September 30, 2021 • 34 mins
As the 1970s came to a close, John Lennon famously withdrew from the public eye to focus on his family life. He was no longer appearing on television shows and peace rallies to rail against the confusion and destruction wrought by the political powers of the world. But as one of those television hosts, Dick Cavett, attests, John was anything but dormant during this period. He nearly made a surprise live appearance on a late-night TV show. He nearly died when he went on a sailing expedition through the Bermuda Triangle. And as his public profile began to increase again, the private security that he and Yoko hired to protect them began to raise some very valid concerns.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Blood on the Tracks is a production of I Heart
Radio and Double Elvis. John Lennon was a musical genius
and one of the most beloved cultural figures of the
twentieth century. His songs inspired dreamers to imagine, his search
for the truth gave power to the people. But some
thought he dreamed too much. Others thought he was too powerful.
(00:23):
So he was followed, he was threatened, he was declared
a danger to the United States, and in night he
was assassinated. This is his story told by his so
called friends. This especial agent Jim Steele with the Federal
(00:46):
Bureau of Investigation work in case number double O nine
at zero eight as zero four nine one. Case subject
as Lenin John Winston. Oh No. This information pertains to
a period ending December. Interview subject is cabin Richard Alba
interview number zero dash nine one dash one dash seven one.
(01:08):
We call number one. What was John Lennon like? He
wasn't like anything. He was unique. Huh. I've always wanted
to hear somebody say that, and I picked you as
(01:28):
the victim. I liked John. I didn't get to know
him a lot. Almost all the time I spent with
him was on my show. I'm still looking for too
long letters he wrote me, which I'm hoping I simply misplaced.
And of course I saw him when I went down
to the courthouse to testify on his behalf to say
that he shouldn't be deported. He was highly intelligent, a
(01:52):
very available guy, accessible, easy to talk to you. The
first time you met him, that old cliche, you felt
like you've known him for a while, But it was true,
and that can be a good thing and a bad thing.
His guard was down more than people knew. In fact,
he often had no guard, and that left him vulnerable. Ultimately,
(02:15):
it's what killed him, because all it took was the
wrong person to get to him, to walk right out
to him. It's flattering Blood on the Tracks, Chapter eight.
(02:48):
John Lennon and Dick Captin. I hadn't seen John Lennon
for years when I heard the news that he had
been shot. We had exchanged letters on and off throughout
(03:09):
the nineteen seventies. But hoping I should be misplaced, last
time I saw him it may have been when I
went down to the courthouse to offer my support to
testify the government was trying to deport him. John had
very politely asked me for my assistance. Perhaps he wanted
a friend who bore a suit and tied to appear
(03:31):
on his behalf in front of the judge. And who
was I to say no? John and Yoko, who had
been on my talk show twice, once in ninety one
and again in nineteen two, when he talked at length
about their ongoing battle with the U. S. Government. Both
times they were on, our ratings went through the roof.
And that can be a good thing, and about thing
(03:53):
I was in his debt. And despite the fact that
our relationship consisted of those appearances on my show and
a few odd meetings here and there, and I do
mean odd, one was backstage at Madison Square Garden and
the other was in a hotel room, and he and
Yoko stayed in bed the whole time. But despite such
limited time spent together, I did consider him a friend.
(04:15):
So I went to the courthouse, stood in front of
the judge. The judge asked me to explain, in my
own words, what was good about John Lenny. He was
highly intelligent. I said, he was a force for good,
a force for good for young people. The judge asked
how he was a force for good for young people.
(04:37):
My mouth was dry. I didn't want to use too
much wit in my response. I wanted to be respectful
of the process and also do my part to guarantee
that John would be allowed to stay in New York.
So how was he a force for good? I responded, Well,
as an example for young people who want to do
something good with their lives. Have you ever heard such
(04:59):
an idiot out of response? Anyway, it couldn't have hurt
John's case that much because they did allow him to stay,
much to Nixon's chagrin. I'm sure John told me all
about his ongoing issues with Nixon, and I told him
about mine. Listen to this. After I testified for John,
(05:19):
I was told my entire staff at the show was
audited by the I R S, every last cameraman, every secretary.
They went after everybody. And not only that, but Nixon
was keeping his own scorecard on my show. Nixon was
trumpeting supersonic transport at the time, you know S S T,
(05:40):
and it was highly controversial. It was basically to try
to get all airplanes flying even faster, and it was
going to cost American taxpayers something like one point something billion. Right,
we're keeping it very closely held here for reasons, as
you know, but I thought you should know that today
(06:02):
I'm going to have conline announced. The the other one.
I thought it was silly, a waste of money, money
spent on paranoia and imagined irrelevance on the global stage.
And I said so on my show many times. And
Nixon had a guy who kept a tally. They had
(06:23):
a running tally of every time I spoke ill of
that program, every time I spoke ill of anything that
had to do with the president. Now, they hated losing face,
they really did. So the White House called our show,
acted as their own booking agent, and they sent the
guy William McGruder onto my show to tout s STAD thing.
(06:48):
At the end of our talk before we cut to commercial,
I got the final word in when I said, well,
I certainly hope the S S T is defeated. That
didn't make me any friends at the White House. John
knew that I was on his page. We were birds
of a feather that said, John and Yoko asked to
meet with me before they would agree to come on
(07:09):
my show. They hadn't done anything like that before. This
was before they took over the Mike Douglas Show for
an entire week, and when I met with John, he
told me that they were interested in me because I
had the only halfway intelligent show on television. I said,
are you sure you want to be on a show
that's halfway intelligent? Those two appearances that they made in
(07:31):
September of nineteen seventy one in May of nineteen seventy
two remained some of my fondest memories. John was nervous,
he was opinionated, and he was funny. I thought the
nineteen seventies were going to be the decade of John Lennon.
That's something truly inspirational was going to happen. But then
he made fewer and fewer appearances on shows like mine,
(07:53):
fewer and fewer appearances in public, And at some point
I realized that I hadn't seen or heard from John
in quite some time. I didn't get a few people,
had a few people outside his immediate family and tightly
knit social circle. What was he doing? We all wondered.
In the second half of the seventies, years went by
(08:16):
without an album or a single. Has he given up
being creative or making music? These were real questions that
we were all asking ourselves. It didn't seem conceivable that
John Lennon would borrow himself into a hermetic life and
never feel inspired to raise his voice again in song
or in protest. But do you know what was going on?
(08:39):
It's like that story about the Japanese Lord, the one
that Yoko told. Did Yoko tell you that story? Here?
