Here's Johnny (and a lot of other guys)
Initially I was just gonna review the new PUBLIC IMAGE Ltd. album End of World, but I like you so much, I decided to just review every single album for your further knowledge and edification. See, a lot of rockers enjoy a little known band from England called the SEX PISTLES, but know little of John Lydon’s post-Sex Pistols band, Public Image Ltd., and they often wonder what kind of music Johnny Rotten did after that legendary night in January of 1978 when the Sex Pistols’ singer asked the crowd, “Ever had the feeling you’d been cheated?”, threw down his microphone, and walked away from the group he joined two and half years earlier; until that 1996 reunion, that is.
But first, let me tell you about what happened the night my friend Steve and I went to see the Public Image Ltd. documentary The Public Image Is Rotten in Los Angeles a few years ago. They showed the movie with the director Tabbert Fiiller doing a Q&A after, and I had a very good time. In fact, after the movie was over, I was the first one to raise my hand and ask a question. Naturally I inquired about what it was like to work with Ginger Baker, who played on the 1986 Public Image album called Album, and the director responded, “He was a total asshole!”, causing the crowd to erupt in laughter. Some other person asked about John Lydon working with a member of THE SMITHS or something, and overall, it was a fun celebration of the music of Public Image Ltd. and the work of John Lydon in general.
But then, sensing that everyone was enjoying themselves a little too much, the broad who curated the event had to go and kill everyone’s buzz by asking the director about John Lydon wearing a red “Make America Great Again” t-shirt. Fiiller just hemmed and hawed and said that the topic never came up. But, instead of just accepting this answer, the curator doubled down and insisted that he give some sort of explanation. The best he could do was to say that the film was mostly shot before Lydon was spotted wearing the shirt, and that he can’t get into John Lydon’s head. Then he followed with, “Fuck Donald Trump!” to which the audience half-heartedly engaged in the required two minutes hate and chanted back the same. Of course, Steve and I just stayed silent and rolled our eyes at each other.
Anyway, after quitting the Sex Pistols at the start of 1978 and no longer calling himself Johnny Rotten, John Lydon started Public Image Ltd. (PiL for short), and the band released a bunch of albums in a whole variety of styles, making it hard to specifically tell someone what kind of music the group actually plays, punk, post-punk, disco, disco-punk, punk-disco, prog-rock, alternative metal, heavy metal, music that sounds like PETER GABRIEL but angrier, experimental avant-garde bullshit, you name it, all while cycling through a bunch of members pretty much right up until the group’s breakup in 1993. Then, in 2009, PiL resumed action, but managed to keep the same lineup intact.
Also, over the years, annoying ass critics and journalists have analyzed and intellectualized John Lydon to death, scrutinizing every tiny move he makes, constantly calling him a “sellout”, and making him own up to and answer for, admittedly, every dumb statement he’s made, usually about how he allegedly hates rock ‘n’ roll. Not that John Lydon was particularly kind to people interviewing him, either. In fact, he acted like quite a prick to the inimitable Tom Snyder in a 1981 interview.
But he’s older, wiser, and fatter now, and he’s most likely come to terms with the fact that Public Image Ltd. is a band and not a "company," as he so often liked to say back in the day.
Public Image: First Issue (1978)
Throwing off the “king of punk” label, reverting back to his natural born name, and replacing a safety-pin-adorned torn blazer with a non-safety-pin-adorned, non-torn blazer, singer John Lydon and his new merry band of musical compatriots made it more or less clear that Public Image Ltd. was not going to be the Sex Pistols 2.0; except for the couple of songs which could be mistaken for Sex Pistols 2.0. But, firstly, let’s meet the band! We have John Lydon on bratty, overly enunciated Cockney punk rock vocals, which are similar to how that Johnny Rotten character sang in that one band, THE U.K. SUBS. Next we have Keith Levene a few years out of THE CLASH, who CBS promotes, but not for revolution, just for cash, on shrill, trebly, and occasionally pretty, non-distorted jangly guitar and keyboard beep-boops. Thirdly we have John Lydon’s old buddy John Wardle a.k.a. JAH WOBBLE on whirling basslines that a prog or reggae musician would play. And, lastly, we have a Canadian drummer named Jim Walker keeping various beats before beating a path out the door right after the first album.
So, yeah, for the most part, Public Image: First Issue is a loud, yet diverse, mildly experimental, and punky rock record that’s perfectly enjoyable if you don’t mind music that sounds like it was recorded in a cave, and you’re not just expecting another Never Mind the Bollocks… Here’s the Sex Pistols. Except that the fun but repetitive “Annalisa”, with its clomp-a-clomp-a percussion and chorus that goes, “Anna-LEEEES-AH”, and “Attack”, which has Johnny going “Attack Attack Attack Attack” over and over, sound like they could very well have been Sex Pistols outtakes. I mean, even lyrics like “you tax and persecute/you who guard all the loot” sound like the kinda crap Johnny was writing for his former band, THE VIBRATORS. Also, for some reason, “Attack” has a weird echo on John Lydon’s voice and sounds like a demo recording.
But, those are the only songs on the album that are like that. And, so, here’s the problem with the album; it sounds incomplete. I mean, in total there are eight tracks, but one of those is just two minutes of John Lydon reciting the lyrics to the NEXT song with no musical backing, as if it isn't really necessary to make his anti-Christian point clear to people in the back row. And the last track is a waste of space called "Fodderstompf," which is more than seven minutes of a funky bass line played over a dance beat, along with the members singing "We only wanted to be loved" with high pitch effects on their vocals, and some chirpy little noises in the background. But, apparently it pissed off Richard Branson, so bully for them! Who cares about giving your fans a quality album with eight fully written songs when you can annoy the guy who owns the record label!
Thankfully the album still has six other songs and thirty or so minutes of music that are pretty good to great. It opens with the slow nine minute dirge "Theme," which sounds like a SABBATH jam, but with Keith Levene’s wiry guitar noodling in place of Toni Iommi’s bluesy licks and John Lydon endlessly shrieking about wishing he could die. I love it, but what a way to make an introduction! I’m guessing the audiences that first heard it in the late 70s, especially coming after the Sex Pistols, found it quite jarring; or at very least worthy of raising an eyebrow. And then there’s the pounding, repetitive, but still catchy angry, three-chord rocker "Religion II," which only has two parts and realistically speaking also sounds like it could have been a Sex Pistols song; just played really slowly.
Lastly you have the two proto-U2 style pop rock tunes. One is "Public Image," which kicks off with a really great two-note bass line that gives me goosebumps every time I hear it, while John Lydon chants "hello" before that lovely chord progression comes in, and then starts waxing about how he’s no longer the singer for the ANGELIC UPSTARTS. The other is “Low Life”, which kinda sounds like “Public Image”, but is still pretty darn good. In fact, when I first heard it, I actually thought the line about “bourgeois anarchists” was a reference to bands like CRASS who claim that the “system” owes them a living in spite of being financially set spoiled brats, but sadly it’s just about Malcolm McLaren.
Which isn’t to say that I’m against John Lydon trashing his old manager. It’s just that it would be cooler if he was trashing Crass, who he might not have even known about at the time…
...speaking of Crass, I thought the line in their song "Punk Is Dead" went "every revolution is just for cash," which would have been a brilliant way of complaining about how the new regime is just as greedy and power hungry as the old one. But, nope! The song actually goes, "CBS promote the Clash/but it ain’t for revolution, it’s just for cash."
REALLY?! YOU’RE SERIOUS??!! A RECORD COMPANY PROMOTES A BAND TO MAKE MONEY AND NOT BECAUSE THEY’RE TRYING TO CHANGE THE WORLD??!!
Well, gorsh, don’t tell that to RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!
Metal Box/Second Edition (1979)
Realizing that he didn’t join a normal band that does that whole album/tour/album/tour thing, original drummer Jim Walker took a walk. Incidentally it would take no less than three drummers to complete the best Public Image Ltd. album, called both Metal Box and Second Edition.
The reason for the name discrepancy is because the group originally spent most of their recording budget to package their second album in a metal box, and thus called it Metal Box. No, I’m serious! Then they put it out again as Second Edition with cool psychedelic pictures of the band members. And, just to prove to the world that Public Image Ltd. wasn’t just the John Lydon Band, they put Keith Levene’s photo on the cover! Weee!
Now, if you skip the first PiL album and go directly to Metal Box/Second Edition after hearing Never Mind the Bollocks…, you’ll definitely be like, what the hell is this? Disco beats? Improvised jams? Robotic noises? A pretty, album-closing synth piece called “Radio 4”? Moaning and groaning in lieu of punky shouting? If you’ve ever read either of John Lydon’s memoirs, you’d know that he was a huge fan of HAWKWIND, CAN, CAPTAIN BEEFHEART, VAN DER GRAAF GENERATOR, a bunch of reggae artists, and any album which has a Roger Dean painting on the cover. In other words, in spite of his wearing that “I Hate Pink Floyd” t-shirt, spiking up his hair, and shouting about anarchy, John Lydon was, in fact, a prog geek!
Just to be clear, though, Metal Box isn’t really prog in the YES or KING CRIMSON sense. Instead it’s got that mix of lo-fi garage and JOY DIVISION-esque, tomb-like production, while more than half the songs have dance beats, and the musicianship is maybe a little too amateurish to be progressive rock. But these are jams built around Jah Wobble’s catchy bass lines, along with Levene’s guitar squawking and synth plunking, and all the members playing with bits of recording technology that they stumbled upon in the studio.
And, in spite of this "messing around" approach, these open-ended jams became actual songs. And, with the exception of a couple tunes, specifically "The Suit" and "Bad Baby", which sound like early sketches for songs that prematurely went to tape, they’re good songs; both for the unique music and for some of Lydon’s haunting and mysterious lyrics. The most obvious culprits are "Swan Lake", a song about his mom dying of cancer (geez!) which uses a melody that vaguely resembles the piece after it was named, and "Poptones", a slow, trippy, and even kind of (don’t laugh) Floyd-y piece sung from the perspective of an assault victim; made especially disturbing by setting lines like "you left a hole in the back of my head" to such a serene guitar melody. The song really does give you the feeling of being discombobulated in the backwoods of some psycho’s house after being violently attacked, or raped, as it were.
Elsewhere, you’ve got the Middle Eastern metal shredding of “Memories”, the proto-industrial noise making of "Careering", the spacey, Kraut-rock vamping of "Socialist", the spaghetti Western twanging of "Graveyard”, which makes me feel like I’m standing in a Wild West town anticipating a gun fight, the almost normal sounding rock song "No Birds", that’s ruined – in a good way – by John Lydon caterwauling all over it with no rhythm whatsoever, and the noisy, pounding, tribal post-punk aggression of "Chant", which kind of reminds me of TEH BIRTHDAY PARTY, and in which Lydon sings in his punk voice about "the side of London that the tourists never see."
Also, is it just me, or does the bass line in the ten-minute opening track "Albatross" sound exactly like "Billie Jean"? I’m not kidding! The first thing I thought when I heard it all those years back is that it sounds like "Billie Jean"! And Metal Box came out in 1979, so "Billie Jean" wouldn’t be out for three more years! I’m not saying that MICHAEL JACKSON and Quincy Jones were ripping off PiL; in fact they probably had no idea who PiL even were. But, who knows? Maybe they were snorting coke at some record exec’s party, and heard the album playing on the stereo in the background and had it subconsciously implanted in their brains. I’m absolutely not ruling this out.
