Never Mind The Bollocks Here's The Sex Pistols

Cooley

90Piesanhour Oh, couldn’t agree more. Some classic intros for sure - only soiled by Rotten’s screeching howl. That’s why I could never abide PiL. But, give the boy his due, his (Pistol) lyrics were top notch.
Some pretentious old rag like Rolling Stone once did a 100 Great Guitarists poll. Yawn. Who cares, really? I mention it only because Jonesy came 99th or something. Fucking travesty. Man’s a guitar god never quite given his due.
The Pistols weren’t a punk band. They were more rock than anything else. We have a lot to thank them for.

YoungParisian_inExile

We and they have a lot to thank Malcolm Mclarern for

Djpekingman

YoungParisian_inExile and Viv....

Travis_Bickle

YoungParisian_inExile agreed. He had a brilliant eye for 'culture'. And how to sell it. The fact that he got Dondi to do the lettering on the Duck Rock cover sums that up. He didn't just get some graffiti done, he knew who Dondi was, knew he was a 'king' in that culture. Thin line between vulture and champion when it comes to this kind of stuff. Not sure he cared....

Jon

Holiday, Pretty Vacant, Anarchy and God Save The Queen, four of the greatest singles ever all on one album. Blimey.

Too young to be affected by it. Ten and just bought that ELO album with the spaceship on the cover. I guess it would be akin to the impact The Specials had on my generation.

Saw them on the reunion tour, my mate thought they were ace, I thought they made a compelling argument for bands not reuniting.

CBIT

pogoing around the living room - lets see how long it takes for next door to complain

CBIT

(or downstairs)

CBIT

jeez, theres so many on here i don't remember !

90Piesanhour

Have you pogoed yourself to sleep?

CBIT

No, very entertaining

90Piesanhour

It is an essential album. A one off, nothing like it before it or since.

Odd_Job

Interesting how we’d probably consider ourselves as similar ages and generation or generations, yet on this LP, its impact differs significantly based on a couple of years of birth year. Don’t know if it’s me looking back with rose tinted specs but I think we were lucky growing up at the ages we were between the mid 70s and into the 90s that so much happened culturally and musically, we perhaps have experienced and lived through more choice of what have proven to be historically important music and youth movements, artists, LPs and singles.

Anchor

Odd_Job Whole heartedly agree with this. Punk breaking the mould then two tone and ska revival, electronic music, indie and hip hop bowls along. Brilliant.

Foxy_Dread

Plenty have commented on how important the Pistols and this LP has been culturally and i'd agree.

Henderson raises an interesting point that they were a manufactured band. I'd dispute that, certainly by what we understand a manufactured band to be nowadays. Did McClaren have a significant input, yes, was he an industry insider who could put together a band and give them a foot up, no!. Did he understand the power of publicity, of course he did but that doesn't equate to manufacture. I suppose the deciding factor to the debate would hinge around how did they come to play the music they did? That's probably in part determined by how people learnt to play instruments in those days. I think everyone started with a Bert Weedon book and learnt to play rock and roll standards and they certainly covered a good few RnR standards. Anyway it's an interesting point HJ made and i could be otherwise, but right now i think it's probably harsh to call them manufactured.

What I think should be stressed about the Pistols is how they were perceived by the establishment. They seem to mark the point when post-war Britain ended and modern Britain began. The hysteria around the band is hard to exaggerate. The tabloids and TV news were in a frenzy wondering if this was the end of society.

I'm rambling but trying to put it in a nutshell, the Pistols and Punk probably made it a lot easier for people to be different, and with that everything has changed.

YoungParisian_inExile

Foxy_Dread your last paragraph is why this is an essential album . And As Jon pointed out there are 4 huge singles on the album plus EMI so perhaps I’m being over critical of the musical content

YoungParisian_inExile

Chuck in post punk , house/techno/rave , indie/dance & grunge ...
As the kids say ... Blessed

hendersonjones

YoungParisian_inExile
60s psych , mod , motown , prog rock , glam and of course just for you rock a billy

YoungParisian_inExile

hendersonjones You look good for your age HJ if you lived through those as well 😁

hendersonjones

YoungParisian_inExile
Certainly grew up listening to my mum and dads records Beatles Stones Dylan Kinks loads really , but distinctly remember my mum taking a liking to punk its attitude and the look . There were a few punks who lived locally and we had a local disco over the road from the Brown Cow every friday , Mick Mccann was one amongst others my mother often spoke to them and to be fair the disco at St mary’s hall always passed by without trouble , all this passed me by late seventies early eighties , until i started going to the football and a whole new bunch of lads started hanging around in the area all different schools but with one thing in common Leeds United and Clothes and looking back we were more troublesome than the punks , i can fully understand why Pies loves this album it’s his youth it’s engraved within him every lyric and beat .

90Piesanhour

hendersonjones Several things combined for me to lead me to punk:

Mum and dad splitting up, after never really being great mum and dad material, leaving me in an emotional void in my early teens.
Never really enjoying the music that was around at the time; ShowaddyWaddy, Yes, Genesis, The Fucking Osmonds, etc. I used to hear Roxy Music, T Rex, Bowie et al and think 'This is interesting'.
The political and economic situation in the UK; Strikes, 3-day weeks, power cuts, overflowing bins, the rise of the far right, youth unemployment, shitty home life, hating/struggling at school.
Seeing news reports and stuff in the papers about how punk was a serious threat to society and the establishment and how it must be stopped.
Hearing Anarchy in the UK on Radio Luxembourg on our little transistor radio and thinking; "They've made music, just for me!"
Talking to my so called friends at school about how exciting the Sex Pistols and punk sounded, only to be told it was complete shit. I couldn't understand it. How could they think that? Do they really prefer Brotherhood of Man and the NF?

Once all that happened, there was no going back. Buying this album, literally, changed my life. An epiphany, if you like. Then I discovered the Royal Standard in Bradford. 2 or 3 bands on a Sunday for 50p. Meeting other punks, who got it, everything. It was like a punk revolution. 1978, RAR gig in London, TRB, Clash, X-Ray Spex on the bill. 80,000 people there, most (it appeared) were punks, and this seemed to be the future. Viva la punk revolution!

This LP was/is a game-changer, a life-changer, a mould-breaker, and you either understand it, and the times it appeared in, or you don't.

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