Great Sex Pistols' 30th anniversary article on Rolling Stone Web site

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

a lengthy excerpt from the new issue coming out june 15th
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"I think I brought a bit of barefaced honesty to music, which I don't think was there before. The closest that would describe what I was feeling, and what my culture was, would be John Lennon's 'Working Class Hero.' It was about complacency: 'No, I don't know my place, and nobody's going to tell me what it is, either, I'll work that out for myself, thank you -- not happy to be a slave worker, I've got a brain. Yes, I've got a shovel, but I've got a brain, too, and I like to use it.' Still shoveling shit, though, really." At the last bit of wordplay he seemed pleased.
A young woman on the sidewalk asked for a cigarette, and he snapped, "No, buy your own," before seizing the occasion to address a bee that was apparently in his boater. "I don't like kids who can afford things begging. That's an abuse of you." It was one more edict in an afternoon's trove of amiable, punning tirades about Green Day, the Hall of Fame, Virgin Records, Courtney Love, zoos, Malcolm McLaren, flared pants, face-lifts, Catholic school and the Ramones, each riff spinning out familiarly in the benign Pacific breeze. "Inducted," he said, apropos the Hall of Fame. "That's what you do to central heating pipes, you induct them. It's the music industry perpetuating the penguin suit and dickey bow, and it's unacceptable. It's not free-form. It's anti-social, really. It's us versus them, and us will win. 'Us' as in U.S."

You're a moralist, I said -- because that, after all, was another overlooked dimension of the Sex Pistols.

He looked offended, but just for a blink. "No, values. I do this because I have values. I would have used the word 'morals' years ago, but I would have used it badly. 'Morals' is religious-based, and I certainly don't want anything to do with that."


more:
http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/14980299/the_sex_pistols_still_rotten_thirteen_years_after_their_debut