I'll tell you. Let me see if I can remember
it correctly. So there's this Japanese lord, very regal, very
important man. He was anything. He commissioned a painter to
create a painting for him. I can't quite recall what
(09:01):
the commission was, exactly what the painting was of, but
that's not important. A year passed and no painting, nothing.
The Lord had become quite impatient, naturally, so he sent
a messenger to go call on the painter and find
out what was going on. The messenger arrived at the
painter's house and asked if the painter was finished. The
(09:25):
painter simply said, oh, all right, just waiting the next
room over there for a moment, and the painter in
his own room quickly scribbled and painted something. The messenger
returned to the lord and said, do you know what
the painter did. He didn't have a painting ready, so
he just scribbled one quickly while I waited in the
(09:45):
next room. This made the Lord furious, so he sent
the messenger out again to fetch the painter and bring
him back to the Lord. The painter arrived and stood
in front of the Lord. The Lord said, I understand
you weren't ready to deliver the painting, and you just
scribbled the thing while my messenger waited in the next room.
(10:06):
The painter wasn't disturbed by this at all. He simply
looked the Lord in the eye and said, oh, yes,
but I spent the entire year preparing for this painting.
(10:47):
Now those letters, I'm still looking for too long letters,
she wrote. I mentioned earlier the letters that John had
sent me over the years, the years in between when
I last saw him at court and now. The letters
were quite long, quite detailed, and quite surprising. They showed
another side of John that perhaps the public rarely saw. Warm, open, vulnerable,
(11:12):
wily misplaced. People have this image of John and Paul
at each other's throats. In the years following the breakup
of the Beatles, their spats were a stuff of legend.
Paul took a shot at John and Yoko and a
song called too Many People, and then John fired back
with how do you Sleep? Which was a not very
(11:33):
thinly veiled attack on Paul. What was that line, the
only good thing you did was yesterday or whatever. I
would argue that conventional wisdom had it that John thought
that Paul wrote saccarin ditties for tea time, and Paul
thought that John had disappeared up his own ass a
little too far with the encouragement of Yoko. I think
(11:54):
that was just publicity. And you know what they say
about publicity. There's no such thing as bad the city,
just like Paul admitting to the press that he dropped acid,
or John saying that thing about the Beatles being bigger
than Jesus, the two greatest songwriters of the second half
of the twentieth century duking it out in song. Now,
(12:14):
that sells some records, and that can be a good
thing and a bad thing, but it wasn't like that
in reality. Here's an example in n Lauren Michael's, the
producer of Saturday Night Live, offered the Beatles a check
for three thousand dollars if they would reunite and appear
on the show. To play three songs. This was the
(12:36):
very first season of the show. Lauren had made the
offer during the show's live broadcast on a Saturday night,
and sure it was tongue in cheek. He appeared at
a desk with one framed photo of Nixon and another
featuring President Ford and Chevy Chase and said, this check
here is made out to the Beatles. Anyway you want,
you want to give ring go less, that's up to you.
(12:58):
But at the same time he was it serious. In nine,
everyone was dead serious about wanting to see the Beatles
play live together again. But here's the thing. Little did
Lord Michaels, No, little did anyone know, But Paul was
hanging out with John at John's apartment in the Dakota Building,
watching Saturday Night Live. They weren't feuding, they weren't fighting,
(13:23):
they weren't trashing each other in song. They were relaxing
at the Dakota, sharing a drink, sharing a laugh, reminiscing.
And then on comes Lord Michael's making his offer. Paul
looked at John and said why not. John laughed and responded, sure,
why not? After all, it was only two miles from
(13:45):
the Dakota to Rockefeller plaza, and at that time at night,
it might take them all of ten minutes to get
there in a cab. Just think. While the majority of
the world assumed the Beatles were fuming at each other
and from separate houses, separate continents, even the most famous
of the Fab four were moments away from putting on
their coats, running to the curb, hailing a cab, riding
(14:07):
down Madison Avenue, and knocking on the door of Studio
eight h to do an impromptu duet on live television.
Very available guy, And that wasn't the only offer that
came the Beatles way. The whole reason that Lauren Michaels
was offering three thousand was to poke fun at this
guy who had offered the boys fifty million for just
one show. Paul said he'd do it. John said something
(14:30):
like I'd stand on me head in the corner for
that kind of money. But the offer had strings attached.
The guy with the money wanted the rights to make
an album and a film of the concert, which the
band would never agree to. The other myth about John
was that he was Howard Hughes incarnate, that he never
left the Dakota after Sean was born, that when Howard
(14:53):
Hughes died in nineteen seventy six, he was actually transfigured
into John Lennon. That John grew his fingernails out long,
so long he couldn't play a guitar anymore, that he
urinated in glass jars and kept those jars all around
the apartment. Can you imagine it was all bunk? Of course,
(15:14):
all of it rumor and hearsay and conjecture. John wasn't
appearing to be making music during those last few years
of the seventies. He wasn't sitting in the corner of
a darkened room covered with a bedsheet for weeks and
months on end. He was getting out there. He was
living life. He was taking chances, though much of the
(15:35):
public never saw the chances he took, and some of
those chances nearly took his life. There's this one great
story that someone told me shortly after John had died.
In right before his forty birthday, John decided he wanted
to hop on a forty three ft sloop that was
(15:55):
docked in Newport, Rhode Island and sail it through the
Bermuda Triangle to the act full island of Bermuda. He'd
spent some time on a friend's yacht in the Long
Island Sound, and he got the bug to go on
a longer voyage. So he found a group of friends
who would go with him. And I'm not making this up.
The guy driving the yacht was called Captain Hank seven
(16:18):
miles along cargo roots next to behemoth tankers. Not to
mention the clusterfuck that is the weather in the Bermuda Triangle,
John could have disappeared into thin air or into the
deep ocean the way so many other vessels and planes
had gone missing. And they had good weather at first,
great weather. Actually that probably put John and the crew
(16:40):
a little too much at ease because when the storm hit,
and the storm always hits in the Triangle, it took
them by surprise. His gardens down, The water turned black,
the winds kicked up, the waves crested at twenty ft tall.
The ocean tossed that sloop from one watery hump to another.
(17:01):
The elements conspired to swallow the yacht hole to reach
out and grab the deck hands one by one and
throw them screaming into the waves and down to the
bottom of the sea. His garbage down where the people
knew for forty eight hours. Captain Hank commanded the wheel,
and when he became too tired to go on, when
the wind had snapped his face raw and the water
(17:22):
had soaked him to the bone, he asked John to
take over. It was a trial by fire, or rather
by wind and water, and son of a bitch, would
you believe that John came out unscathed on the other
side of that storm. He made it to Bermuda. The
entire crew made it with him. He was highly intelligent.