I also wish I was THERE in 1979, so I could tell John Lydon, Keith Levene, Jah Wobble, and, I guess, latest drummer at the time Martin Atkins that they should market Metal Box with a poster showing punks hitting each other with their copies of Metal Box, and the poster would read, “The only band that BATTERS.”
Similarly, I’d market THE FALL as “the only band that SPLATTERS.” Haha, get it? Because they’re falling?
And I’d market the TALKING HEAD as “the only band that CHATTERS.”
No, but really, I’d market THE CLASH as "a mediocre band that critics and college students love, because they appeal to their 100 IQ tastes and sensibilities."
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It’s live albums that make you realize that, no matter what pretentious philosophy a band uses to push their agenda, when a group of guys gets on a stage holding musical instruments and performs in front of a crowd, they are, in fact, just another band.
And, believe me; the philosophy behind Public Image Ltd. was pretty damn pretentious. John, Jah, and Keith didn’t consider their group to be a band, but a multi-media company that didn’t feel like engaging in the standard practices of the entertainment industry, and instead made movies and other bits and bobs of media in addition to music; similar to early DEVO and THE RESIDENTS, I suppose. Of course, other than a few standard music videos, PiL didn’t actually make any movies, and used this "we’re a company, not a band" excuse to be a bunch of lazy asses who barely toured.
But, as evidenced by Paris Au Printemps or Paris in Spring, PiL did indeed play live. The album captures seven songs total; three from Public Image/First Issue and four from Metal Box/Second Edition, and to be honest, they sound like a perfectly good and energetic garage-y post-punk band; albeit one that doesn’t rehearse very much, which makes “Bad Baby” into a total mess, since I think Keith Levene is literally just hitting any random ol’ notes on his keyboard. I guess, it’s kind of funny, since I never particularly liked that song anyway, and, for what it’s worth, Jah Wobble and Martin Atkins keep a steady beat going. But, seriously, come on. Can you try a little harder?
The fact that they were so lazy about rehearsing and touring is a shame, since they otherwise shake, rattle, and roll as well as the other bands in their genre, such as Joy Division, BAUHAUS, the Fall, WIRE, INNER CITY UNIT, SWELL MAPS, CHROME, THE BUSH TETRAS, HOSE, MISSION OF BURMA, MAGAZINE, the Birthday Party, THE SCIENTISTS, LAUGHING CLOWNS, WALL OF VOODOO, KILLING JOKE, GANG OF FOUR, THE POP GROUP, THE SLITS, THE RAINCOATS, TEENAGE JESUS AND THE JERKS, JAMES CHANCE AND THE CONTORTIONS, PERE UBU, THE BUTTHOLE SURFERS, FLIPPER, NO TREND, THE SICKNESS, BIG BLACK, or SWANS; or at least, they certainly have the capabilities to, and none of those bands felt compelled to make pretentious claims about how they’re not actually bands, but "companies" or "collectives," as some lame ass excuse to not practice, perform, or tour. Just because their genre is experimental post-punk and art punk that pushes the boundaries of rock into new, interesting, and sometimes barely listenable directions doesn’t change the fact that they’re still, ya know, BANDS. What made Public Image Ltd. so special? (That’s a rhetorical question, by the way).
None of that changes the fact that Martin Atkins’ aggressive thump-thumpa drumming turns "Chant" into a STOOGES-tier bit of noise punk, and that "Attack” still might as well be a Sex Pistols song. Maybe that’s why they toured and practiced so little, because if they actually DID try, they would run dangerously close to sounding like a normal, well-rehearsed band, and God forbid they do that!
Furthermore, Keith Levene’s love for random buzzing noises turns "Theme" and "Careering" into spacey, Hawkwind-style, psychedelic space rock. I guess the latter gets a little ridiculous, since it sounds like elephants dying, and "Poptones" is still as hypnotic and Floydian as its studio form, even if the group screws up a few times.
So, yeah, as sloppy, unrehearsed, and not together as their performance is (are? I guess Paris Au Printemps is made up of recordings from two different shows), it still sounds like it would have been hella fun to attend; especially since John Lydon calls someone in the audience a "wanker."
I translated "wanker" into French using Google translate, and it spit out "branleuse" for feminine and "branleur" for masculine. This only means one thing; that John Lydon was so progressive for 1980, that even when he was yelling at an audience member, he didn’t want to misgender anyone.
Also, is it just me, or does the bass line in the ten-minute opening track "Albatross" sound exactly like "Billie Jean"? I’m not kidding! The first thing I thought when I heard it all those years back is that it sounds like "Billie Jean"! And Metal Box came out in 1979, so "Billie Jean" wouldn’t be out for three more years! I’m not saying that MICHAEL JACKSON and Quincy Jones were ripping off PiL; in fact they probably had no idea who PiL even were. But, who knows? Maybe they were snorting coke at some record exec’s party, and heard the album playing on the stereo in the background and had it subconsciously implanted in their brains. I’m absolutely not ruling this out.
I also wish I was THERE in 1979, so I could tell John Lydon, Keith Levene, Jah Wobble, and, I guess, latest drummer at the time Martin Atkins that they should market Metal Box with a poster showing punks hitting each other with their copies of Metal Box, and the poster would read, “The only band that BATTERS.”
Similarly, I’d market THE FALL as “the only band that SPLATTERS.” Haha, get it? Because they’re falling?
And I’d market the TALKING HEAD as “the only band that CHATTERS.”
No, but really, I’d market THE CLASH as "a mediocre band that critics and college students love, because they appeal to their 100 IQ tastes and sensibilities."
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Paris Au Printemps (1980)
It’s live albums that make you realize that, no matter what pretentious philosophy a band uses to push their agenda, when a group of guys gets on a stage holding musical instruments and performs in front of a crowd, they are, in fact, just another band.
And, believe me; the philosophy behind Public Image Ltd. was pretty damn pretentious. John, Jah, and Keith didn’t consider their group to be a band, but a multi-media company that didn’t feel like engaging in the standard practices of the entertainment industry, and instead made movies and other bits and bobs of media in addition to music; similar to early DEVO and THE RESIDENTS, I suppose. Of course, other than a few standard music videos, PiL didn’t actually make any movies, and used this "we’re a company, not a band" excuse to be a bunch of lazy asses who barely toured.
But, as evidenced by Paris Au Printemps or Paris in Spring, PiL did indeed play live. The album captures seven songs total; three from Public Image/First Issue and four from Metal Box/Second Edition, and to be honest, they sound like a perfectly good and energetic garage-y post-punk band; albeit one that doesn’t rehearse very much, which makes “Bad Baby” into a total mess, since I think Keith Levene is literally just hitting any random ol’ notes on his keyboard. I guess, it’s kind of funny, since I never particularly liked that song anyway, and, for what it’s worth, Jah Wobble and Martin Atkins keep a steady beat going. But, seriously, come on. Can you try a little harder?
The fact that they were so lazy about rehearsing and touring is a shame, since they otherwise shake, rattle, and roll as well as the other bands in their genre, such as Joy Division, BAUHAUS, the Fall, WIRE, INNER CITY UNIT, SWELL MAPS, CHROME, THE BUSH TETRAS, HOSE, MISSION OF BURMA, MAGAZINE, the Birthday Party, THE SCIENTISTS, LAUGHING CLOWNS, WALL OF VOODOO, KILLING JOKE, GANG OF FOUR, THE POP GROUP, THE SLITS, THE RAINCOATS, TEENAGE JESUS AND THE JERKS, JAMES CHANCE AND THE CONTORTIONS, PERE UBU, THE BUTTHOLE SURFERS, FLIPPER, NO TREND, THE SICKNESS, BIG BLACK, or SWANS; or at least, they certainly have the capabilities to, and none of those bands felt compelled to make pretentious claims about how they’re not actually bands, but "companies" or "collectives," as some lame ass excuse to not practice, perform, or tour. Just because their genre is experimental post-punk and art punk that pushes the boundaries of rock into new, interesting, and sometimes barely listenable directions doesn’t change the fact that they’re still, ya know, BANDS. What made Public Image Ltd. so special? (That’s a rhetorical question, by the way).
None of that changes the fact that Martin Atkins’ aggressive thump-thumpa drumming turns "Chant" into a STOOGES-tier bit of noise punk, and that "Attack” still might as well be a Sex Pistols song. Maybe that’s why they toured and practiced so little, because if they actually DID try, they would run dangerously close to sounding like a normal, well-rehearsed band, and God forbid they do that!
Furthermore, Keith Levene’s love for random buzzing noises turns "Theme" and "Careering" into spacey, Hawkwind-style, psychedelic space rock. I guess the latter gets a little ridiculous, since it sounds like elephants dying, and "Poptones" is still as hypnotic and Floydian as its studio form, even if the group screws up a few times.
So, yeah, as sloppy, unrehearsed, and not together as their performance is (are? I guess Paris Au Printemps is made up of recordings from two different shows), it still sounds like it would have been hella fun to attend; especially since John Lydon calls someone in the audience a "wanker."
I translated "wanker" into French using Google translate, and it spit out "branleuse" for feminine and "branleur" for masculine. This only means one thing; that John Lydon was so progressive for 1980, that even when he was yelling at an audience member, he didn’t want to misgender anyone.
The Flowers of Romance (1981)
Well, Jah Wobble is gone now too. But, instead of finding a new bass player, they simply recorded an album without one. Sadly, they recorded an album mostly without guitar either. They also forgot to write songs.
Basically, The Flowers of Romance is the most experimental album in the PiL discography. It’s just John Lydon, Keith Levene, and Martin Atkins screwing around in the studio with various forms of percussion, keyboards, tape loops, and found objects, and occasionally stumbling upon a melody or a hook that they deemed worthy to put to tape. Incidentally, some of what they deemed worthy to put to tape really wasn’t all that worthy to put to tape. On the plus side, it’s short; nine songs, or pieces, I guess, in 33 minutes.
And, while it may have seemed "wild" and "revolutionary" in 1981, with albums like Rembrandt Pussyhorse by the Butthole Surfers, Prick by THE MELVINS, and the entire BOREDOMS discography coming out in its wake, The Flowers of Romance really just comes off as a jerk-off release that hipsters get duped into taking seriously.
My biggest complaint about The Flowers of Romance, however, is the lack of guitar. Levene plays his noisy, trebly guitar on one song, "Go Back", which is one of the three better songs on the album. It’s got John Lydon singing in his sarcastic punk voice about how good times are ahead and telling "aliens" to "go back" and referencing neo-fascists and the KKK, etc. to this stomping beat and this creepy "bing-bong" sound, with Levene playing neat little scratchy riffs. And, in spite the absence of bass, it’s a good song. It sounds cool, and it complements "Chant" from the previous album.
There’s also “Flowers of Romance”, a groovy little Middle Eastern-ish jam that has John Lydon scraping away on the violin. I’m no expert on musical instruments, but from what I hear, he kinda, sorta knows what he’s doing. Lemmy said in his memoir White Line Fever that one could really rock out on the violin, so why didn’t John Lydon do this more often? And you have "Track 8," which has a hypnotic, circular rhythm and John Lydon mocking radical feminists and body positivity in a speak-sing voice that he had not used before. At least he appears to be mocking radical feminists and body positivity. Or he’s just dissing some fat ho, because occasionally fat hoes need to be dissed. You tell me!
"A bed in the corner
The suffering suffragette
Such an obvious trap, imagine that!
A Butterball turkey
Spread her body, naked and silly
A bulbous heap batting her eyelids
The lights go down
Erupting in fat
The black-wall tunnel, an elephant's grave
A second-hand mattress
Come and play total commitment
Premenstrual tension"
Take that, the “Riot Grrrrl” movement, or something!
