When on May 27, 1977 the Sex Pistols released “God Save the Queen”, the quartet was considered the leader of a new movement that had begun to take shape as part of an underground scene around the SEX clothing store, operated by the designer Vivienne Westwood and the elusive agent Malcolm McLaren, at 430 King’s Road in London. The single was the first advance of what would be her long-awaited debut album, and the only one of her career, Never mind the bollocks here’s the Sex Pistols and the presentation of the band in society. The song was banned from the radio and despite the number of sales, the Radio 1 station never recognized its number 1.
In parallel with the celebrations of the Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II the London quartet formed at that time by: johnny rotten, Steve Jones, Paul Cool Y sid viciousdecided to promote the release of his first single with a presentation on a boat on the River Thames, in a move financed by the Virgin Records label, owned by businessman Richard Branson. McLaren, acting as his manager, had done a ballet with a series of labels, including the legendary EMI Capitol, to try to land a record deal and would be the first punk band to achieve such success.
The performance act had the intention of provoking powerful groups, making fun of other record companies and at the same time promoting an album that sought to conquer the popularity charts. Punk tried to reject the excess of the music inherited from the 1960 generation, the complexity of progressive rock, the disconnection that existed between the musical superstars of the moment with their public and at the same time yearned to insert themselves into that world.
The frenetic guitars of “God save the Queen” driven by a dose of amphetamines, was the stone in the shoe of what English society wanted to hide under the Jubilee celebrations. “There is no future in England’s dream,” Johnny Rotten declaimed in his frontal assault and his nasal voice. England was plunged into a crisis not seen since the 1930s with high unemployment and a stagnant economy with no real promise for the youth and working classes.
The British Empire was still dealing with the aftermath of World War II, and right-wing neo-fascist movements were beginning to gain strength as well. For a generation, punk represented a break with the values imposed after the war that culminated in the countercultural movements of the 1960s and a showcase of a bleak future. The media decided to make the Pistols the public enemies of society and it was their way of exorcising the moral panics of the time.
The history of Sex Pistols it is intimately related to the mythology of punk. the mockumentary The Great Rock and Roll Swindle, directed by Julien Temple, tried to impose the narrative that the band had always been conceived by the McLaren mastermind. An idea that has always been rejected by the band. Alex Cox movie Sid and Nancy was the one that crystallized the mythology of Sid Vicious as the perfect prototype of punk in an extraordinary performance by Gary Oldman. Cox’s film served to create the mythology of Vicious as a character characterized by his histrionic nihilism and who, with his tragic death at the age of 21, became the eternal martyr of punk.
46 years after the Sex Pistols crossed the River Thames, “God Save the Queen” is once again a counterpoint to Queen Elizabeth’s Silver Jubilee celebrations, but this time to promote the series Gun (FXNetworks). Based on guitarist Steve Jones’ memoir published in 2016, Lonely Boy: Tales from a Sex Pistolthe series directed by acclaimed director Danny Boyle is a new reinterpretation of the Sex Pistols myth.
The Danny Boyle series has been criticized and questioned by members of the band, but it is a way of retelling the mythology about the Sex Pistols. In 2021, Johnny Rotten faced his former teammates in court to try to prevent the series from being made. In addition to the memoirs of guitarist Steve Jones, the history of the Sex Pistols has been told by John Lydon in his book Anger is an energy and by original bassist Glen Matlock on I Was a Teenage Sex Pistol. None of the versions coincides with the truth and over the decades we have more of the mythology of the Sex Pistols, the spitting, the violence and a nostalgic romanticism around the punk phenomenon.
The Sex Pistols in the series Pistol directed by Danny Boyle. Photo: Courtesy Star+
The mythology of punk always has this idea that the genre was seeking to break with the establishment in the music industry, when in reality it was always subconsciously trying to insert itself into the mainstream. After the release of Never Mind The Bollocks Here’s the Sex Pistols, the Pistols imploded in January 1978 during their first tour of the United States. The genre that was called punk is atomized and dispersed in a series of variations that emerged in the following years on the island, such as post punk, new wave, goth rock, etc.
The Sex Pistols didn’t last more than a few years, but in their brief stint around the world they taught a generation of musicians to make music on their own terms and with everything and their contradictions, their influence is still felt almost half a century later with the same force, energy and fury.
Operations coordinator for El Economista online
Online Operations Coordinator. Journalist. Since 2019 he writes the weekly music column “Mixtape” in El Economista. He has been a reporter on technology and business, startups, pop culture, and a supplement editor for The Washington Post and RIPE.