999 The Sex Pistols - The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle (1979)
999 The Sex Pistols - The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle (1979)
Soundtrack/Compilation (Double album) - Punk
About the Act:
Punk started in New York, but made the leap to London, The explosive cultural, fashion and musical movement was spearheaded in the UK by The Sex Pistols. It is hard to overstate their pivotal importance in what was one of the most profound shifts in pop music, bringing working class disaffection into the mainstream, riding on a wave of shock and controversy that the press and the public were seemingly pregnant for. Managed and possibly somewhat manufactured by their manager Malcolm McLaren, the band consisted of Johnny Rotten, Steve Jones, Glen Matlock and Paul Cook. Later, Matlock was replaced on the bass by Sid Vicious.
Their active history was about 2.5 years from 1975-1978 in which they made one studio album, played quite a few gigs, and caused (and courted) controversy with their violence and attitudes. Their history has been picked over many times by people who know far more about them than I do.
About the Album:
This album is the soundtrack to the film of the same name. The film was Malcolm McLaren's highly stylised, somewhat inaccurate, and definitely biased portrayal of the life of the Sex Pistols, in which he lays claim for their creation and manipulation. It features some tracks by the sex pistols as they were, and reworkings of some of their songs, songs recorded by the splintered remains of the band, and fronted by several people including Ronnie Biggs, Julian Tudor-Pole and Mclaren himself, covers of Sex Pistols songs by other bands, and some song covers sung by Sid Viscous.
My History with this Album:
I was too young, or too timid to embrace the punk movement as it happened as a child, so I kind of watched from afar with horrified fascination. I have not heard this album before, but have heard some of the tracks.
Review:
In some ways this is a truly bizarre album, combining some stuff that fits squarely in the pigeonhole of punk, (some of which emphasises the punk sensibility even more by being badly recorded) with curiosities like the disco medley of Sex Pistols hits, and the French street musicians version of Anarchy in the UK. If I were a serious punk fan (which I am not in any way) then I might be angered by the disrespect and subversion of both the principles of the movement, and the truth of the story portrayed through the film. There is part of me, though, that sees the irony in that.
I quite like some of the songs, in particular the covers of the Eddie Cochran songs Something Else and C'Mon Everybody. The cover of My Way is OK but I find it somewhat contrived. The less familiar stuff leaves me cold, mostly. The Ronnie Biggs fronted "No One Is Innocent" is quite fun and interesting, but the other track he fronts, "Belson was a Gas" is truly objectionable. I guess that was the point.
This is not an album for listening to as an album, unfortunately like most soundtrack albums, it doesn't sit together as a listening experience. Ultimately I'm not impressed by this. Not impressed at all.
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