(17:44):
He felt the thrill of overcoming a life threatening challenge.
He felt untouchable, he felt lucky, and he felt inspired,
so inspired that he came back to New York City
after his unbelievable journey, and he knew what he was
going to do next. He was going to make a record.
He had it all in his head. It had been
there all along, Just like the painter in the parable
(18:07):
about the Japanese Lord, John was done preparing. He was
ready to create. We'll be right back after this word
word word now. I think John's intentions were good, great,
(18:30):
even as he entered a new phase of his creative life.
I know a thing or two about starting over. ABC
canceled my talk show in nine. Despite the fact that
I had intelligent conversations, or as John would say, halfway intelligent,
with celebrities like Marlon Brando, Laurence Olivier, Katherine Hepburn, and
(18:50):
Norman Mailer, the ratings had dipped too much for the
network's liking. Some said, if the show hadn't been halfway intelligent,
then we would have fared better. Well, I didn't let
it take me down. I found new challenges. I've written
for The New York Times, I've been in movies, I've
been on Broadway. Granted it's not sailing a sloop to
(19:11):
Bermuda through gale force winds. But these were things that
kept me from being too comfortable. You can't let yourself
get too comfortable. In John Lennon's case, I also think
that by he had become a little too comfortable with
being just another face on the street in New York City.
I think he truly thought he had achieved peak anonymity,
(19:32):
that he was just another guy wearing a New York
City T shirt, just another dad pushing his toddler and
a stroller. Of course, this couldn't be further from the truth.
He was John Lennon for God's sakes, everyone knew who
he was, a very available guy. Everyone knew where he lived.
(19:54):
Thanks to an interview in the New York Daily News,
Yoko even gave specific details, not only as too where
they were recording their new album, Double Fantasy, but what
hours they were typically in the studio. Anyone who paid
attention to his daily habits knew his routine. It was
extremely easy to find him at the park next to
the Metropolitan Museum, at Cafe La Fortuna in Central Park,
(20:14):
going to and from the Dakota. He wasn't anything. In fact,
fans just wandered up into John and Yoko's apartment off
the street. I was told of one particular incident in
which a fan made his way through the lobby, up
the elevator to John and Yoko's door. The door was unlocked,
of course, it was look, I always locked the door
(20:36):
of my New York City apartment, and I have a
fraction of the amount of fame that John has. But
this curious fan found John Lennon's door unlocked and let
himself in. He walked through the living room, the kitchen,
He walked into John and Yoko's bedroom. Fans walking up
to John's place of residence was nothing new. It happened
(20:56):
as early as the early seventies in England. Tittenhurst Park,
the palatial country house in Ascot that John and Yoko
owned before selling it to Ringo Star. There's an unnerving
and incredible scene in a documentary that was made about
the making of Imagine where a noticeably troubled man walked
right up to the front door of the house and
told John that he thought all of the Beatles songs
(21:17):
had been written about him. Most people would have had
that man ushered off the premises right away, or at
least called the authorities. But what did John do after
clarifying that the Beatles songs weren't written about him? John
welcomed the man inside his house and fed him. John
showed compassion, He sought to understand. Stranger is walking into
(21:43):
the Dakota Building may not have rattled John, but Yoko
was definitely concerned. Had pretty much everyone living in New
York as early as the mid seventies were pretty concerned.
Do you know about the Fear City pamphlets? I think
this was ninety s. Visitors stepped off planes at LaGuardia
or JFK and walked into the terminal only to be
(22:06):
handed these pamphlets that said Welcome to Fear City on
the front with an image of Death himself. Inside were
survival tips. Pulled onto your purse with both hands. Don't
leave anything of value visible in your car, not even
a couple of pennies. In fact, the pamphlet said that
until things got better, the best tip was to stay
(22:28):
the hell out of New York if at all possible.
And what's even crazier is that these pamphlets were handed
out by plane clothes officers of the NYPD. Throw the
son of Sam into that mix. In n while the
city was enduring widespread blackouts and garbage strikes, it took
a certain thick skinned individual to live in New York
(22:49):
City in the nineteen seventies. Whether or not John was
thick skinned, I think he was, But I think more dangerously,
he was a bit oblivious to the clear and present
danger of his doubt. Yoko felt the fear and paranoia
more than most. Yoko hired an x FBI agent named
Douglas McDougald to act as a bodyguard, primarily for Sean,
(23:12):
but she also wanted suggestions on how she and John
could better protect themselves. McDougall had major concerns about how
openly and lais fair the Lennen's were. He often had
no guard. He thought, at the very least, he should
accompany Sean whenever he was out and about in the city,
even with Yoko there. That way, Yoko could be a
(23:33):
mother and worry about Sean, while McDougall could worry about
everyone else. But McDougall's recommendations ran deeper than that. He
wanted to assign an armed bodyguard to John and Yoko.
The armed guard would ride with them wherever they went.
He'd check their car and surroundings before they got in,
and then when they reached their destination, the bodyguard would
(23:54):
be the first out of the car to once again
clear the area before John and Yoko emerged in plain sight.
John had made his fair share of enemies over the years.
He spoke his mind, he didn't hold back. He was
highly intelligent. He'd offended the Christian Right, He'd offended the Crown.
He'd offended Nixon. He won't like anything. He defended Beatles fans.
(24:20):
He'd offended the American jingoists who thought he should just
shut the hell up and go back to England. He
defended people in bars in Los Angeles who were just
out for a good time and instead were treated to
a drunken display of entitlement. I think it's safe to
say that by just about everyone who still thought about
(24:41):
John Lennon had their own opinion about John Lennon, and
it's also safe to say that most opinions were radically
different than they were at the height of Beatlemania. But
John had a plan. He was recording an album, Double Fantasy,
with his wife Yoko, and it was going to be
the way back into the hearts and minds of the public.
(25:02):
He would win over those who had written him off
and remind everybody who had forgotten about him how great
he was. The record buying and radio listening public would
remember what it was they loved so much about John
Lennon in the first place. That was the whope at least. John, however,
should have been on higher alert because the people who
hadn't forgotten about him, well, they thought about him a lot.
