"Walking on Thin Ice" by Yoko Ono

Song#:  0519
Date:  03/07/1981
Debut:  87
Peak:  58
Weeks:  10
Genre:  Art Rock, Dance



Pop Bits:  On the evening of John Lennon's murder, he and Ono had been in the studio recording this song. Lennon had been finishing up his lead guitar work on the track. After they were done, the couple fatefully went back to the Dakota instead of going out to dinner and Lennon was fatally shot. Ono went into seclusion for a period of time but did complete and release this song and released it as a single. Since it features Lennon's last artistic work the single got attention and it became Ono's first and only pop chart entry.

ReduxReview:  Well, you either like it or you don't. If you are in Ono territory, you are in one odd world. I would probably say that for Yoko Ono, this is probably her most accessible song. She had one other later in the 80s called "Hell in Paradise" which was fairly solid too, but this song may be the peak of her powers. Now obviously, Ono had no intentions of becoming a pop princess, but if you are working in the rock realm and not necessarily full-on avant-garde, there has to be some coherency to it and this song is probably the best she offered to bridge the gap. (Side note: I had a roommate in college that would come in some nights after drinking and yell "walking..on..thin..ice" and then make this hideous screeching sounds. It was pretty funny at the time and about as annoying as most of Ono's work on record...)

ReduxRating:  7/10

Trivia:  Ono would go on to record more albums and found success on the US dance chart, especially after 2003 when several of her songs were remixed by different DJs. Known just as ONO for these singles, she topped the dance chart with nine of them. The first one to do so was a remix of "Walking on Thin Ice"

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