I loved John Lennon – all the Beatles really. Their music, their lyrics have become part of our popular culture. Just look at how often John Lennon’s song ‘Imagine’ is used in commercials, TV shows, movies. It’s pretty remarkable.

Sadly, John Lennon died on December 8, 1980, 30 years ago today. He was only 40 years old. He was a rebellious, highly opinionated, anti-war Englishman who was one of the greatest songwriters of all time.

In a Rolling Stone tribute, an old interview was recalled where Lennon, complaining about fans and media who criticized his break from music for a 5-year period, said:

“What they want is dead heroes, like Sid Vicious and James Dean,” Lennon says. “I’m not interested in being a dead fucking hero…so forget ’em, forget ’em.”

That quote was just 3 days before he was murdered by Mark David Chapman in front of Lennon’s apartment building, “The Dakota” in NYC. Chapman currently resides at Attica Correctional Facility in NY and has been denied parole six times. He is up for parole review again in 2012.

Here are a few other great Lennon quotes:

“Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”

“As usual, there is a great woman behind every idiot.”

“When you’re drowning you don’t think, “I would be incredibly pleased if someone would notice I’m drowning and come and rescue me.” You just scream.”

“Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn’t argue with that; I’m right and I will be proved right. We’re more popular than Jesus now; I don’t know which will go first – rock and roll or Christianity.”

“If being an egomaniac means I believe in what I do and in my art or music, then in that respect you can call me that… I believe in what I do, and I’ll say it.”

“Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives. I think we’re being run by maniacs for maniacal ends and I think I’m liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That’s what’s insane about it.”

“The basic thing nobody asks is why do people take drugs of any sort? Why do we have these accessories to normal living to live? I mean, is there something wrong with society that’s making us so pressurized, that we cannot live without guarding ourselves against it?”

As you can see by these few quotes, John Lennon was opinionated, very bright, a rebel, a thinker, and sometimes quite a bit contradictory.

By the way, John Lennon’s Imagine lyrics are here.