(25:25):
He was highly intelligent. One in particular, it turns out,
who did nothing but think about the ways in which
John Lennon had brought him down. Let him down, left
him down a very available guy. This person was down
he thought John Lennon had put him there, which, to
(25:46):
use this person's own logic meant that John Lennon was
a charlattan, a turncoat, the very opposite of what he
appeared to be. And as I said, John Lennon was
also very much in the public eye. You could walk
up to him, ask for his autograph, shake his hands down.
On a visit to New York, you were just as
(26:07):
likely to see John Lennon walking down seventy Street as
you were to see yellow cabs and rats scurrying in
the subway cliche. So evil came to Fear City, and
evil found John Lennon living without fear. I used to
live near the Dakota Building, and had I still been
living there in December, I probably would have heard the
(26:30):
shots ring out, though I'm glad I didn't, because I
don't think the sound would have ever left me. On
(27:06):
November sevente John and Yoko on No Lennon released Double Fantasy,
the first album by either of them in more than
five years. It was the longest John had gone between
albums since nineteen sixty three. The fourteen songs on the
album alternated between John songs just Like Starting Over, Watching
the Wheels, and Women, to name a few, and Yoko
(27:28):
songs like Kiss, Kiss Kiss, and every Man Has a
Woman Who Loves Him. The lead single, Just Like Starting
Over didn't exactly fly into the number one slot upon
its release, but it did make it into the top
ten within the first few weeks. Some fans, who had
waited so long and so patiently for new John songs
(27:49):
were loath to be subjected to Yokos songs in between.
Some would pick the needle up on their turntable every
time a John song ended and move it forward to
the next groove in the vinyl where the next John
song began. In Critics, however, weren't especially kind to Yogo
or John. The l a time said, quote, those expecting
the return of the mythical Lenin will be sorely disillusioned unquote.
(28:12):
The Washington Post accused John's songs of quote general lack
of substance, lyrical directness, and undistinguished melodies unquote. The UK
press was even nastier. Melody Maker declared the record to
be a quote god awful yawn unquote. In the New
musical Express, Charles shar Murray suggested that quote Lennon keep
his big happy trap shut until he has something to say,
(28:34):
even vaguely relevant to those of us not married to
Yoko Ono unquote. The critics were wrong, of course, as
critics often are. The last album John Lennon released while
he was alive did extol the laid back virtues of
house husbandry and family life. It may have even defined
the sub genre that, with decades later, come to be
(28:54):
known as dad rock. The songs, however, are simple and expressive,
and the melo these are anything but undistinguished. Yokos songs
offer an experimental counterbalance to John's and strive to keep
one of his feet firmly planted in the avant pop scene.
A few weeks after Double Fantasy was released, on the
(29:16):
afternoon of Friday, December five, Mark Snyder pulled his cab
over at the intersection of Eighth Avenue in fifty five
Street to pick up a fair. The man who climbed
into the back seat was heavy set, a spectacle, invisibly agitated.
He carried a heavy Duffel bag and had a copy
of the latest issue of Playboy magazine rolled up under
his arm, the one that featured an extensive interview with
(29:38):
John Lennon. The man gave the cabby three addresses. The
first was the Century Apartments on Central Park West. Snyder
pulled the cab to the side of the road and
the man told him to wait. A few minutes later,
the man was back in the cab and gave Snyder
a second address, sixty five and Second Avenue. Snyder drove
(29:59):
to the location, and once again the man asked Snyder
to wait while he ran inside for a moment. Both
times the man carried the heavy Duffel bag with him,
and both times he returned to the cab out of breath.
This time, when the man returned, his irritation seemed to
have subsided. He was no longer stewing, his eyes had softened.
Snyder looked back at the man's pudgy face and the
(30:20):
CAB's rear view mirror and saw a smile come over him.
The man laughed, and then he started talking. I just
have to tell you this, it's just too cool. I
just dropped off some tapes of John Lennon and Paul
McCartney studio sessions they just recorded today. Lennon and McCartney.
They played for like three hours. I was the engineer.
(30:42):
I engineer all of John's stuff. Snyder admitted that he
was too cool. Eight million stories in the Naked City,
and this was one of them who would have thunk it.
John and Paul at it again. But what Snyder didn't
know was that the man in the back of his cab,
the man telling this incredible story, wasn't an audio engineer
at all. He'd never laid eyes on John Lennon in
(31:03):
his lighte. Snyder didn't know that the man in the
back of his cab had recently stopped having hallucinations for
long enough to get himself from Hawaii to New York City,
where he booked a sixteen dollar and fifty cent room
at the y m c A and hit the streets
of the Big Apple with a copy of The Catcher
in the Rye stuffed in the back pocket of his jeans. Suddenly,
the man's mood changed again, his smile bent into a grimace.
(31:27):
He shook his head a few times in quick succession.
The man then gave Snyder one final destination, Bleaker Street,
Fifth Avenue, and they arrived and the man paid his fare.
Thanks Snyder and asked him his name. Snyder's answer appeared
to give the man some fleeting happiness. Wow, he said,
your name is Mark too. Huh, what are the chances?
(31:48):
And then Mark David Chapman hoisted up his duffel bag,
exited Snyder's cab, and headed out in search of a
record store so that he could purchase a brand new
copy of Double Fantasy, the lay this album from John
Lennon and Yoko Ono. He would then bring it over
to the Dakota Building off Central Park West for the
next phase of his plan, a plan that will begin
(32:09):
with asking the phony people for an autograph and end
with Blood on the Tracks. Kay, all right, everybody, thanks
(32:31):
for listening to Blood on the Tracks. If you like
what you hear, be sure to find and follow Blood
on the Tracks on Apple podcast, I Heart Radio, app,
Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. On this
season two of Blood on the Tracks, we'll be releasing
ten episodes on the Incredible Life of John Lennon, with
a new episode every Thursday. You can also binge all
ten episodes of season one on the insane story of
(32:54):
the notorious record producer Phil Spector right now. It's available
wherever you get your podcasts. This episode of Blood on
the Tracks was written by Zeth Lundie and hosted an
executive produced by me Jake Brennan. Also executive produced by
Brady sab Story and copy editing by Pat Healy. This
episode was mixed by Colin Fleming, Additional music and score
elements by Ryan Spraaker. This episode featured Chris Anzeloni as
(33:18):
Dick Cabint. Blood on the Tracks is produced by Double
Elvis and partnership with I Heart Radio. Sources for this
episode are available at Double Elvis dot com on the
Blood on the Track series page. If you want to
chat about this show or hear more about the other
shows we're making a Double Elvis tap in on Instagram
at double Elvis, on Twitter at Double Elvis FM, and
(33:39):
now on Twitch where we're streaming three days a week
at Twitch dot tv slash Double Elvis Podcasts, And finally,
be sure to check out disgrace Land, the award winning
music and true crime podcast that I also host. Disgraceland
is available only on the free Amazon Music To hear
tons of insane stories about your favorite musicians getting away
(33:59):
with murder and be have you very badly go to
Amazon dot com slash disgrace Land, or if you have
an Echo device, just say Alexa. Play the disgrace Land podcast,
Rock Amoll, That Crazy, Our Dad,
Blood on the Tracks is a production of I Heart
Radio and Double Elvis. John Lennon was a musical genius
and one of the most beloved cultural figures of the
twentieth century. His songs inspired dreamers to imagine, his search
for the truth gave power to the people. But some
thought he dreamed too much. Others thought he was too powerful.
