How Do You Sleep? Lyrics
So Sgt. Pepper took you by surprise
You better see right through that mother's eyes
Those freaks was right when they said you was dead
The one mistake you made was in your head
[Chorus]
Ah, how do you sleep?
Ah, how do you sleep at night?
[Verse 2]
You live with straights who tell you you was king
Jump when your momma tell you anything
The only thing you done was yesterday
And since you're gone you're just another day
[Chorus]
Ah, how do you sleep?
Ah, how do you sleep at night?
[Instrumental Break]
[Chorus]
Ah, how do you sleep?
Ah, how do you sleep at night?
A pretty face may last a year or two
But pretty soon they'll see what you can do
The sound you make is muzak to my ears
You must have learned something in all those years
[Chorus]
Ah, how do you sleep?
Ah, how do you sleep at night?
About
This is the eighth track from Imagine, John Lennon’s second solo album after the Beatles broke up. A scathing result of the Lennon/McCartney feud, this song is one of pop music’s first diss tracks. Lennon actually wrote it in response to the Paul McCartney track “Too Many People.”
According to the 1981 Playboy interview this is what Lennon said about the song in 1980, just before his untimely death:
You know, I wasn’t really feeling that vicious at the time. But I was using my resentment toward Paul to create a song, let’s put it that way. He saw that it pointedly refers to him, and people kept hounding him about it. But, you know, there were a few digs on his album before mine. He’s so obscure other people didn’t notice them, but I heard them. I thought, Well, I’m not obscure, I just get right down to the nitty-gritty. So he’d done it his way and I did it mine. But as to the line you quoted, yeah, I think Paul died creatively, in a way.
The inside cover of Imagine also featured a picture of Lennon holding the ears of a pig, which ridicules the cover photo of McCartney’s May 1971 album, Ram.
Q&A
Find answers to frequently asked questions about the song and explore its deeper meaning
It’s not about Paul, it’s about me. I’m really attacking myself. But I regret the association, well, what’s to regret? He lived through it. The only thing that matters is how he and I feel about these things and not what the writer or commentator thinks about it. Him and me are okay.
–John Lennon (from the 1972 Imagine film)
You know, I wasn’t really feeling that vicious at the time. But I was using my resentment toward Paul to create a song, let’s put it that way. He saw that it pointedly refers to him, and people kept hounding him about it. But, you know, there were a few digs on his album before mine. He’s so obscure other people didn’t notice them, but I heard them. I thought, Well, I’m not obscure, I just get right down to the nitty-gritty. So he’d done it his way and I did it mine. But as to the line you quoted, yeah, I think Paul died creatively, in a way.
–John Lennon (from the 1980 Playboy interview)
I heard Paul’s messages in Ram – yes there are dear reader! Too many people going where? Missed our lucky what? What was our first mistake? Can’t be wrong? Huh! I mean Yoko, me, and other friends can’t all be hearing things. So to have some fun, I must thank Allen Klein publicly for the line ‘just another day’. A real poet! Some people don’t see the funny side of it. Too bad. What am I supposed to do, make you laugh? It’s what you might call an ‘angry letter’, sung – get it?
–John Lennon (Crawdaddy Magazine)
- 1.Imagine
- 3.Jealous Guy
- 4.It’s So Hard
- 7.Oh My Love
- 8.How Do You Sleep?
- 9.How?
- 10.Oh Yoko!