'Suppose - Did It Inspire Imagine'
Paul Simpson investigates Elvis’ 1967 song 'Suppose' and considers whether it inspired John Lennon's classic 'Imagine'.
- An EIN Spotlight by Paul Simpson -
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A quiet, chilling ballad, Suppose is worth a listen in its own right.
It is one of a handful of Elvis’s recordings that ¬– like his cover of Dylan’s 'Tomorrow Is A Long Time' – suggests roads he sadly never got to take.
Yet it also intrigues me because of the possibility – and I put it no more strongly than that – that it inspired 'Imagine', the utopian anthem that became John Lennon’s signature song.
In this EIN Spotlight respected author Paul Simpson takes a fascinating look at this overlooked song...
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A quiet, chilling ballad, Suppose is worth a listen in its own right.
It is one of a handful of Elvis’s recordings that ¬– like his cover of Dylan’s Tomorrow Is A Long Time – suggests roads he sadly never got to take. Yet it also intrigues me because of the possibility – and I put it no more strongly than that – that it inspired Imagine, the utopian anthem that became John Lennon’s signature song.
The mere suggestion has divided Presley’s legion of fans. On one online forum, some have noted similarities between the songs – one even suggesting "It’s obvious that John Lennon committed plagiarism" ¬– while another countered: "To say this inspired Imagine is ludicrous and there is nothing remotely close between the 2 songs except the titles. Thanks for the laugh." |
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Suppose has no right to be as good as it is. The song’s co-writers are George Goehring and Sylvia Dee. Goehring is best known for writing Little Donkey while Dee provided the lyrics for Chickery Chick, a song about a chicken with the irritating habit of saying "Chickery chick, cha-la, cha-la, chekala romey/In a bananika bollika wollika" which topped the US charts in 1945. She also co-wrote Moonlight Swim with Ben Weisman for Blue Hawaii. In a bizarre coincidence, Dee died, at the age of 52, eight days before Elvis recorded Suppose in MGM Studios in Culver City, California.
Goehring and Dee’s reflective, desolate ballad clearly intrigued Presley. He can be heard performing it at Graceland on The Home Recordings compilation and, in June 1967, he cut a long and a short version of the song. Elvis's phrasing is impeccable – the pause after "suppose I had no wish" and before "to be alive" is exquisite. Though Elvis sings as if he’s gripped by existential despair, his performance, like the song, is simple and plaintive, letting the haunting lyrics work their magic. When he speculates that the tall green trees may not survive, the thought is mysteriously moving.
This was clearly a song that Elvis cared deeply about and so, inevitably, it was not included in Speedway, the movie for which it was created. It was buried at the film’s soundtrack album, the worst selling in Presley’s career, stalling at No82 in the Billboard charts.
'Suppose' was the final track on the 1968 released album, the last of five 'Bonus Songs'
But did this ballad inspire Imagine? The case that it did can be simply summarised. Suppose and Imagine are synonyms. In both songs, the singer lists a number of things that might not exist. In both numbers, the singer is alone at the piano, contemplating another world. Both songs feature many lines that begin with a single repeated word – suppose or imagine. And in the verse Elvis repeats, he sings, "It’s impossible to imagine a world without a star, but imagining no you …" And the timeline – Suppose was cut in June 1967, Imagine in July 1971 – means that the inspirational influence cannot be ruled out.
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This could just all add up to a heap of coincidences. Certainly the official version of the creation of Imagine does not mention the soundtrack to Speedway, Elvis or Suppose. Lennon said: "The song was originally inspired by Yoko’s book Grapefruit. In it are a lot of pieces, imagine this, imagine that. Yoko actually helped me a lot with the lyrics, but I wasn’t man enough to give her credit for it."
Published in 1963, Grapefruit contained a three-line poem called Cloud Piece, which starts with the line "Imagine the clouds dripping", which was reproduced on the back of the Imagine album. And the political content of the song – what Lennon called it’s "sugar coated … anti-religious, anti-nationalistic, anti-conventional, anti-capitalistic" message – has no real parallel in Elvis’s oeuvre, although some of the same humanitarian concern runs through his impassioned rendition of If I Can Dream.
The popular cliché is that Lennon stopped listening to Elvis in 1958 when the King went into the army. Yet for all of the former Beatle’s well-publicised swipes at his idol, that isn’t quite true. Lennon is said to have been in the audience when the King sold out Madison Square Garden in 1972. His old band-mate George Harrison even went backstage to meet Presley.