(00:23):
So he was followed, he was threatened, he was declared
a danger to the United States, and in night he
was assassinated. This is his story told by his so
called friends. This especial agent Jim Steele with the Federal
(00:46):
Bureau of Investigation work in case number double O nine
at zero eight as zero four nine one. Case subject
as Lenin John Winston. Oh No. This information pertains to
a period ending December. Interview subject is cabin Richard Alba
interview number zero dash nine one dash one dash seven one.
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We call number one. What was John Lennon like? He
wasn't like anything. He was unique. Huh. I've always wanted
to hear somebody say that, and I picked you as
(01:28):
the victim. I liked John. I didn't get to know
him a lot. Almost all the time I spent with
him was on my show. I'm still looking for too
long letters he wrote me, which I'm hoping I simply misplaced.
And of course I saw him when I went down
to the courthouse to testify on his behalf to say
that he shouldn't be deported. He was highly intelligent, a
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very available guy, accessible, easy to talk to you. The
first time you met him, that old cliche, you felt
like you've known him for a while, But it was true,
and that can be a good thing and a bad thing.
His guard was down more than people knew. In fact,
he often had no guard, and that left him vulnerable. Ultimately,
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it's what killed him, because all it took was the
wrong person to get to him, to walk right out
to him. It's flattering Blood on the Tracks, Chapter eight.
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John Lennon and Dick Captin. I hadn't seen John Lennon
for years when I heard the news that he had
been shot. We had exchanged letters on and off throughout
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the nineteen seventies. But hoping I should be misplaced, last
time I saw him it may have been when I
went down to the courthouse to offer my support to
testify the government was trying to deport him. John had
very politely asked me for my assistance. Perhaps he wanted
a friend who bore a suit and tied to appear
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on his behalf in front of the judge. And who
was I to say no? John and Yoko, who had
been on my talk show twice, once in ninety one
and again in nineteen two, when he talked at length
about their ongoing battle with the U. S. Government. Both
times they were on, our ratings went through the roof.
And that can be a good thing, and about thing
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I was in his debt. And despite the fact that
our relationship consisted of those appearances on my show and
a few odd meetings here and there, and I do
mean odd, one was backstage at Madison Square Garden and
the other was in a hotel room, and he and
Yoko stayed in bed the whole time. But despite such
limited time spent together, I did consider him a friend.
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So I went to the courthouse, stood in front of
the judge. The judge asked me to explain, in my
own words, what was good about John Lenny. He was
highly intelligent. I said, he was a force for good,
a force for good for young people. The judge asked
how he was a force for good for young people.
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My mouth was dry. I didn't want to use too
much wit in my response. I wanted to be respectful
of the process and also do my part to guarantee
that John would be allowed to stay in New York.
So how was he a force for good? I responded, Well,
as an example for young people who want to do
something good with their lives. Have you ever heard such
(04:59):
an idiot out of response? Anyway, it couldn't have hurt
John's case that much because they did allow him to stay,
much to Nixon's chagrin. I'm sure John told me all
about his ongoing issues with Nixon, and I told him
about mine. Listen to this. After I testified for John,
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I was told my entire staff at the show was
audited by the I R S, every last cameraman, every secretary.
They went after everybody. And not only that, but Nixon
was keeping his own scorecard on my show. Nixon was
trumpeting supersonic transport at the time, you know S S T,
(05:40):
and it was highly controversial. It was basically to try
to get all airplanes flying even faster, and it was
going to cost American taxpayers something like one point something billion. Right,
we're keeping it very closely held here for reasons, as
you know, but I thought you should know that today
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I'm going to have conline announced. The the other one.
I thought it was silly, a waste of money, money
spent on paranoia and imagined irrelevance on the global stage.
And I said so on my show many times. And
Nixon had a guy who kept a tally. They had
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a running tally of every time I spoke ill of
that program, every time I spoke ill of anything that
had to do with the president. Now, they hated losing face,
they really did. So the White House called our show,
acted as their own booking agent, and they sent the
guy William McGruder onto my show to tout s STAD thing.
(06:48):
At the end of our talk before we cut to commercial,
I got the final word in when I said, well,
I certainly hope the S S T is defeated. That
didn't make me any friends at the White House. John
knew that I was on his page. We were birds
of a feather that said, John and Yoko asked to
meet with me before they would agree to come on
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my show. They hadn't done anything like that before. This
was before they took over the Mike Douglas Show for
an entire week, and when I met with John, he
told me that they were interested in me because I
had the only halfway intelligent show on television. I said,
are you sure you want to be on a show
that's halfway intelligent? Those two appearances that they made in
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September of nineteen seventy one in May of nineteen seventy
two remained some of my fondest memories. John was nervous,
he was opinionated, and he was funny. I thought the
nineteen seventies were going to be the decade of John Lennon.
That's something truly inspirational was going to happen. But then
he made fewer and fewer appearances on shows like mine,
(07:53):
fewer and fewer appearances in public, And at some point
I realized that I hadn't seen or heard from John
in quite some time. I didn't get a few people,
had a few people outside his immediate family and tightly
knit social circle. What was he doing? We all wondered.
In the second half of the seventies, years went by
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without an album or a single. Has he given up
being creative or making music? These were real questions that
we were all asking ourselves. It didn't seem conceivable that
John Lennon would borrow himself into a hermetic life and
never feel inspired to raise his voice again in song
or in protest. But do you know what was going on?
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It's like that story about the Japanese Lord, the one
that Yoko told. Did Yoko tell you that story? Here?
