Metal Box

The opening song, the near-legendary Albatross (which is almost eleven minutes of Beckett-like lyrical ruminations, over screaming guitars, a heavy and monotonous bass-line and some trance-like percussion) picks up where Theme (the opening track of their first album) left off, giving us more of Lydon's existential anguish and torment, as he screams about death and all manner of other related-horrors that infuse the album with a bleak, gothic and claustrophobic sound. Unlike the first album, the emphasis here is more on sound rather than song, so there's no real standout singles like Annalisa or Public Image, instead, we get longer tracks with much reliance on layered instrumentation. This is very much a precursor to those Radiohead classics, Kid A and Amnesiac, with PiL creating a landscape of cold synthesisers, an aching violin and that great integrated sound of Keith Lavene's scratchy, distorted guitar and the dub pounding bass of Jah Wobble.

This is dark music, as bleak as albums like Tilt, OK Computer, Regeneration, Blood on the Tracks and The Final Cut... although it has a sound that is unlike any of those albums, or indeed, anything else you've ever heard. The album progresses on from the epic Albatross onto the dark Memories, which sets Lydon's grating vocals and doom-laden lyrics against a backdrop of distorted, echoed guitars and a funky monotonous bass-line, which is further complemented by an Eastern-tinged and somewhat alien violin (or possibly keyboard) refrain wailing away in the background. It leads us perfectly into my favourite song on the album, the mesmerising Swan Lake.

The production here is fantastic, with the band retaining a minimalism, which builds towards that feeling of suffocating claustrophobia, with the actual distance of the instruments from one another becoming completely apparent through the use of different recording techniques. This creates an even more alienated sound, which works wonderfully with something like Swan Lake... which begins with that unmistakable Keith Lavene guitar sound and Wobble's bobbing bass. Like much of the album, the song becomes a testament to Lydon's despair following the death of his mother (and possibly some of the lingering pain left over from the death of Sid Vicious also), with lines like "I see it in your eyes" and that piercing closing refrain "words cannot express" really encapsulating (along with Lydon's vocals) the true pain and numbness of grief. The song is a definite band highlight, with Levene's guitar playing (sometime layering three of four different styled guitar parts over one another to create a sound that is beautiful, yet dissonant at the same time) at an absolute peak... whilst Jeannette Lee's violin is purposely piercing to match those swirling synths.

The next two songs (Poptones and Careering) move further away from the more rock-like sound of something like Albatross and Swan Lake and more towards absolute noise. The former is a particularly abrasive parable about a young girl being driven out into the middle of nowhere, presumably by an older man with the intention of rape... the music becoming as ugly as the subject matter as the song intensifies ("hindsight does me no good, standing naked in the back of the woods... the cassette played, poptones!!"). It's one of the most abrasive pieces of music ever composed... something that becomes even more disturbing when coupled with the bleak lyrics and Lydon's cold, emotionless delivery. Careering is even darker still, with Wobble's bass taking a greater precedence alongside that mechanical, almost industrial percussion. The lyrics are even more like Beckett, seemingly cut up and repositioned at random to create a brutal portrait, which never entirely becomes clear.

After the lengthy and agitated No Birds the album moves into the most Can-sounding track on the album, the three-minute instrumental piece, Graveyard. The rest of the album's second half continues seamlessly, furthering the bleak and mocking tone of the first half with scalding tracks like The Suit, the bombastic Chant and the surprisingly haunting and very beautiful closing track, Radio 4 (...a heavenly wash of beautiful synths and a hint of real bass). This is the perfect way to end the album, offering a sense of hope after eleven tracks of bleak beauty... and it's all the proof we need to see that this incarnation of PiL were one of the most exciting, important and extraordinary bands of all time.

After Metal Box, the band would undergo a change of personnel and produce the even more abrasive percussion based album The Flowers of Romance (...a record I still don't fully appreciate) before another change in line-up would turn the band into a vehicle for Lydon's personal take on 80's indie-pop. However, Metal Box remains a testament to the band when they were at their utmost creative peak... and, in my opinion, is one of the most original and remarkable albums ever produced.

This was the last album proper from the great PIL line-up, generally centred around Lydon, Keith Levene & Jah Wobble; though Wobble's Betryal, PIL's follow-ups Flowers of Romance/This is What You Want... & Levene's Commercial Zone are all worth picking up. Lydon since those has been very patchy- apart from the great Baambaata & Leftfield collaborations & the odd track like This Is Not a Love Song, Fishing & The Body...

The era of post-punk was one that produced some of the most interesting music of all time, easily the most fertile period in British music. Taking the ethos of punk, the influences of dub & burgeoning electronics, often with an anti-establishment persepective, many UK bands began to push the envelope. PIL were at the forefront of this shift- shunning conventional live performances, wearing suits (pre-empting Blur & Dexys) & being antithetical to the uniformity of punk sold out. Metal Box is contender for the greatest album produced in this era, from the late 70s to early 80s- though albums such as Entertainment!, 154, Cut, Y, Secondhand Daylight, Closer, Dub Housing, Reproduction, This Heat!, Sandinista!, Remain in Light etc should be acknowledged...

These 12-tracks were actually a double album, the ultimate PIL statement which I believe was not greeted with the same critical fervour it is recalled today (don't blame me, I'm too young!). It stands up there with the greatest inventive guitar music of the last few decades, from Captain Beefheart & Can to more recent acts like Mission of Burma, Slint, Butthole Surfers, Tortoise & Clinic. It's an album that has a sybaratic quality, the strange chemistry of dub, alien guitar & alienated vocals works perfectly. The dub-influences on punk are apparent throughout, especially on tracks like instrumental Socialist, Graveyard & the brilliant Careering. PIL's debut was brilliant, but this is their definitive statement & the best thing Lydon had ever been on...

Personally, I detected a Beckettian-vibe to earlier tracks like Theme & opener Albatross (over ten-minutes) certainly continues this, with a tedious cursed worldview. Lydon & PIL rejecting what went before- this was the year in which the remains of the Pistols fell apart & the other John known as Sid died in dire/exploitative circumstances. Lydon was elsewhere & also dealing with personal loss in his own family, which he addresses in Death Disco (aka Swan Lake)- a moving track with sublime keyboards. Though it doesn't go on long enough; quite simply this is Chic in Hell- Lydon noting that "words cannot express..."

Memories is like prime Pistols (Bodies, No Feelings), but honed & even more potent with the musical assault of Levene & Wobble (& whoever else). The concluding part of the album is even more immense, from No Birds- with its horrifying perception of the modern world ("I like the illusion...of privacy...A caviar of silent dignity...A layered mass of subtle props...this could be heaven")- which piddles over later attempts to make similar statements from bands like Blur & Primal Scream. Chant is the ultimate Krautrock-inflection on punk, as great as something extreme on Tago Mago- Lydon & co in a trance of repetition...Radio 4 is the final track, an instrumental that might have been intended as a joke, but with its keyboard refrain & Wobble's original bassplaying feels touching...

Metal Box is quite simply one of the greatest albums ever produced, more worthy of being in those endless Top 100 lists than retro stuff like The Stone Roses & Definitely Maybe. It's easy to see why Massive Attack referenced PIL on their debut album Blue Lines- though if this was a Massive album, it would be Mezzanine. I don't care if this line-up of PIL reform as the PIstols did (it's unlikely)- but this album remains in print, with the greatest cover/packaging an album has ever come with. & it's an album that no one should be without...forget the Pistols, get the real thing instead-