Fans are planning to pay their respects to John Lennon, after he was shot dead 30 years ago today (08.12.10).

The Beatles singer and songwriter was assassinated outside his New York home by a crazed fan in 1980, and followers of the musician will gather at the city’s nearby ‘Strawberry Fields’ memorial to him and his hometown of Liverpool in England to pay tribute.

Both fans and his family – including his sons Julian and Sean, and wife Yoko Ono – have performed their own homages to the star in recent weeks, staging shows in Iceland and New York while a monument in the star’s memory was unveiled in Liverpool in October, on what would have been his 70th birthday.

Sean, John’s son with Yoko, has spoken about his father’s wide reaching impact on not only pop music but in campaigning for peace and self expression, such staging a ‘bed-in’ where he and Yoko twice stayed in bed for an entire week as a peaceful protest against war.

Sean told NME magazine: “Dad was completely happy to run the risk of not being understood. He just made the statements that he wanted to make.”

“When dad did ‘Give Peace A Chance’ or the bed-in he was ridiculed for it and it was seen as a joke. But the impact was great because he was a pop star who was rejecting everything about that life – and people respected him for it. He was one of a kind.”