The rest of the tracks go from bad to okay. The album starts with one of its worst songs, "Four Enclosed Walls," which is just John Lydon wining over a drum beat and a little chirping sound in the background that I read was made by a pocket watch. Though, I guess it’s kind of funny that the first word you hear on the album is "Allah," and the song has the line "destroy the infidel." The other two that weren’t worth the tape, money, and time are "Hymie’s Him," which sounds like someone sat their kids behind the drums and keyboards and told them to just make noise, and the closing track "Francis Massacre," which sounds like the person who sat his kids behind the drums and the keyboards and told them to just make noise replaced his kids with monkeys.
The other three are a bit better than that, I suppose. "Phanegen" sounds like a sea shanty set in the Orient with some interesting chimes tinkling away. "Under the House" has some spooky backwards tracks, which makes sense, since it’s about a haunted house. And "Banging the Door" has creepy, buzzing synthesizers that help generate an oppressive, dystopian vibe, even if the song is apparently just about a bunch of punk rockers constantly knocking on John Lydon’s door.
It’s hard to believe that a major recording company threw their money at something like this. What I don’t get is why Keith Levene didn’t play guitar on more songs; and bass, for that matter, since he does, in fact, play bass on two of the songs. Like, why couldn’t they have done the experimental stuff AND had more guitar on the album? Why must it be one or the other? Ah well, the things coke will do to arrogant Limey jackasses.
Actually, I read on Wikipedia, that The Flowers of Romance is an example of Musique concrete, which I assume means that it’s music that belongs on the concrete (or encased in it ~ Ed).
Another live album? And recorded live in Japan? Didn’t Johnny’s previous band, STIFF LITTLE FINGERS, sing, "You think it’s swell playing in Japan, but everybody knows Japan is a dishpan" in that one song, "Japan Is a Dishpan"? Why didn’t he call his second live album Live in Tokyo Japan, Which I think Is a Dishpan? I’ll never figure that man out.
Ostensibly putting out another live album so soon would feel like a completely pointless endeavor, but on the other hand, it’s fun to compare and contrast how a group of tight, no-name professional musicians handles the work of British punk musicians who can barely play. Because now Keith Levene is gone too, leaving John "Johnny Rotten" Lydon, the former lead singer for RICHARD HELL and the VOIDOIDS, as the only original member of Public Image Ltd. And there he is looking all smug, standing by himself on the cover in the middle of some random street in Tokyo, basically all but saying what people suspected for the previous five years, that Public Image Ltd. is just the John Lydon Band.
The claim is further driven home on the album credits, since he didn’t even bother having "vocals" printed next to his name where they list the other band members; who include, by the way, remaining drummer Martin Atkins, and three new guys, guitarist Joseph Guida, bassist Louie Bernardi, and keyboardist Tom Zvoncheck, whose job it was to tightly replicate what’s on the album and present it as safe, fun, dance-ready, live rock ‘n’ roll for normal rock crowds.
In other words, anyone who thinks of Public Image Ltd. as an experimental post-punk band might be surprised – pleasantly or not – to hear songs from the first three albums, played as if they’re just normal punk, new wave, and disco tunes; no different than if they were going to see, I dunno, OINGO BOINGO, post-Freedom of Choice Devo, or THE VILLAGE PEOPLE doing new wave. And I’m talking songs like "Flowers of Romance" and "Banging the Door," where all of the noises are replicated on the keyboard, therefore transforming these percussion-driven studio experiments into just slightly quirky songs you’d hear in an 80s teen sex comedy.
And the live version of “Swan Lake”, which is listed as "Death Disco," sounds more like a professionally-produced studio track than the version that appeared on Metal Box, while the audience of, presumably, non-English speaking Japanese people sings along with "Under the House," which is just John Lydon chanting over some drums! So, that’s gotta be worth something, right? Speaking of vocals, John Lydon is really hamming it up this time with the annunciations and saying “AH” after every line. So, either he’s having a lot of fun, or he’s blown out on coke, which I read he did a lot of at the time.
The online music critic Mark Prindle (www.markprindle.com), who I copped my writing style from, but not my politics, and who blocked me because I called one of his Facebook friends a bundle of sticks, and who deserves to be cancelled for hate speech for his ethnic stereotyping of Italian and Polish people in HIS review of Live in Tokyo, hates the funky, synthetic slap bass. But he’s a gen X grunge/indie kid who grew up in the 80s when this was prevalent, while I’m a millennial who loves 80s kitsch, so I think it sounds great! I also really love the endless onslaught of "WOMP-WOMP" and "WEEEEE-EEEEE-OOO" synth noises sprinkled on top of many of these songs; specifically three punky classics from Public Image/First Issue, one solitary disco dance number from Metal Box/Second Edition, three conventionalized versions of sound experiments from The Flowers of Romance, and THREE ENTIRELY NEW SONGS from the as-yet-unreleased fourth PiL studio album This is What You Want… This Is What You Get, rendering 3/8 of that album somewhat redundant when it came out.
The Japanese audience also appears to be so well-behaved, that John Lydon felt no need to call anybody a "wanker."
I translated “wanker “ into Japanese using Google translate, and it spit out “"Fuzakeru;" no male or female version, just "Fuzakeru." This only means one thing; that Japanese culture is so progressive and steeped in equity, that people don’t feel the need to separate their wankers into categories of “male” and "female."
Way to go Japan on being ahead of those backwards French!
Weeee, now Johnny Rotten is making dance music that’s perfect for the workout scene in an 80s teen movie with all the girls provocatively gyrating in skintight spandex. If I wasn’t into 80s kitsch, I might have more issue with This Is What You Want… This Is What You Get and its use of electronic slap bass, but there’s been a point where I went from hating the instrument to loving its utterly synthetic sound; just like I went from hating the ALICE COOPER song "He’s Back (The Man Behind the Mask)" to loving the cheesy but fun theme to Friday the 13th Part 6: Jason Lives.
No, but get it? The cover says, "This is what you want…" and has John Lydon mean muggin' like he’s the pissed off punk rocker of yesteryear, and the back says, "This is what you get!," and has John Lydon doing a funny little disco dance! So funny, right? Oh, hahaha!!! He sure pulled the rug out from under us, even though Public Image Ltd. has existed since 1978, and he’d been messin’ with our musical expectations from the start! Of course, if you’re some arty jackass, you probably think that the previous studio album is the epitome of John Lydon’s career, but if you actually enjoy something we call music, then its follow-up, This Is What You Want… This Is What You Get is one HELL of an improvement!
Actually, This Is What You Want… This Is What You Get is somewhat significant in my life, since, back when I went to Retro Deluxe or "80s Night" in Grand Rapids between 2007 and 2009, I would always request DJ Jeff Leppard play the super-catchy dance-rocker "This Is Not a Love Song," where John Lydon keeps reminding you over and over that the song you’re listening to isn’t a love song; as if any of his songs are love songs!
In fact, I honestly have no idea what the hell the song is even supposed to be saying. See, when John Lydon talks about personal stuff, he paints disturbing pictures, like in "Swan Lake," "Poptones," or on the creepy little goth rock number from the album we’re currently discussing, "Tie Me to the Length of That," which is about being dropped as a baby from the baby’s perspective. But, when it sounds like he’s making a political statement, I’m like, is he FOR or AGAINST this? Like, on "…Love Song" for instance. He says, "Happy to have and not to have not/big business is very wise/I’m crossing over into enterprise." Oookay… so, is that supposed to be a put-down of big business? Is it just an admission of fact? I dunno, whatever.
With Martin Atkins on drums for the last time before he skedaddled off to Killing Joke and a Keith Levene writing credit on five out of the eight songs, the fourth studio album by Public Image Ltd. is the last remnant of the old PiL; even if, by this point, Public Image Ltd. had become synonymous with John Lydon and some other guys messing with various musical styles just cuz. But, hey, one of the three musicians from Live in Tokyo plays bass on the album, and John Lydon pulls out the ol’ violin again. Plus only three of the songs count as dance music.
And, as I mentioned, TIWYWTISWYG is good! It’s certainly more enjoyable than The Flowers of Romance. At least, this time, John Lydon, Keith Levene, and Martin Atkins took the time to write actual songs! Well the last track, "The Order of Death," probably didn’t require much writing. It’s just this kinda dark, catchy Muzak you’d hear playing at a posh 80s nightclub, with John Lydon repeating the name of the album over and over again. You might also remember it from the scene in the sci-fi horror movie Hardware where the creepy guy uses his telescope to peep on the girl.
But the rest of the album is pretty darn entertaining; the first three songs are all-four-on-the-floor, dance music with the bits of saxophone, electronic slap bass, and PRINCE-style funk guitar, along with the ill-fitting goth-rock fourth track, "Tie Me to the Length of That," in which Lydon sings in his lower register from the first-person perspective of a baby experiencing early life; including the part where you get dropped on the floor. Since, of course, as babies, we were all dropped on the floor.
The second side, on the other hand, seems to have the same type of experimental stuff as The Flowers of Romance, with the improvised noise making, tribal percussion, and experiments with different sounds. Though, for some reason, "The Pardon," "Where Are You," and "1981" sound tighter, more professional, and just musically less grating than the 'compositions' from The Flowers of Romance; probably because they’re being performed by professional musicians, who understand notes and tones better than Keith Levene and John Lydon do, sorry to say. Also, the production is more normal and good; as opposed to just sounding like it was recorded in a garage.
In other words, if what you want is real music made by real musicians, that isn’t a bunch of arty, experimental bullshit, then, henceforth, that is exactly what you get!
And then the guy who claims that he hates rock music makes a killer rock album that totally rocks for rock fans to rock out to. And, I’m serious! Whenever I tell anybody, "Johnny Rotten made an album with STEVE VAI and GINGER BAKER," people are like, "No way! Really? That actually sounds pretty bad ass, dude!" Indeed, it is pretty bad ass, dude.
Although the Public Image Ltd. album Album (a.k.a. Cassette a.k.a. Compact Disc) is considered a John Lydon solo album, I consider it the work of a super-group featuring prog-metal shredder Steve Vai, from FRANK ZAPPA, ALCATRAZZ, DAVID LEE RITH, and WHITESNAKE, and legendary jazz/rock virtuoso percussionist and terminal asshole Ginger Baker of CREAM, BLIND FAITH, FELA KUTI, and Hawkwind. On top of that, keyboardist Bernie Worrell from FUNKADELIC, PARLIAMENT, Talking Heads, and JACK BRUCE, drummer Tony Williams who played for MILES DAVIS, bassist/producer Bill Laswell of the New York avant-garde scene, and some other guys on other instruments play on the album as well.
That is a rather advanced and diverse group of musicians gathered together just to provide the musical backing for the former lead singer of the Sex Pistols. And only closed-minded punk rockers, who are just into fast, thrashing, three-chord, knucklehead rock, don’t realize how AWESOME that is. My only complaint is that it wasn’t the start of something more; that it was a one-and-done deal, and that this group of musicians would never work with Johnny Rotten again. Especially since Ginger Baker only plays drums on four of the seven tracks; I mean, Tony Williams is no slouch either, but you get the point.
In short, Album is just one big mix of prog, metal, and funk that’s for the musicians and music geeks in the crowd. It’s not for the lovers of avant-garde experimentation and pretentious noisy nonsense, nor is it for the punks; but then most of PiL’s music isn’t for punks. Album/Cassette/Compact Disc, however, is mainly for the people who sit around and discuss the technical aspects of music, comparing who is the best at what instrument, and constructing imaginary supergroups in their heads.
