You’d be a hard-hearted soul not to feel at least a shred of sympathy for Julian Lennon. It can’t have been easy, for all the reasons you’d expect. Though he’s enjoyed a decent-ish career in music (Top Ten hits, Grammy nominations) he’s never really escaped the long shadow cast by his old man.
Now, in a revealing interview in the Observer this weekend, Julian has opened up about all this. Ostensibly it was to promote his new collection of his photographic work, Life’s Fragile Moments. But conversation inevitably turned to his lifelong struggle to escape that shadow.
“It had always been, ‘John Lennon’s son, John Lennon’s son’,” he said. “And I’m going, for f’s sake. I said, what I need to do for me, first and foremost, is to build up a body of work, a foundation that I can stand on, that nobody can take away from me. And I continue to do so. It’s not to show off, it’s just to prove to myself that I can actually do this stuff. I’m not interested in fighting other people’s opinions.”
When asked what he made of the current resurgence of interest in the Beatles, he said: “It’s news to me half the time. I’m not part of the inner circle - I never have been. You have to realise that when Dad left, when I was between three and five (it was a bit of a process), it was just mum and me, and we had nothing to do with the Beatles or Dad. I visited him on the odd occasion but we were very much on the outside. I’m thankful that Sean and I get on like a house on fire - we’re best buddies and he tells me what he can, but things are pretty secret on the Beatles front.”
He said he felt unbothered by this and that acceptance was something he’d learned from his mother: “It was watching how she handled what she was dealt with love and grace and positivity. I saw that that’s the only way forward. You take the high road, you be the better person and try to learn from all the crap that’s thrown at you. Without question, I’ve had my moments of depression and I still deal with some very serious anxiety on occasion, but the only way is to push yourself through. Wallowing’s no good - been there, done that.”
Life’s Fragile Moments is out now, but Julian also said he’d started working on a memoir, albeit one with a difference: “I felt it would be nice to tell my side of the story but it’s not going to be your standard autobiographical book. I want something based more on art and emotions.”
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