Describing himself as a public hate figure at 20, the musical icon that was born John Lydon put the fear of God into conformist society with bilious anti-establishment lyrics and an unsettling, gruesome stage presence. Recruited by impresario, Malcolm McLaren, to front the band that morphed into the Sex Pistols after associate and future Clash manager, Bernie Rhodes, spotted him sporting a home-made 'I Hate Pink Floyd' T-shirrt and safety-pinned trousers inside the McLaren-run punk retail hotspot, Sex, Lydon set about re-inventing himself as Johnny Rotten and quickly became the (decaying-toothed) poster boy for the London scene. Rotten was, in fact, a name that perfectly encapsulated Lydons new-found antagonism as well as being symbolic of the stagnancy, corruption and hypocrisy that abounded in the firmly-established British institutions that the Pistols man critiqued. Honourably forthright and dangerously honest, Rottens penchant for nihilism and multi-faceted, eloquent attacks on the monarchy, Capitalism, record companies and expectation seethed with a genuine anger and fury that combated any notion that the Pistols image and ethos was fully controlled and orchestrated by McLaren. Yet amongst this hatred, Rotten managed to achieve the impossible and imbue his defiance with a sarcastic and ironic humour, proving that if there was hope, it lay in laughter.
A 22 year old English Literature graduate from Birmingham. I am passionate about music, literature and football, in particular, my beloved Aston Villa. Lover of words and consumer of art, music is the very air that I breathe.
