What's-a-Matter Midge? (Hey!)

Midge Ure and Joe Dolce photographed in 1981 -

guess who has just scored the number one single

 

 

I.  Schadenfreude (n);  pleasure derived from another's misfortune or humiliation ...

 

I have to admit, it amuses me to discover that - even after all these years - singer-songwriter Midge Ure is still pissed off by the fact that Joe Dolce beat him and his synth-pop combo, Ultravox, to the number one spot in 1981 [1]. 

 

Let us remember the time, reminding ourselves (and explaining to younger readers) who the principle protagonists of this little drama are, beginning with one of Scotland's greatest musical exports ...

 

II. Midge Ure (He'll Love You Forever and Ever)

 

Midge Ure may now just be one of those talking bald heads who regularly appear in rockumentaries on Sky Arts and be better known for his charity work, but, back in the day, he was a flash young fucker from the outskirts of Glasgow, with good-looks, bags of talent, and responsible for some big hits in the '70s and early-mid '80s.

 

He started off as a member of Slik - who were a bit like the Bay City Rollers - and so impressed Malcolm McLaren that, prior to auditioning Johnny Rotten and giving him the job, Midge was offered the role of lead singer with the Sex Pistols in 1975. 

 

Obviously, he turned it down, but, two years later, he would link up with bassist Glen Matlock (after the latter was fired from the Sex Pistols and replaced by Sid Vicious), to form the Rich Kids, releasing the glorious pop-punk anthem Ghosts of Princes in Towers in August 1978. 

 

Leaving the band due to musical differences, Midge next formed Visage, along with Rusty Egan (who had also been in the Rich Kids) and Steve Strange on vocals. Their second single, Fade to Grey (1980), was another top ten hit written and produced by Ure.   

 

But, arguably, it's Ultravox with whom Midge is most associated and best remembered. Replacing John Foxx as the lead singer and guitarist in November 1980, he revitalised the group and ensured they had massive commercial success, including seven top ten albums and seventeen top forty singles, until finally disbanding in 1987. 

 

This included the title track from their fourth album, released as a single in January 1981, Vienna ...     

 

 

III. Austria 2 Italy 1

 

I have to admit, despite its haunting notes and pizzicato strings, Vienna means nothing to me - it's way too mystic and soulful for my tastes. 

 

But it's regarded by the people who do like this kind of thing as one of the finest examples of the new romantic synth-pop genre and became Ultravox's signature song; one which Midge proudly continues to perform to this day (even though, apparently, when he first heard the classical-sounding orchestration he was hesitant about its use in a pop song, fearing it might be a bit too much even for a band that was proud of its own grandeur).  

 

Vienna was one of the best-selling singles of 1981 and voted Single of the Year at the Brit Awards; it reached number one in Ireland, Belgium, and the Netherlands, but it never made the top spot in the UK charts. Initially, Vienna was held in the number two position by John Lennon's Woman. But then, hilariously, Joe Dolce's comic masterpiece, Shaddap You Face, kept it there for a further three weeks.

 

Although known as a novelty record, the fact is people all over the world loved to sing along with Dolce's song (and still do). Not only did it get to number one in fifteen countries, but there have been numerous foreign language cover versions and the original single has sold over six million copies since its release. 

 

So hats off to Joe Dolce, an Italian-American-Australian singer-songwriter who is now highly respected as a poet and essayist. Maybe, one day, Midge will even agree to meet him - having turned down the opportunity to do so when in Australia a couple of years back - and the two will produce a song together ... I think that would be kind of nice.

   

 

Notes

 

[1] I'm basing this on recent press reports, including this one in the Scottish Mail on Sunday, by John Dingwall (18 Oct 2020): click here. 

      To be fair to Midge, I can imagine it would be irritating to be forever asked about Joe Dolce and subject to mockery throughout the last forty years - such as in this scene from the sixth and final episode of the BBC sitcom Filthy, Rich and Catflap (Feb 1987), featuring Rik Mayall and Ade Edmondson: click here.  

 

Discography: 

 

Slik, 'Forever and Ever', single released from the album Slik, (Bell Records, 1975). 

