A star is born, but instead of emerging into the world beaming for the cameras, he spits and snarls and announces his intention to destroy the establishment via the medium of rock records. But who is it? Is it Bob Geldof or John Lydon?
Citizens of Boomtown: The Story of the Boomtown Rats — another in the ongoing trend of the BBC screening films that are fundamentally ads for a band’s new album — made the case for Geldof, suggesting he and his bandmates singlehandedly dragged Ireland into the modern age (the Daily Telegraph’s chief rock critic popped up to say they were the first roar of the Celtic Tiger). The Public Image is Rotten, which was shown in a few cinemas in 2018 but is now streaming on Vimeo, traced Lydon’s path from the Pistols through Public Image Ltd.
As one former PiL band member notes: ‘It just became a drip, drip, drip of shit’
Both films suffered some of the same shortcomings.
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