It seems obvious from the outset that the latter was set to self-destruct before long, as he did. The cohesion that somehow held them together seems to have been torn when Glen got the push and was replaced by the talentless walking disaster known to history as Sid Vicious. It's easy to see, though, why they never stayed long enough to record a second album. But John seems to have hated them all with a vengeance at some time or other, although he did work with them all up to a point. The impression is that his original colleagues – guitarist Steve Jones, bass guitarist Glen Matlock and drummer Paul Cook – were all quite accomplished musicians, and that he and possibly their manager Malcolm McLaren, the man who was tone deaf and 'hadn't a clue about music', came in with the mission of changing 'just another group' into harbingers of chaos. He writes in some detail of his upbringing and family life, of the meningitis at an early age which left him with poor vision and that sometimes unnerving gaze, of his claustrophobia, epilepsy, and aversion to certain kinds of lighting, and gives us a bird's-eye-view of the music scene of which he became a part when the group first formed at the end of 1975. This memoir, which includes contributions from various friends and associates including Chrissie Hynde and Billy Idol, is an interesting if sometimes rather disjointed affair. Was he the iconoclast who if some of the tabloids were to be believed was about to destroy western civilization almost single-handed? Had he really come to destroy, or merely to use the showbusiness system and end up becoming part of what he had set out to fight, or both – or what? Picking up this book immediately makes you wonder what exactly you make of John Lydon, the man who became notorious in the late 1970s as 'Johnny Rotten' of the Sex Pistols. This isn't a comfortable read, but he would probably feel insulted if I suggested that it was.
Summary: What do you make of John Lydon, alias 'Johnny Rotten' of the Sex Pistols, the man who if some of the tabloids were to be believed was about to destroy western civilization almost single-handed? This memoir of the chaotic heyday of punk rock is entertaining in a strange kind of way, even if his continual mouthing off at everyone and everything can become a little wearisome.
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