Furthermore, John Lydon even lets out his inner rocker in a couple places, especially in "FFF," where he replaces the snotty, punky, Cockney Johnny Rotten singing for a tough, manly, distinctly non-British ROCK voice; ya know, he pronounces “farewell, my fairweather friend” as “fare-WAAAY-EL, my fair-WHETHA fraaay-eend!” It pops up again in "Fishing" when Lydon shouts, "Go CRAWWWLLL back in your dustbin!" Like with the violin, I wish John Lydon would have done this more during his career!
Especially since everywhere else, John Lydon just sounds like the punk rock singer. Even still, you get a diverse array of material here, from the pleasant and calming "Rise," with its well-meaning, heart-warming repetition of that Irish saying "may the road rise with you," to the slamming funky "Bags" to the dreary and doomy "Round" to the straight-up head banging metal of "Home," which is so metal, in fact, that VOIVOD covered it on their latest album, Morgöth Tales, to the grooving album closer "Ease." Even the skeptics who didn’t understand how the style of Steve Vai and Ginger Baker could mesh with what John Lydon does were quieted; as easily recognizable metal shredding finds its place alongside cool ass funky tribal drumming and bits of keyboards and other noises popping into the mix. Also apparently Steve Vai considers his work on Album to be some of his best, so what’s not to like?
I’ll answer that; Repo Man. That’s the science fiction movie with Harry Dean Stanton and Emilio Estevez, where they just drive around for 90 boring and pointless minutes, before ::: spoiler alert::: this alien thing beams up Estevez with no real explanation given. The movie has an otherwise decent, if typical, hardcore punk soundtrack featuring FEAR, CIRCLE JERKS, BLACK FLAG, and SUICIDAL TENDENCIES, and it helped expand the reach of hardcore punk to people who otherwise might not have known about it.
And John Lydon copped that whole "generic" concept from it, calling his album Album (Cassette on cassette and Compact Disc on CD). See, in Repo Man, the products have generic names like "beer" and "cereal," and I guess John Lydon thought that was so cool, he used it for his album. Otherwise, I don’t get why he liked the movie so much; I thought it was pretty lame, and certainly not deserving its status as one of the top cult science fiction pictures of all time.
More like Alex Sucks Cox if you ask me!
Meet the new band; same name as the old band; and not really all that different from the previous band! John Lydon cobbled together a "who’s who" of unemployed post-punk musicians, for whom getting onto a major label and having health insurance and a tour rider must have been a Godsend, and decided to name it the same thing as his previous three or four or five bands. Hey, what was he supposed to call his new band; "John Lydon and the Angry Unemployed Post-Punk All-Stars"? "Public Lords of the New Church Ltd."? "Public Audio Dynamite"?
John Lydon is now joined by John McGeoch from Magazine, SIOUXSIE AND THE BANSHEES, and THE ARMOURY on guitar, Lu Edmonds from THE DAMNED, THE SPIZZLES, THE MEKONS, and SHRIEKBACK on guitar and keyboards, Allan Dias, who wasn’t even deemed worthy of a Wikipedia entry, most likely due to institutional racism, on bass, and Bruce Smith of the Slits, the Pop Group, THE NEW AGE STEPPERS, and RIG RAG + PANIC on drums. And I can say with confidence that none of these experimental, quirky, wiry, lo-fi, underground post-punk bands (or the second Damned album) had any influence on Happy?.
Nope, instead John Lydon assembled a post-punk supergroup to make late 80s funky alternative metal! I’m serious! Happy? sounds like LIVING COLOR or Introduce Yourself-era FAITH NO MORE, just with the guitars not as heavily distorted, but the same funky bass, clean-to-distorted guitar dynamics, and other odd, quirky touches that make one’s metal more "alternative." "Seattle," which is not an early homage to the Melvins, MUDHONEY, SOUNDGARDEN, and NIRVANA, eases you in with super catchy clean guitar work before some heavier riffs come in, but try to listen to the angry sounding "Angry," which has the chorus "You make me angry," and telling me that’s not metal; albeit funkier and with not as heavy distortion, but lots of cool sound effects.
It’s almost like this band heard the band on the previous PiL album and was like, "Is this what you want, John? Okay, we’ll try our best to do that!"
And, honestly, while neither McGeoch nor Edmunds shreds like Steve Vai, the guitar work is still pretty great; you get riffs upon catchy riffs, which work in tandem with John Lydon doing his typical Cockney, punky thang, along with little keyboard tinkles throughout, and even soulful female backup vocals on half the songs; though at first they sound a little corny on "Rules and Regulations" until you get used to ‘em, and then you’re like, hey, that sounds okay! Especially since they make sense on the anti-evangelical "Save Me," ironically doing the church gospel vocal thang.
Meanwhile "Hard Times" is JETHRO-TULL-style folk prog that sounds like the music to an epic battle sequence in a movie like Braveheart with its acoustic/electric guitar multi-tracking, "The Body" has a funky, AEROSMITH, strip club vibe even though it’s about abortion, and "Open and Revolving" actually reminds me of that SCORPIONS song "Hate to Be Nice," which would come out six years later on the album Face the Heat and is roughly in that same alterna-pop-metal style that would be defined by UGLY KID JOE, or something. And "Fat Chance Hotel" is all big and epic.
In other words, Happy? is a great guitar rock album made by musicians who came from the intellectual, arty, anti-rock star, anti-masculine post-punk world, where showing off your guitar skills is looked at as goofy, VAN HALEN-tier rock star nonsense. And that’s pretty funny, because, the two times I saw Public Image Ltd. – in 2010 and 2012 – Lu Edmonds was totally playing the rock star on stage; looking all bad ass with this guitar, throwing out guitar pics to the crowd, making kissy faces at female audience members, etc.
It’s only rock ‘n’ roll, kids.
Speaking of Lu Edmonds, he left after Happy?. And, though he’s been back with the band since 2009, they didn’t play any material from the one album that he’s actually on when I saw them live! But, even if he didn’t actually play on 9, he’s there in spirit, since he’s got a songwriting credit on every song.
As for the rest of the band, guitarist John McGeoch, bassist Allan Dias, and drummer Bruce Smith are back, and still playing funky rock music, with the metal taking a backseat to variety of different styles, ranging from prog rock to dance rock, all showcasing the group members’ superb musical abilities. There are also more keyboards, and one song even has a digeridoo! Okay, let’s be honest; this music, and especially the late 80s production, has more in common with PETER GABRIEL, MEN AT WORK, and 80s TOTO than it does with the experimental post-punk of yesteryear. So, honestly, if you’re not a fan of various types of guitar-based rock, you’re probably not gonna like PiL albums from Album to their next release, That What Is Not.
Also the soulful female backup vocals from the previous album have been joined by non-soulful, European sounding backup vocals, which are put to good use on club-ready tracks like "Like That" and "Same Old Story"; not to mention the lovely "Disappointed," which has some of McGeoch’s most gorgeous, clean-guitar fretwork. But, don’t you worry, NAACP, the soul sisters get a spot on the album as well; specifically on the song "Worry," on which Bruce Smith also plays an atypical drum beat.
And, okay, it might be a stretch to consider any of this “metal” in the way most people understand the term, but you gotta understand that these are, for the most part, driving rock songs with riffs and solos, even if those riffs and solos don’t sound like they’re being pumped through a half-stack of Marshalls. And songs like "Warrior," "Brave New World," and "Armada," certainly have metal riffs. Or they sound like darker, angrier versions of Men at Work's "Land Down Under" and Toto's "Africa"; I’ll let you decide! On the other hand, the opening track, "Happy", which, given its title, should probably have been on the previous album, is a catchy pop-rocker that’s full o’ them funky guitars, and parts of it even if remind me of "Love Shack"; that is if "Love Shack" had snotty punk vocals.
"A bed in the corner
The suffering suffragette
Such an obvious trap, imagine that!
A Butterball turkey
Spread her body, naked and silly
A bulbous heap batting her eyelids
The lights go down
Erupting in fat
The black-wall tunnel, an elephant's grave
A second-hand mattress
Come and play total commitment
Premenstrual tension"
Take that, the “Riot Grrrrl” movement, or something!
The rest of the tracks go from bad to okay. The album starts with one of its worst songs, "Four Enclosed Walls," which is just John Lydon wining over a drum beat and a little chirping sound in the background that I read was made by a pocket watch. Though, I guess it’s kind of funny that the first word you hear on the album is "Allah," and the song has the line "destroy the infidel." The other two that weren’t worth the tape, money, and time are "Hymie’s Him," which sounds like someone sat their kids behind the drums and keyboards and told them to just make noise, and the closing track "Francis Massacre," which sounds like the person who sat his kids behind the drums and the keyboards and told them to just make noise replaced his kids with monkeys.
The other three are a bit better than that, I suppose. "Phanegen" sounds like a sea shanty set in the Orient with some interesting chimes tinkling away. "Under the House" has some spooky backwards tracks, which makes sense, since it’s about a haunted house. And "Banging the Door" has creepy, buzzing synthesizers that help generate an oppressive, dystopian vibe, even if the song is apparently just about a bunch of punk rockers constantly knocking on John Lydon’s door.
It’s hard to believe that a major recording company threw their money at something like this. What I don’t get is why Keith Levene didn’t play guitar on more songs; and bass, for that matter, since he does, in fact, play bass on two of the songs. Like, why couldn’t they have done the experimental stuff AND had more guitar on the album? Why must it be one or the other? Ah well, the things coke will do to arrogant Limey jackasses.
Actually, I read on Wikipedia, that The Flowers of Romance is an example of Musique concrete, which I assume means that it’s music that belongs on the concrete (or encased in it ~ Ed).
Live in Tokyo (1983)
Another live album? And recorded live in Japan? Didn’t Johnny’s previous band, STIFF LITTLE FINGERS, sing, "You think it’s swell playing in Japan, but everybody knows Japan is a dishpan" in that one song, "Japan Is a Dishpan"? Why didn’t he call his second live album Live in Tokyo Japan, Which I think Is a Dishpan? I’ll never figure that man out.
Ostensibly putting out another live album so soon would feel like a completely pointless endeavor, but on the other hand, it’s fun to compare and contrast how a group of tight, no-name professional musicians handles the work of British punk musicians who can barely play. Because now Keith Levene is gone too, leaving John "Johnny Rotten" Lydon, the former lead singer for RICHARD HELL and the VOIDOIDS, as the only original member of Public Image Ltd. And there he is looking all smug, standing by himself on the cover in the middle of some random street in Tokyo, basically all but saying what people suspected for the previous five years, that Public Image Ltd. is just the John Lydon Band.
The claim is further driven home on the album credits, since he didn’t even bother having "vocals" printed next to his name where they list the other band members; who include, by the way, remaining drummer Martin Atkins, and three new guys, guitarist Joseph Guida, bassist Louie Bernardi, and keyboardist Tom Zvoncheck, whose job it was to tightly replicate what’s on the album and present it as safe, fun, dance-ready, live rock ‘n’ roll for normal rock crowds.
In other words, anyone who thinks of Public Image Ltd. as an experimental post-punk band might be surprised – pleasantly or not – to hear songs from the first three albums, played as if they’re just normal punk, new wave, and disco tunes; no different than if they were going to see, I dunno, OINGO BOINGO, post-Freedom of Choice Devo, or THE VILLAGE PEOPLE doing new wave. And I’m talking songs like "Flowers of Romance" and "Banging the Door," where all of the noises are replicated on the keyboard, therefore transforming these percussion-driven studio experiments into just slightly quirky songs you’d hear in an 80s teen sex comedy.
