John Lennon – I’m Losing You

Yesterday was John’s birthday 80th birthday…that just doesn’t seem right. He has been gone for 40 years…the same amount that he lived. 

I’m Losing You is on the Double Fantasy album released in 1980.

There are two versions of this song that are well known. Co-producer Tom Douglas brought Rick Nielsen and Bun E. Carlos of the band Cheap Trick to play on this song, but it was eventually re-recorded with the studio musicians. That is the version that ended up on the album.

The Rick Nielsen and Ben E. Carlos version was included years later on the John Lennon Anthology Collection released in 1998.

Some say the edgier track with Nielsen and Carlos wasn’t used because Yoko didn’t like the version, the recording didn’t fit in with the rest of the album, or it sounded a little too much like Cold Turkey…a previous song by Lennon. If I had to guess I would say it was because the track would have stood out against the others. Personally I would have went with the Nielsen and Carlos version anyway.

While on vacation in Bermuda during the summer of 1980, Lennon tried to call Yoko Ono but couldn’t get through to her and wrote this song based on his frustration.

Double Fantasy peaked at #1 in the Billboard Album Charts, Canada, and The UK in 1981.

From Songfacts

This is a track from Double Fantasy, Lennon’s final album during his lifetime, released only three weeks before his murder. The song resulted from John’s inability to get Yoko on the phone at a time when he feared for their relationship.

Yoko Ono told Q November 2010 that this is one of her favorite Lennon songs. She said: “I’m Losing You is an incredible song. I think as a songwriter, that tops it all. Some of the songs I’m in. But it’s almost like Picasso drawing a lot of his wife because his wife was around. And I was very lucky I was his wife.”

Director Jay Dubin, whose work at the time included commercials for Crazy Eddie’s, was called in to shoot a music video to promote the Double Fantasy album. On August 10, 1980, he brought his team to the Hit Factory studio and captured Lennon performing this song, along with “I’m Moving On” and some cover tunes. The video was abandoned after Lennon’s death a few months later and the footage has never materialized.

Here are the two versions

I’m Losing You

Here in some stranger’s room
Late in the afternoon
What am I doing here at all?
Ain’t no doubt about it
I’m losing you
I’m losing you

Somehow the wires have crossed
Communication’s lost
Can’t even get you on the telephone
Just got to shout about it
I’m losing you
I’m losing you

Well, here in the valley of indecision
I don’t know what to do
I feel you slipping away
I feel you slipping away
I’m losing you
I’m losing you

Well now you say you’re not getting enough
But I remind you of all that bad, bad, bad stuff
So what the hell am I supposed to do?
Just put a band-aid on it?
And stop the bleeding now
Stop the bleeding now
Well…

I’m losing you
I’m losing you

Well, well, well
I know I hurt you then
But hell, that was way back when
Well, do you still have to carry that cross? (Drop it!)
Don’t wanna hear about it
I’m losing you
I’m losing you

Don’t wanna lose you now
Well…
No, no, no, no…

Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player.

20 thoughts on “John Lennon – I’m Losing You”

  2. A lot of the stuff I read on social media this week concerning John’s 80th- seems to have centered on his death and all the great music we missed out on. I think of what his family. Yoko, Julian- I would think over the past 40 years as Julian became an adult himself that their relationship would have gotten closer- and Sean who was only 5 at the time- what they missed out on- and his friends. His music- if he had never recorded another song- he had already done enough.

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    1. He has been built up and torn down so much in some cases I think people have forgotten he was a human being…a father, friend, and husband. He is “John Lennon” the Beatle.
      I will admit I sometimes have to shake myself of that.

      That is the first thing my dad told me after he died…he didn’t know much about him and wasn’t a fan…but dad reminded me of him being a person not a hero or whatever.

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  4. Nice post! I hadn’t known about the Cheap Trick connection with Double Fantasy. Have you ever read anything to indicate that John might have been planning to go on tour to support that album? (There’s something to imagine!)

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    1. Yes I have…his last interview he hinted at them already working on the next album “Milk and Honey” and possibly touring or doing some concerts.

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  5. Love that tune, Max, including the version with Cheap Trick, which I had not heard before – very cool!

    I also have to say that while half of “Double Fantasy” is comprised of songs by Yoko, I still think it came out as one of Lennon’s best solo albums. And even Yoko’s songs are better than some of her earlier tunes I’ve heard.

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