 

Rich Kids, 'Ghosts and Princes in Towers', single released from the album Ghosts and Princes in Towers, (EMI, 1978). 

 

Visage, 'Fade to Grey', single released from the album Visage, (Polydor, 1980). 

Ultravox, 'Vienna', single released from the album Vienna, (Chrysalis, 1980). 

Joe Dolce Music Theatre, 'Shaddap You Face', (Full Moon Records, 1980).

Readers interested in Midge Ure can visit his official site: midgeure.co.uk

Readers interested in Joe Dolce can visit his official site: joedolce.net

Can Anyone be a Sex Pistol?

 Anson Boon / Johnny Rotten

 

 

I. 

 

For whatever reason, I'm still thinking about Danny Boyle's new six-part series based on the story of the Sex Pistols. And the question that keeps returning is this: Can Anson Boon convincingly play the part of Johnny Rotten? 

 

Or is it the case that, in order to truly inhabit a role, an actor needs the same lived experience [1] as the person they are portraying? Ultimately, what is the relationship between acting and authenticity?

II. 

 

Firstly, let me say this: I know why some people think it important that, for example, black actors play black characters on stage and film and that such roles aren't given to white actors wearing theatrical makeup. I understand the issues surrounding blackface and how it has lent itself to racial stereotyping and, indeed, racist caricature and can see why such a practice is now considered offensive (even when there is no wilful malice or disrespect intended by the actor playing the part). 

 

Similarly, I sympathise with disabled actors who time and again see roles for which they would seem to be ideally suited go to able-bodied performers. It seems discriminatory - and probably is discriminatory. For although the performing arts take place in an aesthetic space that is uniquely different to what most people think of as the real world, that space is not entirely separate from the latter and still unfolds within a wider cultural history and a network of power and politics, privilege and prejudice. 

 

As Howard Sherman writes:

 

"If we lived in a society, a country, where everyone was indeed equal in opportunity, then the arguments for paying heed to the realities of race, ethnicity, gender and disability might be concerns that could be set aside. But that's far from the case, and if the arts are to be anything more than a palliative, they must think not just of artifice, but also about the authenticity and context of what they offer to audiences." [2] 

 

Unfortunately, whenever someone points this out they are immediately told that the very essence of acting is people pretending to be what they're not; about performance, persona, and pretence; that it's not about the lived reality of an actor, who is paid to wear a mask not bear their soul or expose their true selves. 

 

However, as Sherman goes on to argue, the it's called acting defence is one that often serves to uphold a state of affars in which too many people have been marginalised and unfairly treated for too long; where the lived experience of those who don't determine the rules of the game - including the rules and conventions of the supposedly liberal world of the arts - has been denigrated or dismissed.      

 

 

III. 

 

Having said that - and this brings us back to Danny Boyle's project and the question I asked at the beginning of this post - one of the key lessons of The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle was that anyone can be a Sex Pistol, regardless of their background.

 

Why? Because it's all about attitude, rather than authenticity; style and swagger, rather than an identity rooted in one's so-called lived experience. As much as Boyle's castration of the Sex Pistols irritates me - click here - the idea that actors can only play people who are the same as them is clearly absurd. 

 

It can be vexing - I wouldn't say offensive - when posh people attempt to portray working class life, or straight actors play gay characters. But, as Julie Burchill says, "if an actor doesn’t look like he’s making fun of someone, we should trust him to give a part his all - and more credit to him if the part is outside of his experience" [3]. 

 

So, good luck to Anson Boon in his attempt to play Rotten! 

 

And good luck also to Louis Partridge as Sid Vicious and Maisie Williams as Jordan. These bright young thespians may never quite understand what was so phenomenal about the Sex Pistols, but that needn't detract from their performance and, as Burchill also points out, there's a danger in getting too uptight about all this: for such anxiety about casting "is merely the equity branch of the cultural-appropriation asshattery" [4]. 

 

 

Notes

 

[1] This moral-ideological notion - increasingly used to negate objective reality - is one I have italicised throughout this post in order to indicate my own scepticism regarding its legitimacy. For those who are interested, it is discussed at length by Brendan O'Neill in a recent essay entitled 'The tyranny of "lived experience"', Spiked, (19 March, 2021): click here.    

