Sex Pistols - Punk 77 (original) (raw)

Johnny Rotten – Vocals, Steve Jones – Guitar, Glen Matlock (then Sid Vicious) – Bass and Paul Cook – Drums

The Sex Pistols are the most recognisable band name and members in punk rock. The first and the best. This band alone stood in the centre of the maelstrom with their manager Malcolm McLaren conducting (he thought) before they all lost the plot in a welter of acrimony and chaos.

McLaren is the link between British and American punk having (mis)managed the New York Dolls and absorbed the influences around that time like Richard Hell etc but he was already advanced with his shop designing with partner Vivienne Westwood clothes that provoked and made a statement and forced a generation gap. What pulled it all together

What pulled it all together was the Sex Pistols. While he may have encouraged the band and been looking for a more street Bay City Rollers, what he didn’t anticipate was his charges developed their own music, lyrics & attitude and in many ways Johnny Rotten was the difference. Sneering vocals, incendiary guitars and a desire to shock and provoke was something not seen before. Add to it the confrontational fashion element and constant controversy and you had the complete package that exploded like a bomb in a crowded room.

Hundreds of bands formed inspired by seeing or hearing the band’s music and look that became known as punk rock and that even to this day has the power to shock and awe.

And in a surreal twist of fate all these years later, Steve Jones’s autobiography was turned into a mini-series by none other than ….. Disney! It’s actually quite good and the trailer is below.

There’s one Sex Pistols site that rules them all and it’s here

It all starts with a group of friends, Wally (Warwick) Nightingale, Paul Cook and petty thief/broken home escapee Steve Jones who form a band, because Wally has a guitar, and call themselves The Strand with Jones on vocals. Songs from this time include Did You No Wrong which is Wally’s one uncredited song albeit with rewritten lyrics that the Pistols used.

The event that caused the band to mutate was when Jones started to hang out at the Let It Rock shop in the King’s Road occasionally pilfering clothes but finding a mentor in owner Malcolm McLaren who with partner Vivienne Westwood is honing ideas around clothes and fashion as provocative statements. Let it Rock will become Sex in 1974 which as a statement was provocative in itself!

Let it Rock became Sex in 1974 then Seditionaries in 1976

McLaren is initially only vaguely interested in the band but a worker at the shop, Glen Matlock, joins the band on bass and the band becomes The Swankers. McLaren meanwhile hotfoots it to the USA, and having become enamoured with the New York Dolls, becomes their manager until they break up. He tries to persuade Sylvan and Richard Hell to come to England to join the band but instead brings back Sylvan’s white Gibson guitar and gives it to Jones. While McLaren is away, his friend Bernie Rhodes mentors and encourages the band.

Other notables to audition for the band Fhaebhean Kwest who would later feature in Raped and Steve New in the Rich Kids. Also approached but turned it down was Midge Ure then fronting boyband Slik who would also end up in the Rich Kids.

By now Wally had been evicted from the band and Jones and band have a home in a rehearsal studio in Denmark Street. Jones is now on guitar. The final piece of the puzzle is completed when Rotten is spotted hanging out the shop and is famously auditioned miming to Alice Cooper’s 18 with a mop.

Apparently, Vivienne had suggested John’s friend Sid Vicious, but Malcolm got it wrong. The other three straight away dislike Lydon but he’s the one and is renamed on account of his rotten teeth. The name Sex Pistols comes courtesy of McLaren and features on a t-shirt Rhodes designed.

Their first gig is supporting Bazooka Joe in November 1975 which at that time feature the future Adan Ant and which results in an altercation and the plug pulled on the band.

Playing near Bromley they pick up Simon Barker as a fan who tells his friends who will become known as the Bromley Contingent and include Billy Idol, Siouxsie, Steve Severin, Berlin, Simone, Debbie Wilson and This group of friends are into Roxy Music, The Velvets etc, gay clubs and already dress outrageously and visit McLaren’s shop.

The Bromley Contingent

McLaren disrupts the accepted booking of bands route and they just turn up at other people’s gigs pretending to be the support act. They also have several altercations when playing with other more established pub circuit bands like Eddie & The Hot Rods at The Marquee (February 1976). They play up in Manchester with Slaughter & The Dogs and Buzzcocks and find some common ground with those bands especially the latter.

In April they pick up an ex-hippy soundman Dave Goodman who play a part in developing their sound. April also sees a fight in the audience caused by Viviene Westwood and 3 of the band join in at the Nashville.

They begin to pick up some music press and other bands seeing them play are influenced and energized like Joe Strummer who leaves his band the 101ers (after they support the Sex Pistols at the 100 Club in June 1976) and joins The Clash under Bernie Rhodes.

‘DON’T LOOK OVER YOUR SHOULDER, BUT THE SEX PISTOLS ARE COMING’

We’re not into music. We’re into chaos.

More violence in July as Sid Vicious, friend of the band, chain whips NME journalist Nick Kent at the 100 Club in response to Kent publicly hitting his girlfriend Chrissie Hynde in the shop SEX. The same month sees seven songs laid down in demo form by Dave Goodman

There is now a scene growing and McLaren puts on the 100 Club Punk Festival in July 1976 which features Subway Sect, The Vibrators, The Clash, Buzzcocks, The Damned and formed for the night Siouxsie & The Banshees. There’s violence at the gig which makes the press when a glass is thrown that shatters in a girl’s eye and Sid Vicious is arrested.

With the growing publicity about the band record companies circled, but the band opted to sign with the biggest which was EMI in October 1976 and within 2 weeks they recorded their debut single Anarchy In The UK.

So It Goes – Sex Pistols – Flowers Of Romance/Anarchy In The UK 4/8/1976 – “Bakunin would have loved it!”

If things had remained the same then punk would probably would have been a minor ripple and the Sex Pistols a typical band but when someone had the bright idea to put them on a live afternoon TV show with Bill Grundy in place of EMI labelmates Queen, ply them with alcohol and provoke them all hell broke loose as the and let loose a stream of expletives.

It made all the front pages of all the major newspapers and the band and punk were now the major interest and viewed as a major threat polarizing the nation. This single incident arguably did more to spread punk music and fashion and cause bands to form or change than anything else.

While the Sex Pistols are often photographed in McLaren’s and Westwood’s punk clothes, Rotten’s graffitied, bricolage clothes set the DIY standard. Add in to that The Clash’s stencilled slogan, paint-spattered clothes and The Ramones motorcycle leathers, straight jeans and sneakers. Top it off with short razored spiked hair, piercings, studs and swastikas. Same for the girls but often with the St Trinian’s look with graffitied long shirts covering just tights or stockings

The result for the band was to be thrown off EMI with a payoff. The Anarchy In The UK tour with The Heartbreakers and Clash was decimated by local authority bans with the band playing just 3 out of the 19 dates but increased the press coverage.

It also exacerbated internal tensions with Glen Matlock (particularly between him and Rotten) being ousted from the band and friend of Rotten and long time band fan Sid Vicious being his replacement. The fact that Sid could hardly play didn’t matter. He looked the part and acted the part.

The band then signed to A&M with their first release to be God Save The Queen which was pressed up and signed outside Buckingham Palace but were dropped within 5 days as a result of internal pressure. The band was again paid off.

This left them with nowhere to play because of bands and no company to release their records. This was solved though not willingly on the part of McLaren who distrusted Richard Branson by signing to Virgin whom he regarded as a hippy label.

You couldn’t make up the luck for the next event. The delays mean the release of God Save The Queen actually lands smack on the Queen Silver Jubilee. The sing with its cover and adverts complete with safety pin through the queen’s lip means a blanket bang across networks playing it and all large chains refusing to stock or even mention it. De[Depending on how you see it, the record either made #2 or #1. A riverboat gig up the Thames to promote the single ends in police violence as the boat is boarded and gig goers including McLaren arrested and beaten up.

The latter half of 1977 saw Rotten and Cook physically attacked and wounded by unknown assailants and the band safely appear on Top Of The Pops for Pretty Vacant with a video though no one noticed the ‘VaCUNT!’ part of the song. The b side also had one of the most pronounced bits of profanity in its intro.

They appeared under pseudonyms to play and Holidays In The Sun was released (banned in some places because it referenced Belsen) and finally the album Never Mind The Bollocks which in true fashion involved the Police, a court case and the decision the title could be displayed in shops.

On Christmas Day 1977, the band gave what would be their final gig at a charity gig in Huddersfield. McLaren by now had become distracted by a film he had been planning about the band. While he was busy with that, he organized the band to tour the USA. Meanwhile, Sid had become a heroin addict, John had become withdrawn from the rest of the band and Jones and Cook were larging it up rock style. McLaren put the band on in the States going again for maximum publicity by playing inappropriate venues where they were guaranteed to cause trouble, publicity and be in danger. He deliberately kept them away from New York which would have been the most sensible place and San Fransico Winterland Ballroom was where it all famously ended with Rotten intoning at the end of the gig.. “Ever get the feeling you’ve been cheated?”

Descending into farce!

It all then started to descend into cash from chaos. Noone Is Innocent backed with Sid singing My Way (it’s a great single though) came out and made the top 10 in July 1978 with typical controversial furore. There followed a stream of singles all hitting the top 10 as McLaren funded the Great Rock N Roll Swindle directed by Julien Temple which turned out was him retelling the story in his own image. There was also a double album released as well again hitting the top 10.

Meanwhile Rotten had a court injunction forbidding him to use that name went to Jamaica with Don Letts and had a great time, came back and formed the massively influential and amazing Public Image that showed that without him the band would never have been the force it was.

Johnny Rotten and PIL on the roof of his house 1978

Sid turned into a cartoon version of himself along with his doomed lover Nancy Spungeon and depending on what you believe either did or didn’t murder her in the Chelsae Hotel but did then overdose and die on February 2nd 1979.

Jones & Cook continued their ligging ways appearing with whoever would have them from The Clash to Sham 69 to The Greedies to well whoever…. and their own band The Professionals.

Mid 1979 they all woke up and realized McLaren was misusing their money as Lydon took to McLaren to court and the others supported him and the band’s assets were frozen.

And so endeth The Sex Pistols amazing story for our time period.;

Four classic singles and ok 5 if you include My Way on 3 different labels over less than a year. Each single an absolute life-changing classic that defined the punk zeitgeist. Each one is a perfect 7″ package matching the sonic attack on the grooves to what has become picture sleeves as art by Jamie Reid. Each sleeve pointedly has no pictures of the band but straight away recognisable as Sex Pistols singles not least because of the now classic ransom lettering used.

After Holidays In The Sun (when Rotten has left) the quality dips and it becomes a cash in as McLaren gets his film done and the double album of the same name is pretty much raped as a cash cow all under the Sex Pistols moniker. Everything unless stated is on Virgin records.

Every single and album even the shit ones made the top 10 and famously it can be argued that God Save The Queen did actually make #1 in the singles charts. God save the Sex Pistols!

Anarchy In The UK / I Wanna Be Me (EMI November1977)

All hail the Pistols. A kind of lumbering beast of malicious intent. I prefer the version off the Swindle album where Rotten’s vocals are malevolently raw. Described By Captain Sensible as “third rate Bad Company riff” and it perhaps sounds a trite sluggish against New Rose.

Sex Pistols – Anarchy In The UK 1976 08 04 “So It Goes”

God Save The Queen / Did You No Wrong (May 1977)

I don’t care what anyone says. THE greatest punk tune ever. Where astute, sneering, lyrics meet a piledriver riff to create punk’s and The Sex Pistols’ greatest moment. Anger, youth and rebellion. Its all here in spades. On the flip is Did You No Wrong that to my ears still packs a punch tho a trite rocky…”a bog is no place to imagine your face” indeed. GSTQ was wrongly denied its place at #1 in the charts.

Oh where there’s no future how can there be sin
We’re the flowers in the dustbin We’re the poison in the human machine We’re the future ..your future God save the Queen We mean it man We love our Queen God saves.

