Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Watching John Lydon on stage surely has to go down as one of the most singular pleasures you are ever likely to have in life.  For those who grew up with him as part of their musical heritage or simply because he made a certain television programme watchable for the time he was on there, John Lydon is an iconic man to behold on stage and in life. For those that made their way to the O2 Academy in Liverpool to witness PIL give a sensational account of themselves, that living legend grinned down at the audience and gave them a night to relish.

There was something different to the man though on an evening in which the sweat coming off all the performers was only beaten by the tremendous downpour and large storm the city suffered whilst PIL were in town. With a BMI Icon Award for Song Writing having been presented to the much loved front man the previous day, the twinkle in his eyes, the large smile that used be so well hidden in his youth was positively beautiful. The man may not like that but to his fans, the fact that he was awarded the accolade, only showed what they had already known, that he is a poet  of the highest order. Not in the sense that many would sit and take in with a cup of tea whilst they have the vicar or Katy Perry round, but in the proper sense, in the Ginsberg mould, a man unafraid to let loose and be seen for what he is and woe betide anyone who doesn’t agree. No that it matters if you agreed or not, for Mr. Lydon would more than likely look at them with that wonderful icy stare and make them quiver at the knees. A modern poet who rants at the setting of the sun and has many fans backing him to the hilt.

With the stage presence of a man possessed with absolute assuredness, John Lydon and PIL played the crowd tracks that were greeted with the same wide open mouths as a five year old being handed the keys to the castle at Christmas. With songs such as Albatross, Love Song, Warrior, This Is What You Want…This Is What You Get and the outstanding Rise  being performed, if anybody would have complained, they would have been in a minority of one.

John Lydon has been called a national treasure, watching the man bathe in a crowd’s delighted roar of approval and yet still having the humility to suggest that the evening wouldn’t be as good as people might have expected only goes to show that the man and his music is and always will be legendary.

Ian D. Hall