Mind Games [Original recording reissued, Original recording remastered]

John Lennon | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (November 5, 2002)
• Original Release Date: 1973
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Original recording reissued, Original recording remastered
• Label: Capitol
• ASIN: B00006L3S3
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (109 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #94,332 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Released in 1973 after the dismal musical detour that was Sometime in New York City, Mind Games showed John Lennon returning to the emotional pop sounds of Plastic Ono Band and Imagine. But while the glorious title track (the album's only hit) was every inch a worthy successor to "Imagine," the rest of the songs were written off by most critics as half-baked experiments. In retrospect, most of them, while not classic stuff, are still better than the bulk of what passed for rock music in the early 1970s. "You Are Here" and "Out of the Blue" are definitely on par with Lennon's best solo work, while "Bring on the Lucie (Freda Peeple)" couches its political barbs in silly good humor. Even better is "Meat City," a rocker as wild and surreal as the "White Album"'s "Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey." The 2002 remastered reissue is fleshed out with three "home version" takes of album tracks. --Dan Epstein

Product Description

*Japanese import mini-vinyl CDs --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Flawed remastering., November 5, 2002

By 

Neil Richardson (West Yorkhire, UK) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mind Games (Audio CD)

Grossly underated album with some of Lennon's best work for years.
Largely retreating from the politcal messages of "New York City", this collection returns to the far more contented sound of "Imagine". The use of laid-back instrumentation, pleasant melodies and highly crafted lyrics, gives the whole album a country-rock feel, the sort of thing you might have expected from Mike Nesmith or The Byrds at the time.

Like all Lennons albums from the mid '70's it has always suffered from appalling sound quality, probably a combination of Lennon's production technique and the use of tapes several generations from the masters. So improving on the sound quality was never going to be difficult.
The original CD release from over 10 years ago is a muddy and completely uninspiring presentation, sounding almost AM radio quality.

The immediate impression of this new version is that the sound is opened up and feels much warmer. You can actully identify many individual instruments for the first time, particularly the bass guitar, and the impression of a wall of sound has been completely eliminated.

Pity then, that the track Meat City has been spoiled by the use of an un-edited vocal take with a littering of ad-libs, exorcised from the original record. The track also fades to early, cutting short the spoken message at the end.

It's a pity that people familiar with the it do not get hear the material and highlight these sort of mistakes before it's release.

Bonus tracks are always going to be a matter of personal opinion. The three selected for this release whilst pleasant enough, add little to the presentation.

29 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Brilliant, Underrated Album..., June 30, 2005

By 

Kelvin Peakin "Lennologist" (Here) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mind Games (Audio CD)

A lot of people consider Mind Games to be another Lennon "flop", coming after Sometime In New York City, which is also considered to be a bad album. However, Mind Games is, without doubt, a stronger album than New York City and while it isn't as strong as some of John's other work, some other artists would probably kill to have an album like this.

The first song is the most well known on the album and wouldn't be out of the place on his Imagine album. It's a nice, relatively slow, upbeat number and always makes its way on to Lennon best-of compilations. After that, the songs aren't as well known. Tight A$ is a fun rocker, but not one of John's best. It seems to wear off its welcome fairly quickly, but the next song is much stronger. Aisumasen (I'm Sorry) is a great love letter/apology to Yoko, and one of the strongest songs on the album. One Day (At A Time) is another good song but is followed by what I consider to be the best song on the album Bring On The Lucie (Freda People). It's a fantastic little number and the only song on the album that has anything "political" in it at all, and it's not even a political song. It's definitely a classing John song, and it is very underrated, much like the rest of the album.

For those wondering, the Nutopian International Anthem is a 5 second long silence, and was the anthem for the conceptual country that John and Yoko created in 1973. After that, we have Intuition, which has always sounded to be like something off of Plastic Ono Band, except a little more upbeat than most of the songs on that album. Out Of The Blue is another of my favorite songs on the album, and is sort of like an upbeat love letter to Yoko.

Only People and I Know (I Know) are fairly good songs, but are hardly the best on this album. However, the last two are definitely classics. You Are Here is a quiet, beautiful song and Meat City is an absolutely fantastic rocker, and a great way to end an amazingly underrated album.

This remastered edition also has three extra tracks. Home demos of Aisumasen (I'm Sorry), Bring On The Lucie (Freda People), and Meat City. They're fairly rough but they're goopd to listen to a couple of times.

Overall, I highly recommend picking Mind Games up. It's not one of John's most famous, but it's a fantastic album, and it is very underrated.

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Why are they doing those strange things?, November 17, 2002

By 

mirrortime (Central, Oregon) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mind Games (Audio CD)

First, let me say that I think the sound quality is amazing and would be interesting as a "Novelty." Hearing stuff I've never heard before is cool and put a smile on my face for the first listen and I love hearing some of the parts in the mix I've never heard before. I feel the same way about the other John Lennon "RE-MIXED/ RE-MASTERED" CD's that have come out in the last few years. But... now that "Mind Games" has come out in the same way as it's predecessors I really wish they would have just re-mastered John's albums the way the were recorded and left them ALONE!!! They sound very different from the original recordings. As flawed as some of the original mixes are I would think that for history's sake we wouldn't repaint the "Mona Lisa." The re-mix DOES change the music completely at times. For example... The beginning of "Meat City" sounds completely different than the original. The new version is much mellower. Also, the end of "Meat City" is missing some of the spoken words. I always thought that was one of the coolest things about this album. And... It must be noted that it was flawed on the original CD release also. It faded out TOO SOON also! Was it lost on the master tape somehow? If not this MUST be corrected! Overall... This would be cool as bonus disc with the original mix CD. Perhaps a 2 CD set. If we all complain enough maybe we can get them to re-issue the orignal mix simply remastered. (I wonder if they're planning on doing that. What a great way to get me to buy the album a total of 4 times :)....Strange but, I never heard hiss on "Nutopian International Anthem " before... wasn't it complete silence and only 3 seconds long not 6?
I'm wondering and somewhat paranoid about what will happen to "Wall and Bridges" and "Rock n' Roll". I am now going to go to E-Bay and look for the original LP/ Album/ Record/ Vinyl (which it looks like I may have parted with too soon) and place a bid just so I can hear John say... "Why are they doing those strange things"... maybe he was forseeing the future about these re-mixes.