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"Thirty years ago this week, on  December 8th, 1980, John Lennon was murdered in New York. He was  emerging from five years of seclusion after the release of Double  Fantasy, the masterpiece he had just finished recording with his  wife, Yoko Ono. In my lifetime, the only comparable event was the  assassination of John F. Kennedy.\r\nPhotos:  John Lennon&amp;apos;s Final Years\r\nLennon&amp;apos;s death hit particularly hard at Rolling Stone. John  had shared many of his final hours with us as we were preparing a cover  story to celebrate his return to public life. Three days earlier, our  reporter, Jonathan Cott, the only person besides me whose name has  appeared on the masthead since our first issue in 1967, had interviewed  John for more than nine hours. When Jonathan, who had known John and  Yoko for years, showed up at their apartment in the Dakota that evening,  John seemed nervous. &amp;quot;Don&amp;apos;t worry, it&amp;apos;s just Jonathan,&amp;quot; Yoko told John.  &amp;quot;It&amp;apos;s OK.&amp;quot; And with that, they began.\r\nThis article appears in the December 23, 2010 - January 6, 2011  issue of Rolling Stone. The issue is available now on newsstands and in  the online archive.\r\nThe conversation was a wide-ranging journey through John&amp;apos;s thoughts  and dreams. As the talk extended deep into the night, John invited  Jonathan to join him and Yoko at the Record Plant to hear some of the  new music they were creating.\r\nJohn  Lennon&amp;apos;s Last Days: Audio clips from Jonathan Cott&amp;apos;s 1980 interview with  Lennon, plus video, photos, playlists and more\r\n&amp;quot;He was the same guy he was before,&amp;quot; Cott recalls. &amp;quot;A joyous,  vibrant, subversive, acerbic, funny, always inspiring, fearless guy. He  hadn&amp;apos;t lost it or become bitter or cynical. He never gave up.&amp;quot; John&amp;apos;s  last words to Jonathan, as he escorted him to the elevator at 4 a.m.,  said it all: &amp;quot;I love her and we&amp;apos;re together.&amp;quot;\r\nJohn  Lennon&amp;apos;s Final Interview: Nine-hour discussion with Rolling Stone took place three days before he died\r\nTwo days later, Annie Leibovitz, our chief photographer at the time,  made her trek to the Dakota to shoot the cover. She created one of the  20th century&amp;apos;s most unforgettable images: a naked Lennon embracing a  clothed Ono &amp;#x2014; named in 2005 by the American Society of Magazine Editors  as the greatest cover of the past 40 years. When John and Yoko saw the  photo, they told her, &amp;quot;You&amp;apos;ve captured our relationship exactly.&amp;quot; What  you saw in the photo was the real John &amp;#x2014; open, daring, vulnerable,  warmhearted. Nobody could have guessed it would be our final glimpse of  him, or that his long conversation with Rolling Stone would  turn out to be his goodbye to the world. Although John did a radio  interview on the day of his murder, his talk with Jonathan constituted  the last time he spoke in-depth to a reporter before the tragedy.\r\nYoko  Ono Picks John Lennon&amp;apos;s Best Songs\r\nWhen John was killed, our plans for a celebratory profile of a  reinvigorated artist turned into a mournful tribute. Jonathan listened  to his two interview tapes, pulled out a few quotes for his story, and  stashed the tapes in a closet, where they sat for nearly three decades &amp;#x2014;  until he discovered them, held together by a decaying rubber band,  earlier this year. It seemed appropriate on the 30th anniversary of  John&amp;apos;s death to present the interview in full, along with a portfolio of  photographs from Annie&amp;apos;s sessions. Some appear here in print for the  first time, among them a more intense shot of John and Yoko embracing.\r\nWe also asked Yoko to tell us about the final hours of John&amp;apos;s life.  Her reminiscence, &amp;quot;John&amp;apos;s Last Days,&amp;quot; is the first time she has written  about that period, discussing everything from the making of Double  Fantasy to their final intimate moments together. Both pieces  remind us of how much John left behind, from his groundbreaking music to  his and Yoko&amp;apos;s ongoing dedication to the cause of world peace. His life  continues to transform the world and make it a better place in ways  that none of us, not even John, could have imagined. But then, that is  exactly what John spent his life trying to tell us: Imagine."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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