When John Lennon was invited to perform in the Rolling Stones' TV special titled “The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus,” he assembled the ultimate supergroup of his time. With Mitch Mitchell behind the drums, Eric Clapton as lead guitarist, Keith Richards on the bass, and Lennon on vocals and rhythm guitar, the band was named The Dirty Mac. They performed two songs on the show: “Yet Blues”, a Beatles tune from "The White Album," and a track for which they served as a backing band for Yoko Ono and violinist Ivry Gitlis, called "Whole Lotta Yoko" (an extended blues jam over which Yoko Ono improvised free-form vocalizations.) The first performance is as good as it gets with such a lineup - Clapton is superb, both in sound and in improvisation, Mitch Mitchell keeps the flow with his perfect timing and sophisticated embellishments, while Keith Richards employs his talents for melody and harmony in creating a fantastic backing bass line. John shouts the blues as a howling wolf, screaming his guts out and paving the way for the grunge-to-come, some two decades later.
And there’s the second track, "Whole Lotta Yoko" and it really is what its name suggests - lots and lots of Yoko’s terrible screaming, on a top of the otherwise excellent Hendrix-like blues jam performed by the band. The violin is barely audible, while Yoko is more than one could bear. After a minute and a half, she kicks in with her irritable “improvisation,” that had hardly anything in common with the music, especially not the key or the harmony of the song. It is one of her worst performance in the series of damagingly bad ones she had throughout her “singing career.” As always, her appearance on stage invokes the everlasting dilemma - What was John Lennon thinking? I mean, it’s love and everything, but what was she doing on stage with such extraordinary and professional musicians in the first place? She’s obviously tone-deaf and has absolutely no imagination for music whatsoever, but let’s leave this dilemma for other debates and articles.
The Dirty Mac performance was recorded on 11 December 1968 It was the first time since the formation of the Beatles that Lennon, who was still in the group, had performed in public without them, and the first time he had performed live since the Beatles' last tour ended in August 1966. Before the performance, Lennon was filmed briefly chatting with Mick Jagger while eating a bowl of noodles. He listed the other members of the Dirty Mac by their proper names but introduced himself as "Winston Leg-Thigh." The name of the supergroup, proposed by Lennon, was a play on "Fleetwood Mac" who at that time were a very popular band in the United Kingdom. When asked what type of guitar amp Lennon would like to use for the performance his answer was "One that plays".
