Sid Vicious And The Idols Max’s Kansas City performance 30th September 1978
A particularly extreme example of the self-immolating celebrity — and one of the first high-profile casualties of the punk era — John Simon Ritchie A.K.A Sid Vicious was given his education in unhealthy lifestyles early in his existence, his mother Anne using (and sometimes selling) heroin throughout his childhood. His father, a Grenadier Guard in the British Army named John Ritchie, left the family shortly after his son’s birth, and his stepfather Christopher Beverly died after only six months, leaving Anne to raise young John Simon primarily on her own. Shortly after the dissolution of her first marriage, Anne relocated herself and her son to the Spanish island of Ibiza, returning to England in 1965 just prior to her second marriage and living in Kent for several years before moving to Hackney in 1971. It was here that John made the acquaintance of John Lydon while both were attending Hackney Technical College in 1974; it was also during this period that he initiated his own hard drug use and began to cultivate the destructive behavior that would earn him such notoriety in later years.
Ultimately, John Ritchie dropped out of school and spent his time hanging around with the so-called Bromley Contingent, a gang of disaffected youths that adopted the music and fashions of the emerging UK punk rock scene and maintained an orbit around the John Lydon (now Johnny Rotten) – fronted band The Sex Pistols. In the summer of 1976 Ritchie became a member of The Flowers of Romance alongside future Public Image Limited guitarist Keith Levene, but the group never actually did anything in public; before the end of the year he had joined Siouxsie and the Banshees as a drummer, although this situation did not endure far beyond the group’s debut performance in September of 1976. Afterwards, while living in a squat with both Lydon and John Wardle (later Jah Wobble), Ritchie chose to call himself Sid Vicious in order to distinguish himself from the overabundance of Johns, and subsequently did his best to live up to the anti-social implications of his new name. By early 1977 he had been drafted into the Pistols to replace departing bass player Glen Matlock, despite the marked limitations of his playing ability (supposedly, Vicious’s bass was turned down during many Pistols shows, and his recorded parts were actually performed by either Matlock or guitarist Steve Jones).
Prior to Vicious’s membership, the Sex Pistols had already earned themselves widespread notoriety for their combative attitudes and use of profanity (a couple of fucks and a shit) during an interview on national television with Bill Grundy; their debut single Anarchy in the U.K., released by EMI in November of 1976, also created a considerable stir around the band despite EMI’s decision to cease manufacturing it after less than two months. Vicious helped to maintain this anarchic reputation by vandalizing the office of A&M’s Managing Director (an act he consummated by puking on the director’s desk) during the party celebrating their signing to the label. The band was forced to find a new home a week later, and thus it was that their next single God Save the Queen was instead released by Virgin in May of 1977. The song instigated an even stronger negative response than Anarchy in the U.K., but the resulting hype also successfully pushed it up to the #2 position in the British charts — although there is some evidence to suggest that it might have actually reached #1.
Issued in October, the Pistols’ debut full-length Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols lived up to the controversy created by the two preceding singles, the album’s title resulting in an obscenity trial that was ultimately dismissed. A month after Bollocks’s release, the fate of the band’s already rapidly-deteriorating bass player was sealed through his meeting with ex-prostitute / heroin addict Nancy Spungen.
Nancy was born in Philadelphia on 27 February 1958, and was a difficult child almost from birth. She threw ferocious tantrums that scared her parents and cried so much that she was given her first sedative at the age of three months. By the age of 4, she had seen a psychiatrist. When Nancy was 11, she attacked her mother with a hammer and smashed her bedroom to pieces. She first tried heroin at the age of 13 and two years later was an addict. Her behaviour was so out of control that doctors refused to treat her until she was diagnosed as schizophrenic. By the time she was 17, her parents asked her to leave home. The unbalanced groupie from New York who had come to London with the intention of latching onto a punk celebrity, Spungen found the equally unbalanced Vicious an easy target, and soon had him sharing her heroin habit as well as her bodily fluids. This tumultuous relationship created significant problems between Sid and his band mates. Lydon in particular repeatedly pressed his friend to sever his ties with Spungen, but the unhealthy co-dependence that had formed between the two was something that Vicious was unwilling to leave behind.
