told you point blank that if you came from the wrong side of the tracks...then you had no hope in hell and no career prospects at all. Out of that came pretentious moi and the Sex Pistols and then a whole bunch of copycat wankers after us. Journalist Nick Kent of the New Musical Express (NME) jammed occasionally with the band, but left upon Lydon's recruitment. "When I came along, I took one look at him and said, 'No. That has to go,'" Lydon later explained. "He's never written a good word about me ever since." In September, McLaren again helped hire a private rehearsal space for the group, who had been practising in pubs. Cook, who had a full-time job he was loath to give up, was making noises about quitting. According to Matlock's later description, Cook "created a smokescreen" by claiming Jones was not skilled enough to be the band's sole guitarist. An advertisement was placed in Melody Maker for a "Whizz Kid Guitarist. Not older than 20. Not worse looking than Johnny Thunders" (referring to the lead guitarist of the New York Dolls, and later the Heartbreakers). Most of those who auditioned were incompetent, but in McLaren's view, the process created a new sense of solidarity among the four band members. Steve New was considered the one talented guitarist to have tried out and the band invited him to join. Jones was improving rapidly, however, and the band's developing sound had no room for the technical lead work at which New was adept. He departed after a month. Lydon had been rechristened "Johnny Rotten" by Jones, apparently because of his bad teeth. The band also settled on a name. After considering options such as Le Bomb, Subterraneans, the Damned, Beyond, Teenage Novel, Kid Gladlove, and Crème de la Crème, they decided on Sex Pistols—a shortened form of the name they had apparently been working under informally. McLaren later said the name derived "from the idea of a pistol, a pin-up, a young thing, a better-looking assassin". Not given to modesty, false or otherwise, he added: "[I] launched the idea in the form of a band of kids who could be perceived as being bad." The group began writing original material: Rotten was the lyricist and Matlock the primary melody writer (though their first collaboration, "Pretty Vacant", had a complete lyric by Matlock, which Rotten tweaked a bit);