Who Played on John Lennon's Albums: 113 Named Musicians Across 12 Releases
Who played on John Lennon's albums comes to 113 named individuals across 120 credits, spread over 12 releases from Two Virgins in 1968 to Milk and Honey in 1984. On my map each release is a station and each credited musician is a line running through the records they played on.
Three Beatles are on it. Lennon himself at all twelve stations, George Harrison at three, Ringo Starr at two. Paul McCartney is not on it anywhere.
That absence is the first thing people notice, and it is not an editing decision. I checked all twelve columns of my research. He simply never played on a John Lennon record.
The 12 Releases These Musicians Are Credited On
- Unfinished Music No. 1: Two Virgins (1968), with Yoko Ono
- Unfinished Music No. 2: Life with the Lions (1969), with Yoko Ono
- Wedding Album (1969), with Yoko Ono
- John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band (1970), solo
- Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band (1970), with Yoko Ono
- Imagine (1971), solo
- Some Time in New York City (1972), with Yoko Ono
- Mind Games (1973), solo
- Walls and Bridges (1974), solo
- Rock 'n' Roll (1975), solo
- Double Fantasy (1980), with Yoko Ono
- Milk and Honey (1984), released after his death
Live albums and compilations are not on this map, and neither are the Beatles years. If the running order is what you came for rather than the players, I have written that up separately as John Lennon albums in order. What follows here is who is on them.
The Beatle Who Never Turns Up on a John Lennon Record
George Harrison plays dobro and slide guitar across Imagine, guitar on Some Time in New York City, and sitar on Yoko Ono's own album. Ringo Starr drums on Plastic Ono Band and again on the Ono record.
So two of the other three turn up, one of them on his wife's avant-garde LP. The fourth never does, across sixteen years and 113 musicians.
Hung on a wall, that is a map with a hole in the middle of it, and it tends to be the thing people talk about first.
John Lennon Discography Map
Twelve releases across 16 years, the solo albums and the Ono collaborations drawn as one transit network.
See This Art PrintOn One Album the Sleeve Calls Eric Clapton "Derek Claptoe"
This is the map where I had to decide whether to believe the sleeves, and Some Time in New York City is why.
Ten credits on that record are printed as puns on the players' own names. Not stage names they used elsewhere, and not aliases anyone would recognise. Just jokes, printed once, on one sleeve.
| What the sleeve says | Who it is | Playing |
|---|---|---|
| Derek Claptoe | Eric Clapton | Guitar |
| Kief Spoon | Keith Moon | Drums |
| George Harrisong | George Harrison | Guitar |
| Raus Doorman | Klaus Voormann | Bass |
| Sticky Topkins | Nicky Hopkins | Electric piano |
| Billy Presstud | Billy Preston | Organ |
| Robbie Knees | Bobby Keys | Saxophone |
| Jim Bordom | Jim Gordon | Drums |
| Dallas White | Alan White | Drums |
| Bilanie & Donnie | Delaney & Bonnie | Guitar and percussion |
A map exists to let you follow one person from station to station. Print "Derek Claptoe" and that stops working, because there is nowhere else in the world he leads. So the map uses the real names and the joke stays here, in the research, where it belongs.
The same problem turns up on Imagine, where two members of Badfinger are credited jointly as "Joey and Tommy Badfinger", and again on Walls and Bridges, where the orchestra is credited as "The Philharmonic Orchestrange". Anything reading sleeves automatically would print all of it exactly as written.
The Four Records Yoko Ono Is Not On
Yoko Ono has eight of the twelve stations, which makes her the second longest line on the print. The four she is missing from are Imagine, Mind Games, Walls and Bridges and Rock 'n' Roll.
Three of those four are 1973, 1974 and 1975, the stretch Lennon spent in Los Angeles apart from her. The map does not know that and does not say it. It just shows a line that runs from 1968, thins to nothing across the middle of the seventies, and comes back in 1980 for Double Fantasy.
Her credit on John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band in 1970, meanwhile, is a single word. Wind.
Ornette Coleman Plays on a Plastic Ono Band Record
Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band in 1970 is the strangest station on the map and the one nobody expects. Ornette Coleman is on it, playing trumpet on a track called "AOS", with his own quartet behind him.
Charlie Haden and David Izenzon on double bass, Ed Blackwell on drums. Four of the most important names in free jazz, on a record with a Beatle playing guitar and another Beatle on sitar.
