“I’ve always hated Elvis”: why John Lydon refused to visit Graceland
Like it or not, the pages of rock and roll history certainly cannot ignore the influence of Elvis Presley. From the moment the Mississippi-born singer walked into Sun Studios back in 1954, the lineage of rock music changed indefinitely. Elvis played a crucial role in popularising rock music, delivering a rebellious new style to the people en masse. However, Presley was also responsible for popularising a complacent rock style that the artists of the punk rock age sought to destroy.
Particularly within the United Kingdom, punk rock was built upon a rejection of the musical mainstream, which rarely reflected the problematic reality of everyday life during the 1970s. Bands like The Clash, X-Ray Spex and, of course, the Sex Pistols were not clouded by the nostalgia of rock’s ‘golden age’ back in the 1950s and 1960s; they were busy creating a rock revolution for the new generation. As you might expect, therefore, Pistols frontman Johnny Rotten harboured a particular hatred for the king of rock ‘n’ roll.
Lydon has always been open about his hatred for most other musicians. Everybody from Joe Strummer to Donna Summer has come under fire from the Sex Pistols frontman over the years, but the punk singer seemed to have a particular dislike for the rock establishment. Colossal artists like The Beatles, Pink Floyd, and, of course, Elvis Presley represented the enemy to Lydon, and his outspoken opinions on those figures have rarely waned.
Like many successful groups from the first wave of punk, it did not take long for the Sex Pistols to be invited across the Atlantic to formulate a new period of British invasion. During their chaotic journey across the States, the Pistols got the chance to pay homage to the rock and roll forefathers, visiting Graceland. However, Lydon was less than impressed by the prospect. “I absolutely did not visit Elvis’s Graceland,” he later recalled, “I think Paul and Steve might have gone. I know I didn’t, even though we drove past it on the way to the gig. I deliberately turned my head away. I didn’t even want to see it.”
Seemingly, though, Lydon’s hatred of Elvis came long before the group’s tour bus passed through Graceland. “I’ve always hated Elvis Presley from an early age,” Lydon recalled in his 1992 memoir Rotten, “And there’s a specific reason. A really boring Irish cousin of mine used to be in the Irish Army military brass band. He was an Elvis fan, and he came over to my family’s house and brought all these awful, godforsaken Elvis records and sat down in my room because I had the record player.”
“He played them for eight solid hours,” he continued, “Over and over. I’ve never forgotten that nonstop crap.” Admittedly, even for dedicated Elvis fans, eight hours of the rockabilly vocalist would be too much to bear. Particularly when taking into account the punk credentials of John Lydon, his deep-rooted hatred for Presley is hardly surprising.
“It left a solid hateful impression for that Elvis Presley,” the frontman wrote, “If anyone who plays in a brass band digs Elvis, then it’s clearly not for me!”
Perhaps without the efforts of that cousin, John Lydon might hold some appreciation for the king of rock – and brass bands, for that matter. On the other hand, it seems fitting for one of the defining figures of the punk age to completely reject the complacency of early rock ‘n’ roll.
