Terri Hooley Voices Regret for Punching John Lennon, Reveals Lennon’s Ex-Wife Said, “You Should Have Hit Him Harder”

Terri Hooley, an influential figure on the Northern Irish music scene, has revealed that he once punched John Lennon after the Beatles legend mistook him for a supporter of the Irish Republican Army. Hooley discusses the incident in a new biography titled Terri Hooley: Seventy-Five Revolutions.

As recounted in an article in U.K. newspaper The Guardian, Hooley was introduced to Lennon while visiting London sometime around 1970 by friends from the counterculture magazine Oz. Hooley, who was raised Protestant in East Belfast, Northern Ireland, recalled that Lennon thought he was an IRA supporter and offered to supply him with weapons, and he responded by punching the Fab Four member.

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“He was stoned so it wasn’t my proudest moment,” said Hooley. “When I met [Lennon’s first wife] Cynthia and told her, she said, ‘You should have hit him harder!’”

Hooley, who turned 75 in December was an in-demand DJ in Belfast during the 1960s, and was an outspoken opponent of the Vietnam war. He once confronted Bob Dylan at a May 1966 concert in Belfast, chastising the folk great because he didn’t stop paying taxes in protest over the war. Hooley said Dylan responded by telling him to “f*ck off.”

Hooley’s Influence on the Northern Irish Music Scene

During the 1970s, Hooley launched counterculture magazines and pirate radio stations, and in 1977 he and some friends opened a record store in Belfast called Good Vibrations. The success of the shop led Hooley to begin a record label, and among the bands he recorded were the pioneering Northern Irish punk groups The Undertones and The Outcasts.

Hooley’s immersion in Belfast’s music scene took place during the violent period of Northern Ireland’s history known as the Troubles.

About his motivation to put out music by these local groups, Hooley said his goals were “[j]ust bringing people together, giving kids hope, and putting Belfast back on the music map.”

Hooley went bankrupt in 1982, although he stayed active in the Belfast music scene until 2015, when health issues led him to close his last record store.

Prior to the book, Hooley was the subject of the 2013 biopic Good Vibrations and a jukebox musical that had a well-received off-Broadway run.

Reflecting on what he achieved with his record store and label, Hooley said, “Good Vibrations existed as a little oasis of positivity when everything was awful, when our country was having a collective nervous breakdown. I was as mad as the rest of them but I wanted love and peace, not violence and hate.”

Terri Hooley: Seventy-Five Revolutions, written by Stuart Bailie, is available now.