Last week, Sex Pistols frontman John Lydon, aka Johnny Rotten, lost the court case around the usage of Sex Pistols’ song in the upcoming mini-series about the band’s guitarist Steve Jones. Today, the singer first spoke out about the judge’s verdict, calling it “destructive to what the band is.” The verdict rules that band members Paul Cook and Jones could use the song according to the “majority rules” basis.
Cook and Jones sued Lydon after he refused to license the music for the mini-series. The newly released statement by Lydon, and his legal team, was released via his website. In it, the team expresses their feelings about the verdict. they also claimed that Lydon was informed only few days before the official announcement of the mini-series called Pistol. “Understandably, John, as the creative force of the Sex Pistols, wanted to know how he was going to be portrayed and his musical works were going to be used to lend credibility to the series. Despite asking for details of the script or screenplay, John still does not know these details.”
They further claim that Lydon’s refusal was a “stand on principle for what he sees as the integrity of the Sex Pistols legacy and fought for what he believed and continues to believe was right.” The statement also alleges that the band had a unanimous decision-making basis for 23 years until 1998 when they switched to majority rules. “For more than 23 years, the Sex Pistols have operated on the basis of unanimous decision making. The Disney production is the first time that the unanimous approach has been ignored.”
The statement also clarifies that Lydon is not part of the mini-series and has no input on it and ends with words by Lydon himself.
“I am the lead singer and songwriter, frontman, image, the lot, you name it. I put it there. How is that not relevant? It is dumbfounding to me. It is so destructive to what the band is and so I fear that the whole project might be extremely negative,” he writes. “How can anyone think that this can proceed without consulting me and deal with my personal life in this, and my issues in this, without any meaningful contact with me before the project is announced to the world. I don’t think there are even words that I can put forward to explain quite how disingenuous this is. As I said in the lyrics of The Order of Death, This is what you want, this is what you get…”
Photo credit: David Uzzardi
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