At the start of 1978 the Sex Pistols embarked on their first American tour, organized by their manipulative manager Malcolm McLaren. The tour fell apart after only two weeks, however, and a few days after a performance at Winterland in San Francisco Rotten announced the dissolution of the band — apparently as a bluff, but no one called him on it and McLaren and half of the band promptly buggered off to Brazil. Vicious had not fared very well in his forced separation with Spungen during the tour, and he immediately flew to New York to reunite with her. A short period was spent back in England before traveling to Paris to contribute to McLaren’s Julien Temple-directed film The Great Rock ‘N’ Roll Swindle (1978) (a largely fictional account of the Sex Pistol’s history); Vicious’ first solo tracks would be recorded for the film’s soundtrack, which included a piss-take on the Frank Sinatra standard My Way and covers of Eddie Cochran’s Something Else and C’mon Everybody.
After raising some money through a final UK performance with the help of a backing band named The Vicious White Kids, Sid and Nancy relocated to New York City on a permanent basis, taking up residence at the Chelsea Hotel on 23rd Street. With $10,000 to spend, the couple went on a drug holiday, scoring heroin on the streets while developing a taste for the barbiturates Tuinal and Dilaudid, a synthetic morphine. They made an effort to kick their habit by signing on at the Spring Street Methadone Clinic, but it was a sour experience for Sid, who suffered frequent beatings from other addicts. He and Nancy then started taking methadone in an attempt to wean them off heroin.
Vicious then attempted to launch a solo career, with Spungen assuming the role of manager and various British and American punk musicians acting as his new band The Idols. A poor-quality collection culled from some of his live performances during this period was eventually released as Sid Sings in 1979. These solo ambitions were abruptly brought to an end in October, when he was arrested for killing Spungen, found dead in their apartment from a single stab wound on the morning of the 12th.
At 2.30am on 12 October, their personal drug dealer with the fantastic name of Rockets Redglare received a frantic call from Nancy to get some ‘D-4s’ (the street name for Dilaudid) and hypodermic needles. Rockets arrived at 3.15am with only some methadone – he had been unable to get any D-4s. Nancy was wearing a shirt over black panties. Sid was sacked out on the bed and the couple was already high on Tuinal, which had slowed them down physically, but did not satisfy their craving for Dilaudid, which they intended to take intravenously. Nancy showed the dealer her open handbag, which was stuffed with 50 and 100 dollar notes. She told him that she would pay double if he could get forty D-4s. He left just after 5am to try his contacts.
Just after this, the guest in room 228 called the front desk to complain about all the noise coming from room 100 below him. The desk clerk sent a bellhop named Kenny to check it out, and he found Sid Vicious wandering the corridors, singing loudly. When Kenny asked Sid to be quiet, Vicious taunted him with abuse, and a fight ensued. Kenny swiftly beat Vicious into submission, bloodying Sid’s face as he fell. The bellhop then returned to the lobby.
At about 7.30am, a woman’s loud moaning awoke Vera Mendelssohn, a 48-year-old sculptor in room 102. It came from next door – room 100, and was a lonely, frightening sound. Nothing more was heard from there until Sid himself telephoned after someone had already called the front desk just after 11.00am.
11.00am on 12 October 1978 the desk clerk at the Chelsea Hotel in New York City received a telephone call. A man told him, “There’s trouble in Room one hundred.” The clerk sent a bellboy to check it out, but before he returned, the front desk had another call, this time from room 100. “Someone is sick here”, a different male voice said. “Need help.”
The platinum blonde lay face-up on the floor of the toilet, her head under the sink. She wore only a black bra and panties, both items soaked with blood from a one-inch knife wound in her lower abdomen. The hotel bed was also extensively stained with blood. The desk clerk called for an ambulance, which arrived with a police escort. After the paramedics confirmed that the woman was dead, police checked the room and found drugs and drug paraphernalia as well as a bloodstained Jaguar K-11 folding knife with a five-inch blade and a black jaguar carved into the handle. The victim had been resident in Room 100 with her drug-addicted boyfriend.
The drug-addled musician could not remember the incident, but the knife responsible for the wound was still in the room when Spungen’s body was discovered. Police found Vicious wandering the hotel hallways, crying; he was immediately taken into custody and charged with second-degree homicide. By the time Sid Vicious was arrested, he had taken enough Tuinal to kill a horse.
Virgin Records on instruction from Malcolm McClaren put up the money required for bail shortly after his arrest.
Vicious’ mental state became even more erratic following his arrest. His mother Anne Beverley flew out to New York City on 16 October, the day of his release on bail. Within a week, he tried to commit suicide by overdosing on methadone and slashing his right arm. His mother discovered him and rushed him to Bellevue hospital, saving his life.
