JD: There's a single disc compilation out called Walking On Thin Ice. I was wondering how you chose the songs you wanted to put on that. Did you think they were the most accessible or the most popular or just best?

YO: Well, I selected all the songs. Walking On Thin Ice being the single is Ryko's decision and I think that's good: I just went with it. The 19 songs I chose.

JD: The packaging on Onobox is very visually striking, it's a beautiful package. Did you have any input into its design besides the fact that you wrote the individual notes for each disc?

YO: Well, I think it's kind of unfair to say that because Roger Gorman is a brilliant designer and he did a good job. But I must say that I did a few suggestions maybe. You know how I am (laughs), I can't help it.

JD: There was a very fun party here last night in New York and a lot of your fans and friends were there, and Sean was there. I had a chance to chat with him for a little while, and you dedicated Onobox to Sean. I was wondering how do you feel his thoughts are about your music? Does he have opinions about it? And how's your relationship these days?

YO: That's about four questions there, right?! OK, about Sean (laughs). Sean is like a friend. And of course, as a mother I do try to take care of a few things, too, oversee things. Basically we're good friends, especially as musicians. I kept discouraging him to go into music field because I didn't think it was too easy for him. Despite all that he's a self-taught musician, a very good one. He writes good music, too. Now, all this seems like it's coming from mother (laughs), but it's the opinion of people who know him and who are around him and just generally know that he's pretty good. And even when he was very young someone would ask him about John's music, and he would say "well, do you know mommy's music? My mommy's music?" And of course I didn't encourage that. Both John and I never encouraged him to listen to us, music or anything like that. I mean, John didn't even tell him about The Beatles. He found out about it, and he found out about my songs, too, and I don't know where he got them. He seems to know all the lyrics, every lick, everything... The Beatles, John... including Jimi Hendrix and all that. He's one of those. He knows all the lyrics of Jimi Hendrix as well, and mine, too. While I have been doing this (Onobox), he have said things like "Mommy, make sure to include that one". There are a few people who kept calling me and telling me to include this and that, and Sean was one of them.

JD: Last night at the party during certain songs he would point out different bits to his friends - "check this out, this part at the end of Yang Yang..."

YO: (Laughs) Really! Yeah, yeah...

JD: Yoko, your earlier freeform singing style which is most evident on Onobox on the first disc, London Jam, was as influential as it was controversial. How did it develop?

YO: Well, you know how it developed. John and I just met and sort of like two cars crashing, we just did it. But of course I was doing that kind of stuff before, but doing it with John was a different experience. Hear Why and how he plays his guitar... His guitar and my voice having a dialogue. That's something that I'd never done before. That intensity was not there before, even when I did it with John Cage or Ornette Coleman. Not to minimize what happened with them, they're brilliant people, too. But it was a different texture with John. John was right out there. His daring spirit matched mine. It was more like a music fight, us trying to top each other and trying to say something. It was like that.

JD: Is that why you think his playing is so inspired on songs like Why and Midsummer New York? Because his guitar playing is so inspired, as much as anything he'd ever done in his career.

YO: Well, he was trying to point out that fact to everybody at the time, saying, if you can't listen to Yoko's songs, at least can't you just listen to my guitar playing? And he was right. What he did with his guitar is incredible. It was a departure from what he had done with The Beatles of course, but in those days I don't think they went that far. Well, Jimi Hendrix was great, but it's a totally different style, a different style of heaviness. And Lennon was up there, you know, with it.

JD: Your work has always been provocative to say the least. And even now in 1992, when Onobox was about to come out, I would hear wisecracks on TV, like Jay Leno on the Tonight Show would make a wisecrack about your voice or something. At this point, how much do other people's opinions about your work affect you?

YO: Oh, it affects me. I was so scared last year, that's why I was so scared thinking about releasing Onobox. I was saying to myself, if I'm gonna put out this one, this time, then I wanna make it as tight as I can, really top quality music-wise, in my own way. And, if they attack me again, maybe I couldn't take it. That's how I felt. But I could at least say to myself that I put out something that I was totally satisfied with. Every note. Everything. And at least somebody will hear it in the next ten years. That's how I felt about it. So at least I should do something that I'm very proud of, because they might attack me again. So then what is my joy, my satisfaction? My satisfaction is that the quality of music is OK. London Jam stuff, that comes chronologically, is the first CD (in Onobox). So I put it in the first, right? Then I thought that I'm making a mistake. They're going to hear the first CD, of course, first. And then say, uh-uh, I'm not going to listen to the other five. So I thought, OK, chronologically, this is the first but maybe I should make this like an extra, one for the musicians, ha ha. Because musicians were always into my work. They were all sort of into it, when I'm doing a session, they knew what's what. They understood my music. So there wasn't anybody that was thinking I'm like somebody that John picked up and said "here's the mic, sing a note", it wasn't like that. It's easy to find out about that immediately because we'd start talking music. Anyway, that's what I thought I should maybe do, just for the musicians. And then I asked myself what am I doing? I've gotta take it, and let's play straight. So this is the first CD. And that's how I did it. And you know what happened then? There are a lot of critics who say that they think that London Jam is the only good CD or the "only worthwile effort". Everyone seems to like London Jam and I can't get over it.