Public Image Ltd are set to tour and record a new album in 2011, John Lydon has revealed. Three months after the death of his stepdaughter, the Slits' Ari Up, Lydon is also considering reuniting the Sex Pistols – and even recording new material. "If [the Pistols] want me to go out on tour with them I'm happy to oblige," he said, "until three weeks later when I'm not."
Lydon last talked about a PiL comeback album in the spring of 2010, saying it depended on the success of a US tour. But everything changed with the death of Ari Up. "It hurt us greatly," Lydon told Stereogum, referring to himself and his wife, Nora Forster. "I don't like to go on about death, but ... it's been a very difficult time. I would have been recording with PiL but after that happened ... there's just no way I could have gone into a recording studio ... Ari was [my wife's] only daughter. I just can't leave her alone with the grief right now ... I have to come to grips with all that and start working again when I'm good and ready. I hope people can respect that."
Despite this request for patience, Lydon intimated that new PiL material and tour dates are forthcoming. He has also been considering other projects and raised the possibility of writing new material with the band that gave him his start. "Because I've been able to get PiL back together – and because I've really been in a songwriting mode – I can now look back on the Pistols and imagine writing with them, too," he said. "I wouldn't have been able to think about that if I hadn't gotten the PiL thing going again. [But] for me, there wouldn't be a PiL if it weren't for them lads in the Pistols, so I feel responsive to their needs. That's how it is."
Lydon is currently promoting Mr Rotten's Scrapbook, a collection of anecdotes, photographs and other material from Lydon's 40-year career.
