JL: Alright, everybody tries to do that thing on me - go on -

EM: Really?

JL: Trying to prove I'm cracked.

EM: No, no,no! I've got about ten words and as soon as I say the word, I want you to say the first word or impression that pops into your mind, okay?

JL: Yes.

EM: Tomorrow.

JL: Yesterday.

EM: Animal.

JL: Food.

EM: Music.

JL: Sound.

EM: Yoko.

JL: Love.

EM: Madness.

JL: Yesterday.

EM: Fear.

JL: All time.

EM: Knightsbridge.

JL: Knightsbridge? - Ah, white railings.

EM: Newspapers.

JL: Print.

EM: Children.

JL: Kyoko.

EM: Age.

JL: Anytime.

EM: Maharishi.

JL: What?

EM: Vacation.

JL: Ah yes,it's about time to take one.

EM: and Mother.

JL: Dead.

EM: Of all the songs that you've written, is there any one particular song that you personally enjoy listening to?

JL: Maybe Walrus.

EM: When you're sitting around with Yoko, do you ever put one of your albums on the record player or are you primarily listening to other people's music?

JL: No, primarily I would listen to my own, or Yoko's, or what peripheral or close friends are making at the time. In the early part of our relationship, I played her a lot of the early stuff that we made that she would never have heard. I have a jukebox at home with all the sort of rock and roll things that I like from "Heartbreak Hotel" to "Be Bop A Lula" to "A Whole Lotta Shakin'" and a few thing like "Walrus" and "Strawberry Fields" or bits and pieces that I might like from the past. So occasionally I do hear them on the jukebox.

EM: Have you ever met Elvis Presley?

JL: Yes, I did once. The four of us met him.

EM: What was that like?

JL: It was very exciting. We were all very nervous as hell. We met him in his big house in Los Angeles.

EM: Oh, in Bel Air.

JL: It was probably as big as the one we were staying in, but it still seemed like a big house; big Elvis. And he has lots of guys around him, you know sort of all these guys that he used to live near. You know, just like we did. We'd always have tons of Liverpool people around us, so I guess he was the same. He had pool tables. I don't know, maybe a lot of American houses have them. But it seemed amazing to us. It was like a nightclub.

He had the t.v. on all the time, which is what I do anyway, and in front of the t.v. he had this massive Fender amplifier with a bass plugged into it, and he's playing bass all the time with the picture off on the t.v. (laughter). So we just got in there and played with him. You know, plugged in to what was around and we all played and sang. And he had a jukebox, like I do, but with all his hits on there. If I made as many as him, maybe I'd have all mine on, too.

EM: You always say that your major appreciation in music is the very roots of rock and roll. So often you have become almost synonymous with early Elvis. I remember the thing you did in Canada, the peace rock and roll revival. You did "Blue Suede Shoes", didn't you?

JL: Yes. I did Carl Perkins' version.

EM: Carl Perkins?

JL: Yes. I had both versions when I bought them years ago and it was a bit of a sort of snob coke thing like you have in the underground now almost, you know, you have the furthest our record, right. The real instinct was to dig Carl Perkins. It was funkier and it wasn't as fast and he had a different break on the beginning of the song which is the one I learned anyhow. But Perkins' version was good because it had a very upbeat, a more glossy electronic version. So that's why I did that. But the early Presley sound I loved which was really the Sun sound that Jerry Lee and a few of them had. And then I love the bass and the piano and the guitar sound.

EM: I can imagine what your jukebox must sound like.

JL: Oh, yes, it's fantastic.

EM: Do you have any recurrent dreams or nightmares?

JL: Yes, but not lately. I haven't been having any recurrent nightmares. But there are a few in my life which I've worked out in a way. One recurrent dream all through my life, as far as I can remember, was the flying bit.

EM: The flying bit?

JL: Yes, I would always fly in kind of danger. But I haven't had that dream for quite a bit, so when it came back I'd forgotten. I'd always remembered it, as a child, sort of flying around and swimming in the air. And I'd always be swimming around where I lived or somewhere that I knew very well. Then other times I remember sort of nightmarish dreams where there would be like a giant horse or something. But this isn't a recurring thing, though.

EM: A giant horse?

JL: Whenever it would get me into a danger point I would fly away. I used to translate it to myself, when I used to dream it in Liverpool. It was that I wanted to get away from the place. I don't think there is any sort of black and white about any of those sorts of things. Later,it's just to get out of a situation, if I'm under stress. I think it's the way my mind relieves me in dreams. You have to express it somehow and dreams are as good a way as any, I guess.

EM: And in recent years you haven't been plagued with any of those recurrent nightmares?

JL: No. But I don't feel satisfied unless I've had a dream. I dream in color, too. If you're going to ask me that. It's always very great and very surreal. My dream world is complete Hieronymus Bosch and Dali. I love it. I look forward to it every night.