Another arrest followed in December due to an assault on Patti Smith’s brother Todd at Max’s Kansas City; after serving two months in jail, Virgin supplied his bail for a second time, and he was released once again pending his trial for Spungen’s murder. That trial would never take place: Vicious was found dead of what is speculated to be a deliberate heroin overdose on February 2nd at the home of his new girlfriend Michelle Robinson.
Supposedly his ashes were scattered on Nancy Spungen’s grave by his mother Anne Beverly as per his request, but whether this actually was accomplished remains in dispute as this act was against the express wishes of the Spungen family…
Photographs of the Sid Vicious Memorial March below taken by Janette Beckman in 1980.
Kill Your Pet Puppy Collective memories of the Sid Vicious Memorial March
Nancy Spungen was not murdered by Sex Pistols member Sid Vicious, Malcolm McLaren says.
McLaren said he can’t believe it.
The former Sex Pistols manager said Vicious, the band’s bassist, was incapable of murdering her.
Spungen was found dead on 12 October 1978 in the couple’s New York hotel room having suffered a single stab wound to her abdomen from which she apparently bled to death.
Vicious was arrested and charged with her murder but claimed to have no memory of the event. He died of of a heroin overdose on February 2 1979.
Writing in a blog for The Daily Beast, McLaren said: “I was stunned when I first heard this and I still can’t believe it. Sid was capable of a wide range of self-destructive acts, but I didn’t think that he could kill someone, especially his girlfriend, unless it was a botched double suicide.”
He added that he believed Spungen was killed after getting in a fight with someone who had stolen money from the couple’s room.
He wrote: “He passed out on the bed, having taken fistfuls of the barbiturate Tuinal. All around him, drug dealers, and friends of Nancy came and went from Room 100.
“Money was stolen and Sid’s knife was taken from the wall where it was hung and seemingly used by someone defending themselves in a struggle with Nancy.
“Nancy was no pushover. Probably, she caught this person stealing money from the bedroom drawer.”
He also revealed that Vicious’ mother Anne Beverley smuggled him heroin hidden in her vagina.
McLaren wrote: “Sid’s mother, Anne, was kind enough and helped him wherever she could. A small-time drug dealer, she smuggled heroin in her vagina to Sid at Riker’s Island, a detention center in New York where he was awaiting trial for the murder of Nancy.”
Carl
February 3, 2010 at 10:12 amUseless idiot!
Kerr Ray Z. Fokker
February 3, 2010 at 11:29 amThe definitive poster boy for a redundant generation, with style and class to match. He was always the smartest pistol despite the public image. (Pun fully intended). And would have been the original singer hadn’t Malcolm chosen the wrong John. (Or so Viv Westwood claimed).
Did more for UK PLC’s self-image than the Grantham asset-stripper ever did. No smoke and mirrors needed either. (Well, plenty of smack smoke and a few broken ones I suppose). Or bullshit wars.
My prediction is that he will be given sainthood by the Church of England after the current 30 year credit expansion goes crack up boom. The precipice was never evaded just delayed with a few tawdry shell games, assorted pyramid schemes and the collateralization of our post-imperial fear and loathing debt obligations.
Rest in Pieces, Sid.
Dr Doom
February 3, 2010 at 2:01 pmRay, you need to write a book (if you haven’t already). You’re cool.
slyme68
February 3, 2010 at 8:18 pmthis link has a radio programme made by Jah Wobble “In search of Sid” with interveiws with poeple who were mates of theirs around Clapton etc when Sid first moved there. http://mondo-de-muebles.blogspot.com/2010/01/in-search-of-sid.html the download link is the title “in search…”.
Penguin • Post Author •
February 3, 2010 at 8:51 pmDr Doom, Kerr Ray Z Fokker is not the messiah, he’s a very naughty boy!
DavidM
February 6, 2010 at 8:33 pmAnyone here caught Alan Parker’s movie doc Who Killed Nancy? Folks can check out the trailer and more here: http://www.whokillednancy.com/trailer/ Raises questions over Sid’s conviction and the credibility of the evidence against him with clues as to a possible killer.
jock
February 7, 2010 at 12:18 pmread the book by Alan Parker ‘no one is innocent’,i suppose thats what the film is based on,lots of unanswered questions re. the murder.
i believe in usa that the case cant be re-opened cos sids dead.
guess we will never know what really happened in that room that night.
thanks for the link tho never knew there was going to be a film.