Pretty Vacant / No Fun (July 1977)

Allegedly based on Abba’s SOS! Classic intro of mounting tension between, guitar, drums and bass before Rotten comes crashing to dispense his version of the blank generation ‘We’re Va-Cunt!’. Superb version of No Fun with a classy “Little bit of fuckology…no fun” spoken intro at the start . First Pistols song to appear on Top Of The Pops with a promo video.

Holidays In The Sun / Satellite (October 1978)

Riff stolen off The Jam ‘In The City‘ blah blah blah. Who gives a toss. From the jackboot stomps at the start to the skull-crushing riff and production, this epic tale of paranoia in East Germany mirrors events at home with the boys unable to play or record through bans or even step outside without fears for their personal safety. On the flip the excellent Satellite is supposedly about Shanne Bradley though have no idea why. Chunky riffs all around and then it’s goodnight Vienna for the band.

Noone Is Innocent / My Way (Virgin June 1978)

Noticeable drop in quality as Ronnie Biggs takes on vocal duties to another great riff. Surpassed though by Sid’s finest moment on the other side as he gives perhaps the best interpretation of My Way in the style of his friend Johnny Rotten. Inspired film sequence for My Way in the Great Rock’N’Roll Swindle.

Something Else / Friggin’ In The Riggin’ (February 1979)

It shouldn’t work but it does. Sid sings Eddie Cochran and does it well basing it on a combination of the two Johnnies – Rotten and Thunders. Enjoy the Legs & Co dancing below from TOTP!

Upping the ante from Bodies is the kids favourite Friggin’ which has just about every swear word in it. So What would be the modern equivalent!

C’Mon Everybody / Watcha Gonna Do About It (June 1979)

Continuing to fill out the Rock N Roll Swindle is Sid doing yet another cover and again Eddie Cochran. Again you can’t fault it but its blatant cash from chaos and there’s even more to come.

Silly Thing / Who Killed Bambi (October 1979)

An actual dial-up in quality. A Steve Jones, tune and lyrics heralding his and Cook’s next band The Professionals. That said it’s a nifty tune with familiar wall of sound guitars and great yb sing along chorus.

It also made #6 in the charts

The Great Rock ‘N’ Roll Swindle / Rock Around The Clock (October 1979)

Seriously? WTF? Why? Some copies had to be withdrawn because of the use of the American Express card. Big deal. Thank God the end before the countless reissues began!

Sex Pistols – Never Mind The Bollocks (October 1977)

Arguably the most awaited album of 1977. Forget the myths – it was a hit with 120,000 advance orders making it go Gold before even being released. And that was with Boots, Woolworths & WH Smiths refusing to stock it because God Save The Queen was on it (they had offered to take it if the song was removed but Virgin refused).

Once again its cover caused all sorts of controversy and publicity with its title with copies removed from record shop windows by police and a court case that eventually settled in the Sex Pistols’ favour. Melody Maker and Record Mirror (see below) took no chances self censoring the artwork (pussies!) Again no picture of the band features on the artwork.

By the time it came out in November 1977, its worth remembering that The Jam had released their second (arguably weaker) album – This Is The Modern World – at the same time, The Clash had rushed in with their eponymous debut, The Damned with Damned, Damned, Damned and The Stranglers had had their second album out already.

But this was the one and it didn’t disappoint. All these years later it still holds up. Crushing riffs and lyrics all spat out with perfectly controlled aggression and intent. I don’t agree much with what Noel Gallagher says about anything but his comment that after dropping the needle onto side one and hearing the jackboots marching and the Holidays In The Sun riff comes in .. that’s it; it’s game over. Everyone might as well shut up shop.

