I think I'll use this album to express my feelings about John's solo career. I agree with Merv that this is probably the high point.
In my early twenties I became excited by John's work, I read his long Rolling stone interview which was around the release of Plastic Ono Band and the Playboy interview which came out around the time of his death, and I thought John was exciting and straight talking and i got all his records. But they haven't carried with me, I took John's side against Paul and saw Paul's work as kind of inconsequential. Now I don't know if I'm taking sides, but i like Paul's, George's and a lot of Ringo's but not much of John's.
The title track of Imagine is great, John's solo career hasn't got a great album, but this is a great song, it is an anthem, the piano is gorgeous, John's singing is fantastic, in fact I still love the sound of John's voice throughout his solo career. "Woman" is fantastically sung and again is a pretty damn good song. I don't know if there is a better solo Beatle track than "Imagine" I can't understand how it wasn't number one "Imagine all the people living life in Peace", that is a great thing to imagine and this song carries that message. All credit to John for creating this song, just with this song he shows he had something to say after the Beatles.
But I just can't sit down and listen to Imagine or any of his other solo albums now. John made a decision to write songs only about himself and his life & to me that seems like an artistic straightjacket. In the Beatles John's writing seemed to be predicated on the idea that he could write about anything. I LOVE his work on Sgt Pepper, he mixes in bits of the news, television commercials, television drama and old circus poster a painting by his son Julian a great huge orchestral orgasm. John would later come to describe this stuff often as "goobledegoop". To me it is expansive, creative exciting and multi-faceted whereas I find his solo approach one dimensional.
I think also because his solo music is so much about himself, it is harder to make the distinction between the artist and his work, if there is something you don't like about John the man it is likely to affect your response to his work. For instance, I like the fact that he was devoted to Sean and Yoko but there is a flip side to that in that he cut off his other son Julian. While John is recording a song Beautiful Boy an ode to sean he is reminiscing on how Julian's conception could be attributed to alcohol consumption. He was Julian's father and he should have been giving him love and trying to build bridges, whereas he seemed to be building a wall.
John was an amazing man an amazing artist with an amazing voice, but for the most part I can't listen to his solo work.