Who: Public Image Ltd
What: End Of World
Where: Venice, Los Angeles, California, via New York City, New York, USA via Holloway, north London, England
Why: An at times divisive character, one time Sex Pistol John Lydon has sustained a music career spanning six decades in media spouting his gob off. Regardless of how one feels about his politics, his place in music history as one of the originators of punk rock is beyond challenge. And with his second act, the post punk Public Image Ltd, Lydon has managed to push the boundaries of another new genre of music, one coloured with shrill, high pitched, non musical vocalizings one cannot quite call singing. A decade earlier Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen made it acceptable for people with unpleasant sounding voices to sing popular music. John Lydon has taken it to a whole other level.
After a 17 year hiatus dating back to 1992, PiL members since 1986 Lu Edmonds (guitar) and Bruce Smith (drums), with punk rock roots of their own (The Damned and The Slits), joined Lydon and new member Scott Firth (bass) for a 2009 tour. The refreshed lineup, the longest serving version of PiL yet, birthed 2012’s This Is PiL, 20 years after their last (That What Is Not from 1992), on their own newly minted record label, financed in part by a butter commercial featuring Lydon. Arguably the healthiest, most potent incarnation of PiL yet, the band continues to enrage with End Of World, their third album in 11 years. And that’s not bollocks.
When: 2023