There are no better reviews of the album than these two from the time. Jon Savage is legendary and came to Sounds via his art punk fanzine. Julie Burchill came to the NME at the right time in 1976 before she turned into a backstabbing narcissist. Always out of her depth musically, here was one of those rare occasions where she actually regonised something great

Original Jamie Reid artwork for NMTB sold at Sotheby’s

Big Bad Beautiful Noise

Jon Savage – Sounds 5.11.77 ****1/2 stars

OHHH. THIS is so ‘important: don’t want to mythologise/sociologise/analyse, don’t want to write a lecture, an essay…
But here am I – there are you – here’s the Sex Pistols.
So I slip into it… It’s very powerful. It’s a very good rock’n’roll album. It excites me. I want to dance. So will you. It’s authentic.

It Isn’t aimed at me, at record reviewers’. The right perspective. Where It counts, that’s the pockets, the pounds, the product shifted. As pop, what counts Is that it’s heard… parties, clubs, Jukeboxes…I feel pretty… redundant, that doesn’t annoy me. So why am I doing this? Well remember 90 per cent of what is written about music is ego… Or ‘You wanna ruin me in your magazine… down with your pen and pad, ready to kill, to make me ill, wanna be someone wanna be someone Y’WANNA BE MEEEEE, RUIN MEEEEEE’. A great lyric. From one of the songs that isn’t on the album.

Oh, but you’re so trusting: 125,000 advance orders? All those articles/reviews in fanzines saying Haven’t heard it yet but know it’s amazing”? Got you sussed. Yeah, me too. I mean hassled to get it… Go on and do something useful, though. Enough. So briefly factual: track listing is-side one: ‘Holidays In The Sun/Bodles/No Feelings/Lar/God Save The Queen/Problems’ Side two: ‘Seventeen/Anarchy In The UK/Submission/Pretty Vacant/New York/E.M.I.’. The singles are the same cuts, mixes different. A little, maybe.

Only three Vicious co-written tracks: ‘Holldays/EMI/Bodles’. The last the only one that hasn’t been alred before. The older cuts -Submission’, ‘Seventeen’ (aka ‘I’m A Lazy Sod’) ‘Liar’, ‘No Feelings’ etc. have been changed around since earller recordings. In the second, the now redundant You’re only 29… lyric (the generation battle’s been won, what you gonna do with the space, kiddo?) has been dropped. I sorta liked all the messing around with release dates and all the bannings and record company swappings because It’s pantomime and yet they’re still out on the edge enough for the whole scam to cling nearish the ‘Anarchy’ byword.

Ambiguous/double-edged so that nobody really knows what’s going on till the last moment… nice. Anyway, ‘conspicuous consumers always pay’, that means whatever happens you and I will still fork out…

But come on: none of this would be taken seriously at all If they didn’t play classic rock’n’roll and weren’t one of the best and most consistent recording bands this year. Look again at those advance orders-Ilke the Beatles/Stones In the heyday. Or near enough.

It’s been hard to avoid them In 1977…I don’t want to go on too much because it’s really all been said ad nauseam. But me? I’m here to offer opinions aren’t I? I mean that’s what this reviewing business is ‘about’ Isn’t It? OK. I wanted to put It In ‘Bargain Bin’ but they wouldn’t let me. I wanted to write a one word review. Y’know, write a book or write nothing. Why ‘Bargain Bin’? ‘Cos all double- think apart It’s a plain disappointment that there are four singles already released on the album. Can’t get round that.K-Tel etc.

“C’mon I’m getting bored… How do they play, Savage?” Oh yeah…great, fantastle. Production’s a wall of sound, Jones’ gultar pure power chords with occasional subliminal overdubs, rhythm base hot, Rotten’s vocal ever more stylish, ever more stylised. On ‘E.M.I.’ and ‘Bodles’ his most sneering. obnoxious best. You know It all already; It’s an all-out attack, the ultimate of rock as rock as outrage, as the big bad beautiful noise… very few albums ever top It for that- ‘White Light White Heat’, the first Ramones album, the only ones coming to mind.

“OK. Tell us about some of the tracks… now…”- Well “Submission’ has always been a great track and It’s one of the best here maybe because It’s taken at a slower pace than the rest and Isn’t a million miles away from being dopey. He wants to drown Jus’ like Jim Morrison In ‘Moonlight Drive’. ‘New York’ got some fun Dolls cops and plss-takes. ‘Bodles’ Is ‘about’ an abortion and says fuck a lot and goes right over the top in being ‘shocking’ while remaining a strong song. Fast, arrival, a different rhythm. ‘Liar’ Isn’t phased like on the bootleg but it makes no odds.