I'll tell you. Let me see if I can remember
it correctly. So there's this Japanese lord, very regal, very
important man. He was anything. He commissioned a painter to
create a painting for him. I can't quite recall what
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the commission was, exactly what the painting was of, but
that's not important. A year passed and no painting, nothing.
The Lord had become quite impatient, naturally, so he sent
a messenger to go call on the painter and find
out what was going on. The messenger arrived at the
painter's house and asked if the painter was finished. The
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painter simply said, oh, all right, just waiting the next
room over there for a moment, and the painter in
his own room quickly scribbled and painted something. The messenger
returned to the lord and said, do you know what
the painter did. He didn't have a painting ready, so
he just scribbled one quickly while I waited in the
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next room. This made the Lord furious, so he sent
the messenger out again to fetch the painter and bring
him back to the Lord. The painter arrived and stood
in front of the Lord. The Lord said, I understand
you weren't ready to deliver the painting, and you just
scribbled the thing while my messenger waited in the next room.
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The painter wasn't disturbed by this at all. He simply
looked the Lord in the eye and said, oh, yes,
but I spent the entire year preparing for this painting.
(10:47):
Now those letters, I'm still looking for too long letters,
she wrote. I mentioned earlier the letters that John had
sent me over the years, the years in between when
I last saw him at court and now. The letters
were quite long, quite detailed, and quite surprising. They showed
another side of John that perhaps the public rarely saw. Warm, open, vulnerable,
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wily misplaced. People have this image of John and Paul
at each other's throats. In the years following the breakup
of the Beatles, their spats were a stuff of legend.
Paul took a shot at John and Yoko and a
song called too Many People, and then John fired back
with how do you Sleep? Which was a not very
(11:33):
thinly veiled attack on Paul. What was that line, the
only good thing you did was yesterday or whatever. I
would argue that conventional wisdom had it that John thought
that Paul wrote saccarin ditties for tea time, and Paul
thought that John had disappeared up his own ass a
little too far with the encouragement of Yoko. I think
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that was just publicity. And you know what they say
about publicity. There's no such thing as bad the city,
just like Paul admitting to the press that he dropped acid,
or John saying that thing about the Beatles being bigger
than Jesus, the two greatest songwriters of the second half
of the twentieth century duking it out in song. Now,
(12:14):
that sells some records, and that can be a good
thing and a bad thing, but it wasn't like that
in reality. Here's an example in n Lauren Michael's, the
producer of Saturday Night Live, offered the Beatles a check
for three thousand dollars if they would reunite and appear
on the show. To play three songs. This was the
(12:36):
very first season of the show. Lauren had made the
offer during the show's live broadcast on a Saturday night,
and sure it was tongue in cheek. He appeared at
a desk with one framed photo of Nixon and another
featuring President Ford and Chevy Chase and said, this check
here is made out to the Beatles. Anyway you want,
you want to give ring go less, that's up to you.
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But at the same time he was it serious. In nine,
everyone was dead serious about wanting to see the Beatles
play live together again. But here's the thing. Little did
Lord Michaels, No, little did anyone know, But Paul was
hanging out with John at John's apartment in the Dakota Building,
watching Saturday Night Live. They weren't feuding, they weren't fighting,
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they weren't trashing each other in song. They were relaxing
at the Dakota, sharing a drink, sharing a laugh, reminiscing.
And then on comes Lord Michael's making his offer. Paul
looked at John and said why not. John laughed and responded, sure,
why not? After all, it was only two miles from
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the Dakota to Rockefeller plaza, and at that time at night,
it might take them all of ten minutes to get
there in a cab. Just think. While the majority of
the world assumed the Beatles were fuming at each other
and from separate houses, separate continents, even the most famous
of the Fab four were moments away from putting on
their coats, running to the curb, hailing a cab, riding
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down Madison Avenue, and knocking on the door of Studio
eight h to do an impromptu duet on live television.
Very available guy, And that wasn't the only offer that
came the Beatles way. The whole reason that Lauren Michaels
was offering three thousand was to poke fun at this
guy who had offered the boys fifty million for just
one show. Paul said he'd do it. John said something
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like I'd stand on me head in the corner for
that kind of money. But the offer had strings attached.
The guy with the money wanted the rights to make
an album and a film of the concert, which the
band would never agree to. The other myth about John
was that he was Howard Hughes incarnate, that he never
left the Dakota after Sean was born, that when Howard
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Hughes died in nineteen seventy six, he was actually transfigured
into John Lennon. That John grew his fingernails out long,
so long he couldn't play a guitar anymore, that he
urinated in glass jars and kept those jars all around
the apartment. Can you imagine it was all bunk? Of course,
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all of it rumor and hearsay and conjecture. John wasn't
appearing to be making music during those last few years
of the seventies. He wasn't sitting in the corner of
a darkened room covered with a bedsheet for weeks and
months on end. He was getting out there. He was
living life. He was taking chances, though much of the
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public never saw the chances he took, and some of
those chances nearly took his life. There's this one great
story that someone told me shortly after John had died.
In right before his forty birthday, John decided he wanted
to hop on a forty three ft sloop that was
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docked in Newport, Rhode Island and sail it through the
Bermuda Triangle to the act full island of Bermuda. He'd
spent some time on a friend's yacht in the Long
Island Sound, and he got the bug to go on
a longer voyage. So he found a group of friends
who would go with him. And I'm not making this up.
The guy driving the yacht was called Captain Hank seven
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miles along cargo roots next to behemoth tankers. Not to
mention the clusterfuck that is the weather in the Bermuda Triangle,
John could have disappeared into thin air or into the
deep ocean the way so many other vessels and planes
had gone missing. And they had good weather at first,
great weather. Actually that probably put John and the crew
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a little too much at ease because when the storm hit,
and the storm always hits in the Triangle, it took
them by surprise. His gardens down, The water turned black,
the winds kicked up, the waves crested at twenty ft tall.
The ocean tossed that sloop from one watery hump to another.
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The elements conspired to swallow the yacht hole to reach
out and grab the deck hands one by one and
throw them screaming into the waves and down to the
bottom of the sea. His garbage down where the people
knew for forty eight hours. Captain Hank commanded the wheel,
and when he became too tired to go on, when
the wind had snapped his face raw and the water
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had soaked him to the bone, he asked John to
take over. It was a trial by fire, or rather
by wind and water, and son of a bitch, would
you believe that John came out unscathed on the other
side of that storm. He made it to Bermuda. The
entire crew made it with him. He was highly intelligent.
(17:44):
He felt the thrill of overcoming a life threatening challenge.
