John Lydon (aka, Johnny Rotten) completely rocked my teen world. I loved his snarky persona, his killer gaze, his Dickensian anarchic ragamuffin sense of style, his ability to almost effortlessly take the piss at any given moment. Fabulous. I remember first hearing his name when Sid Vicious died, and I can remember reading their names in the newspaper, and feeling this sense of terror -- who would have names like that? "Johnny Rotten?" "Sid Vicious?" "Sex Pistols?" I was 9 when I first encountered those names, and it was years later until I actually listened to the Sex Pistols -- bought them on cassette. For me, it was a revelation. I can vividly remember driving along Route 224, popping the cassette into my car's player, listening to "Never Mind the Bollocks" for the first time and thinking "Wow. This is awesome stuff." I had avoided them before then, because of the whole killer reputation of the band, their infamy. I just assumed it would be noise, not worth my time. But it was sooooo good. It was precisely the itch that I needed to be scratched at that time, when I was just stalking around town by myself. I became a Punk in that transformative moment, devoured the music, now referred to as "old-school" -- but to me, simply Punk. I loved that he had his own unique look, something quintessentially him, a kind of anti-fashion fashion that was quickly overshadowed by people trying to "look Punk" when the truth was that there WAS no look to Punk -- or the point was not having a look, but simply looking unique. And he managed that masterfully. Rotten taught me that so many people are easily outraged and frightened, and their judgments of the merit or lack of merit of something were meaningless, and that the only way to really suss something out was to do it yourself, and to think for yourself. That so often the fearful were afraid to try anything new and odd and different, and locked themselves into tiny cages.Sure, Lydon lapsed into self-parody later, but his original incarnation was just magnificent. He's one of the few pop culture figures I'll honestly mourn when he finally dies, just because he's so damned fun. I read his biography years ago, found him curious and thoughtful behind his snarly exterior.