DavidM
February 7, 2010 at 2:29 pmIs indeed based on said book. Sure to make for a fascinating read.
Not caught the movie as yet. Had hoped it’d be screened at a local cinema, but no. Really ought to pick up the DVD.
Sam
February 8, 2010 at 5:10 amPoor Sid. He was quite the face back in the day but the truth – that he couldn’t play bass – has really sunk his iconic status over the years. I don’t think any of us knew the difference back in the day, nor would we have cared though it’s interesting that Steve played most of the bass on NMTB. I always thought the ‘Sid Vicious RIP’ crowd were a bit sad and it kind of marked the spot where punk became an anachronism. I wonder if we followed his lead by cutting ourselves up with broken bottles etc… which was quite de rigeur in certain circles for awhile. Shane MacGowan mentioned doing the same thing, presumably before all the gruesome shots of our Sidney, so what was that all about? Self mutilation – ‘cutting’ – is a recognised mental disorder these days. Jake mentioned burning ourselves with cigarettes in his book. I slashed my hand at a Damned gig at the Moonlight and Dave Vanian licked the blood off my hand. I haven’t washed it since.
jock
February 21, 2010 at 1:04 pmalthough he was a bit of a dick, i found he’s great to paint pictures of, so at least he was photogenic if nothing else.
http://s644.photobucket.com/albums/uu164/swagbag65/misc/?action=view¤t=sidney-1.jpg
Kerr Ray Z. Fokker
April 18, 2010 at 10:19 amCelebrate good times!
http://img515.imageshack.us/i/svmarch1.jpg/
http://img121.imageshack.us/i/svmarch2.jpg/
http://img215.imageshack.us/i/svmarch3.jpg/
The thing I have recently noticed about pics of London street fashions and punk/skin gigs from the 78-80 period is that the punks and skins are usually far outnumbered by the herberts. As a former onetime herbert myself I would like to say that it was the herberts who were the true nihilists as we were simply too disorientated and mired in spiritual procrastination to even adopt a proper fashion icon. Also too poor as well.
@Dr Doom….
I tried to write a book about 15 years ago and realised that I had no talent whatsoever. Let’s continue to keep the world (outside of KYPP) safe from my ramblings.
Chris L
April 18, 2010 at 2:04 pmsome really brilliant photos there mate, particularly liked these ones:
http://img215.imageshack.us/i/svmarch3.jpg/
http://img515.imageshack.us/i/hardestskinever.jpg/
jock
April 18, 2010 at 2:36 pmwhos the big bloke to the right of the cop?sure looks like that actor who always played a german in war films,wasnt he the german panzer tank commander left to guard the bank in the dirty dozen?
http://img121.imageshack.us/i/svmarch2.jpg/
Chris L
April 18, 2010 at 4:26 pmor is it Boris Johnson’s punk past revealed?
luggy
April 18, 2010 at 8:05 pmThe only actor he reminds me of is Clancy Brown. Looks a bit light-skinned in that photo but is it not Pat Marc?
Kerr Ray Z. Fokker
April 19, 2010 at 10:32 amLol. Think that’s Micky French. And the German panzer commander comment isn’t too wide of the mark.
Fuck me, there’s some truly weird shit uploaded on that imageshack account. The private stuff is a bizarre mix of abstruse diagrams from dubious physical anthropology forums and candid shots of what looks like Russian housewives. Suspect it to be the work of some drunken Sud Afrikan IT manager. Or maybe I have finally succumbed to Tyler Durdenesque sleep posting.
http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/7430/pdvd000f.jpg
Anyway, in order to facilitate further Tottenham victories I will upload more bonehead photos forthwith….
Nick Hydra
April 19, 2010 at 12:12 pmIsn’t he the one out of ‘The Great Escape’ who captures Richard Attenborough? “Gut afteroon, Herr Bartlett.”
Jock: You’re thinking of ‘Kelly’s Heroes’, ‘The Dirty Dozen’ is the one with Charles Bronson, Telly Savalas and Donald Sutherland where they blow up the nazis in the bunker attached to the French chateau.
Nick Hydra
April 19, 2010 at 12:19 pmpic here http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/pop_ups/03/entertainment_lord_attenborough_at_80/img/3.jpg
“Your German is sehr gut, and your French also. Hands Up!!”