And the live version of “Swan Lake”, which is listed as "Death Disco," sounds more like a professionally-produced studio track than the version that appeared on Metal Box, while the audience of, presumably, non-English speaking Japanese people sings along with "Under the House," which is just John Lydon chanting over some drums! So, that’s gotta be worth something, right? Speaking of vocals, John Lydon is really hamming it up this time with the annunciations and saying “AH” after every line. So, either he’s having a lot of fun, or he’s blown out on coke, which I read he did a lot of at the time.
The online music critic Mark Prindle (www.markprindle.com), who I copped my writing style from, but not my politics, and who blocked me because I called one of his Facebook friends a bundle of sticks, and who deserves to be cancelled for hate speech for his ethnic stereotyping of Italian and Polish people in HIS review of Live in Tokyo, hates the funky, synthetic slap bass. But he’s a gen X grunge/indie kid who grew up in the 80s when this was prevalent, while I’m a millennial who loves 80s kitsch, so I think it sounds great! I also really love the endless onslaught of "WOMP-WOMP" and "WEEEEE-EEEEE-OOO" synth noises sprinkled on top of many of these songs; specifically three punky classics from Public Image/First Issue, one solitary disco dance number from Metal Box/Second Edition, three conventionalized versions of sound experiments from The Flowers of Romance, and THREE ENTIRELY NEW SONGS from the as-yet-unreleased fourth PiL studio album This is What You Want… This Is What You Get, rendering 3/8 of that album somewhat redundant when it came out.
The Japanese audience also appears to be so well-behaved, that John Lydon felt no need to call anybody a "wanker."
I translated “wanker “ into Japanese using Google translate, and it spit out “"Fuzakeru;" no male or female version, just "Fuzakeru." This only means one thing; that Japanese culture is so progressive and steeped in equity, that people don’t feel the need to separate their wankers into categories of “male” and "female."
Way to go Japan on being ahead of those backwards French!
This Is What You Want… This Is What You Get (1984)
Weeee, now Johnny Rotten is making dance music that’s perfect for the workout scene in an 80s teen movie with all the girls provocatively gyrating in skintight spandex. If I wasn’t into 80s kitsch, I might have more issue with This Is What You Want… This Is What You Get and its use of electronic slap bass, but there’s been a point where I went from hating the instrument to loving its utterly synthetic sound; just like I went from hating the ALICE COOPER song "He’s Back (The Man Behind the Mask)" to loving the cheesy but fun theme to Friday the 13th Part 6: Jason Lives.
No, but get it? The cover says, "This is what you want…" and has John Lydon mean muggin' like he’s the pissed off punk rocker of yesteryear, and the back says, "This is what you get!," and has John Lydon doing a funny little disco dance! So funny, right? Oh, hahaha!!! He sure pulled the rug out from under us, even though Public Image Ltd. has existed since 1978, and he’d been messin’ with our musical expectations from the start! Of course, if you’re some arty jackass, you probably think that the previous studio album is the epitome of John Lydon’s career, but if you actually enjoy something we call music, then its follow-up, This Is What You Want… This Is What You Get is one HELL of an improvement!
Actually, This Is What You Want… This Is What You Get is somewhat significant in my life, since, back when I went to Retro Deluxe or "80s Night" in Grand Rapids between 2007 and 2009, I would always request DJ Jeff Leppard play the super-catchy dance-rocker "This Is Not a Love Song," where John Lydon keeps reminding you over and over that the song you’re listening to isn’t a love song; as if any of his songs are love songs!
In fact, I honestly have no idea what the hell the song is even supposed to be saying. See, when John Lydon talks about personal stuff, he paints disturbing pictures, like in "Swan Lake," "Poptones," or on the creepy little goth rock number from the album we’re currently discussing, "Tie Me to the Length of That," which is about being dropped as a baby from the baby’s perspective. But, when it sounds like he’s making a political statement, I’m like, is he FOR or AGAINST this? Like, on "…Love Song" for instance. He says, "Happy to have and not to have not/big business is very wise/I’m crossing over into enterprise." Oookay… so, is that supposed to be a put-down of big business? Is it just an admission of fact? I dunno, whatever.
With Martin Atkins on drums for the last time before he skedaddled off to Killing Joke and a Keith Levene writing credit on five out of the eight songs, the fourth studio album by Public Image Ltd. is the last remnant of the old PiL; even if, by this point, Public Image Ltd. had become synonymous with John Lydon and some other guys messing with various musical styles just cuz. But, hey, one of the three musicians from Live in Tokyo plays bass on the album, and John Lydon pulls out the ol’ violin again. Plus only three of the songs count as dance music.
And, as I mentioned, TIWYWTISWYG is good! It’s certainly more enjoyable than The Flowers of Romance. At least, this time, John Lydon, Keith Levene, and Martin Atkins took the time to write actual songs! Well the last track, "The Order of Death," probably didn’t require much writing. It’s just this kinda dark, catchy Muzak you’d hear playing at a posh 80s nightclub, with John Lydon repeating the name of the album over and over again. You might also remember it from the scene in the sci-fi horror movie Hardware where the creepy guy uses his telescope to peep on the girl.
But the rest of the album is pretty darn entertaining; the first three songs are all-four-on-the-floor, dance music with the bits of saxophone, electronic slap bass, and PRINCE-style funk guitar, along with the ill-fitting goth-rock fourth track, "Tie Me to the Length of That," in which Lydon sings in his lower register from the first-person perspective of a baby experiencing early life; including the part where you get dropped on the floor. Since, of course, as babies, we were all dropped on the floor.
The second side, on the other hand, seems to have the same type of experimental stuff as The Flowers of Romance, with the improvised noise making, tribal percussion, and experiments with different sounds. Though, for some reason, "The Pardon," "Where Are You," and "1981" sound tighter, more professional, and just musically less grating than the 'compositions' from The Flowers of Romance; probably because they’re being performed by professional musicians, who understand notes and tones better than Keith Levene and John Lydon do, sorry to say. Also, the production is more normal and good; as opposed to just sounding like it was recorded in a garage.
In other words, if what you want is real music made by real musicians, that isn’t a bunch of arty, experimental bullshit, then, henceforth, that is exactly what you get!
Album/Cassette/Compact Disc (1986)
And then the guy who claims that he hates rock music makes a killer rock album that totally rocks for rock fans to rock out to. And, I’m serious! Whenever I tell anybody, "Johnny Rotten made an album with STEVE VAI and GINGER BAKER," people are like, "No way! Really? That actually sounds pretty bad ass, dude!" Indeed, it is pretty bad ass, dude.
Although the Public Image Ltd. album Album (a.k.a. Cassette a.k.a. Compact Disc) is considered a John Lydon solo album, I consider it the work of a super-group featuring prog-metal shredder Steve Vai, from FRANK ZAPPA, ALCATRAZZ, DAVID LEE RITH, and WHITESNAKE, and legendary jazz/rock virtuoso percussionist and terminal asshole Ginger Baker of CREAM, BLIND FAITH, FELA KUTI, and Hawkwind. On top of that, keyboardist Bernie Worrell from FUNKADELIC, PARLIAMENT, Talking Heads, and JACK BRUCE, drummer Tony Williams who played for MILES DAVIS, bassist/producer Bill Laswell of the New York avant-garde scene, and some other guys on other instruments play on the album as well.
That is a rather advanced and diverse group of musicians gathered together just to provide the musical backing for the former lead singer of the Sex Pistols. And only closed-minded punk rockers, who are just into fast, thrashing, three-chord, knucklehead rock, don’t realize how AWESOME that is. My only complaint is that it wasn’t the start of something more; that it was a one-and-done deal, and that this group of musicians would never work with Johnny Rotten again. Especially since Ginger Baker only plays drums on four of the seven tracks; I mean, Tony Williams is no slouch either, but you get the point.
In short, Album is just one big mix of prog, metal, and funk that’s for the musicians and music geeks in the crowd. It’s not for the lovers of avant-garde experimentation and pretentious noisy nonsense, nor is it for the punks; but then most of PiL’s music isn’t for punks. Album/Cassette/Compact Disc, however, is mainly for the people who sit around and discuss the technical aspects of music, comparing who is the best at what instrument, and constructing imaginary supergroups in their heads.
Furthermore, John Lydon even lets out his inner rocker in a couple places, especially in "FFF," where he replaces the snotty, punky, Cockney Johnny Rotten singing for a tough, manly, distinctly non-British ROCK voice; ya know, he pronounces “farewell, my fairweather friend” as “fare-WAAAY-EL, my fair-WHETHA fraaay-eend!” It pops up again in "Fishing" when Lydon shouts, "Go CRAWWWLLL back in your dustbin!" Like with the violin, I wish John Lydon would have done this more during his career!
Especially since everywhere else, John Lydon just sounds like the punk rock singer. Even still, you get a diverse array of material here, from the pleasant and calming "Rise," with its well-meaning, heart-warming repetition of that Irish saying "may the road rise with you," to the slamming funky "Bags" to the dreary and doomy "Round" to the straight-up head banging metal of "Home," which is so metal, in fact, that VOIVOD covered it on their latest album, Morgöth Tales, to the grooving album closer "Ease." Even the skeptics who didn’t understand how the style of Steve Vai and Ginger Baker could mesh with what John Lydon does were quieted; as easily recognizable metal shredding finds its place alongside cool ass funky tribal drumming and bits of keyboards and other noises popping into the mix. Also apparently Steve Vai considers his work on Album to be some of his best, so what’s not to like?
I’ll answer that; Repo Man. That’s the science fiction movie with Harry Dean Stanton and Emilio Estevez, where they just drive around for 90 boring and pointless minutes, before ::: spoiler alert::: this alien thing beams up Estevez with no real explanation given. The movie has an otherwise decent, if typical, hardcore punk soundtrack featuring FEAR, CIRCLE JERKS, BLACK FLAG, and SUICIDAL TENDENCIES, and it helped expand the reach of hardcore punk to people who otherwise might not have known about it.
And John Lydon copped that whole "generic" concept from it, calling his album Album (Cassette on cassette and Compact Disc on CD). See, in Repo Man, the products have generic names like "beer" and "cereal," and I guess John Lydon thought that was so cool, he used it for his album. Otherwise, I don’t get why he liked the movie so much; I thought it was pretty lame, and certainly not deserving its status as one of the top cult science fiction pictures of all time.
More like Alex Sucks Cox if you ask me!
Happy? (1987)
Meet the new band; same name as the old band; and not really all that different from the previous band! John Lydon cobbled together a "who’s who" of unemployed post-punk musicians, for whom getting onto a major label and having health insurance and a tour rider must have been a Godsend, and decided to name it the same thing as his previous three or four or five bands. Hey, what was he supposed to call his new band; "John Lydon and the Angry Unemployed Post-Punk All-Stars"? "Public Lords of the New Church Ltd."? "Public Audio Dynamite"?
John Lydon is now joined by John McGeoch from Magazine, SIOUXSIE AND THE BANSHEES, and THE ARMOURY on guitar, Lu Edmonds from THE DAMNED, THE SPIZZLES, THE MEKONS, and SHRIEKBACK on guitar and keyboards, Allan Dias, who wasn’t even deemed worthy of a Wikipedia entry, most likely due to institutional racism, on bass, and Bruce Smith of the Slits, the Pop Group, THE NEW AGE STEPPERS, and RIG RAG + PANIC on drums. And I can say with confidence that none of these experimental, quirky, wiry, lo-fi, underground post-punk bands (or the second Damned album) had any influence on Happy?.
