Completing the transition of Public Image Ltd. from abrasive and avant-garde rock to a much more immediately approachable affair, Album – possessing one of the most well-known album sleeves of the 1980s, with intentionally generic packaging matched by retitlings as Cassette and Compact Disc depending on the medium – was John Lydon backed by a slick Bill Laswell-assembled studio band featuring Ginger Baker, Ryiuchi Sakamoto and Steve Vai among others. But they aimed for the commercial jugular and found it, with the smash single “Rise” almost being Lydon’s own U2 anthem. 

– Ned Raggett