Chart entered : 14 June 1980
Chart peak : 21
Earlier in the year Virgin had put out a compilation LP of the Pistols' single and titled it with commendable honesty "Flogging A Dead Horse". This one put the carcass to bed as far as the charts were concerned.
The overall consensus is that the Sex Pistols ended when John Lydon walked offstage at the Winterland ballroom in January 1978. Some would argue they were finished when Glen Matlock was offed nine months earlier, the Sid Vicious line up managing only three more songs including the unspeakable "Belsen Was A Gas" in his wake. That was not how Malcolm McLaren saw it ; he was not prepared to let John cashier his pet project. His first idea was that Sid would take over as front man. Sid could only be persuaded to record three songs , all covers , and be filmed performing them for McLaren's new film project and that on condition that McLaren sign away the right to manage him. Sid turned out to be a surprisingly good singer and his versions of "Something Else" and "C'mon Everybody" both reached number 3 in the charts although he was already dead by that time. He went to New York in September 1978 for the final act of his short life.
That left just Paul Cook and Steve Jones who recorded a handful of new songs in the spring of 1978 including the subsequent single "Silly Thing" and new backing tracks for some old session recordings featuring John and Glen. The release of this material was held up by John's legal case against McLaren which opened a week after Sid's death in February 1979. Paul and Steve initially supported McLaren but then switched sides as the evidence of misappropriation mounted. John was victorious and McLaren's connection with the group was severed. We'll be picking up on his subsequent adventures very soon.
Virgin cobbled together the material recorded since John's departure and put out the double LP "The Great Rock And Roll Swindle" , a soundtrack to the film which wouldn't be released for another year , then proceeded to release six singles from it ( seven if you include the previously released "No One Is Innocent / My Way" ) . All were hits.
This was the last of them and the only one to feature John. The song was originally recorded by Paul Revere and the Raiders but is best known as a Monkees song. The Pistols recorded it during a demo session in October 1976 . Cook and Jones re-recorded the backing ( presumably removing Glen's playing ) during the 1978 sessions. A bilious attack on a gold-digger it was performed with appropriate venom by Micky Dolenz . It's more likely that the Pistols picked up on it through The Heartbreakers as a certain young man from Stretford pointed out in a letter to the NME in 1976. It's good to hear John's voice again but Steve and Paul's subsequent work can't disguise that it's only a guide vocal by an inexperienced singer and the whole sound of the record is a bit murky. It's hard to believe it would have been a hit for a new band in 1980.
It wasn't quite the last single. Earlier in the year The Police had charted with a "single" ( that wouldn't have been allowed in the chart under current rules ) called "Six Pack" which comprised their five singles for A &M up to that point plus a sixth 7 inch containing the album track The Bed's Too Big Without You. Virgin responded with their own version "Sex Pack " which had the Pistols ten hits plus two unreleased songs by Paul and Steve ,"Black Leather" and "Here We Go Again". The former is an undisguised ( and not very good ) metal song while the latter sounds like the terraces punk of Sham 69. Consumers finally said enough is enough and it didn't chart.
Reissues have charted on six subsequent occasions most notably "God Save The Queen " in 2002 to coincide with the Golden Jubilee when it reached number 15. A live version of "Pretty Vacant" from their Finsbury Park concert in 1996 reached number 18.
We know what John did next but what of the others ? Let's deal with Sid first. He played a few gigs in New York doing a covers set backed by members of the New York Dolls . The "highlights" appeared on the album "Sid Sings " in 1979 for which the word "rough" is inadequate. A fortnight later he was found at the Chelsea Hotel in a state of drug-induced stupefaction with his girlfriend Nancy Spungen dead on the floor from a knife wound to her stomach, her body already decomposing from years of drug abuse. He gave conflicting accounts of what had happened and was charged with her murder. McLaren provided bail during which time he attempted suicide and then assaulted Patti Smith's brother. For the latter offence he was sent to Riker's Island prison enduring cold turkey and repeated sexual assaults. He was bailed a second time on 1st February 1979 but died of a heroin overdose that same night. It has been postulated that his mother , an addict herself, deliberately engineered the overdose as a mercy killing.