Eight years later, during production of (Just Like) Starting Over, Lennon jokingly referred to the song as the "Elvis/Orbison track". On the stripped down version released in 2010, he says: "This one’s for Gene, and Eddie and Elvis … and Buddy." His homage to the King is particularly obvious on the line "It’s been too long since we took the time …"
That sign of respect was no whim. Listening to the music he had adored as a boy revived Lennon’s interest in music. Nine years before, as Richard Williams has recalled (Guardian article here) he was staying at New York’s St Regis Hotel and sifting through a load of old Elvis singles he had asked someone to buy for him. Sifting through them, Lennon said to Williams: "I’m going to have a jukebox with just Elvis records on it, isn’t it great?" (My Baby Left Me, Hound Dog and Love Me Tender made the cut, Bossa Nova Baby and Are You Lonesome Tonight? didn’t). He also admitted to Williams how he pinched bits from his favourite rock and roll numbers to use in his songs.
This was the same year he recorded Imagine, which was produced by Phil Spector, an even more ardent admirer of Elvis than the Beatles. Interviewed by Rolling Stone in 1969, Spector gushed: "Gosh, Elvis is so great. You have no idea how great he is, you really you don’t. He is sensational. He can do anything with his voice."
It is possible to envisage Spector buying the Speedway album – even though he would have detested it. It is possible to imagine Lennon making the same purchase –if only out of sardonic curiosity to see how low his hero had fallen. Yet there is no proof – and that is where the case for Suppose as a possible inspiration for Imagine ultimately rests. Only if the Lennon family decide to auction/disclose his entire record collection will we ever definitively know.
And ultimately it doesn’t really matter. Suppose is still a beautiful ballad, sung with commitment and intelligence by the greatest singer of the 20th century.
Spotlight written by Paul Simpson (images by Piers Beagley)
-Copyright EIN July 2015
EIN Website content © Copyright the Elvis Information Network.
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EIN Reader's Feedback
From Cesar Emilio R
It's a good song but I highly doubt Lennon would seek out Speedway on vinyl but stranger things have happened.
What I do know is this song deserved a better fate than being buried on this LP.
EIN Piers
I strongly suspect that Lennon's producer Phil Spector will have obtained every Elvis album for free, especially due to his work with the "Wrecking Crew" musicians in LA some of whom worked on the Speedway session. While the soundtrack was awful one can "imagine" Phil Spector playing the "Bonus Songs" to hear what Elvis might have been recording away from the mundane movie songs. So I believe that it is likely that Spector would have listened to 'Suppose' at some point - NOT that this means it in anyway would have influenced Lennon's Imagine. But it is another coincidence and possible link.
From Drew B
Good shout....I never thought of that until now.
Lennon was a huge fan of Elvis remember so I would guess he would look out for the bonus songs on an album.. the Piano Ballads especially
From Marvin B
Listen to Little Sister and then listen to Get Back. They sound alike
From Sharon E
Beautiful song by ELVIS!!! I for One, can most definitely "imagine",,, this being the inspiration for Lennon.
From Ali C
I always said this song was on a par with Imagine !
It's a beautiful song sung by the most beautiful voice in the world and shoulld have been realeased as a single !
From Scott H
I imagine it's possible I suppose. But would John Lennon have listened to the Speedway soundtrack? and his song lyrics are cherry picked from the musings in Yoko's book. So then, did Yoko base her whole philosophy on the Speedway soundtrack? is the very title amphetimine related? is 'let yourself go' a recipe to find real love?
From Cesar Emilio R
It's a good song but I highly doubt Lennon would seek out Speedway on vinyl but stranger things have happened.
What I do know is this song deserved a better fate than being buried on this LP.
Pat O'D
In some ways Lennon's life mirrored Elvis', the specs, drugs, becoming a recluse, syrupy songs in their final years, hair etc .
About this song on Imagine (the most stupid song that Lennon wrote as if everything that he wrote came true and everything went away! All you needed is for one bloke to mess with another man's missus and you would be back to the beginning).
Best to have what we got and work on that.
I think Yoko would be a unreliable source, you could not trust her if she said no.
Suppose is a great song tho a gem .
From Alex C
The lyrics of John Lennon's anthem were by John Lennon admission written by Yoko Ono which hated Elvis Presley by her own admission.
John always said that he loved Elvis ( even if, being widely into drugs, he often referred erratically about his love of Elvis & about meeting him, which was a dream of his) until he met Yoko Ono ( she liked old time music & jazz crooners but not r'n'r generation of singers like Elvis ) he then tended to stay away from his roots but, he spontaneously shouted (during the performance of Elvis's classic number Hound Dog) "Elvis I love you" in his 1972 New York Concerts .
So sorry, you can't even "Suppose" maybe inspired John Lennon's classic, you can just "Imagine" it.
Thank you for your time & your mind
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