Punk icon wants a duet with Taylor Swift despite once calling her ‘incredibly dull’ (2025)

Punk icon Johnny Rotten has changed his mind about Taylor Swift and even wants to work with the pop megastar.

The estranged frontman of Sex Pistols is open to doing a duet with Swift despite previously bashing her and her music, The Mirror reported.

“Those that do that (kind of music) like Taylor, they do it very well,” Rotten told the outlet. “There was a period in music about 10 years ago when they were really out to kind of get her. I just thought all the boyfriends she dissed (on her songs), she deserves a go at me. Imagine that duet?

Rotten, who is now performing under his birth name John Lydon, told NME in February that Swift is “incredibly dull.”

“There’s a whole history of that kind of singer in America: the pop teenage trivia thing. What she’s grown into is too elaborate and she’s trapped by not meaning to annoy her fanbase,” Lydon told the outlet.

“No really, it’s just daft. She’s got no place to go, so it’s gone into swishy ballroom-gown vibe,” he continued. ”She’s going to be another one of those that ends up in Vegas, because that’s the only place left and that’s no future at all, is it?”

Swift is not the only celebrity that Lydon has criticized. In the same NME interview, the 69-year-old said he “doesn’t like Lady Gaga as a human being.”

“I don’t think she projects anything healthy. I don’t feel any soul. I don’t feel her heart in it. It seems a shame. She should have another side to her,” Lydon told the outlet.

The punk singer is set to embark on his solo tour, titled “This Is Not The Last Tour,” this May. Meanwhile, his Sex Pistols bandmates will embark their first U.S. tour in more than two decades this September.

The tour is the band’s first time since 2003, according to the Associated Press. The new shows will feature original band members Steve Jones, Paul Cook and Glen Matlock along with singer Frank Carter who will replace Lydon. Fans can shop for tickets using reliable third-party ticket sellers like StubHub, VividSeats and SeatGeek.

Lydon previously told The Independent that he would “never” rejoin the “woke” group “not after what I consider their dirty deeds.”

“They’ve killed the content, or done their best to, and turned the whole thing into a rubbish, childishness, and that’s unacceptable,” Lydon told the news outlet. “Sorry, I’m not going to give a helping hand to this any longer, as far as I am concerned, I am the Pistols, and they’re not.”

The rest of the band’s members have shared a similar sentiment about playing with Lydon.