John Lennon’s Friend Said It Was ‘Amazing’ That Nobody Was ‘Seriously Injured’ When He Recorded With Phil Spector

In 1973, John Lennon threw fuel on his already-chaotic Lost Weekend when he started recording with producer Phil Spector. While some of their recording sessions were productive, many others devolved into drunken arguments and violence. Lennon’s friend, Elliot Mintz, expressed shock that no one wound up seriously hurt. 

John Lennon’s friend said the recording sessions with Phil Spector were dangerous

Lennon and Spector began working on the album Rock ‘n’ Roll together. Their studio sessions often collapsed into utter chaos.

“The Spector Sessions, as they came to be known, were among the most notorious jams in rock ‘n’ roll history,” Mintz wrote in his book We All Shine On: John, Yoko, and Me. “I ended up spending about half a dozen all-nighters at these riotous, drug- and alcohol-fueled bacchanals, occasionally finding myself in the unenviable position of having to tidy up some of the messes afterward.”

Spector once even fired a gun in the studio. Mintz said this incident and others made him feel grateful that everyone made it out of the recording sessions unscathed.

“I wasn’t here (thank goodness) the night Spector famously fired a gun into the ceiling, but I saw plenty of other harrowing incidents,” he wrote. “It’s amazing to me that nobody ended up seriously injured. Even more astonishing was that such a profoundly wonderful album — Rock ‘n’ Roll — came out on the other end of all that chaos and debauchery.”

He said the first sessions didn’t hint at the chaos to come

The early sessions felt calm compared with what came later. People drank and used drugs, often leading to unproductive nights.

“As I recall, though, the Spector Sessions didn’t start out quite so raucous,” Mintz wrote. “In fact, when I popped in for my first visit, driving over from the radio station after my show ended at 11:00 p.m., the mood at the studio was decidedly sleepy, if a bit boozy.”

Mintz said that on that night, as with others, they accomplished nothing. 

“John didn’t get a chance to sing a single note that night,” he wrote. “After a couple of hours fiddling at the control console, Spector announced it was a wrap and slipped out the door without another word. John and the other musicians looked at each other, shrugged their shoulders, and started filing out of the studio into the parking lot. Everyone was drunk, or high, or both.”

John Lennon believed his album with Phil Spector was a mess

Lennon had many problems with Rock ‘n’ Roll. Upon reflection, he found the recording sessions disastrous and had issues with it all the way up until its release.

“It started in ’73 with Phil and fell apart,” he told Rolling Stone in 1975. “I ended up as part of mad drunk scenes in Los Angeles and I finally finished it off on me own. And there was still problems with it up to the minute it came out. I can’t begin to say, it’s just barmy, there’s a jinx on that album.”