Steve helped Julian Temple complete the film which although taken out of McLaren's hands by the courts still largely told the story from his point of view. He and Paul then went into the studio with Sham 69's Jimmy Pursey and Dave Tregunna to form a sort of punk supergroup. The legal situation was complicated because Sham 69 hadn't fulfilled their contract with Polydor but it was all academic because Steve and Paul found Pursey impossible to work with and quit the sessions. They found Thin Lizzy's Phil Lynott and Scott Gorham more agreeable and recorded the Christmas novelty single "A Merry Jingle" with them as The Greedies which reached number 28 in December 1979.
Following that Steve and Paul re-branded themselves as The Professionals , recruited a new bass player Andy Allen and renegotiated their deal with Virgin. The record company were not alone in over-estimating public interest in the drone Pistols ; Smash Hits gave them a front cover that was still talked about in the office years later. Their first single "Just Another Dream" in July 1980 was a flop then "1-2-3" limped up to number 43 in October, their only hit. Both sound very like "Silly Thing" , melodic power pop numbers with heavy riffing that would benefit from having a decent singer out front. The band had more problems when Allen decided to sue Virgin who retaliated by refusing to release their debut album.
The band recruited Paul Myers from Subway Sect as their new bassist and a second guitarist Ray McVeigh but all their momentum had been lost. "Join The Professionals " wasn't released until June 1981 but is no step forward musically. The next single "The Magnificent" in October 1981, trailing the album "I Didn't See It Coming", shows some awareness that they had to move on , sounding very like Siouxsie and the Banshees in places but it was too late. The band had further ill luck when three of them were injured in a car accident which put paid to their promotional tour. In 1982 The Clash offered them a support slot on their U.S. tour but the band had lost the appetite to continue and split up.
While Paul returned to the UK, Steve stayed in the States where he was recruited by playboy and would-be rock star Michael Des Barres for his supergroup Chequered Past which also featured ex-Blondie men Clem Burke and Nigel Harrison ( and briefly Frank Infante ). The band took a while to release anything, largely because Clem was playing with Eurythmics as they broke big in 1983.
Their only, eponymous, album in 1984 was panned as soulless arena rock and attacked for both Des Barres' privileged background and the New Wave credentials of Steve and the ex-Blondie boys. The only single "Only the Strong ( Will Survive ) " is somewhere between Rick Springfield and Def Leppard and wasn't even released in the UK. Chequered Past came to an end in 1985 when The Power Station poached Des Barres to replace Robert Palmer.
On the positive side Steve got to know John and Andy Taylor from Duran Duran and that helped him establish himself as a session musician in L.A.
In 1987 he re-emerged with a solo album "Mercy". Musically it's OK, flittering between Billy Idol and Chris Rea but his singing voice hasn't improved and some of the lyrics are pathetic bottoming out in the pitiful tribute to Sid, "Drugs Suck". What the point of the pub singer version of "Love Letters " which closes the album is I can't imagine. The meandering AOR of "Mercy" was released as a single in the UK and got used in an episode of Miami Vice and the Mickey Rourke vehicle Homeboy .
This helped finance a second solo album "Fire and Gasoline" in 1989. The opening track "Freedom Fighter" ( the UK single ) is pure Billy Idol, a hard rocking biker anthem and it stays in that vein for the rest of the LP. The irony of a former Sex Pistol slavishly copying a former member of Generation X is obvious.
When that didn't sell Steve put the idea of solo fame to bed and returned to session work for a few years. In 1996 he and John Taylor who had just left Duran Duran joined ex Guns and Roses men Duff McKagan and Matt Sorum in the jamming band , Neurotic Outsiders. The following year they put an album out on Madonna's Maverick label, the bulk of which was composed by Steve. It's an enjoyable pop -rock album like Therapy ? with a sense of humour and sly references to past glories e.g "Jerk" having the same intro as "God Save The Queen".
That same year Steve agreed to link up with his original band mates in the Filthy Lucre tour and he's taken part in all the reunion tours and appearances since, doing session work, production and a spot of acting in between times. From 2004 to 2009 he had a daily radio show "Jonesy's Jukebox" in Los Angeles. In 2013 he became musical director and comic foil on the second season of Russell Brand's American TV show Brand X, a long way from the yob who swore at Bill Grundy the best part of 40 years earlier. He's recently had a recurring role in Californication.