 

[2] Howard Sherman, 'The Frightened Arrogance Behind "It’s Called Acting"', (2 August, 2016): click here. Sherman - an arts administrator, advocate and author - was Interim Director of the Alliance for Inclusion in the Arts (New York), from 2013 - 2017. Although I'm sympathetic to his concerns, I worry that his arguments can be extended in a way that ultimately renders acting - and, indeed, even the imaginative creation of characters by writers - almost impossible. In other words, that a call for political correctness ends in a form of woke puritanism.         

 

[3] and [4] Julie Burchill, 'It’s called acting for a reason', Spiked, (21 August, 2018): click here.

 

The Great Rock 'n' Roll Castration

Johnny Rotten and Sid Vicious as portrayed by Anson Boon and Louis Partridge

 

Director Danny Boyle irritated me in 2012 with his ludicrous opening ceremony for the London Olympics, featuring a twenty-minute tribute to the NHS, so when I heard that he was making a six-part TV series about the Sex Pistols (based on Steve Jones's Lonely Boy memoir), I began to prepare for a heavily sentimental take on the story.   

 

But, having now read further details of the project - including who's cast to play Rotten and company - and seen images released from on set, I fear what we are about to be offered is a revision of the past that exchanges sneering nihilism for an uplifting tale of smiling punks in touch with their feelings and struggling to live up to their bad boy image, whilst dealing with issues of abuse, deprivation, and addiction 

 

Even the title of the series - Pistol - speaks of castration; of a band rendered sexless and transformed from cocky young 'erberts with an eye for fashion into sensitive boys crying out for attention and who only wanted to be accepted by society and loved as people.*   

 

Still, as a friend of mine said, you never know; the project might be redeemed by a brilliant script (co-written by Frank Cottrell Boyce and Craig Pearce) and some excellent performances from the young cast. I doubt it. But we'll see when the series airs next year.   

 

 

Notes

 

* John Lydon - who has already spoken out against Boyle's project - mocked this idea of poor misunderstood punks on 'Fodderstompf', the closing track of the first Public Image Ltd. album (Virgin Records, 1978): click here.  

 

For a related post to this one in which I discuss the relationship between acting and authenticity and address the question of whether anyone can be a Sex Pistol, click here. 

I'll Put a Knife Right In You: Notes on the Case of Sid and Nancy

Sid and Nancy indulge in a little knife play for the camera
Photos by Pierre Benain (1978) 

snapgalleries.com

 

 

Sex Pistol Sid Vicious had a fetishistic fascination with knives: he loved to play with knives: he loved to pose with knives. And, if The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle is to be be believed, he was happy to threaten the good citizens of Paris with a knife if they got in his way whilst he was out cruising the boulevards and arcades looking for trouble.

 

Sid also liked to cut himself, both on and off stage. And his penchant for self-harm and violence was something he shared with his American girlfriend, Nancy Spungen, who was a troubled (some might even say wayward) young woman. 

 

Diagnosed with schizophrena at fifteen, Nancy left home two years later and worked as a stripper and prostitute in New York, before moving to London in 1977, where she met Vicious, with whom she began an eighteen-month relationship. The star-crossed lovers were as devoted to one another as they were addicted to drugs and self-destructive behaviour.        

 

None of these facts, however, means that Sid murdered Nancy on that fateful night in October 1978. And it certainly doesn't mean that an unfairly vilified twenty-year old girl deserved such a horrible fate; lying semi-naked and bleeding to death on a cold bathroom floor, having received a single stab wound to the abdomen.*

 

The established facts of the case are well-documented. But we'll probably never know the truth of what actually happened; was it unintentional homocide ... was there another party involved ...?

 

Vicious was charged with second-degree murder, but died of a heroin overdose whilst out on bail and just days before he was due to go into a studio with Paul Cook and Steve Jones to record an album of popular standards in order to raise funds for his legal defence, including, at Malcolm McLaren's (amusing if tasteless) suggestion, Mack the Knife ...

 

 

* Note: According to the police report, Miss Spungen was stabbed with a Jaguar Wilderness K-11 folding knife and not a 007 flick knife as is often claimed. 

