John Lydon: ”God Save The Queen’ has done wonders for this country’ – video

'It was an incredible achievement for a record to be discussed openly in the Houses Of Parliament,' says singer

Former Sex Pistols frontman John Lydon has insisted that the band’s notorious single ‘God Save The Queen’ has “done wonders for this country”.

In a video interview with NME.COM discussing the making of the track, which you can watch by scrolling down to the bottom of the page and clicking, the singer said that he considered the song to be an “incredible achievement”.

Lydon – who revealed that he had written the song’s lyrics in one morning while eating “a can of baked beans on toast” – said:

I’m very proud of the achievements in that record, it’s done wonders for this country.

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He went on to add: “It’s musically timeless, although it absolutely encapsulates that period and free spirit of teenage angst and rebellion. But it’s bigger than that. It’s braver. It’s by far the hardest thing to have done initially: it was a full-on challenge to the establishment, and I meant it to be so.

“I knew it would get me into all kinds of hell on earth, and I was fully prepared for that,” he continued. “To me, it was an incredible achievement for a record to be discussed openly in the Houses of Parlimaent under the Traitors And Treasons Act.”

The Public Image Ltd. singer also insisted that today’s crop of musicians could learn from the song, stating: “The lesson being to pop bands, even to this current day – and you know who you are – why aren’t you putting together songs that actually mean something?

“Why aren’t you solving the problems out there?,” he added. “You’ve got to hit the problems on the head. That’s how you make a great record, and that’s why people acknowledge you.”

Earlier this week (September 24), a new super deluxe boxset of the band’s debut LP ‘Never Mind The Bollocks…’ was released to celebrate the album’s 35th anniversary which includes music, videos, interviews pictures and replica memorabilia. Lydon, however, distanced himself from the reissue, stating: “It’s so ridiculous. They don’t realise they’re actually killing the fucking spirit of the thing. This is not KISS.”

Public Image Ltd. released their latest album ‘This Is PiL’ in May of this year. The LP, which was the follow-up to the band’s 1992 effort ‘That What Is Not’, was their first official studio album in 20 years and was released through their own PiL Official label.

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