Yoko Ono - Between My Head and the Sky 2009

Rock and art: its funny, it seems an awfully long time since bag-ism and bed-ins and jamming with bearded men in robes, but about 10 seconds since Fluxus and cutting clothes off and white chess sets. Yoko Onos early rock excursions are, understandably, somewhat of their time, but then, so were her collaborators. John Lennon apart, she was working with Eric Clapton, Frank Zappa, Elephants Memory, all talented artists, but men who had come up through the blues, and jazz, and Marshall amps, and all that hoo ha.

Yoko Onos art came from an uncluttered place, nobody save possibly John Cage has ever used so much space, and whiteness, and silence in their work. And its that which has always served her well, in both her art and her music. From David Bowie to the B-52s, rock artists have always respected the simplicity and modernity of Yoko Onos work and when she released her 1980s single, Walking On Thin Ice, it fit right in to the new era (not least because John Lennon shoplifted Talking Heads Cities for the riff).

Yoko Onos work has been mostly excellent (though Im still trying to erase from my memory a concert at the Wembley Conference Centre where she sang Imagine as audience members waved candles) and almost always essential. Dont Worry Kyoko, Mrs Lennon, I Felt Like Smashing My Face In A Clear Glass Window, Mind Train, Walking On Thin Ice, Nobody Sees You Like I Do, Rising - these are just a few of the songs Ono has recorded in the past 35 years that everyone should own, encompassing not just the brilliant, hippy-distressing Aaiiiiiieeeeee! primal wail that thrills even now, but also in recent years an emotional sound which contracts with her sometimes chilly early work.

Perhaps its the murder of her husband that released a desire to communicate quieter feelings, perhaps its her upbringing in a somewhat distant Japanese well-to-do family, or just the passage of time that makes us all reflective. But Yoko Onos music since the 1990s has been dissonantly thunderous and quietly melancholic.

Shes also continued to have a genius for collaboration. In the 1970s, she often used John Lennons superstar friends, and in recent years shes worked with Sean Lennons band (this album is on his label), who are forceful and happy, as you might expect, with both avant-garde and modern rock stylings.

2007s Yes, Im A Witch (in your Face, misogynous rock) saw her give her old recordings to everyone from Cat Power and Peaches to Hank Schocklee and Jason Pierce, with suitably grateful results. Ono may not have been a direct influence on all these people, but without her, theyd all be playing the ukulele on a boat. Possibly.

And now she releases an album with a classically Yoko title, which like much music made by people whove got a hell of a back catalogue, leans on every style of her career. Theres a rhythmically heavy train song (Waiting For The D Train). Theres a gorgeously affirmative piano piece (Im Going Away Smiling) which may well be about John Lennon. Theres both primal and post-electro blip on The Sun Is Down (the collaborators here are Sean Lennon, New Yorican Japanese band Cibo Matto and Tokyos Cornelius).

A few of the songs here are in Japanese, which is only fitting, and a lot of them (Ask The Elephant!) have Onos elliptically charming wit (if she is a witch, shes a very funny one). The general impression is unsurprisingly eclectic with, slightly surprisingly, a lot of trumpets. The final track, IΓΓé¼Γäóm Alive, is 26 seconds long, features nothing but four words and some curious banging, and is the most moving thing Ive heard in ages.

This is an excellent album that manages to be both a mature summary of an artists career and something completely fresh and new. At a time when the old daddy singers are congratulating themselves for being able to enter a studio and re-record their own songs, it must be a great source of satisfaction for Yoko Ono (and if hes around in the ether, John Lennon) that she is out-performing, out-classing and out-original-ing her husbands 1960s peers. But then, she always did.
(David Quantik, uncut.co.uk)

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From Fluxus and performance-art pioneer and Two Virgins to chart-topping dance-music heroine (inspiring punk rock along the way!), Yoko Ono has been an innovative and influential force on music and art, while simultaneously campaigning for peace on the worlds stage. At 76 years young, Yoko continues to kick ass - and is preparing to release Dont Stop Me!, a career-defining album made with her new Plastic Ono Band. The record is a gorgeous, mind-melting blend of styles, restating and sharpening themes while plunging into the always-mysterious future.

The sessions happened at NYCs Sear Sound, the same studio that used to house the old Hit Factory, where Double Fantasy was recorded. Sean Lennon produced the sessions with Yoko and acted as musical leader for a group evenly divided between Japanese avant pop musicians, and downtown Manhattan improvisers. In the former category was Yuka Honda of Cibo Matto, and the current group led by Keigo Cornelius Oyamada - Yuko Araki and Hirotaka Shimmy Shimizu. Ms. Ono had been so happy with a performance theyd done together in Tokyo in January, she invited them to New York to record. In the latter category we find Shahzad Ismaily, Erik Friedlander, Michael Leonhart, Daniel Carter and Indigo Street, a group of brilliant instrumentalists.

As Sean says, Yoko unleashed a deluge of new songs, writing about 16 songs in 6 days, the most prolific day peaking out at 6 songs written and tracked in an afternoon. The recording session was like a tornado of inspiration. Some of the best lyrics on the record Yoko actually freestyled as if she were a lyrical divining rod.

The results are pretty amazing.

Yoko Ono. Between My Head and the Sky. Hold that thought.

New studio album will be released on September 21, 2009 on Sean Lennons label, Chimera Music. (imaginepeace.com)

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Yoko Ono Plastic Ono Band - Between my head and the sky 2009
(New York Chimera Music)

1. Waiting for the D train
2. The sun is down!
3. Ask the elephant!
4. Memory of footsteps
5. Moving mountains
6. Calling
7. Healing
8. Hashire, hashire
9. Between my head and the sky
10. Feel the sand
11. Watching the rain
12. Unun to
13. I'm going away smiling
14. Higa Noboru
15. I'm alive


Yoko Ono: vocals
Sean Lennon: acoustic and electric guitars, piano, keyboards, bass, drums, percussion
Keigo Cornelius Oyamada: guitars, bass, Tenorion, programming, percussion
Hirotaka Shimmy Shimizu: guitars, percussion
Yuko mi-gu Araki: drums, percussion
Shahzad Ismaily: guitars, bass, drums, percussion
Yuka Honda: Pro-tools editing, sampler, e. piano, organ, percussion
Michael Leonhart: trumpet, vibraphone, percussion
Erik Friedlander: cello
Daniel Carter: tenor saxophone, flute
Indigo Street: guitar

Produced by Yoko Ono and Sean Lennon