This Day In London’s History
1975: The Sex Pistols play their first gig at Saint Martin’s College.
After Johnny Rotten joined The Swankers as their new vocalist, the band changed its name to The Sex Pistols under the guidance of its new manager Malcolm McLaren. Shortly afterwards, on this day 31 years ago, they played (or attempted to play) their first gig at Saint Martin’s College. Their debut was not exactly an overwhelming success – it’s rumoured they were hauled off stage without managing to finish a single song. This was quite an apt beginning, then, for a band that revelled in its own chaos whilst managing to cause national outrage and controversy for much of its mere two-year existence.
Still, when they weren’t vomiting on old ladies in airport lounges or introducing new televisual swearing landmarks, they were instrumental in the rise of punk – a culture that has been hugely beneficial to the economy of some of the more annoying parts of Camden Town for decades.
Capital Connections
In 1976, The Sex Pistols provoked one of their most well known controversies when they called an allegedly drunk Bill Grundy a “dirty fucker” and a “fucking rotter” on live early-evening television as a response to his apparent attempts to flirt with Siouxsie Sioux. However even though the ensuing outrage spread across the nation, the offending television programme had in fact only actually been broadcast to the London region.
Londoner Of The Week
Who would have thought there were so many budgerigar fanatics in London? Budgieman seems to have inspired quite a few of them in the last week (not least clashcityrocketkat who may have overdone it a bit after reading our interview).
One Thing You Must Do In London This Week
If you can bear the crowds, the Oxford Street Christmas Lights are being switched on this Thursday, from 6pm outside Selfridges. If you didn’t manage to win tickets to see All Saints a couple of weeks ago, you can still get a glimpse of them as they flick the switch. And for even more entertainment value, Jordan and Peter Andre are threatening to further humiliate themselves with another ear-splitting rendition of their forthcoming Christmas single. Probably best attended whilst mildly intoxicated.
Note from the Sex Pistols to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (upon their induction) taken from thelastminute’s Flickr photostream under the Creative Commons Attribution License.
