Anger is an Energy: My Life Uncensored

by John Lydon

I love my Pubic Hairs Limited. We totally challenged what everybody considered music to be at that time. It fundamentally changed the concept of music forever. In fact, I changed music twice.

My idea for the lead role was Justin Timberlake. I thought, ‘That would work.’ Because Justin at the time was out there, but he was coming to a rough end in his music. He was getting bored and starting to do acting, and he hadn’t got any good roles yet. I thought this would be tailor-made for him, being so fluffy and nice and kind of simple in his approach to life. I thought this would be a real challenge for him to take on, the role of Johnny Rotten, and there was every chance he could sing the songs.

The twins’ names were some ridiculousness that Ari came up with. She didn’t want a name from the Bible, so she found Pedro and Pablo, which is indeed Spanish for Peter and Paul. Aaaargh!

While we were running around up there, I interviewed Aidan Quinn and James Woods, who were a lot of fun, then there was Cyndi Lauper and Christopher Walken – I didn’t have much good to say to either of them two. I also managed to miss one actor. He’s very big and popular, he’d even won an Oscar in that period – Kevin Spacey – but I didn’t know who he was. I since found out, and I really love his films! They say he has a photographic memory, he can remember dialogue on one read – well, let’s hope he don’t remember me.

The idea of losing Nora is unbearable. And we’re coming of the age now that we have to consider death, because all my peers are dying around me left, right and centre! I look at all of them, and I think, none of them have done anything like what I’ve got up to, and they’re all kicking the bucket rather sharpish. I must have sustainability, and that has to be because of the positive influence of having Nora in my life. She is such a positive person. Our worry is, how we are going to manage to die together, because if one goes before the other, it’s going to be absolutely murder on the survivor. But the way we look at it, in terms of statistics, women have a greater longevity, so we should die at exactly the same time. That would be just perfect.