The Flowers of Romance

The Flowers Of Romance is the third studio album by Public Image Ltd., released in the spring of 1981 by Warner Bros. Records in North America and Virgin Records elsewhere. With bassist Jah Wobble long gone from the band, and drummer Martin Atkins splitting his time between PiL and another band, Brian Brain, drums and percussion became the primary pulse of PiL’s music, replacing Wobble’s trademark reggae-influenced bass of the first two albums. Atkins’s drums are heard on five of the original album’s nine cuts, with Levene handling the rest (both Levene and Atkins are playing on “Under The House”) and Lydon banging on anything he could get his hands on as percussion during the sessions, including instruments not meant to be banged on (for example, a banjo is heard being throttled with a drumstick on “Phenagen”). Lydon also made his most deliberate instrumental contributions to the Flowers sessions, including playing sax and violin on the title track.