Former Sex Pistols frontman John Lydon, aka Johnny Rotten, has lashed out at his ex-bandmates touring with singer Frank Carter, describing the combination as “karaoke.”

In January, the iconic British punk band announced they’d be touring Australia, New Zealand, and the UK. Sex Pistols Featuring Frank Carter first played shows together last August for charity.

For that event, they performed the iconic LP Never Mind The Bollocks in its entirety, which they’ll also perform on their upcoming tour. The band’s current line-up comprises Carter – of The Rattlesnakes and Gallows fame – along with original Sex Pistols members Steve Jones, Glen Matlock, and Paul Cook.

In a new interview with British publication The i Paper, Lydon expressed distaste for his former bandmates touring with Carter, saying it “pissed [him] off” and resembled “karaoke.”

“When I first heard that the Sex Pistols were touring this year without me, it pissed me off,” he began. “It annoyed me. I just thought, ‘They’re absolutely going to kill all that was good with the Pistols by eliminating the point and the purpose of it all.’ I didn’t write those words lightly.”

He continued, “They’re trying to trivialise the whole show to get away with karaoke, but in the long term, I think you’ll see who has the value and who doesn’t. I’ve never sold my soul to make a dollar. It’s the Catholic in me – that guilt I don’t want to trip.”

Lydon also outlined his feelings about the matter in another recent interview with Classic Album Review. He said, “I wrote the fucking songs, didn’t I? I gave them the image. I was the frontman. I am the voice, what made the whole world sing. And now you’re going out, as they did the year before with Billy Idol. It’s just karaoke, really.”

Sex Pistols Featuring Frank Carter’s Australian tour begins at Melbourne’s Festival Hall on Saturday, 5 April, before heading to Adelaide’s Hindley Street Music Hall on Sunday, 6 April, Sydney’s Hordern Pavilion on Tuesday, 8 April, Brisbane’s Fortitude Music Hall on Wednesday, 9 April, and concludes at Fremantle Prison on Friday, 11 April. You can find tickets via the Live Nation website.

Lydon and his other band, Public Image Ltd. (PiL), will tour across Europe and the UK from May to August.