Britain’s global influence or ‘soft power’ has largely been down to our two greatest exports – our former monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, and our culture. Though dearest Lilibet may no longer be with us, the impact of our most popular musicians and artists is noticeable. Even a cursory search online for ‘world’s biggest pop stars’ and the likes of Harry Styles, Ed Sheeran, Adele, and Dua Lipa all crop up.
John Lydon has, of course, been vocal about his anti-monarchist leanings. With The Sex Pistols’ snarling 1976 anarchist anthem ‘God Save The Queen’, the band became an instant cultural export themselves, one whose influence can still be felt in every sinew of punk rock music.
There was also an era of British music which Lydon was equally unforgiving about, a trend which gave rise to the global pop culture phenomenon that was Beatlemania: the British Invasion. Lydon loathed the swathe of British bands that broke America so much that he later labelled them “piss-poor”.
The Beatles had a knack for songwriting, it’s safe to say. But in their infancy, they’d borrow heavily from the American R&B acts which seemed somewhat exotic to them, covering songs from the likes of Little Richard and Chuck Berry, citing them as key influences in their musical make-up. Black musicians, sadly, weren’t afforded the kind of admiration their white counterparts received, who were evidently deemed not as palatable in sixties America. Elvis Presley proved that already.
With the Fab Four breaking through across the Atlantic, American audiences went weak at the knees for any young Chelsea-booted buck with a mop top and a British accent. The Rolling Stones, The Who, The Animals, The Zombies, The Hollies, The Small Faces, and countless others tried their luck across the pond – and succeeded.
They didn’t succeed in impressing an infant John Lydon, however, who admittedly was a tad too young to truly engage in the movement. During a 2017 interview with Newsweek, the Public Image Ltd frontman was more in awe of the successors of the British Invasion, notably Led Zeppelin.
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“The chaps that stand up, they’ve always impressed me because what they did was challenging in its time,” Lydon explained. “Led Zeppelin, they took the blues and turned it backwards, upside down and on its head. That incredible drummer [John Bonham], insane!”
After gushing about Zeppelin’s bold and brazen reimagining of American blues music, Lydon then turned his attention to the British Invasion, adding: “They come from a different period in time. I was never very interested in rock bands that were imitating black America. I resented that. So the ideology of the British Invasion is so awful.”
“That was putting white faces on black music, played very badly, without the empathy and the gruelling existence that black people had to endure,” he elaborated. “When I started with the Pistols, what I did not want was a piss-poor representation of English blues music.”
Black artists’ influence on popular music is indelible. Whilst the British Invasion bands did make a point of crediting their inspirations, the originators of R&B seldom received the adoration and remuneration they rightly deserved. Clearly, that notion didn’t sit well with Lydon, whose musical influences leading up to the Pistols’ formation ranged from Iggy and the Stooges, Captain Beefheart, and Alice Cooper.
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Though there was one artist who dabbled with rock ‘n’ roll prior to the British Invasion, who Lydon did admit to playing a part in his musical education. Cliff Richard was arguably the UK’s biggest pop star before The Beatles arrived, and whilst he certainly didn’t achieve overseas superfandom like his Liverpudlian peers, his music impacted Lydon as a child.
In a 2016 interview with Pitchfork, he delved into ‘The Music That Made Him’, saying Cliff’s 1959 single ‘Move It!’ was the first record he wanted to buy. “My parents had a fantastic collection. It wasn’t just Irish folk tunes and accordion diddly-doos, there was early Beatles and lots of Cliff Richard too,” he recalled. “The first record I would have ever wanted to buy was ‘Move It!’ by Cliff Richard. It was a really good song at the time and still is. Early Cliff was a riotous assembly of sorts, and he had moves that left a good impression on a five-year-old.”
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