Paul returned to London and had a small role in nurturing the early career of Bananarama. He then teamed up with former Bow Wow Wow guitarist Matthew Ashman in Chiefs of Relief in 1985 replacing Dave Barbarossa. His first single with them was "The Freedom To Rock " (over-) produced by Rusty Egan, a forgettable example of synth-rock bombast. That was in October 1985 ; their next single "Weekend" came out 18 months later and plods along somewhere between Big Audio Dynamite and Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine. They released one self-titled album in 1988 in the same vein then split up.
He dropped out of the music industry for a while re-emerging as Edwyn Collins's drummer in the 1990s. He's been involved in all the Pistols reunions. Since 2004 he's been involved in Man Raze the side project of Def Leppard guitarist Phil Collen. Necessarily a part-time band they've put out a couple of albums. Most of their output hasn't been too far removed from Collen's parent band but they have dabbled in other genres as the title of their second LP "PunkFunkRootsRock" suggests. They've yet to make much of an impact with the public. He's also been involved since 2007 with Vic Godard and Subway Sect helping them re-record some of their old material. His daughter Hollie has put out a couple of albums in recent years.
Finally we come to Glen. After leaving the Pistols he formed the band Rich Kids in March 1977 with drummer Rusty Egan, guitarist Steve New and singer/guitarist Midge Ure from temporary teen sensations Slik. Both the latter two had been considered for the Pistols at one point or another. As befitted Glen's reputation as the melodic lynchpin of the Pistols Rich Kids aimed at a poppier version of punk but it never quite came off and they became a bit of a byword for well-hyped failure. They were late getting a single out , Matlock's "Rich Kids" only emerging in January 1978. It's pedestrian punk pop but helped by a red vinyl issue it reached number 24 in the charts which was as good as it got for the band. They followed it up with the much more interesting "Marching Men" written by Ure, a pounding anti-fascist warning with some interesting guitar abuse from New. It was a brave choice of single but wasn't rewarded. The album "Ghosts of Princes And Towers" released in August 1978 limped to number 51. The title track written by Glen and New became their final single , a rueful look at thwarted ambitions that could have done with a cleaned up production . They got on Rock Goes To College that October but a combination of creative differences and New's substance abuse put paid to the group shortly afterwards.
While Ure and Egan went off to kick start the New Romantic movement Glen formed The Spectres with former TRB guitarist Danny Kustow. They put out a couple of singles, a messy cover of Dave Berry's "This Strange Effect" and "Stories" , a decent stab at modern pop that sounds a bit like New Musik. Glen also worked with Bette Bright ( aka Mrs Suggs ) around this time.
In 1982 Glen joined Hot Club alongside former Original Mirrors singer Steve Allen and drummer Calvin Hayes, son of Mickie Most. Unsurprisingly they got a deal with RAK . Their debut single "The Dirt That She Walks In Is Sacred Ground To Me" was featured on one of the first episodes of the revamped Whistle Test in the autumn of 1982. It's a distinctive electro-pop chant set to a marching rhythm but didn't catch fire. Allen was bumped in favour of Clark Datchler before the next single "It Ain't Me Girl" in July 1983 which I haven't heard.
When that failed , Glen was next to walk the plank as the band morphed into late eighties hitmakers Johnny Hates Jazz. He kept a low profile for the rest of the eighties as he battled a drink problem. He sobered up for the new decade and published the book "I Was A Teenage Sex Pistol" in 1990. He also started playing pub gigs with a new band as Glen Matlock and the Mavericks. The first Pistols reunion in 1996 came about when he bumped into Steve Jones in L.A.
Glen used the Filthy Lucre Tour as a springboard for an attempted solo career , releasing the album "Who's He Think He Is When He's At Home ? " on Creation. I've only heard a couple of tracks including the single "My Little Philistine" which is a likeable breezy alt-rock number although like Steve, Glen isn't the greatest singer in the world.
Since then Glen has kept his options open by being in around five bands simultaneously. He's done all the Pistols reunions and stood in for Ronnie Laine on The Faces ( a long time love ) reunion tour. He periodically makes albums , to minimal interest, with his band The Philistines. He's also been involved in two collectives with Clem Burke, the International Swingers and Slinky Vagabond.
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