Memories

Public Image Ltd: Memories 

(Virgin Records, 1979)

  

"Blessed are the forgetful, for they get the better even of pain."

 

 

I. 

 

Looking back, one of the admirable things about 22-year-old John Lydon, after he left the Sex Pistols in 1978, is he had no time for rosy retrospection. 

 

Indeed, if anything, he viewed his own punk past and Rotten persona negatively - as something to be abandoned or overcome, rather than desperately clung to or fondly remembered:

 

I'm not the same as when I began  ... This person's had enough of useless memories ... [1]

 

 

II.

 

However we attempt to configure it, the nature of one's relationship to one's own past remains an interesting question ...

 

Is it best, for example, to simplify one's own history and, in the process of simplifying it, also give it a positive gloss; are good memories (and reshaped lies) vital in maintaining self-esteem and happiness? 

 

Or is it best (if possible) to never look back; to regard nostalgia as a dangerous disease; to tie innocence and becoming to forgetfulness and/or an active denial of the past? 

 

It was, after all, because of Lydon's refusal to rest on his laurels or bullshit about his experience as a Sex Pistol, that he was able - in collaboration with Keith Levene and Jah Wobble - to deliver unto the world his Metal Box [2]. 

 

Arguably, with this album Lydon proved himself to be a genuinely creative artist (or a true star as he once signed himself to me) and not merely a derivative talent or copycat; i.e., one who uses memory to mimic ability and as a resource to plunder. 

 

As Nietzsche says, original artists and great poets seek to counter the deadening effects of an all-too-faithful memory (i.e., a mere recording capability that is of no value creatively speaking).

 

Sadly, however, Lydon never quite succeeded in getting rid of the albatross and he became a monster of passive memory, increasingly consumed by ressentiment. 

 

Now, his entire being revolves around having the last word, settling old scores, slagging off everyone he's ever known or worked with; a grotesque (and bloated) parody of his former self, it should be clear by now that he's the one who makes us feel ashamed ...

 

We let him stay too long.  

 

And he's old.    

 

Notes

 

[1] Lines from the singles 'Public Image' (Virgin Records, 1978) and 'Memories' (Virgin Records, 1979), by Public Image Limited. 

      Cf. Lydon's attitude to the past (and the importance of memory) in the single 'Hawaii' - taken from the album End of World (PiL Official, 2023) - in which he remembers all the good times shared with his wife, Nora Forster. For a discussion of this song, click here.    

 

[2] Metal Box, was PiL's second studio album released by Virgin Records in November 1979. The album is a million miles away from Never Mind the Bollocks (1977) and, indeed, a significant departure from PiL's debut album released eleven months earlier; the band moving in an increasingly avant-garde direction. Metal Box is widely regarded as a landmark of post-punk. An alternative mix of 'Memories' appears on the album - click here to play the 2009 remastered version.  

     

 

For an earlier post in which I discuss Johnny Rotten as an artist in decline, click here.

 

 

Aloha! Should Johnny Rotten Mind His Language?

Johnny singing his heart out on The Late Late Show Eurosong 2023 Special 

RTÉ Television Centre, Dublin (3 Feb 2023)

 

 

I. 

 

Sadly, Johnny Rotten has failed in his bid to emulate Johnny Logan and will not be representing Ireland in this year's Eurovision Song Contest. Somewhat ironically, the 67-year former Sex Pistol and his post-punk outfit Public Image Ltd., were defeated by a group calling themselves Wild Youth.    

The song that Rotten safety-pinned his hopes on - 'Hawaii' [1] - is described as a love letter to his 80-year-old wife, Nora, who - as he never tires of telling us - has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's. 

 

Whilst the track with its refrain of remember me, I remember you, is certainly touching, one can't help but find it a rather feeble response to his wife's condition when compared, for example, to the ferocious song written in response to the cancer that killed his 46-year old mother, Eileen, in 1978.

There's nothing nostalgic or sentimental about 'Death Disco', as Rotten rages in despair at the dying of the light in his mother's eyes and watches as she lies choking on a bed, surrounded by rotting flowers [2].

 

His Eurovision entry, by contrast, is much more accepting that all journeys end and that all one is ultimately left with are memories of happier times - if one's lucky, that is, and dementia doesn't rob you of the past as well as aggressively restrict your ability to think and carry out everyday activities in the present.     

Perhaps, being generous, we might say that 'Hawaii' is the song of a more mature and reflective songwriter, whereas 'Death Disco' was the composition of a young man almost insane with anger. 

 

However, for all its poignant charm, 'Hawaii' still wasn't selected for Eurovision: in fact, it finished fourth out of the six songs competing and was given a lukewarm reception by the judges. But then, the Irish have never really accepted London-born Lydon as one of their own; he was even arrested in Dublin once, in 1980, and spent a weekend in Mountjoy prison on a trumped up charge. 

 

Still, maybe it's for the best that PiL didn't win the vote. For in this age of political correctness, certain voices have been raised in woke circles about the problematic use (or appropriation) of the word aloha by non-Hawaiian speakers like Lydon ...

 

 

II.  

 

In a recent article publised in USA Today, David Oliver suggests that it's time to stop using culturally sensitive words out of context [3]. Just because you can say hello in Hawaiian, writes Oliver, that doesn't automatically give you the right to do so. 

 

For aloha isn't merely a simple greeting. It has a profound (some might say sacred) meaning for native speakers, referring to a spiritual force that might be described as love, peace, or compassion; a force that is fundamental to existence. Aloha means recognising this force in oneself, in others and in all things.

 

I suppose a Heideggerian might identify aloha as an elementary term - i.e., one that speaks Being [4] - and it might be argued that it is devalued when coming from the mouth of a tourist, or someone who uses it simply to add a little exotic colour to a song lyric.

 

Personally, I wouldn't want to take this argument too far. However, I can agree that we all need to be cautious and respectful when using words that we don't fully understand and which speak others in their otherness; i.e., we all need to mind our language, as it were - even Mr. Rotten.      

 

 

Notes

[1] 'Hawaii', by Public Image Limited (John Lydon / Bruce Smith / Lu Edmonds / Scott Firth), will be released on vinyl as a limited edition 7" single later this year. To watch the official promo video, click here. Or to watch the band performing the song on The Late Late Show, click here. 

[2] 'Death Disco', by Public Image Limited (John Lydon / Keith Levene / Jah Wobble / Jim Walker), was a single release in June 1979 on Virgin Records: click here for the official video. An alternative version entitled 'Swan Lake' can be found on Metal Box (Virgin Records, 1979).  

 

[3] David Oliver, 'Is it time to stop saying "aloha" and other culturally sensitive words out of context?', USA Today (13 Jan 2023): click here. 

 

[4] For Heidegger, the ultimate task of philosophy is to preserve the force of the elementary words in which Dasein expresses itself. See Being and Time, trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson (Blackwell, 2001), p. 262.