Sex Pistols legend John Lydon, aka Johnny Rotten, has been competing on The Masked Singer as "The Jester", it was revealed on Wednesday night's (November 10) double-elimination Group A semifinals.

According to Billboard's Gil Kaufman, "The Jester" came in and ripped through Alice Cooper's "School's Out" and then really switched things up with a down-home cover of the Soggy Bottom Boys' bluegrass jam "Man Of Constant Sorrow".

The judges didn't know what to do with this oddball character, with Robin Thicke praising him for bringing some "metal" edge to the typically poppy prime-time series and the panel swinging wildly with their guesses. Their off-the-mark suggestions ranged from Def Leppard singer Joe Elliott to the Red Hot Chili Peppers' Flea, Ozzy Osbourne, Jack Black, Howard Stern and always-wrong Ken Jeong's suggestions: SpaceX billionaire boss Elon Musk or mean reality judge Simon Cowell.

They were all, of course, terribly, terribly wrong. In the end, when "The Jester" head came off, the man inside the mask was none other than legendarily irascible punk progenitor John Lydon of the Sex Pistols and PiL. Though known as snot-rocket-shooting, journalist-baiting, queen-thrashing, anarchy-advocating sourpuss alter ego Johnny Rotten in the Pistols and a progressive post-punk noisemaker in Public Image Ltd., Lydon, 65, did not sign on to perform on the family-friendly show as some kind of postmodern joke.

In fact, the flame-haired firestarter tells Billboard he actually agreed to strut his stuff in the hilariously weird harlequin costume for the sweetest possible reason. We spoke with Lydon before his elimination to find out what motivated him, why his beloved bejeweled codpiece didn't make it to air, and what feelings a 21-year-old Johnny Rotten would have said about such anarchy in the US.

Read more at Billboard.com, and watch some video below: