Announced in March 1996 following speculation and criticism from the band's former manager Malcolm McLaren and a reviewer for The Times, the tour was conducted for financial reasons and named after a 1976 Daily Express headline.
Their Finsbury Park appearance was filmed and released as Filthy Lucre Live, while their dates in Ireland were cancelled on moral grounds and their Roskilde Festival performance was truncated after the band were bottled.
[4] The band split up in January 1978 after a concert at Winterland Ballroom, with Rotten changing his name back to John Lydon and declining to perform any Sex Pistols songs for several years afterward.
[19] In a January 2019 NME interview, Skin of Skunk Anansie stated that she did not enjoy touring with the Sex Pistols due to the racism administered by audiences and criticised Rotten for his failure to address the matter.
[7] MJ of Melody Maker compared their Phoenix Festival performance to a cabaret show and Rotten to a "pink and green-haired Liza Minnelli",[7] while the NME described the band as "bloated, dilapidated dinosaurs".
He also criticised Goldfinger for delivering "a half-hearted set that couldn't have interested the audience any less" and described Gravity Kills as "a weak and trendy Nine Inch Nails rip-off whose hyperactive keyboardist should be given a sedative, followed by many piano lessons".
[16] Writing retrospectively, The Herald wrote in June 2007 that the band's efforts were "a bit like watching grandpa attempt to emulate Eminem after a one too may sherries on Christmas day" [sic],[23] however Andy Greene of Rolling Stone was more positive in January 2013, describing the shows as "absolutely explosive".
[9] Reviewing Filthy Lucre Live, The Independent favourably compared Rotten with Roy Chubby Brown and wrote that the album "springs from the speakers with more spunk and drive than we have any right to expect, sounding just as angry as a two-decade grudge should".