John Lydon calls Danny Boyle’s comments “disgusting”
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Credit: BBC
The Roxy Music classic John Lydon loves the most
The contributions John Lydon has made to rock music and popular culture are so manifold that without him, the world would be a very different place and one that is much worse than it is today. Despite what you might think of some of his views, Lydon’s work ranks up there with the very best, a testament to his quality as an artist.
Lydon first burst onto the scene as Johny Rotten, the sneering frontman of punk legends the Sex Pistols. Almost overnight, he became one of the definitive heroes of a generation, helping to pull music out of the sclerotic state that it was in the mid-late 1970s and setting it on a different course into the orgiastic green light of the future. These days, his contributions often get overlooked because he tends to be problematic, but they should not be.
After the Sex Pistols released their debut album Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols in 1977, Lydon established himself as one of music’s ultimate iconoclasts, setting the scene for the likes of Kurt Cobain, Eddie Vedder and Chris Cornell to carry the torch. Indicating just how far-reaching his influence is, without the flame-haired Englishman, there would be no Chester Bennington, Death Grips or Billie Eilish.
As well as being the champion of the first wave of punk, Lydon also became public enemy number one for the establishment. After their notorious appearance on Today with Bill Grundy in December 1976, he and his bandmates affirmed themselves as the most polarising outfit in English history, which proved to be the making and the end of the band, a strange paradox that their members have all agreed on.
After the Sex Pistols imploded in 1978, Rotten found creative advancement in the equally as influential outfit, Public Image Ltd, who became one of the staples of the post-punk movement. Over the next two decades, they remained one of the most stimulating groups out there, with Lydon building on the creative vision he had laid in his previous outfit. He triumphantly communicated that he wasn’t just a one-trick pony.
The invariably surprising nature of Lydon has kept us on our toes for years, with him dropping many nuggets of information that confirm him as the most onion-like in the industry. From his love of video games to him applauding the Queen, it’s the man’s business to shock society, and when it comes to his music tastes, that’s exactly what he does.
Speaking to The Guardian in 2009, Lydon surprisingly revealed his love for Roxy Music, and shed love on one of Bryan Ferry and Brian Eno’s most imposing albums, 1973’s For Your Pleasure, and specifically the track ‘In Every Dream Home a Heartache’. He said: “I get what Bryan Ferry is trying to do – experimenting in a bizarre world and then couching what he finds in the style and language of the hunting set. It’s an exotic, intriguing concept and he’s the only one doing it.”
He continued: “This song [about a love affair with a blow-up doll] reveals a corner of your psyche that not many people would like to admit exists: that the mind wanders into dark places and the body follows. It’s a romantic delusion, and it’s fascinating material for a song.”
