Saturday, April 22, 2006

Greetings From Beyond

I never expected John Lennon to be the Beatle who would be communicating from beyond the grave. "Imagine there's no heaven, it's easy if you try. No hell below us, above us only sky." That would seem to imply a certain amount of skepticism for the possibility of an afterlife. Besides, wasn't Paul supposed to be dead first? It reminds me of a number of late night experiments in reel-to-reel tape recording and slowing down and speeding up "Revolution Number 9" carried out by my older brother and his friend. They were listening for clues: the crackling flames of a car burning, the dying moans of Paul (the cute one), and the cries of mourning. I remember how profoundly creepy I found that experience, and that was when they were all still really alive.
Well, all that ambivalence falls away when one hears about the recently conducted seance with John Lennon, available this Monday on pay-per-view. For just nine dollars and ninety-five cents, you can find out what "the smart Beatle" has on his mind (or consciousness) these days. Now that half of the group is gone, it's probably important to keep up with what is going on here and in the netherworld. The disembodied voice of Lennon will be heard speaking via Electronic Voice Phenomenon. "EVP" is based on a belief that spirit voices communicate through radio and TV broadcast signals. The seance was held in one of his favorite New York restaurants, La Fortuna.
This visit to the other side is brought to you by the same folks who made eight million dollars on a similar "psychic experience" in 2003, in which they tried to contact the departed spirit of Princess Diana. It reminds me of Harry Houdini's promise to his wife, after years of exposing fakes and charlatans, that he would attempt to reach his wife when he reached the Great Beyond. I wonder if Houdini would have made his return from the grave on pay-per-view. I know George wouldn't - the shy one.

1 comment:

Kristen Caven said...

Oh, yes, I've been an extra-big devotee of Lennon ever since I read John Lennon in Heaven, which he wrote after his death. It explains the whole Number 9 thing in full detail.