Nope, instead John Lydon assembled a post-punk supergroup to make late 80s funky alternative metal! I’m serious! Happy? sounds like LIVING COLOR or Introduce Yourself-era FAITH NO MORE, just with the guitars not as heavily distorted, but the same funky bass, clean-to-distorted guitar dynamics, and other odd, quirky touches that make one’s metal more "alternative." "Seattle," which is not an early homage to the Melvins, MUDHONEY, SOUNDGARDEN, and NIRVANA, eases you in with super catchy clean guitar work before some heavier riffs come in, but try to listen to the angry sounding "Angry," which has the chorus "You make me angry," and telling me that’s not metal; albeit funkier and with not as heavy distortion, but lots of cool sound effects.
It’s almost like this band heard the band on the previous PiL album and was like, "Is this what you want, John? Okay, we’ll try our best to do that!"
And, honestly, while neither McGeoch nor Edmunds shreds like Steve Vai, the guitar work is still pretty great; you get riffs upon catchy riffs, which work in tandem with John Lydon doing his typical Cockney, punky thang, along with little keyboard tinkles throughout, and even soulful female backup vocals on half the songs; though at first they sound a little corny on "Rules and Regulations" until you get used to ‘em, and then you’re like, hey, that sounds okay! Especially since they make sense on the anti-evangelical "Save Me," ironically doing the church gospel vocal thang.
Meanwhile "Hard Times" is JETHRO-TULL-style folk prog that sounds like the music to an epic battle sequence in a movie like Braveheart with its acoustic/electric guitar multi-tracking, "The Body" has a funky, AEROSMITH, strip club vibe even though it’s about abortion, and "Open and Revolving" actually reminds me of that SCORPIONS song "Hate to Be Nice," which would come out six years later on the album Face the Heat and is roughly in that same alterna-pop-metal style that would be defined by UGLY KID JOE, or something. And "Fat Chance Hotel" is all big and epic.
In other words, Happy? is a great guitar rock album made by musicians who came from the intellectual, arty, anti-rock star, anti-masculine post-punk world, where showing off your guitar skills is looked at as goofy, VAN HALEN-tier rock star nonsense. And that’s pretty funny, because, the two times I saw Public Image Ltd. – in 2010 and 2012 – Lu Edmonds was totally playing the rock star on stage; looking all bad ass with this guitar, throwing out guitar pics to the crowd, making kissy faces at female audience members, etc.
It’s only rock ‘n’ roll, kids.
9 (1989)
Speaking of Lu Edmonds, he left after Happy?. And, though he’s been back with the band since 2009, they didn’t play any material from the one album that he’s actually on when I saw them live! But, even if he didn’t actually play on 9, he’s there in spirit, since he’s got a songwriting credit on every song.
As for the rest of the band, guitarist John McGeoch, bassist Allan Dias, and drummer Bruce Smith are back, and still playing funky rock music, with the metal taking a backseat to variety of different styles, ranging from prog rock to dance rock, all showcasing the group members’ superb musical abilities. There are also more keyboards, and one song even has a digeridoo! Okay, let’s be honest; this music, and especially the late 80s production, has more in common with PETER GABRIEL, MEN AT WORK, and 80s TOTO than it does with the experimental post-punk of yesteryear. So, honestly, if you’re not a fan of various types of guitar-based rock, you’re probably not gonna like PiL albums from Album to their next release, That What Is Not.
Also the soulful female backup vocals from the previous album have been joined by non-soulful, European sounding backup vocals, which are put to good use on club-ready tracks like "Like That" and "Same Old Story"; not to mention the lovely "Disappointed," which has some of McGeoch’s most gorgeous, clean-guitar fretwork. But, don’t you worry, NAACP, the soul sisters get a spot on the album as well; specifically on the song "Worry," on which Bruce Smith also plays an atypical drum beat.
And, okay, it might be a stretch to consider any of this “metal” in the way most people understand the term, but you gotta understand that these are, for the most part, driving rock songs with riffs and solos, even if those riffs and solos don’t sound like they’re being pumped through a half-stack of Marshalls. And songs like "Warrior," "Brave New World," and "Armada," certainly have metal riffs. Or they sound like darker, angrier versions of Men at Work's "Land Down Under" and Toto's "Africa"; I’ll let you decide! On the other hand, the opening track, "Happy", which, given its title, should probably have been on the previous album, is a catchy pop-rocker that’s full o’ them funky guitars, and parts of it even if remind me of "Love Shack"; that is if "Love Shack" had snotty punk vocals.
But my pick for the strongest showcase of the guitar player’s talent and favorite song on the album overall is "U.S.L.S. 1.," this atmospheric, slow moving number built around a powerful three-note guitar melody, wind noises, and minor notes played on the keyboard. If the intent of the song is to create the feeling of some impending disaster about to unfold, well, mission accomplished!
You also have "Sand Castles in the Snow," which is this super hyper dance song that sounds like the music for a really loud and flashy arcade game. If the intent of the song is to give fans seizures, well, mission also probably accomplished!
So, yeah, in spite of (or, perhaps, because of, depending on how you see these things) the cheesy, outdated 80s production, 9 is another damn fine rock album made by damn fine musicians, even though it’s only the seventh PiL album; I’m guessing John Lydon is probably counting the two live albums.
Though, it would have been way cooler and funnier if the album was called Nein.
That What Is Not (1992)
And then John Lydon makes a heavy metal album. A real heavy metal album.
Before I ever heard Public Image Ltd., I asked this dude who sold CDs at Dixieland Flea Market what Public Image Ltd. sounded like, and he told me, "A lot of people think that Johnny Rotten did punk or metal after the Sex Pistols, but he actually went on to make dance music!" Clearly, this guy never heard That What Is Not.
Furthermore, in his first memoir, Rotten: No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs, John Lydon said he hates heavy metal. I find this claim rather hard to believe after listening to That What Is Not.
And, way back in 1976, David Vanian made fun of the "Anarchy in the U.K." single by saying that it’s just BAD COMPANY with Paul Rodgers swiped out for John Lydon. I say that That What Is Not is just SAXON, U.D.O., or DIO with Biff Byford, Udo Dirkschneider, or Ronnie James Dio swiped out for John Lydon.
That’s right; That What Is Not is a heavy metal – and occasionally hard rock – album with bluesy riffs, big choruses, melodic guitar leads, and all of the overly-expressive, melodramatic gestures that one expects from traditional heavy metal. And, just to be clear, this isn’t like Album, Happy?, or 9, where metal riffs are tempered with idiosyncratic musical and production touches. It’s just a loud, hard, heavy, and straight-forward heavy metal album that, otherwise, makes no sense in the Public Image Ltd. discography. If you’re an early PiL fan into their avant-garde post-punk stuff, or even if you’re a fan of John McGeoch’s work with Magazine and Siouxsie and the Banshees, or if you just like the prior two PiL albums, you might very well consider That What Is Not to be a bunch of clichéd cock rock bullshit and wonder what on Earth possessed remaining PiL members John Lydon, John McGeoch, and Allan Dias, who are joined by new guys on rhythm guitar and drums, to make such an album.
Whatever the case may be, I enjoy That What Is Not quite a bit. First of all, drummer Bruce Smith has left, so maybe he was the stopgap that would have prevented the group from going in such a blatantly metal direction. Secondly, for what it’s worth, McGeoch makes a superb metal guitar player, and if ACCEPT, Alcatrazz, METAL CHURCH, or EXCITER were ever in search of a replacement guitarist, McGeoch would be just as capable as those who are considered part of the "scene," yo (if her were alive that is...). Thirdly, the songs…
I can just imagine the surprise, shock, and horror an old PiL fan might experience upon putting on the That What Is Not CD and being greeted by the epic opening track "Acid Drops," with its total 80s metal, epic fantasy-quest music, only to hear John Lydon – and not Rob Halford – positing the opening question, "what does it mean?"; before the song slows down and gets all "evil," "dark," and "sinister," while a sample of the "no future" part of "God Save the Queen" plays in the background.
After that, it’s one minor-note, power chord, and blues and pentatonic scale, riff-and-solo-a-thon after another; as John Lydon angrily emotes hatred for junkies in "Luck’s Up," expresses disgust for religious hypocrites in "God," and makes fun of blind sycophants in "Emperor," among other complaints and concerns he has about the world. There are also some other little touches here and there; like the quiet verse/loud chorus formula in "Cruel," soulful backup vocals in "Unfairground," and a couple of songs with the harmonica and the TOWER OF POWER horn section; harmonica is put to especially good n' catchy use in the big chord, party-rocker "Covered," even if the song gets kind of annoying when John Lydon repeats "I give" over and over again, and the album closes with a big funky-Cucamonga-arriba-ariba-Latin-fiesta party jam called "Good Things," like John Lydon is trying to be Buster Poindexter or something.
And "Think Tank" is just DOKKEN with Don Dokken swiped out for John Lydon.
Then Public Image Ltd. didn’t make another album for twenty years.
Psycho’s Path (John Lydon solo) (1997)
Considering that his discography doesn’t follow any particular rhyme or reason, that he slapped the band/brand Public Image Ltd. onto all of his recordings (okay, except for the “World Destruction” single he did with AFRIKA BAMBAATAA), even when they’re clearly in different genres, that every PiL album has a different line-up, and that at least two PiL albums are already de facto solo albums, I think it’s perfectly okay to lump his actual solo album, Psycho’s Path, in with the rest of the PiL discography.
Hot off the heels of the 1996 Sex Pistols reunion tour, which apparently provided the funds to complete Psycho’s Path, John Lydon, with the help of his brother Martin and some guy named Mark Saunders, both of whom played guitar and keyboards, put out an honestly decent album that’s got a surprisingly full band mix and sounds far more like a rock album than one would expect from something made by one guy sitting behind a console pushing buttons!
I’m not joking; I was expecting a mediocre KRAFTWERK rip-off with chintzy sounding programmed dance beats and repetitive keyboard lines, but these are mostly fleshed-out rock songs that sound like they could be played by a band; at least until you get to the techno club remixes at the end. But we’ll just pretend the album ends at 45 minutes and doesn’t include the last five tracks. Even the drums, which I’m assuming were programmed, sound like normal drums; or at least like something being hit in rhythm. Maybe John Lydon did the percussion on "Sun" organically, since it doesn’t have the most complicated beat. And the bass sounds reasonably good throughout as well, if a bit synth-y.
Okay, the percussion on "Dog" is definitely programmed, since it’s got a little bit of that 90s hip-hop vibe with the fake bongos or whatever, while "Dis-Ho" is 'oontz-oontz' club dance music with funny lyrics about getting screwed over by some bee-yotch, and "Stump" is trance-techno. But "Grave Ride," "Psychopath," and "Take Me" are just good alternative pop-rock songs with melodic guitar work that could fit in with late 80s Public Image. Ltd., while "Another Way" makes some fun use of the recorder flute, "A Yes and a No" is mellow and chill with some pretty ambiance and more flute sounds, the aforementioned "Sun" is novelty burlesque with Johnny playing the accordion, and "Armies" is prog-rock with whirring synth and guitar interplay.
Also, it’s worth mentioning that John Lydon’s actual vocals are calmer than they’ve ever been. He does a little bit of the angrier, punky shouting, but, for the most part, he’s just singing, and he’s actually got a decent voice!
