Touch Me (Yoko Ono song)
song by Yoko Ono
"Touch Me" is a song written by Yoko Ono that was first released on her 1970 album Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band. An edited version was later released in the U.S. as the B-side to John Lennon's single "Power to the People".
"Touch Me" was recorded at Abbey Road Studios in London during recording sessions in September and October 1970.
Music and vocals
"Touch Me" features vocals by Ono backed by Lennon on guitar, Klaus Voormann on bass guitar and Ringo Starr on drums. Beatle biographer John Blaney describes the instrumentation provided by Lennon, Voormann and Starr as a "jazz-rock fusion" and states that "their investigations into group dynamics [produce] a wave of sound to support Ono's vocal modulations." On the other hand, Beatle biographer Bruce Spizer states that the song consists of "little more than Yoko wailing over a changing and disjointed musical backdrop." Music lecturers Ben Urish and Ken Bielen describe the song as "a gritty effort, with grumbling and staccato guitar work from Lennon under Ono's alternately fractured and wavering vocals." Music critic Johnny Rogan describes the song as a "highly wrought performance by Yoko, reinforced by instrumental contributions from Lennon, Voormann and Starr." In addition to instrumentation, the song includes the sound of a tree falling early on.
Interpretations
Pop Matters critic Adam Mason interprets "Touch Me" as an outpouring of Ono's inner torment. Musician Thollem McDonas described "Touch Me" as "a desperate plea for connectivity." He went on to state that:
John's guitar seems to ascend, going on infinitely, while Ringo plays the drums like orchestral timpani. The pause at 3:25 is so pregnant. It makes you wonder, where is this piece going? It's like the beginning of the end...Sweet anticipation that is ultimately unfulfilled, before dissolving into the sound of joyful, or wrathful, creatures.
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Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 19, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q108208409. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1970.
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This entry incorporates text from “Touch Me (Yoko Ono song)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.