After all these years, John Lydon hasn’t received a word from his old Sex Pistols bandmates.

“I expected some kind of connection when [my wife] Nora died [in 2023], but nothing,” he recently told The Times. Lydon’s wife, Nora Forster, who was by his side for 44 years, passed away in 2023 due to Alzheimer’s complications.

While the Sex Pistols, which included Lydon from 1975 to 1978 and again briefly in 1996, didn’t contact him, he still holds “a very great fondness for the chaps from that period.”

He did, however, clarify, “What they evolved—or devolved—into since is another consequence.”

Lydon’s comments come after a long history of clashes with guitarist Steve Jones, bassist Glen Matlock and drummer Paul Cook. In 2021, Jones and Cook sued him over the use of Sex Pistols songs in Danny Boyle’s Pistol, which drew from Jones’ memoirs.

Lydon lost the lawsuit, with the musicians arguing that a “majority rule agreement” allowed them to override his objection. The trio has since revived the band without him, bringing Frank Carter on as the new vocalist.

When questioned by The Times about a possible reunion with his former bandmates, Lydon’s response was final: “No.”

He added that, despite his public objections, he had hoped the Pistol series would be good, but in the end, he called it “terrible.”

“Something in me wanted it to be good, but it might as well have been about the Partridge Family,” Lydon said. “I don’t like anything to do with it because I wasn’t asked to contribute.”

It’s no shock to fans that the other Sex Pistols have largely shunned Lydon in recent years. In a Rolling Stone interview, Jones even said he tried to break his own wrist to cut short a 2008 reunion tour with Lydon, because, “I didn’t ever want to f****** hang out with [Lydon] again.”

In 2017, Cook ruled out any reunion with Lydon for the Never Mind the Bollocks 50thanniversary tour.

“We wouldn’t want to do it, and John definitely wouldn’t want to do it after what’s happened,” he said in the Rolling Stone interview. “So, that’s it. And I don’t want to do it with John anyway.”

This story was originally published by Parade on Dec 30, 2025, where it first appeared in the News section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.