“C’mon commit yourself… you haven’t said what you really think…”Aaah, get off of my back. OK. Still think It doesn’t matter as this is going to chart Immediately but that’s not true really otherwise I wouldn’t be doing this jive at all would I? A few general points: ain’t convinced that they’ve got enough Impetus yet to produce stuff as good as the ’76 songs, of which there are nine on the album. But this is a good holding operation. The publicity tactics? Unless cleverly handled (to date – brilliant) can become routine very fast (last year’s rebels) but the line has been walked with great skill. Interest still hyper-Intense.

As rock’n’roll, can’t be faulted. As sound. Dispels criticisms made by such as I about ‘Pistols as media event’. Ashamed! I wuz wrong!

Noticed they haven’t played live this year unless In an adequately controlled situation – abroad,late-nite, private party etc. Will they?

Still. Feel somewhow that new songs smack of a creeping contrivance… and, yeah, what’s fine on a single as blast wears me down with nihilism over an album. Believing In nothing, on plastic at least, makes you unassailable but leaves a funny taste…-JON SAVAGE.

Never Mind The Sex Pistols – Here’s The Bollocks

Julie Burchill NME 5.11.1977

WHAT ARE YOU waiting for? True love, school to end, Third World/civil war, more wars in the Third World, a leader, the commandos to storm the next acroplane, next week’s NME, The Revolution?
THE SEX Pistols album! Hail, hail, rock and roll, deliver them from evil but lead them not into temptation. Keep them quiet /off the street /content.

Hey punk! You wanna elpee-sized “Anarchy” single? You wanna original “Anarchy” in a black bag? You wanna bootleg album? You wanna collect butterflies? Very fulfilling, collecting things… very satisfying.. Keep you satisfied, make you satiated, make you fat and old, queueing for the rock and roll show,The Sex Pistols. They could” have dreamed up the name and died. The hysterical equation society makes of love / a gun power/crime shoved down its own throat, rubbed in its own face. See, I’m just as repressed and contaminated as the next guy. And I like The Sex Pistols. Aesthetically, apart from anything else. Three of them are very good-looking. And the sound of the band goes.

“I don’t wanna holiday in the Sun/I wanna go in the city/ There’s a thousand things I wanna say to you. All very Weller, but is this at Jagger I see before mo? No, it’s the singles, all four of them “Anarchy In The U.K.”. “God Save The Queen”. “Pretty Vacant” and “Holidays In The Sun” constituting one third (weigh it) of the vinyl. Of course, there are other great songs.

This is no first-round knock-out. This is no Clash attending the CBS Convention; no Jam voting Conservative; no Damned fucking an American girl with a Fender bass; no Stranglers distorting Trotsky and Lenin for their own cunt-hating bully-boy ends. No, this is The Sex Pistols. The band which (so I’m told- I wasn’t there in the beginning” started it all.

Great songs like “Submission”, a numb-nostrilled “Venus In Furs”/”Penetration” “I Wanna Be Your Dog”, in form: hypnotic, in content writhing. Pain through a dull, passive haze. Is that a whip in your hand or are you abnormal? “Submission/Going down.down, dragging her down/ Submission/I can’t tell you what I’ve found, “Smack? Geeks? What’s the mystery and who grew up on The New York Dolls? Dogs yelp as the drill continues. Most unhealthy and ya like it like that? Well, it grows on you. A bit like a cancer.

Great songs like “No. Feelings”: “I got no emotion for anybody else/You better understand I’m in love with myself/My self/My beautiful self. “Ah, solipsism rules, as Tony Parsons used to say before he got wise. Good dance tune, anyway, while “Problems” says it all: “Bet you thought you had it all worked out/Bet you thought you knew what I was about/ Bet you thought you’d solved all your problems/but YOU are the problem.”