And, as mentioned above, tracks 11 – 15 are the remixes done by LEFTFIELD, THE CHEMICAL BROTHERS, and CANNY SABER. Having DJs and electronic artists take rock songs and mix up the various tracks, add dance beats, samples, and other various bells n' whistles, and otherwise tailor them to the electronic club music scene was big in the 90s. If you like that sort of thing, which I don’t, you might find enjoyment out of the last five tracks, but I find them and that whole DJ remix genre scene to be pretty useless.
I mean, it’s extremely disappointing when a band you like, such as WHITE ZOMBIE, puts out a new album, and you get all excited only to find out that there are no new songs on it, and it’s just the old songs being FUCKED WITH by DJ Butthole or whatever.
Only fifteen more years until the next PiL album!
This Is Pil (2012)
Woo, woo, woo, Public Image Ltd. is back! When it was announced that Public Image Ltd. had reformed in 2009, the question was, well, who would actually be in the band? After all, it’s not like John Lydon’s previous band, DISCHARGE, where there’s only one possible line-up that can do reunions, and they only had one album and a handful of singles, and you know exactly what songs they play onstage.
Also, recently, Glen Matlock said he would most likely never work with John Lydon again, because John Lydon wore that MAGA t-shirt, and wah, wah, wah… yeah, I’m sure John Lydon is losing sleep over that.
But, I digress. As it were, unlike Johnny’s previous band, THE DEAD BOYS, Public Image Ltd. had lots of different line-ups and configurations. Who would join Johnny in this latest incarnation of PiL? Would this be a reunion of the classic Metal Box lineup with Jah Wobble, Keith Levene, and Martin Atkins? Would Jim Walker be flying back in from Canada to resume the drummer position he left behind after the first album? Was this finally gonna be that supergroup I’d always hoped for with Steve Vai and Ginger Baker that started on Album but never fully materialized? Would John Lydon hit up the mighty Tommy Zvoncheck and try to pluck him out of his far superior gig with the MOOGY KLINGMAN BAND??!!
Nah. They just brought Lu Edmonds and Bruce Smith back on guitar and drums respectively, and recruited the entirely new Scott Firth, who had prior played in the backing band for – laff it up – THE SPICE GIRLS.
I wonder if that inspired this band I recently saw called THE SPICE PISTOLS, who opened for surf punk legends AGENT ORANGE and are dudes who dress like the Spice Girls and do Sex Pistols and Spice Girls covers. Yeah, it’s just as stupid as it sounds.
The other major question is what the first Public Image Ltd. album in twenty years would actually sound like. After all, when your recorded output kinda goes from one genre to another – even on the same album – it’s hard to really say what your signature sound is.
But, since Metal Box is the PiL album most people love and cite as the group’s career masterpiece, the new PiL line-up basically just defaulted to the bass-driven, dance-y, post-punk style of that one; only with professional musicianship, normal production that’s not constrained by lack of time and money, and halfway pre-written SONGS. Well, mostly, anyway. I mean, the opening title cut is just John Lydon repeating "this is PiL, we are PiL, Public Image Ltd." over and over again as if he wanted to make absolutely sure you didn’t think you had purchased an album by some other band. And songs like "Deeper Water" and "I Must Be Dreaming" just sound like John Lydon blathering about like a homeless derelict with a couple topics swirling around in his brain.
In general, though, with twelve new songs and a running time of 64 minutes, This Is PiL is a pretty good, if somewhat flawed and overly long reunion album. For the most part, Scott Firth is basically a surrogate Jah Wobble, with the trippy, catchy bass lines, right down to damn near plagiarizing "Memories" for the song "One Drop," while Lu Edmond kinda functions as a more refined Keith Levene, playing nice, pleasant, and understated melodies over the bass lines, and Bruce Smith keeps these extended pieces together with a nice bounce-y beat. But, damn, does John Lydon’s voice sound really hoarse! It’s not bad, but it’s definitely showing its age; or abuse from cigarettes! It doesn’t ruin anything, though, and actually sounds kind of cool.
With that said, my favorite tunes, unsurprisingly, are the most rockin’ ones; "Terra-Gate," which is short, fast, and actually, ya know, ROCKS, and "Human," a fun, catchy, noisy, guitar-dominated piece that allows Lu Edmonds to show off his skills, even shredding a bit! You also have "Reggie’s Song," which has a weird time signature but also rocks, "Fool," which is slow and sad and sounds like it was a written by a depressed clown, and "It Said That," which has those neato Middle Eastern parts, if’n it gets a little repetitive with the "it said that/it said what/that said that," or however the hell it goes.
On the other hand, my least favorite songs are the pointless spoken word poem with some instrumental tones in the background called "The Room I Am In" and the bass drum thumping, hip shaking Afro-Cuban acoustic guitar stomp "Lollipop Opera," which would be fine if it didn’t sound like John Lydon was trying to rap over it!
"This is PiL-ah
We are not swill-ah
Though we’re a bit over the hill-ah
But this is how we pay our bills-ah"
Holy shit, Johnny Rotten is doing punk again! I’m serious! I don’t mean like what nerdy record store hipsters call punk, or that it’s "punk" in the proverbial sense, where it sounds nothing like punk, but someone calls it punk because of the lyrics.
I mean the first two songs are raw n' raunchy, middle upper tempo raucous, noisy, pissed off, garage-y punk tunes, with Lu Edmonds hammering away at chords and individual notes like it’s the late 70s, while John Lydon rants about… fixing his toilet. "Double Trouble" is actually pretty funny, and Johnny hasn’t stuffed so many cuss words in such a short period of time since "Bodies" by his old band, THE COCKNEY REJECTS! While "Know How" is under three minutes long! Did they hear the latest albums by Wire and The Fall and say, "Well, bloody hell, we can be pretentious arty jackasses AND still rock our balls off!"? It’s not likely that John Lydon will ever make new music with his old band, THE ANGELIC UPSTARTS, ever again, so this is the next best thing.
Sadly they’re the only songs on the album that sound like that. Happily, the album is still more ROCK than its predecessor. Sadly, it’s still not ALL rock, as you shall soon see.
And then the third song sounds like a cross between surf/spy music and "Lucifer Sam" by PINK FLOYD, only John Lydon seems to be kvetching about Bettie Page, Mae West, and other old-timey broads to make some point about how the United States is a country that glorifies in porn, but couches its values in Christian morality, or whatever. As I mentioned way earlier, I often have no real idea what John Lydon is actually SAYING with his lyrics; sometimes I wonder if he even does, or if he just gets a few ideas in his head, decides they sound neat, and then writes them down. I’m just pleasantly surprised that PiL is rockin’. While I can’t help but think the main, opening riff to "Spice of Choice" sounds like BILLY IDOL's "White Wedding"!
Sorry! I’m not calling Lu a plagiarist! When you’re writing a lot of melodies and riffs, you’re bound to stumble upon ones that sound like ones that have been written decades before.
Then, after the sixth song, "The One," a happy-go-lucky pop song with BEACH BOYS harmonies, acoustic/electric double-tracked guitars, and an overall feel-good vibe, What the World Needs Now reverts back to the bass-driven post-punk that the group decided is their signature sound on their previous album. It’s almost as if the members had an argument, and Lu demanded that his instrument get the limelight at least half the time, rather than be relegated to just providing textures over whirling bass lines, before Scott Firth was like, "Ah, but, mate, Public Image Ltd. is a POST-punk band! If you wanted to rock out with your bollocks out, you should have rejoined The Damned! I hear the Stranglers always need a new guitar player!" And then Lu sheepishly went back to his corner of the rehearsal room, and the group wrote the next five songs.
And, no, before you ask, which I know you were about to, "I’m Not Satisfied" is not a FRANK ZAPPA cover, like The Fall did on their 1995 album, Cerebral Caustic. But, to be fair, even if the song is back to the bass-driven post-punk style, it’s still got some nicely pronounced and melodic guitar work from Lu, so, in light of everything I said, the song is also pretty rockin’. "Whole Life Time" ain’t bad either.
See? You CAN find a golden mean and make everyone happy!
On the other hand, "Big Blue Sky" is a slow and ambient bore, and the last two songs, "Corporate" and "Shoom," are just repetitive and self-indulgent John Lydon rant pieces with some thumping music behind them; sadly a harbinger of what was to come. But they do have one thing in common with the first song; cuss words! For some reason, after years of mostly not swearing on his albums, John Lydon has decided to start dropping a bunch of f-bombs. And, yet, I STILL have no idea what he’s trying to say with lyrics like:
"Fuck You
Fuck off
Fuck sex
All sex is bollocks
Es-sex is bollocks
Success is bollocks
Ba-ba, me baby bollocks"
You can try to find meaning in this shit all you want.
Hey, What the World Needs Now is good! Not great, but good! And there are funny cartoon drawings on the cover! And Public Image Ltd. recorded two albums in a row with the same lineup!
Take that, John Lydon’s old band, THE BUZZCOCKS!
Also, recently, Glen Matlock said he would most likely never work with John Lydon again, because John Lydon wore that MAGA t-shirt, and wah, wah, wah… yeah, I’m sure John Lydon is losing sleep over that.
But, I digress. As it were, unlike Johnny’s previous band, THE DEAD BOYS, Public Image Ltd. had lots of different line-ups and configurations. Who would join Johnny in this latest incarnation of PiL? Would this be a reunion of the classic Metal Box lineup with Jah Wobble, Keith Levene, and Martin Atkins? Would Jim Walker be flying back in from Canada to resume the drummer position he left behind after the first album? Was this finally gonna be that supergroup I’d always hoped for with Steve Vai and Ginger Baker that started on Album but never fully materialized? Would John Lydon hit up the mighty Tommy Zvoncheck and try to pluck him out of his far superior gig with the MOOGY KLINGMAN BAND??!!
Nah. They just brought Lu Edmonds and Bruce Smith back on guitar and drums respectively, and recruited the entirely new Scott Firth, who had prior played in the backing band for – laff it up – THE SPICE GIRLS.
I wonder if that inspired this band I recently saw called THE SPICE PISTOLS, who opened for surf punk legends AGENT ORANGE and are dudes who dress like the Spice Girls and do Sex Pistols and Spice Girls covers. Yeah, it’s just as stupid as it sounds.
The other major question is what the first Public Image Ltd. album in twenty years would actually sound like. After all, when your recorded output kinda goes from one genre to another – even on the same album – it’s hard to really say what your signature sound is.
But, since Metal Box is the PiL album most people love and cite as the group’s career masterpiece, the new PiL line-up basically just defaulted to the bass-driven, dance-y, post-punk style of that one; only with professional musicianship, normal production that’s not constrained by lack of time and money, and halfway pre-written SONGS. Well, mostly, anyway. I mean, the opening title cut is just John Lydon repeating "this is PiL, we are PiL, Public Image Ltd." over and over again as if he wanted to make absolutely sure you didn’t think you had purchased an album by some other band. And songs like "Deeper Water" and "I Must Be Dreaming" just sound like John Lydon blathering about like a homeless derelict with a couple topics swirling around in his brain.
In general, though, with twelve new songs and a running time of 64 minutes, This Is PiL is a pretty good, if somewhat flawed and overly long reunion album. For the most part, Scott Firth is basically a surrogate Jah Wobble, with the trippy, catchy bass lines, right down to damn near plagiarizing "Memories" for the song "One Drop," while Lu Edmond kinda functions as a more refined Keith Levene, playing nice, pleasant, and understated melodies over the bass lines, and Bruce Smith keeps these extended pieces together with a nice bounce-y beat. But, damn, does John Lydon’s voice sound really hoarse! It’s not bad, but it’s definitely showing its age; or abuse from cigarettes! It doesn’t ruin anything, though, and actually sounds kind of cool.
