, then road manager,
Speaker 1: then person and little assistant. He helped put together the
Speaker 1: album cover collage of Sergeant Pepper's Only Hearts Club band.
Speaker 1: He sang in the chorus of Yellow Submarine. He rang
Speaker 1: the alarm clock during the sessions for a Day in
Speaker 1: the Life. He hit the anvil during the sessions from
Speaker 1: Maxwell's Silver Hammer. He produced No Matter What, one of
Speaker 1: Bad Fingers biggest hits for Apple Records. That was then,
Speaker 1: This was now, and now wasn't so great? Where Mao
Speaker 1: had once again become a regular companion of his old
Speaker 1: friend John Lennon during that period of time when John
Speaker 1: became a lone wolf resident of l A. Now Mao
Speaker 1: was alone again. Naturally, John was gone back to New
Speaker 1: York and presumably back to his wife Yoko. Meanwhile, Mao's
Speaker 1: wife didn't want him anymore and they were separated. She
Speaker 1: wanted a divorce. Mau thought that his friend Keith Moon
Speaker 1: would give him purpose again. Mooney hired Big Mal to
Speaker 1: produce his solo album, Two Sides of the Moon, but
Speaker 1: m c A Records fired Maw when it be came
Speaker 1: a parent that moons wild antics and Mao's excessive drinking
Speaker 1: we're going to yield less than desirable results. And so
Speaker 1: now mal Evans was holed up inside the bedroom at
Speaker 1: eight one to to West fourth Street in l A.
Speaker 1: He didn't remember how many value he'd taken, or how
Speaker 1: many drinks he'd had, or why exactly he was holding
Speaker 1: the thirty thirty rifle in his hands. He heard voices
Speaker 1: coming from downstairs. It was more than just Fran, more
Speaker 1: than just Frand and a friend that she had called.
Speaker 1: Mal heard four or five, maybe six different voices, and
Speaker 1: then Mal heard footsteps. They were coming upstairs. He checked
Speaker 1: the chamber of the rifle and realized that it wasn't loaded.
Speaker 1: Probably for the best. Mal Evans may have been a
Speaker 1: lot of things, but he wasn't the type to shoot
Speaker 1: a man. The LAPD cops who burst into the bedroom
Speaker 1: didn't know this about Mao. They didn't know that Mal's
Speaker 1: rifle wasn't loaded, and also didn't know that Mal wouldn't
Speaker 1: fire the damn thing if it was. The cops were armed,
Speaker 1: and there were two of them, and they pointed their
Speaker 1: police issued thirty eights at Male's big frame. Put it down,
Speaker 1: Put the weapon down. They both yelled ultimatum and stereo.
Speaker 1: Mal just stood there holding the unloaded rifle, his hands
Speaker 1: gone gooey on the long, cold barrel, his head numbed
Speaker 1: by pills and alcohol. Mal couldn't feel the rifle in
Speaker 1: his hands. He couldn't feel anything as he moved his
Speaker 1: body to one side and absentmindedly aimed the butt of
Speaker 1: the rifles squarely at the cops. He did hear the
Speaker 1: six gunshots as they rang out from the cops. Police
Speaker 1: issued thirty eights, but he never felt the four bullets
Speaker 1: center his body. Back in New York City, John Lennon
Speaker 1: heard about mal evans Is unexpected and untimely death at
Speaker 1: the age of forty. Like the rest of the Beatles
Speaker 1: and just about everyone else who knew mal John was
Speaker 1: gut it. The death of the Beatles manager Brian Epstein
Speaker 1: in seven have been tragic, especially for John, but Male's
Speaker 1: death was more than tragic. It was violent, twisted. John
Speaker 1: thought back to the day in l a when he
Speaker 1: himself hid from the L A. P D On the
Speaker 1: second floor of an apartment. How they had chased him upstairs,
Speaker 1: shotguns locked and loaded. How close John Lennon's life came
Speaker 1: to ending in the same way mel Evans's life had ended.
Speaker 1: It was shocking. But what shocked John even more was
Speaker 1: the news that he received just days later. The phone
Speaker 1: inside John and Yoko's apartment at the Dakota Building rang out.
Speaker 1: John was no longer paranoid that the US government will
Speaker 1: be waiting on the line to listen in to his
Speaker 1: every conversation. Nixon had resigned. John's phones were no longer bugged.
Speaker 1: In just a matter of months, he'd received his green
Speaker 1: card and become an American once and for all. John
Speaker 1: answered the phone. It was Neil aspen All, the Beatles
Speaker 1: former road manager, personal assistant and later a manager of
Speaker 1: Apple Corps, calling from London. John could hear the fear
Speaker 1: and concern in Neil's voice all the way across the
Speaker 1: Atlantic as he frantically told John that Mao's remains had
Speaker 1: gone missing. Mal had been cremated in Los Angeles, after
Speaker 1: which Harry Nilson had been tasked with mailing males ashes
Speaker 1: back to his wife and mother in London. Harry put
Speaker 1: the ashes in the box just like he put the
Speaker 1: lime in the coconut, and then he sent them on
Speaker 1: their trip abroad. But they never arrived. There was no
Speaker 1: record that they had ever existed. Big Mal had vanished
Speaker 1: just like that, And Neil Aspinall and John Lennon and
Speaker 1: all the others were left behind. Wonder what had happened?
Speaker 1: Why it was that one day someone was here and
Speaker 1: the next they were gone. And then how just days
Speaker 1: after that their memory was gone, to the thing they
Speaker 1: had left behind, no trace, No blood on the tracks.
Speaker 1: All right, everybody, thanks for listening to Blood on the Tracks.
Speaker 1: If you like what you hear, be sure to find
Speaker 1: and follow Blood on the Tracks on Apple podcast, I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio, app, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1: On this season two of Blood on the Tracks, we'll
Speaker 1: be releasing ten episodes on the Incredible Life of John Lennon,
Speaker 1: with a new episode every Thursday. You can also binge
Speaker 1: all ten episodes of season one on the insane story
Speaker 1: of the notorious record producer Phil Spector right now. It's
Speaker 1: available wherever you get your podcast. This episode of Blood
Speaker 1: on the Tracks was written by Zeth Lundie and hosted
Speaker 1: an executive produced by me Jake Brennan, also executive produced
Speaker 1: by Brady sad Story and copy editing by Pat Heally.
Speaker 1: This episode was mixed by Colin Fleming. Additional music and
Speaker 1: score elements by Ryan Spreaker. In this episode featured Rob
Speaker 1: Kendrick as David Bowie. Blood on the Tracks is produced
Speaker 1: by Double Elvis and partnership with I Heart Radio. Sources
Speaker 1: for this episode are available at Double Elvis dot com
Speaker 1: on the Blood on the Track series page. If you
Speaker 1: want to chat about this show or hear more about
Speaker 1: the other shows, we're making a Double Elvis tap in
Speaker 1: on Instagram at double Elvis, on Twitter at double Elvis Fm,
Speaker 1: and now on Twitch where we're streaming three days a
Speaker 1: week at Twitch dot tv slash double Elvis Podcasts. And finally,
Speaker 1: be sure to check out disgrace Land, the award winning
Speaker 1: music and true crime podcast that I also host. Disgrace
Speaker 1: Land is available only on the free Amazon Music. To
Speaker 1: hear tons of insane stories about your favorite musicians getting
Speaker 1: away with murder and behaving very badly, go to Amazon
Speaker 1: dot com slash disgrace Land, or if you have an
Speaker 1: Echo device, just say Alexa play the disgrace Land podcast.
Speaker 1: Rock Am Dad