John Lydon – Metal Express Radio

PUBLIC IMAGE LIMITED (Live)

June 13, 2018 Mick Burgess

I wonder what a venom spitting, establishment bashing Johnny Rotten would have made of the prospect of a 40th anniversary tour back at the height of the foundation shaking explosion of the Sex Pistols back in 1977? The Pistols may have flickered very brightly and ever so briefly but they certainly left their mark. Johnny Rotten morphed back into plain old John Lydon and quietly went about reconstructing a musical career with Public Image Limited that has now reached it’s 40th birthday. Surely it’s only old dinosaurs like The Who and Emerson Lake and Palmer who celebrate 40th birthdays? Lydon, ever the rule breaker however, does just what he wants and this evening fans turned up in their droves to celebrate 40 years with Lydon and his band PiL. For an hour and a half Lydon plundered material from right across the PiL catalogue opening with Warrior from 9, their final offering of the ’80s before heading back into the ’70s with Memories and forward to The One from their latest album, What The World Needs Now. Within the space of three or four songs Lydon had covered four decades of PiL all with his trademark vitriolic rasp as cutting as ever. The hypnotic, brooding bass line of Scott Firth laid the foundations for Lydon’s biting attack on the modern world during Corporate. Death Disco’s up-tempo dance beat belied the agony of Lydon’s lyrics and his anguish at the loss of his mother was etched in every word. Musically PiL cover so much ground, whether it’s the tribal rhythms of Flowers of Romance or the Funky vibe of I’m Not Satisfied or the T-Rex like feel to The One, no one can accuse them to sticking to a rigid formula. With the home stretch bringing in the big hitters, This …READ MORE

JOHN LYDON: “I’ll Not Let The Queen Put A Sword Anywhere Near My Neck”

June 3, 2018 Mick Burgess

He burst onto the music scene in the mid ’70s and shook it to its very core as Johnny Rotten fronting the Sex Pistols. Now a little older and wiser he’s celebrating 40 years of Public Image Limited, the band he formed after the Pistols had crashed and burned. Mick Burgess caught up with a hugely jovial, witty and eloquent John Lydon to talk about 40 years of PiL, the celebratory tour, career spanning box set and the prospect of being knighted by the Queen of England. In June will start your first UK tour in a couple of years. Are you looking forward to getting out there to perform again? This will be the first time in years where I’ll actually be touring in the summer. It always seems to be around November and I’m really prone to flus, chills and ills so this’ll be a nice surprise to be 100% healthy. I won’t know what to do with that. It’s a pretty long tour but it’s quite well paced with plenty of rest days in there. Do you now have that luxury of being able to plan your own tour so the days of 14 shows in 14 days are well and truly over? Those aren’t rest days. They are days that we’ll be recording the new album. After each show we return to our studio in The Cotswolds and record between each show. We actually have a very heavy year this year and will go to South America and North America later this year. This tour marks your 40th anniversary since the formation of PiL. Did you ever dare think you’d be in a band that lasted 10 years let alone 40 years? While we’re celebrating it’ll be complete hard work so there’s no time to rest …READ MORE

STEVE VAI – Various Artists – Archives Vol. 4

June 6, 2003 Jeremy Juliano

Steve Vai’s Archives Vol. 4 is not an album that can easily be pigeonholed. Vai has worked tirelessly through the years with countless artists across many genres of music. This collection is a sampling of some of those writing/recording sessions that some fans may not have realized Steve was even involved with at one time. Finally, these rare gems have been compiled and are presented in one tidy package with liner notes about each project. The disc starts with a B-side from Vai’s Whitesnake days called “Sweet Lady Luck.” This song fits like a glove with the now legendary “Slip of the Tongue” release, and one has to wonder why it was not included? This is a much stronger song than “Kittens Got Claws” or “Slow Poke Music.” This track alone is worth the price of the disc. “The Rumble” features Steve on guitar alongside Chick Corea, as he takes on “The Music of West Side Story.” To say that anyone could improve upon a Stephen Sondheim piece would just be ludicrous; the man is a legend in the annals of Broadway scores, and West Side Story is one of the classics. But this Jazz/Rock infused interpretation would make Sondheim smile at its creative dynamic. From Whitesnake to Chick Corea and then to John Lydon, a.k.a. Johnny Rotten, you couldn’t make up a crazier musical path. When Lydon reemerged on the music scene he wasn’t the same old punk, now he was a creative force, forging Modern Pop. Here Vai plays on “Ease” and “Home;” both songs don’t qualify as guitar extravaganzas, but that just goes to show the maturity of his musical aptitude. Track five, “Western Vacation,” is solo Steve and unfortunately the weakest link of the disc. Never one to conform to the norm, this tune is all …READ MORE