With that said, my favorite tunes, unsurprisingly, are the most rockin’ ones; "Terra-Gate," which is short, fast, and actually, ya know, ROCKS, and "Human," a fun, catchy, noisy, guitar-dominated piece that allows Lu Edmonds to show off his skills, even shredding a bit! You also have "Reggie’s Song," which has a weird time signature but also rocks, "Fool," which is slow and sad and sounds like it was a written by a depressed clown, and "It Said That," which has those neato Middle Eastern parts, if’n it gets a little repetitive with the "it said that/it said what/that said that," or however the hell it goes.
On the other hand, my least favorite songs are the pointless spoken word poem with some instrumental tones in the background called "The Room I Am In" and the bass drum thumping, hip shaking Afro-Cuban acoustic guitar stomp "Lollipop Opera," which would be fine if it didn’t sound like John Lydon was trying to rap over it!
"This is PiL-ah
We are not swill-ah
Though we’re a bit over the hill-ah
But this is how we pay our bills-ah"
What the World Needs Now (2015)
Holy shit, Johnny Rotten is doing punk again! I’m serious! I don’t mean like what nerdy record store hipsters call punk, or that it’s "punk" in the proverbial sense, where it sounds nothing like punk, but someone calls it punk because of the lyrics.
I mean the first two songs are raw n' raunchy, middle upper tempo raucous, noisy, pissed off, garage-y punk tunes, with Lu Edmonds hammering away at chords and individual notes like it’s the late 70s, while John Lydon rants about… fixing his toilet. "Double Trouble" is actually pretty funny, and Johnny hasn’t stuffed so many cuss words in such a short period of time since "Bodies" by his old band, THE COCKNEY REJECTS! While "Know How" is under three minutes long! Did they hear the latest albums by Wire and The Fall and say, "Well, bloody hell, we can be pretentious arty jackasses AND still rock our balls off!"? It’s not likely that John Lydon will ever make new music with his old band, THE ANGELIC UPSTARTS, ever again, so this is the next best thing.
Sadly they’re the only songs on the album that sound like that. Happily, the album is still more ROCK than its predecessor. Sadly, it’s still not ALL rock, as you shall soon see.
And then the third song sounds like a cross between surf/spy music and "Lucifer Sam" by PINK FLOYD, only John Lydon seems to be kvetching about Bettie Page, Mae West, and other old-timey broads to make some point about how the United States is a country that glorifies in porn, but couches its values in Christian morality, or whatever. As I mentioned way earlier, I often have no real idea what John Lydon is actually SAYING with his lyrics; sometimes I wonder if he even does, or if he just gets a few ideas in his head, decides they sound neat, and then writes them down. I’m just pleasantly surprised that PiL is rockin’. While I can’t help but think the main, opening riff to "Spice of Choice" sounds like BILLY IDOL's "White Wedding"!
Sorry! I’m not calling Lu a plagiarist! When you’re writing a lot of melodies and riffs, you’re bound to stumble upon ones that sound like ones that have been written decades before.
Then, after the sixth song, "The One," a happy-go-lucky pop song with BEACH BOYS harmonies, acoustic/electric double-tracked guitars, and an overall feel-good vibe, What the World Needs Now reverts back to the bass-driven post-punk that the group decided is their signature sound on their previous album. It’s almost as if the members had an argument, and Lu demanded that his instrument get the limelight at least half the time, rather than be relegated to just providing textures over whirling bass lines, before Scott Firth was like, "Ah, but, mate, Public Image Ltd. is a POST-punk band! If you wanted to rock out with your bollocks out, you should have rejoined The Damned! I hear the Stranglers always need a new guitar player!" And then Lu sheepishly went back to his corner of the rehearsal room, and the group wrote the next five songs.
And, no, before you ask, which I know you were about to, "I’m Not Satisfied" is not a FRANK ZAPPA cover, like The Fall did on their 1995 album, Cerebral Caustic. But, to be fair, even if the song is back to the bass-driven post-punk style, it’s still got some nicely pronounced and melodic guitar work from Lu, so, in light of everything I said, the song is also pretty rockin’. "Whole Life Time" ain’t bad either.
See? You CAN find a golden mean and make everyone happy!
On the other hand, "Big Blue Sky" is a slow and ambient bore, and the last two songs, "Corporate" and "Shoom," are just repetitive and self-indulgent John Lydon rant pieces with some thumping music behind them; sadly a harbinger of what was to come. But they do have one thing in common with the first song; cuss words! For some reason, after years of mostly not swearing on his albums, John Lydon has decided to start dropping a bunch of f-bombs. And, yet, I STILL have no idea what he’s trying to say with lyrics like:
"Fuck You
Fuck off
Fuck sex
All sex is bollocks
Es-sex is bollocks
Success is bollocks
Ba-ba, me baby bollocks"
You can try to find meaning in this shit all you want.
Hey, What the World Needs Now is good! Not great, but good! And there are funny cartoon drawings on the cover! And Public Image Ltd. recorded two albums in a row with the same lineup!
Take that, John Lydon’s old band, THE BUZZCOCKS!
End of World (2023)
Eight years, three elections, and a whole world gone mad since their last album, Public Image Ltd. is back with an album with an appropriately apocalyptic title, and John Lydon is trying to be as contrarian and iconoclastic as ever. He proudly wore a MAGA t-shirt and announced to the world that he voted for Donald Trump; he mourned the death of Queen Elizabeth, rather than celebrating it; and now he claims that the right-wingers are the rebels, pissing off left-libs, like the broad who curated the showing of the Public Image Ltd. documentary I talked about up above.
Of course, it’s hard for me to take John Lydon too seriously as an iconoclast since I’m friends with Rob “the Barron” Miller of AMEBIX and TAU CROSS, and since I’ve been exposed to the far more controversial, and, er iconoclastic works of ANAL CUNT, GG ALLIN, THE MENTORS, BOYD RICE, and SKREWDRIVER, among many others.
Now that I think about it, why hasn’t John Lydon been cancelled for calling THE NEW YORK DOLLS "a bundle of sticks"? You know the song I’m talking about, right? It goes, "The New York Dolls are a bunch of hicks/they think they’re tough, but they’re really just bundles of sticks."
And, then I saw that Colin Liddell had already written a review of the new PiL album. In it, he claims that all the other reviews of End of World, that harp on and on about John Lydon’s legacy with the Sex Pistols and early Public Image Ltd. and posit how he can stay "cutting edge" in his old age, frame the album "incorrectly," and that the "correct" way to frame it is from the perspective of some Japanese artist who believed he mastered his art as he got older; that, during John Lydon’s entire career, he’s been really good at being edgy, but not so great at being musical, and that Public Image Ltd. only started to get good when the latest line-up with guitarist Lu Edmonds, bassist Scott Firth, and drummer Bruce Smith made their recorded debut on This Is PiL back in 2012. All this is punctuated by his general dismissal that much early PiL is just avant-garde noise bullshit that you keep in your collection to look hip, but never actually listen to.
Oh, and if you think otherwise, that means you may just be a university-brainwashed, intellectual halfwit "who misspent their youths at uni rather than being gobbed on at the London Forum," and that you need to "Just listen to the brutal wit, backlash energy, and sonorous menace of ‘Being Stupid Again’ for clarification," even though the song isn’t that good, and people could just as easily listen to the far superior "Cancel Culture" by German Judas Priest knockoffs PRIMAL FEAR if they want a dose of anti-wokeness.
And, "for clarification," I’ve never been "gobbed on," so to speak, but I did get my wrist broken at a GWAR show catching a stage diver when I was 17, and even as recently as last year, I had my car window broken out during an OVERKILL show at a venue in the biggest shithole area of downtown Detroit. So I think I’m enough of a "punter" and "yob" to be qualified to opine on the latest PiL album, along with all the others, which I’ve already been doing up to this point anyway, so what’s up!
First of all, why would you “frame” the album at all? Personally I plan to listen to it! The cover looks like it was painted by a five year old in his kindergarten class, and if you get the CD, it would be too small to put on your wall anyway! HAHAHAHA!!!
Secondly, and far more disappointing than the lousy artwork, is that End of World only has three good songs on it out of a total of thirteen (fourteen if you get the Japanese version!). It starts off promisingly enough with the heavy gothic death rock opener "Penge" and the wicked-sick, Lu Edmonds rip-roaring riff-a-thon "End of the World," both getting me to lick my chops at the prospect that End of World will kick my ass through my face with rockin’ yet refined, aggressive but tempered, punky but arty, and ultimately catchy rock music in a manner similar to Wire, The Fall, Pere Ubu, or The Stranglers.
And, other than the super catchy 80s, new wave-y throwback "Pretty Awful," this did not happen. Okay, "Car Chase" and "North West Passage" are passable, and "Hawaii," which is not a Beach Boys cover, is just there. If you feel emotions, which I don’t, it might move you, but I have no use for music which makes me feel like I’m just lying on a beach an’ thinkin’ ‘bout sheeyit.
Otherwise, we get a lot of mood pieces with a beat and John Lydon saying some shit over it! For instance, as I said earlier, "Being Stupid Again" really isn’t that good. Yeah, it’s cool how the lyrics bash politically correct university wokesters with lines like "all maths is racist" and "men into women and back into men," but, musically speaking, nothing really happens in the song! And the same can be said for "Walls," "Strange," "Down on the Clown," and "LFCF." That last one stands for "liars, fakes, cheats, and frauds," but it doesn’t matter what the songs are about, since the music supporting them is damn near nonexistent! I mean, yeah, there’s a bass line, a drum beat, and maybe even a couple guitar notes, but they repeat as if on loop, and that’s it! These songs sound more like the work of one person sitting behind a mixing console than John Lydon’s solo album does!
And, while those songs aren’t too offensive and just fade into the background, I honestly couldn’t stand "Dirty Murky Delight" and "The Do That." The former is John Lydon’s attempt at some kind of "top hat and tails" show-tune-y swing jazz music that you’d hear in an old musical, but not very good, and the latter is a BO DIDDLEY beat with yet still another one of John Lydon’s painfully annoying attempt at rapping, with really stupid lines like "I won’t do this, and I won’t do that/ and I won’t eat fat, and I won’t talk that”; both, I should add, with absurdly minimalist guitar work.
"This has been achieved with the tremendous musicality of, especially, Lu Edmonds (who could probably get a note out of a lump of rock), and has been done without compromising one iota on the acerbic bile and biting wit of Mr. Lydon, who has always been a more incensed version of Morrissey (also Irish) with just as much Oscar Wilde in him (ooh er, missus!)."
I guess Colin Liddell had better get Lu Edmonds a lot more lumps of rock, then! Also, for what it’s worth, I don’t think John Lydon is really much like MORRISSEY at all; I’d put him in the same category as Jello Biafra, HENRY ROLLINS, and Mike Patton, largely entertaining characters who have limited musical ability but enough smarts to surround themselves with professional musicians willing to help them see through their whacky musical ideas.
In short, instead of worrying what some Japanese artist thinks, why don’t you complain about the fact that the Japanese version of End of World has a bonus track that’s not on the North American or European version of the album?
After all, I think I just might need to listen to the brutal wit, backlash energy, and sonorous menace of "Punkenstein" for further clarification.
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