Whatcha gonna do? Vegetate? Listen to The Sex Pistols album? Great songs gone, ineffectual flicks of the wrist like “New York”, which probably has David JoHansen quaking in his heels, and “E.M.I. “you guessed it, they’re bitching. “You’re only twenty-nine/You gotta lot to learn. “In spite of this inspired opening. “Seventeen” rambles a little and the guitars do go on a bit. “I just speed/That’s all I need.”

Whaddya think of it so far? Well, I’ve saved the best bit for you to linger over. You’ve already heard two songs the band co-wrote with Sid Vicious (as opposed to Glen Matlock, The True Pop Kid): “E.M.I.” and “Holidays In The Sun”.

Here’s the third. It’s called “Bodies”.

“She was a girl from Birmingham/She had just had an abortion/She was a case of obscenity/Her name was Pauline, she lived in a tree/She was a no one who killed her baby/She was an animal/She was a bloody disgrace/Bodies/ I’m not an animal/Bodies/I’m not an animal/Dragged on a table in a factory/An illegitimate place to be / In a packet in a lavatory/Died in a baby screaming/Bodies/ Screaming fucking bloody mad /Not an animal/It’s an abortion Bodies/I’m not an animal/Mummy/I’m not an abortion/Look at it squirm/ Gurgling bloody mess/I’m not a discharge/She don’t want a baby who looks like that/I don’t want a baby who looks like that/I’m not an animal/ I’m not an animal/I’m not an animal/Mummy.”

What? Good God. Was I shocked! Did I jump! Is that what they wanted, to shock people? Smart boys. Do they mean it? Is it satire of the most dubious kind? Did John’s Catholic schooling leave its mark? I don’t know where “Bodies” is coming from and it scares me. It’s obviously a gutter view of sex/dirt/blood reproduction and if the song is an attack on such a mentality it’s admirable..

But, as with “Holidays In The Sun”, Rotten never allows himself to make a moral judgment and, going by things he’s said, he seems refreshingly capable of making them. I wish he would. I wish he would say that East Germany is presently organising itself better than West Germany or vice versa, if that’s what he believes. I wish The Sex Pistols had said in “Bodies” that women should not be forced to undergo such savagery, especially within a “Welfare” State.

I’m sick of unlimited tolerance and objectivity, because it leads to annihilation. I wish everyone would quit sitting on the fence in the middle of the road. I think “Bodies” will be open to much misinterpretation and that to issue it was grossly irresponsible.

Many of these songs (under new names) also crop up on their bootleg album-plus “Satellite”, in which The Pistols give the finger to the provinces, and “Just Me” which has a non-existent tune and frightening words: “You wanna be me/Didn’t I fool you?”The singing is done with much less expertise, Rotten sounding sick to death. It’s a much better record.

I don’t really know anything about music but The Sex Pistols seem to play as well as anyone I’ve heard, and I’ve heard Jimi Hendrix and Pete Townshend records. I never knew what was meant by “guitar hero”- it sounds like the kind of phrase a mental retard might mouth. “Guitar hero” you mean as in “war. hero”, that kind of thing? Why should anyone wish to play more usefully than Steve Jones, or drum more elaborately than Paul Cook, or play better bass than Sid Vicious? What purpose could it serve to outdo them?

So what are The Sex Pistols? For the tabloids a welcome rest from nubiles (sex and violence in their name alone and drugs too, if you count Rotten’s speed dalliance); for the dilletantes, a new diversion (Ritz has a monthly punk column); for the promoters, a new product to push; for the parents, a new excuse; for the kids, a new way (in the tradition of the Boy Scouts, the terraces and One-Up-Man-Ship) in which to dissipate their precious energy.

Johnny Rotten, Oliver Twist of this generation: “I wanna some MORE, Malcolm!”

