Recording Lennon recorded "How Do You Sleep?" on 26 May 1971 at Ascot Sound Studios, during the sessions for his Imagine album. String overdubs took place on 4 July 1971 at the Record Plant, in New York City. The song features a slide guitar part played by George Harrison. Aside from Lennon on rhythm guitar and vocals, the track also includes contributions from Klaus Voormann on bass, Alan White on drums, acoustic guitar played by Ted Turner, Rod Linton and Andy Davis, as well as additional piano parts by Nicky Hopkins and John Tout. Although he had been united with Lennon, Ringo Starr and Klein, against McCartney, in the recent lawsuit, Harrison recalled that the period was one of "very strange, intense feelings" among all the former Beatles, and he was initially wary of Lennon's invitation to play on the new album. Given this, Harrison added, he was relieved that Lennon was "openly pleased I came". As with all the tracks on Imagine, several outtakes of "How Do You Sleep?" became available on bootleg albums and in documentary films about Lennon. A run-through of the song in the 2000 film Gimme Some Truth includes what authors Chip Madinger and Mark Easter describe as "John's query to Paul", as Lennon faces the camera and sings: "How do you sleep, ya cunt?" Starr visited the studio during the recording of the song and was reportedly upset, saying: "That's enough, John." The final mix version as released on the album is in mono rather than stereo, unlike all the other tracks. In 2018, two versions of the original recording sessions were released in 5.1 surround sound as part of the Imagine box set. Reception and aftermath In a contemporary review of Imagine, Ben Gerson of Rolling Stone highlighted "How Do You Sleep?" among the album's three "really worthy, musically effective numbers" but found it "horrifying and indefensible" as a song that "lay waste to Paul's character, family and career". Gerson concluded: "The motives for 'Sleep' are baffling. Partly it is the traditional bohemian contempt for the bourgeois; partly it is the souring of John's long-standing competitive relationship with Paul." Writing in the NME, Alan Smith said of the track: "Musically, it's tremendous – open, big, powerful, thundering, dramatic – but this is a song which will be remembered for its lyrics …" As its ultimate putdown of McCartney, Smith identified the couplet "The