Wobble: You’ve got all that and you’ve got Levene’s very clever guitar part, that ringing thing that influenced so many people. He’d been a roadie for Steve Howe of Yes, who was a big influence. I think Keith was classically trained; he’d learnt to reduce things. He had a harmonic sense that most other guitarists would die for – at that time. Of course, it had the life of a bloody dragonfly. Because of the drugs, and the shit that goes with it. He’d lost it halfway through Metal Box.
Lydon: All of our tastes were so varied. There’s a rhythm guitar thing in it where you could imply Wishbone Ash, a band all of us liked. Some have said dub, though we don’t necessarily see that. We were more bass-oriented than the Pistols.
Bill Price, engineer: Johnny I’d known from doing all the Pistols stuff. They’d recorded it and he wasn’t quite happy, so he came to me to mix and do over-dubs. Johnny was nominally in charge. But he would look over his shoulder and ask Jah, “Is this the right direction?” He was bowing to his greater knowledge of that Caribbean aspect.
Lydon: I’d been a reggae DJ since I was 14, playing the serious hardcore stuff. To me, it was Finsbury Park music.
Wobble: I had a fight with the assistant engineer. He was disrespectful and rude. I bashed him up. Everywhere we went, there tended to be trouble.
Price: Jah Wobble had a fist-fight with my assistant, Jeremy Greene. They had an argument about a reggae person’s talent. They were throwing punches down the end of the mixing desk. It wasn’t helping the session much. You know Mr Wobble. And Mr Greene is 6’4” and 20 stone. It was an even match. We’d been up the pub.
Lydon: When it was finished, I knew the song was something else. I’m amazed I was a part of it. I can look at myself and go: “My God, you did that? Not bad, boy.”
Price: It was a single to start a band. It reminded me in that sense of “Anarchy In The UK”. It was a similar statement.
Wobble: “Public Image” was fantastic. But things started to go down the month after its release. Money started to come in, and junkies go for that. John was weak. He didn’t deal with the situation. He trusted the wrong people, Machiavellian parasites. You could write a great little Greek tragedy about it. Keith was a very knowing, spoilt kid from the suburbs who ran rings around John, who’s a Catholic kid from Finsbury fucking Park. I said to John, “Listen, he’s got to have a hiding. You’ve got to take control.” It’s only years later you realise it wasn’t easy for him. His mum was very ill. And I was a piss-taker, a bit of a Gazza. An obsessive, mad thing that wore people out. I just felt frustrated. I wanted to be out on the road. In my time with PiL, we did 20 shows in two years. We should’ve done 20 shows a month. We had a lot of power at that time, which we could’ve used against Thatcher.
PiL’s first show was a warm-up in Belgium, and it was a riot. In Paris, someone threw a frozen pig’s head at me. Then we did the Rainbow. I’d been caning the speed and the booze. It was turmoil. There was that tribalistic “white bloke” element in the crowd that still wanted the Pistols.
Lydon: The harassment got worse than the Pistols for a period. We didn’t get many gigs in Britain. We upped and moved off to America, and things fell apart. It was too different a culture for some members, lonely for home. But home didn’t want us.
Wobble: John had that light around him that fascinated people. But it got incredibly dark and decadent within a year. With the heroin-users there was this pall about his flat. Eventually [in July 1980] I left. I think some opportunity was wasted. With the Pistols and PiL, there’s this feeling of feeling cheated.
Lydon: These young whipper-snapper bands, I wish they sounded nothing at all like me. That would be the greater compliment. PiL had to create this out of our own heads. Imitation is not the greatest form of flattery. Bands should expand the universe, not narrow it.
Fact File
Written by: PiL
Performers: John Lydon (vocals), Keith Levene (guitar), Jah Wobble (bass), Jim Walker (drums)
Produced by: PiL
Engineers: John Leckie, Bill Price
Recorded at: Advision Studios, London; Wessex Studios, London
Released as a single: October 13, 1978
Highest UK chart position: 9
Highest US chart position: n/a
Timeline
April 1978: Three months after the Pistols split, Keith Levene and Jah Wobble join John Lydon’s unnamed new band. Canadian drummer Jim Walker answers his anonymous ad (“Lonely Musician Seeks Comfort in Fellow Trendies”) to complete the lineup the next month
July 1978: “Public Image” is recorded in two sessions across London
October 1978: “Public Image” is released, entering the Top 10
December 1978: Public Image – First Issue is released. PiL make their live UK debut on Christmas Day
