One of the albums that John Lennon released with Yoko Ono that has become part of his official discography is Live Peace in Toronto, released in December of 1969. The live album recorded in Toronto in September of 1969 when The Beatles were still officially together is one of the few live documents of Lennon outside of his time with The Beatles. It is sometimes overlooked in Lennon’s non-Beatles discography. How the concert came about is a fascinating backstory.
That story and the story of the concert itself are told in entertaining detail in Revival 69: The Concert That Rocked the World. The film tells how an oldies festival concert in Toronto became the unlikely venue for the first-ever live concert by the Plastic Ono Band. The band, the brainchild of John Lennon and Yoko Ono, also featured longtime Beatles inner circle musician and artist Klaus Voormann on bass, Alan White on drums, and guitar god Eric Clapton.
John Brower, one of the concert promoters of the event, is the main narrator of how Lennon and Ono and their band came to play the festival, but there are also new interviews with others who were there such as Voormann, Alice Cooper, Robbie Krieger of The Doors, Geddy Lee of Rush who was there with his friends and was just another young Canadian music fan, Anthony Fawcett, John and Yoko’s assistant at the time, and various behind-the-scenes eyewitnesses. In addition, there are plenty of archival audio and video interviews.
The main performers were a veritable who’s-who of rock ‘n’ roll pioneers, including Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, Bo Diddley, and Gene Vincent. Lennon and Ono’s participation in the concert came about in the 11th hour. When the promoters were having trouble selling tickets, they enlisted Los Angeles rock scenesters Rodney Bingenheimer and Kim Fowley. While their initial participation yielded few results, Fowley suggested to the promoters to contact Lennon and Ono in London.
They were contacted and, attracted by the idea of forming a group outside of The Beatles, their love for and history with Toronto and the fact that so many of Lennon’s early rock heroes were appearing on the bill, they agreed to do it. Much of the film breathlessly recounts how Lennon formed a band and how he, Ono, and the band finally made their way to the concert. There are clips of some of the other performers (but not the headliners The Doors, who were not filmed), and animation. Lennon and Ono’s performance is almost secondary, as the film is more about the times and how this historic concert took place.
The concert was filmed by the esteemed film music documentarian D.A. Pennebaker and there was a film of it released called Sweet Toronto, along with a previous film by Ron Chapman, the director of this documentary. Some of the performances from the concert have appeared on various non-film album releases, including music from Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Alice Cooper, and Chicago, which at the time was still going by its original name, the Chicago Transit Authority.
Other than some trailers, there are no extras or bonus material. There is also no booklet of any kind. Kino is one of the best visual physical media companies in the world and it is surprising no extras or booklet were included, and the release is only available on DVD and not Blu-ray.
For fans of The Beatles, the film will further elucidate that crucial time at the end of The Beatles and the beginning of John Lennon’s life and career as The Beatles were breaking up, and after they broke up.
GRADED ON A CURVE:
B
