Gimme Some Truth
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| "Gimme Some Truth" | ||
|---|---|---|
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| Song by John Lennon | ||
| from the album Imagine | ||
| Released | September 9, 1971 (US) October 8, 1971 (UK) |
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| Recorded | 1971 | |
| Genre | Rock | |
| Length | 3:16 | |
| Label | Apple/EMI | |
| Writer(s) | John Lennon | |
| Producer(s) | John Lennon, Yoko Ono, and Phil Spector | |
| Imagine track listing | ||
| I Don't Wanna Be a Soldier Mama I Don't Wanna Die (5) |
"Gimme Some Truth" (6) |
Oh My Love (7) |
"Gimme Some Truth" is a protest song written and performed by John Lennon from his 1971 album Imagine.
Like several songs on the album, such as the title track "Imagine" ]]," "Gimme Some Truth" has blatant political references emerging from the time it was written, during the latter years of the Vietnam War.
The song expresses Lennon's frustration with deceptive politicians ("short-haired yellow-bellied sons of Tricky Dicky"), chauvinism ("tight-lipped condescending mommy's little chauvinists"), and acts of military violence such as the My Lai massacre. The song encapsulates the general feeling of the time, when people were heavily participating in protest rallies against the government.
Lennon's dig at US President Richard Nixon, referring to him in the lyrics of the song as "Tricky Dicky," proved to be increasingly relevant after the song's release, when in 1972 the Watergate scandal erupted. "Tricky Dicky" became a popular nickname for Nixon during the Watergate hearings, and came into widespread usage.
The song references the nursery rhyme "Old Mother Hubbard," using the rhyme's content (about a woman going to get her dog a bone, only to discover that her cupboard is empty) as a political parallel to the events of the day, a practice that goes all the way back to when the rhyme was originally printed in 1805. The song also alludes to "soft soap," using it as a slang term for liquid soap, likening its slippery qualities to a politician trying to quell public unrest with insincere praise.
[edit] Origins
Work on the song began as early as January 1969 during the Beatles' Get Back sessions, which would eventually evolve into Let It Be. Bootleg recordings of the group peforming songs that would eventually go onto the members' solo recordings feature a few performances of "Gimme Some Truth."
[edit] Trivia
- John Lennon's fellow former Beatle George Harrison plays lead guitar on the song, with Klaus Voormann (a longtime friend of the Beatles and designer of the cover for their Revolver album) on bass.
- A 2000 direct-to-video documentary film showing the recording sessions and evolution of Imagine took its title, Gimme Some Truth: The Making of John Lennon's Imagine Album, from this song.
- John Wiener took the title of this song for his 1999 book, Gimme Some Truth: The John Lennon FBI Files, about Lennon's problems with the government in the 1970s.