He felt untouchable, he felt lucky, and he felt inspired,
so inspired that he came back to New York City
after his unbelievable journey, and he knew what he was
going to do next. He was going to make a record.
He had it all in his head. It had been
there all along, Just like the painter in the parable
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about the Japanese Lord, John was done preparing. He was
ready to create. We'll be right back after this word
word word now. I think John's intentions were good, great,
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even as he entered a new phase of his creative life.
I know a thing or two about starting over. ABC
canceled my talk show in nine. Despite the fact that
I had intelligent conversations, or as John would say, halfway intelligent,
with celebrities like Marlon Brando, Laurence Olivier, Katherine Hepburn, and
(18:50):
Norman Mailer, the ratings had dipped too much for the
network's liking. Some said, if the show hadn't been halfway intelligent,
then we would have fared better. Well, I didn't let
it take me down. I found new challenges. I've written
for The New York Times, I've been in movies, I've
been on Broadway. Granted it's not sailing a sloop to
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Bermuda through gale force winds. But these were things that
kept me from being too comfortable. You can't let yourself
get too comfortable. In John Lennon's case, I also think
that by he had become a little too comfortable with
being just another face on the street in New York City.
I think he truly thought he had achieved peak anonymity,
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that he was just another guy wearing a New York
City T shirt, just another dad pushing his toddler and
a stroller. Of course, this couldn't be further from the truth.
He was John Lennon for God's sakes, everyone knew who
he was, a very available guy. Everyone knew where he lived.
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Thanks to an interview in the New York Daily News,
Yoko even gave specific details, not only as too where
they were recording their new album, Double Fantasy, but what
hours they were typically in the studio. Anyone who paid
attention to his daily habits knew his routine. It was
extremely easy to find him at the park next to
the Metropolitan Museum, at Cafe La Fortuna in Central Park,
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going to and from the Dakota. He wasn't anything. In fact,
fans just wandered up into John and Yoko's apartment off
the street. I was told of one particular incident in
which a fan made his way through the lobby, up
the elevator to John and Yoko's door. The door was unlocked,
of course, it was look, I always locked the door
(20:36):
of my New York City apartment, and I have a
fraction of the amount of fame that John has. But
this curious fan found John Lennon's door unlocked and let
himself in. He walked through the living room, the kitchen,
He walked into John and Yoko's bedroom. Fans walking up
to John's place of residence was nothing new. It happened
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as early as the early seventies in England. Tittenhurst Park,
the palatial country house in Ascot that John and Yoko
owned before selling it to Ringo Star. There's an unnerving
and incredible scene in a documentary that was made about
the making of Imagine where a noticeably troubled man walked
right up to the front door of the house and
told John that he thought all of the Beatles songs
(21:17):
had been written about him. Most people would have had
that man ushered off the premises right away, or at
least called the authorities. But what did John do after
clarifying that the Beatles songs weren't written about him? John
welcomed the man inside his house and fed him. John
showed compassion, He sought to understand. Stranger is walking into
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the Dakota Building may not have rattled John, but Yoko
was definitely concerned. Had pretty much everyone living in New
York as early as the mid seventies were pretty concerned.
Do you know about the Fear City pamphlets? I think
this was ninety s. Visitors stepped off planes at LaGuardia
or JFK and walked into the terminal only to be
(22:06):
handed these pamphlets that said Welcome to Fear City on
the front with an image of Death himself. Inside were
survival tips. Pulled onto your purse with both hands. Don't
leave anything of value visible in your car, not even
a couple of pennies. In fact, the pamphlet said that
until things got better, the best tip was to stay
(22:28):
the hell out of New York if at all possible.
And what's even crazier is that these pamphlets were handed
out by plane clothes officers of the NYPD. Throw the
son of Sam into that mix. In n while the
city was enduring widespread blackouts and garbage strikes, it took
a certain thick skinned individual to live in New York
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City in the nineteen seventies. Whether or not John was
thick skinned, I think he was, But I think more dangerously,
he was a bit oblivious to the clear and present
danger of his doubt. Yoko felt the fear and paranoia
more than most. Yoko hired an x FBI agent named
Douglas McDougald to act as a bodyguard, primarily for Sean,
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but she also wanted suggestions on how she and John
could better protect themselves. McDougall had major concerns about how
openly and lais fair the Lennen's were. He often had
no guard. He thought, at the very least, he should
accompany Sean whenever he was out and about in the city,
even with Yoko there. That way, Yoko could be a
(23:33):
mother and worry about Sean, while McDougall could worry about
everyone else. But McDougall's recommendations ran deeper than that. He
wanted to assign an armed bodyguard to John and Yoko.
The armed guard would ride with them wherever they went.
He'd check their car and surroundings before they got in,
and then when they reached their destination, the bodyguard would
(23:54):
be the first out of the car to once again
clear the area before John and Yoko emerged in plain sight.
John had made his fair share of enemies over the years.
He spoke his mind, he didn't hold back. He was
highly intelligent. He'd offended the Christian Right, He'd offended the Crown.
He'd offended Nixon. He won't like anything. He defended Beatles fans.
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He'd offended the American jingoists who thought he should just
shut the hell up and go back to England. He
defended people in bars in Los Angeles who were just
out for a good time and instead were treated to
a drunken display of entitlement. I think it's safe to
say that by just about everyone who still thought about
(24:41):
John Lennon had their own opinion about John Lennon, and
it's also safe to say that most opinions were radically
different than they were at the height of Beatlemania. But
John had a plan. He was recording an album, Double Fantasy,
with his wife Yoko, and it was going to be
the way back into the hearts and minds of the public.
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He would win over those who had written him off
and remind everybody who had forgotten about him how great
he was. The record buying and radio listening public would
remember what it was they loved so much about John
Lennon in the first place. That was the whope at least. John, however,
should have been on higher alert because the people who
hadn't forgotten about him, well, they thought about him a lot.
(25:25):
He was highly intelligent. One in particular, it turns out,
who did nothing but think about the ways in which
John Lennon had brought him down. Let him down, left
him down a very available guy. This person was down
he thought John Lennon had put him there, which, to
(25:46):
use this person's own logic meant that John Lennon was
a charlattan, a turncoat, the very opposite of what he
appeared to be. And as I said, John Lennon was
also very much in the public eye. You could walk
up to him, ask for his autograph, shake his hands down.