Nick Hydra
April 19, 2010 at 12:29 pmHis name is Karl Otto Alberty, and he was in ‘Kelly’s Heroes’ and ‘Battle of the Bulge’
jock
April 19, 2010 at 12:33 pmthats him lol-did he give up the acting to become a punk?
jock
April 19, 2010 at 12:36 pmand carry on with the bonehead pics Kerr Ray Z. Fokker, anything to stop man city getting that 4th spot and a place in europe 🙂
Kerr Ray Z. Fokker
April 19, 2010 at 6:48 pmIf this wayward and disturbing trend of mine continues, the Yids will be heading for an alarming amount of silverware next season.
Hmmm…
Never thought I’d live to see Karl Otto Alberty being mentioned on a Sid Vicious thread. Will wonders never cease?
Continuing the movie lookalike theme, I did notice that one of the punks in the first SV march photo looks like the actor who played Wally Hairstyle (?) from Alex Cox’s Sid & Nancy. In fact, I’m half convinced it is him.
Sam
April 19, 2010 at 11:07 pmMaybe your method’ll work during the World Cup. Mine last time was to sit 3 feet from the tele on a little stool with my vintage Geoff Hurst England top on. Fat use that did against Portugal so maybe I’ll start uploading pics of boneheads.
Kerr Ray Z. Fokker
April 20, 2010 at 2:51 pmSam, it only works if you don’t support the team in question. You need a Peruvian neighbour to wear that Geoff Hurst shirt whilst his Colombian houseguest gets busy with the Bonner photos!
Sam
April 20, 2010 at 3:43 pmSounds like a plan.
doo rag
April 23, 2010 at 5:53 ami’d just been thinkin i’d like to see more pictures of the audiences at gigs back in them days…look at the pic’s from the anarchy tour in last month’s UNCUT (yes i read it sometimes, i kind of hate what MOJO & UNCUT represent – rock&roll is now just another hobby activity for middle aged men with more money than me, fuck em – but i read em (sometimes)) & look at the people who’re watching the heartbreakers, thunders looks so cool & the audience look like such dorks.
Nick Hydra
May 2, 2010 at 12:32 pmAs I’m always telling my girlfriend (who is a mere 35), if you want to understand the ’70s, don’t look at the bands on TOTP2, look at the AUDIENCE.
Anyone who didn’t live through it can’t imagine how shit the ’70s were.
Kerr Ray Z. Fokker
May 3, 2010 at 10:31 am“1970’s were made in ‘ong kong!”
Sam
May 3, 2010 at 1:58 pmGood point Nick. I liked The Filth and the Fury for mainly showing the other nicey nice stuff that was around at the time. I pissed myself laughing at one clip – Noel Edmonds on TOTP saying in this horribly smug voice “Erm….it’s Emerson Lake and Palmer”.
Dramatisations always show wall to wall mohicans. There were very few punks around even in ’79.
Chris Low
May 4, 2010 at 11:38 amEh????? I’d have said it was 1979/1980 when there were MORE punks than any other time. Roundabout the time the Swindle came out and there seemed to be a new UK Subs song on TOTP every other week I’d have said was when you saw more punks about than anything else; this being a short time before Two Tone/The Mod Revival which obviously a lot migrated to.
Kerr Ray Z. Fokker
May 4, 2010 at 12:51 pmI’d actually agree with Sam. Punk was seriously dead in ’79. Made a bit of a comeback in ’80-’81 with the second wave, although I got the feeling that most of the punks around then weren’t Londoners. Punk peaked around ’77 in London, from what I remember. Most of them then became skins, mods, casuals etc.
Btw, to be a punk in ’77 meant you had short hair, a few badges, army greens/drainpipes and maybe a donkey jacket. If by punks, you mean painted leather jackets and mohicans, then yes, that was later on.
Sam
May 4, 2010 at 2:16 pmI mean punks compared to the rest of the population. Smoothies, lads, bootboys, soulboys everywhere. Noel Edmonds (him again) haircuts, flares, shirts with stupid prints on them. Purdy cuts for the girls. To add to Kerr’s list – ripped jeans were frightening to people. They became such standard wear in the eighties though.
Kerr Ray Z. Fokker
May 4, 2010 at 6:03 pmI had a number one at 13 and frightened the living daylights out of all and sundry. Hard to believe now, eh? I think my school might have even sent a letter home at one point. (“Dear Mr Fokker, we have noticed that your son doesn’t look like Keith fucking Chegwin. Is there a problem at home?”)