“You’re a fraud”: The artist John Lydon claimed to be underwhelmed by
John Lydon has never been one to keep what he’s thinking to himself. It’s in his nature to rock the boat, to cause a scene, and put people’s noses out of joint.
He’s also never been afraid of letting the world know what he thinks about other singers and artists. Even pre-fame, he was spotted by the other members of the Sex Pistols as he walked down the street wearing a t-shirt with “I hate” scribbled above the words “Pink Floyd”. As his notoriety grew, so did his opportunity to slam other groups, such as U2, who he called “a band that should never have existed”, Green Day, who Lydon denounced as “imitators”, and Depeche Mode: “A bad example of how bad things can be is Depeche Mode, who I absolutely hate. They are completely lifeless. There’s no love in what they do”.
Perhaps this controversial reputation led VH1 to commission Lydon to create his own seven-part series in 1999, to be titled Rotten TV. Lydon’s website describes the show as having “no strict format: not a talk show; not a music show; not a sketch show; not a political debate show. But yes: all of the above, and more.”
Surely, VH1 had been hoping that his combative style would lead to plenty of must-watch moments between big-name guests and, ultimately, high-viewing figures. But before they could get any sparks flying, they struggled to book many big-name guests on the show. Ultimately, only three of the planned seven episodes were ever completed and aired.
Near the start of the first episode, Lydon follows up an interview with American ‘madam’ and aspiring musician Jody ‘Babydol’ Gibson with a segment where he aired his grievances with the more major artists who had turned down requests to appear on the programme. He doesn’t hold back, looking directly down the camera and talking like a spurned lover as he calls out the “whole bunch of people I’ve invited here tonight that didn’t turn up”.
Of those he directly name checks, Ozzy Osbourne is the first in the line of fire and gets off the lightest of all, with Lydon lamenting that he has “done such great stuff over the years, starting with Black Sabbath. You know, you’re a working-class Englishman here. But he can’t be bothered to turn up”.
Courtney Love (or, “Courtney Love’s Kurt’s Money” as he calls her) doesn’t get off so easily. Too busy making a film at the time to appear on Rotten TV, Lydon says of her – seemingly without any irony – that “you love the idea of being a rebel. But you haven’t proved, to me or anybody, exactly what being a rebel is. What are you rebelling against? You’re just a pile of confusion. You cheap fake!”.
Another ‘fake’ in his eye, yet who he still asked to appear on the show, is Guns n Roses frontman Axl Rose. With his hair dyed an Axl Rose orange, Lydon laughs. “This is a man who also proclaims he loves, huh? My singing style?” Taking a pause to think, he adds in a more serious tone, “You’re a fraud. And I’m underwhelmed”.
Finally, he takes a swipe at Neil Young, who turned the interview down because he only speaks to people he knows. When the camera cuts back to Lydon, he is dressed up as the Canadian icon in a pork pie hat, sunglasses and lumberjack jacket. Given the explanation for Neil Young’s no-show, Lydon asks him to “explain this song” before strumming tunelessly on a guitar and whining the lyrics to Young’s ‘Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)’, which name-checks Johnny Rotten himself. “Rock and roll will never die”, Lydon adds to close out the segment, “but you fucks will”.