George Harrison and Ringo Starr are both at that same station. It is the only point on the print where two Beatles and the Ornette Coleman quartet stand in the same place.
Julian Lennon Plays Drums on Walls and Bridges, Aged Eleven
Julian Lennon is credited with drums on "Ya Ya" on Walls and Bridges in 1974. He was born in 1963, so he was eleven.
It is a short track at the end of the record and it is his only station on the whole map. One of the shortest lines on the print, and the one that tends to get pointed at once somebody spots the surname.
Elton John is at the same station, on piano and harmony vocals on "Whatever Gets You Thru the Night". He also only appears once.
Double Fantasy and Milk and Honey Are the Same Band
The last two stations share eight musicians: Earl Slick, Hugh McCracken, Tony Levin, Andy Newmark, George Small, Ed Walsh, Howard Johnson and Arthur Jenkins.
That is because they are the same sessions. Milk and Honey came out in 1984 built from recordings made before Lennon's death in 1980, so the map ends with two stations four years apart that are really one.
Hugh McCracken is one of them, credited on lead guitar for Double Fantasy and guitar for Milk and Honey. Two stations, four years apart on the sleeve, and one set of sessions in fact.
Two of Bowie's Guitarists Turn Up on the Last Two Stations
Earl Slick plays lead guitar on Double Fantasy and guitar on Milk and Honey. Carlos Alomar sings backing vocals on Milk and Honey.
Both of them are also in my research for the David Bowie map, where Alomar is one of the longest lines in that whole catalogue. Lennon and Bowie had written "Fame" together in 1975, and five years later the same players are on the last record Lennon finished.
Which Size Suits This as a Gift for John Lennon Fans
The A2 at 420 x 594mm (23 x 16 in) is enough for twelve stations, and the overall shape reads well: a sparse experimental start, a crowded middle, two dense stations at the end. It starts at £42.00.
The A1 at 594 x 841mm (33 x 23 in) is about the late records rather than the early ones. Double Fantasy carries twenty-nine credits and Milk and Honey twenty-seven, so the right-hand end of this print is far busier than the left, and at the larger size those names stay readable.
Both come unframed if they would rather choose a frame themselves, or in a black wood frame, ready to hang. Every print is a Giclée on 230gsm premium fine art paper, textured matte, archival and acid-free, with the full detail on the print and frame specification page.
Questions About Yoko, Milk and Honey and the Beatles Years
Who played on the most John Lennon albums?
Lennon himself is on all twelve. After him it is Yoko Ono on eight, Klaus Voormann on seven and Jim Keltner on five. Paul McCartney is on none of them.
Does it cover the Beatles years?
No. This one starts in 1968 with Two Virgins and runs to 1984. If you want the band years, that is a separate print.
What is not on the map?
Live albums, compilations and the Beatles records are all left off, and so is anything released after the artwork was drawn. The map covers the twelve releases listed above and nothing else.
Is Yoko Ono on the map?
On eight of the twelve stations, which is more than anybody except Lennon himself. Her line runs from 1968 to 1984 with a gap across the middle of the seventies.
Does Milk and Honey count as a real album?
It gets a station. It was released in 1984 from recordings made before Lennon's death in 1980, and it shares eight of its musicians with Double Fantasy, which is the argument for treating it as the end of the same run.
Does it show who played what on each track?
No. Each line tells you which albums that musician appears on. Track-level roles appear only on my Rolling Stones Goats Head Soup album map.
This Is the Best-Connected Print in the Range
No other map I have made leads to as many others. George Harrison and Ringo Starr both point to the Beatles discography art print, and Harrison has his own George Harrison discography art print, where Klaus Voormann, Leon Russell and Eric Clapton turn up again.
Keith Moon, hiding here as Kief Spoon, has one of the longest lines on the Who discography art print. Earl Slick and Carlos Alomar lead to the David Bowie discography art print. Jim Keltner, on five Lennon records, also plays on the Tom Petty discography art print.
And then there is the Paul McCartney discography art print, which is the only way to get him anywhere near this one. Hung as a pair, the gap is the point.
The full range sits in the music art print collection. If you came here for the gift rather than the research, the John Lennon discography art print is the print itself, in A2 or A1, unframed or in a black wood frame, from £42.00. If you are not sure which map they would want, there is a gift card for music fans instead.
