The Plastic Ono Band

In a 1980 conversation with author David Sheff, John Lennon described the Plastic Ono Band as an entirely conceptual entity rather than a conventional ensemble. He explained that the name functioned purely as an idea, lacking the fixed personnel of the Beatles or similar outfits, which accounted for the ever-changing roster of players. Although Lennon devised the term impulsively, he retained it across the bulk of his post-Beatles output, applying it to whichever musicians supported him at any particular time. Yoko Ono likewise adopted the designation for her own projects and has maintained its use well into the twenty-first century.

The moniker first appeared on Lennon's 1969 single "Give Peace a Chance," captured during the couple's Montreal "Bed-In for Peace" shortly after their June marriage that year. With several prominent acquaintances present and guitarist Tommy Smothers seated alongside Lennon, the track was taped on portable equipment; the artist chose the Plastic Ono Band credit after noticing the plastic music stands at hand. Ono's composition "Remember Love" occupied the B-side. Later that September the pair appeared at the Toronto Rock & Roll Revival Festival, backed by a hastily assembled group consisting of Eric Clapton on guitar, Klaus Voormann on bass, and Alan White on drums; the performance was issued as the album Live Peace in Toronto 1969. An expanded lineup drawn from that same Toronto ensemble, now including George Harrison along with Delaney & Bonnie and Bobby Keys, performed at a December UNICEF benefit concert in London.

Between 1969 and 1971 Lennon issued several additional singles under the Plastic Ono Band name, among them "Cold Turkey," "Instant Karma," "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)," and "Power to the People." In December 1970 the couple underscored the project's collaborative nature by issuing John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band and Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band on the same day, both recorded with an identical core group of musicians during shared sessions. For the 1972 album Some Time in New York City, Lennon and Ono retained the Plastic Ono Band billing while also listing Elephant's Memory, the New York band then working with them, thereby assigning the musicians dual identities on the release.

Ono continued the practice in 1973 with Approximate Infinite Universe and Feeling the Space, each presented as a Plastic Ono Band project. Lennon meanwhile began experimenting with variations on the name, crediting the Plastic U.F.Ono Band on 1973's Mind Games and the Plastic Ono Nuclear Band on 1974's Walls & Bridges. Following their return to recording in 1980 after an extended hiatus, the pair issued material simply under their own names, setting the Plastic Ono Band aside until 2009, when Ono revived it for Between My Head and the Sky, billed as Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band and featuring Sean Lennon among the participants. She employed the same billing for 2013's Take Me to the Land of Hell and has continued to invoke the name for her live backing musicians from 2009 onward.