Lennon Murphy bares some, if not all.
Boy, I love Yoko Ono: I think the woman is a genius and at 70-something she still rocks it live. (Yep, I can hear the oodles of boomers booing as I type.) But the news discussed in the open letter below, issued on a press release from singer-songwriter Lennon Murphy’s people, is totally bizarre:
“Yesterday I received notice that Yoko Ono had filed a law suit against me, asking for a cancellation of the trademark that I own for the name “Lennon.” This could very well mean the career that I have worked so hard at, the one you all have believed in, may come to an end. I wanted to address the situation to all my fans because without you I am nothing and it’s not fair to everyone who has believed in my music not to be properly informed of this pure bullshit.
“When I first started playing music at 14, I was known for the most part as ‘The Lennon Murphy Band.’ Not a name I was very fond of, no one could ever agree on anything so it made sense. A few months later some of the shows started being marketed using my full name as well as some that just using ‘Lennon.’ There was never really any consistency but there was well enough to justify stating that ‘Lennon’ had been used in fact since 1997. When I signed with Arista Records in 2000 at the age of 18, a marketing decision was made to continue being known just as Lennon. In all honesty, I didn’t care. I was just happy to sign a record deal, make an album, and pay my bills.