Unfinished Music No. 1: Two Virgins

Unfinished Music No. 1: Two Virgins is an experimental album by John Lennon and Yoko Ono. It consists of tape looped sound collages, ambient room noise, Yoko’s signature wails, and snippets of dialogue between John and Yoko. It was John’s first recording without any other Beatle, and also the first of three avant-garde albums with Yoko Ono.

Two Virgins was recorded and released in the same year as The Beatles' The White Album.

While Two Virgins was originally ten tracks without “Remember Love,” which was added for a re-release of the album on June 3rd, 1997 under the observation of Ono. Digital versions of the album, however, have seen each side’s five tracks merged into one track each.

The album was reportedly recorded one night when Lennon invited Yoko to his home/studio while his then-wife Cynthia Lennon was away on holiday. They continued recording all night and consummated their relationship as the sun rose.

Two Virgins gained notoriety less from its recorded content and more for the packaging which features an image of John and Yoko in the nude depicting innocence and rebirth through the new collaborative relationship. Distributors circumvented the provocative album art with paper sleeves with a hole cut out revealing the faces of John and Yoko. The sleeve also featured Genesis 2:21-25 with the final verse in bold.

So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and then closed up the place with flesh. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man.” That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh. Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.