Rocktrospectiva: The Raw "This Is What You Want...This Is What you Get Turns 40

 

Released on 6 July 1984, "This Is What You Want...This Is What You Get" was the fourth studio album by English post-punk band Public Image Ltd., the album spawned the singles "Bad Life" & "This Is Not A Love Song", the origins of the record goes back in early November 1982, when the band announced the imminent release of a new single, "Blue Water", and a six-track mini album, "You Are Now Entering a Commercial Zone", on their new label, which was supposed to release the unused music for the film "Copkiller". But this did not happen, with the band instead continuing to record a full-length album at Park South Studios.

 

Back in mid-1983, in PiL's absence, Keith Levene took the unfinished album tapes and did his own mix, he flew over to London and presented them to Richard Branson as the finished new PiL album for Virgin Records: Commercial Zone. On the other hand, John Lydon decided to completely abandon the tapes and re-record the whole album from scratch with session musicians, and this new version of Commercial Zone became This Is What You Want... This Is What You Get in 1984. 

 

The album opened with "Bad Life" the track changed into "Mad Max" so there were two sets of lyrics for the same song, gave it to Keith Levene some writing credit like many of the tracks who were written before he quit, "This Is Not A Love Song" originally titled "Love Song", a sort of rare and response song to that constant request from the label to deliver a hit, in this case why don't you write a love song?, ok, there yoy go but this is not a love song, "Tie Me To The Length Of That", this was about being born, "The Pardon", about people's lack of desire for change, "Where Are You" about not receiving anything no feedback of nothing, "1981" about what John was singing about, this is from 1981, and "The Order Of Death", which is a reference to the film "Copkiller" aka "The Order Of Death", the line "This is what you want..This is what you get" gives the album its title, appears in the film, about this last track, it was supposed the band to score the soundtrack for the Italian crime thriller "Copkiller" from 1983 starring Harvey Keitel, so Lydon, Levene and Atkins work together on this. 

The critical reception was mixed, some critics considered it as a step down from the band's early efforts, called tentative and the least powerful and intense album in PiL's catalogue, even though "This Is Not A Love Song" still stand as a standard for the band. 

 

This Is Want You Want...This Is What You Get Track List: 

1. Bad Life

2. This Is Not A Love Song

3. Solitaire

4. Tie Me To The Length Of That

5. The Pardon

6. Where Are You?

7. 1981

8. The Order Of Death