The Great Rock ‘N’ Roll Swindle

I normally like to pull an Amazon review for an objective alternative view on records but this time I’ve come up blank and the main reason is people do not understand this album. Like this badly translated from the original German review.

schrottvogel – 5.0 out of 5 stars Unique variety of styles — punk in the broader senseReviewed in Germany on 1 May 2005

Not so easy to evaluate this plate… Due to the great variety of styles, it is quite uneven, and for the serious punk traditionalist, this record is probably quite problematic. You have to bring a certain amount of humor to appreciate the wit and irony of this record, and you probably have to have a musical openness due to the extreme variety of genres — classical, pop, punk, rock’n’roll, disco — too.

Anyone who brings these requirements should access; it will contain an extraordinary record that is no second time, which is simply fun when listening and has a lot of surprises to offer. Friends of fancy cover versions and unusual constructions also get their money’s worth here. Anyway, everyone else should listen in first.

Nevertheless, I donate 5 points, because this record is so unique, steeped in history and — just good!

Quite simply it’s not a Sex Pistols album, What you say? Course it is. It’s got their name on it.

That much is true but here are the facts. It was released after the band split and Vicious was dead. They had no choice in its cover, songs or running order. Only around 1/3 of the songs actually feature the band and the rest are other bands and bits of Sex Pistols. It’s a soundtrack to a film McLaren made about himself and the Sex Pistols and funded with the band’s money without their consent.

Ok so those that feature the Sex Pistols band are genuinely interesting, such as the early cover versions like No Lip or Stepping Stone and you can see even then they had some spite and bile. But the plaudits go to the version of Anarchy In The Uk which is genuinely frightening with Rotten’s voice so raw and full of pent up aggression, it feels like flailed skin.

For the rest it’s how much stomach you have for the slow dismantlement of the Sex Pistols power though Vicious’s My Way is inspired.

1 God Save the Queen (Symphony) – Sex Pistols, Malcolm McLaren
2 Johnny B Goode 3 Road Runner
4 Black Arabs – Black Arabs
5 Anarchy in the U.K. 6 Substitute 7 Don’t Give Me No Lip, Child 8 (I’m Not Your) Stepping Stone
9 L’anarchie Pour Le U.K. – Sex Pistols, Louis Brennon
10 Einmal War Belsen Bortrefflich
11 Einmal War Belson Wirflich Bortrefflich – Sex Pistols, Ronnie Biggs
12 Silly Thing
13 My Way
14 I Wanna Be Me
15 Something Else
16 Rock Around the Clock – Sex Pistols, Edward Tenpole
17 Lonely Boy
18 No One Is Innocent – Sex Pistols, Ronnie Biggs
19 C’mon Everybody
20 EMI (Orchestral)
21 The Great Rock ‘N’ Roll Swindle – Sex Pistols, Edward Tenpole
22 Friggin’ in the Riggin’
23 You Need Hands – Sex Pistols, Malcolm McLaren
24 Who Killed Bambi? – Sex Pistols, Edward Tenpole
25 Watcha Gonna Do About It?

Laid low after all the negative press and banning the Pistols attempted to break out and kick start themselves again out of inertia. They were after all a band and they needed to play live and show that Sid could play at all !!. The idea then was to play a number of secret gigs around the country under different names and thus circumvent the banning. The tour came to be known as the SPOTS tour or Sex Pistols On Tour Secretly. As a result of this speculation the gigs were sold out and the band were up for it glad to be playing at last. To Steve Jones it was how it should be:

“That tour was real good, there were a lot of fans queuing up around the block, and they went nuts when we played. It was like how it should have been, a band playing to an audience which dug you. This was playing to fans who wanted to come and see us.” (The Sex Pistols ‘Inside Story – Fred & Judy Vermorel) The tour was a success.

The album ‘Never Mind The Bollocks’ was released to the usual furore, bannings etc. To celebrate they went out on tour again and the tour was called Never Mind The Bans .This tour was basically it for the Pistols before the endgame in the US of A killed the band dead. They were playing material that was nearly two years old, only a couple of new songs and a deadweight for a bassist. Still they managed to pull it together but it was only a matter of time. Two of those gigs were Nikkers in Keighley Yorkshire and Club Lafayette Wolverhampton .The colour photos below from Keighley were supplied by Ross Galloway