On a visit to New York, you were just as
(26:07):
likely to see John Lennon walking down seventy Street as
you were to see yellow cabs and rats scurrying in
the subway cliche. So evil came to Fear City, and
evil found John Lennon living without fear. I used to
live near the Dakota Building, and had I still been
living there in December, I probably would have heard the
(26:30):
shots ring out, though I'm glad I didn't, because I
don't think the sound would have ever left me. On
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November sevente John and Yoko on No Lennon released Double Fantasy,
the first album by either of them in more than
five years. It was the longest John had gone between
albums since nineteen sixty three. The fourteen songs on the
album alternated between John songs just Like Starting Over, Watching
the Wheels, and Women, to name a few, and Yoko
(27:28):
songs like Kiss, Kiss Kiss, and every Man Has a
Woman Who Loves Him. The lead single, Just Like Starting
Over didn't exactly fly into the number one slot upon
its release, but it did make it into the top
ten within the first few weeks. Some fans, who had
waited so long and so patiently for new John songs
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were loath to be subjected to Yokos songs in between.
Some would pick the needle up on their turntable every
time a John song ended and move it forward to
the next groove in the vinyl where the next John
song began. In Critics, however, weren't especially kind to Yogo
or John. The l a time said, quote, those expecting
the return of the mythical Lenin will be sorely disillusioned unquote.
(28:12):
The Washington Post accused John's songs of quote general lack
of substance, lyrical directness, and undistinguished melodies unquote. The UK
press was even nastier. Melody Maker declared the record to
be a quote god awful yawn unquote. In the New
musical Express, Charles shar Murray suggested that quote Lennon keep
his big happy trap shut until he has something to say,
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even vaguely relevant to those of us not married to
Yoko Ono unquote. The critics were wrong, of course, as
critics often are. The last album John Lennon released while
he was alive did extol the laid back virtues of
house husbandry and family life. It may have even defined
the sub genre that, with decades later, come to be
(28:54):
known as dad rock. The songs, however, are simple and expressive,
and the melo these are anything but undistinguished. Yokos songs
offer an experimental counterbalance to John's and strive to keep
one of his feet firmly planted in the avant pop scene.
A few weeks after Double Fantasy was released, on the
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afternoon of Friday, December five, Mark Snyder pulled his cab
over at the intersection of Eighth Avenue in fifty five
Street to pick up a fair. The man who climbed
into the back seat was heavy set, a spectacle, invisibly agitated.
He carried a heavy Duffel bag and had a copy
of the latest issue of Playboy magazine rolled up under
his arm, the one that featured an extensive interview with
(29:38):
John Lennon. The man gave the cabby three addresses. The
first was the Century Apartments on Central Park West. Snyder
pulled the cab to the side of the road and
the man told him to wait. A few minutes later,
the man was back in the cab and gave Snyder
a second address, sixty five and Second Avenue. Snyder drove
(29:59):
to the location, and once again the man asked Snyder
to wait while he ran inside for a moment. Both
times the man carried the heavy Duffel bag with him,
and both times he returned to the cab out of breath.
This time, when the man returned, his irritation seemed to
have subsided. He was no longer stewing, his eyes had softened.
Snyder looked back at the man's pudgy face and the
(30:20):
CAB's rear view mirror and saw a smile come over him.
The man laughed, and then he started talking. I just
have to tell you this, it's just too cool. I
just dropped off some tapes of John Lennon and Paul
McCartney studio sessions they just recorded today. Lennon and McCartney.
They played for like three hours. I was the engineer.
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I engineer all of John's stuff. Snyder admitted that he
was too cool. Eight million stories in the Naked City,
and this was one of them who would have thunk it.
John and Paul at it again. But what Snyder didn't
know was that the man in the back of his cab,
the man telling this incredible story, wasn't an audio engineer
at all. He'd never laid eyes on John Lennon in
(31:03):
his lighte. Snyder didn't know that the man in the
back of his cab had recently stopped having hallucinations for
long enough to get himself from Hawaii to New York City,
where he booked a sixteen dollar and fifty cent room
at the y m c A and hit the streets
of the Big Apple with a copy of The Catcher
in the Rye stuffed in the back pocket of his jeans. Suddenly,
the man's mood changed again, his smile bent into a grimace.
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He shook his head a few times in quick succession.
The man then gave Snyder one final destination, Bleaker Street,
Fifth Avenue, and they arrived and the man paid his fare.
Thanks Snyder and asked him his name. Snyder's answer appeared
to give the man some fleeting happiness. Wow, he said,
your name is Mark too. Huh, what are the chances?
(31:48):
And then Mark David Chapman hoisted up his duffel bag,
exited Snyder's cab, and headed out in search of a
record store so that he could purchase a brand new
copy of Double Fantasy, the lay this album from John
Lennon and Yoko Ono. He would then bring it over
to the Dakota Building off Central Park West for the
next phase of his plan, a plan that will begin
(32:09):
with asking the phony people for an autograph and end
with Blood on the Tracks. Kay, all right, everybody, thanks
(32:31):
for listening to Blood on the Tracks. If you like
what you hear, be sure to find and follow Blood
on the Tracks on Apple podcast, I Heart Radio, app,
Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. On this
season two of Blood on the Tracks, we'll be releasing
ten episodes on the Incredible Life of John Lennon, with
a new episode every Thursday. You can also binge all
ten episodes of season one on the insane story of
(32:54):
the notorious record producer Phil Spector right now. It's available
wherever you get your podcasts. This episode of Blood on
the Tracks was written by Zeth Lundie and hosted an
executive produced by me Jake Brennan. Also executive produced by
Brady sab Story and copy editing by Pat Healy. This
episode was mixed by Colin Fleming, Additional music and score
elements by Ryan Spraaker. This episode featured Chris Anzeloni as
(33:18):
Dick Cabint. Blood on the Tracks is produced by Double
Elvis and partnership with I Heart Radio. Sources for this
episode are available at Double Elvis dot com on the
Blood on the Track series page. If you want to
chat about this show or hear more about the other
shows we're making a Double Elvis tap in on Instagram
at double Elvis, on Twitter at Double Elvis FM, and
(33:39):
now on Twitch where we're streaming three days a week
at Twitch dot tv slash Double Elvis Podcasts, And finally,
be sure to check out disgrace Land, the award winning
music and true crime podcast that I also host. Disgraceland
is available only on the free Amazon Music To hear
tons of insane stories about your favorite musicians getting away
(33:59):
with murder and be have you very badly go to
Amazon dot com slash disgrace Land, or if you have
an Echo device, just say Alexa. Play the disgrace Land podcast,
Rock Amoll, That Crazy, Our Dad,
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