 

Musical bonus: The Misfits, Horror Business (Plan 9 Records, 1979): click here. 

      This classic punk single was inspired by the murder of Nancy Spungen and Hitchcock's Psycho (Marion Crane, as fans of the film will know, also meets her bloody end in a bathroom). 

      It's interesting to note that Jerry Only - bassist with the Misfits - was one of the small group of friends with Sid at his new girlfriend's apartment on the night he took his fatal overdose (1 Feb 1979) and that there was talk of the band backing Vicious on a proposed solo album.  

 

For an earlier post on piquerism and knife play, please click here.       

99% is Shit

I remember once being told by a friend that he understood the phrase 99% is shit to mean that the only kind of commitment that counts is total commitment. Anything less than 100% was a sure sign of someone who couldn't be trusted and whose authenticity was in doubt.

It's a perfectly valid interpretation and reveals much about the fanatic mindset of those who took the seriously extreme call to arms issued by the Sex Pistols extremely seriously.

(This was during a time when we were both scornful of so-called plastic or part-time punks; the kind of people who play their records very loud and pogo in front of the bedroom mirror - but only when their mum's gone out.)*

As a matter of fact, however, when Sid Vicious spoke about 99% being shit, he wasn't quite thinking in such terms. Rather, he meant - more brutally - that the vast majority of people, including fans, are worthless. Thus, in the same interview, he would say: 'I’ve no interest in pleasing the general public, I don’t want to, because I think largely they're scum, they make me physically sick.'

Such violent contempt for the masses was, of course, a key feature of much modern art; the avant-garde were, by definition, a revolutionary elite who prided themselves on their own difference and superiority.** 

And the Sex Pistols - at least as conceived by McLaren - belong to this tradition (contra the Clash who even at the time were sneered at for being social workers and who would doubtless echo the cry We are the 99% which became a unifying slogan of the Occupy Movement in the summer of 2011).

As do the Cash Pussies, who released their only single, 99% is Shit, in April 1979, featuring snippets of an audio interview conducted a couple of years prior with the (recently deceased) Sex Pistols bassist.***

Notes

* The lines are from the single 'Part Time Punks', by Television Personalities, (Rough Trade 1980): click here.

** According to John Carey, Modernist art was primarily concerned not only with the exclusion of the masses, but with a denial of their humanity. See The Intellectuals and the Masses (Faber and Faber, 1992). Of course, it should be remembered that Carey's book is itself 99% shit.   

*** Perhaps not surprisingly, the band were conceived by an old art school friend of Malcolm's, Fred Vermorel, and his wife, Judy, and the track was produced by Dave Goodman, famous for his work with the Sex Pistols. 

Play: Cash Pussies, 99% is Shit, (The Label, 1979): click here. 

Sid Vicious: My Way

Sleeve art for the 7" single release (Virgin Records, 1978) 

from the album The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle (Virgin Records, 1979)  

For many people, the most memorable scene in The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle is the one in which Sid Vicious gives his own unique interpretation of that sentimental slice of cheese made famous by Sinatra: My Way.  

Whatever one might think of him, there's no denying that the 20 year-old Sex Pistol gives an astonishing performance and embodies a look and a moment of punk perfection on stage at the Olympia, Paris.

Indeed, even Paul Anka, who wrote the song - adapted from on an earlier release by Claude François and Jacques Revaux - conceded in an interview thirty years later that whilst he had been somewhat destabilized by Sid's version, he nevertheless admired the sincerity of the performance.

And French pop's greatest poet and pervert, Serge Gainsbourg, who witnessed Sid's finest few minutes on stage, was so smitten that - according to Malcolm - he thereafter kept a picture of him on his piano, alongside that of Chopin.

Whether that's true or not, I don't know. And whether Sid ever did anything his way is, of course, highly debatable; philosophically speaking, the very idea of free will determining an individual's actions seems dubious.

One suspects that had it been his decision, Sid would have covered a Ramones track and that the choice of this particular number was therefore McLaren's. Still, it was a good choice - and a fateful choice; for Vicious and his girlfriend Nancy Spungen, the end really was near ... 


See: The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle, dir. Julien Temple, 1980: click here to watch Sid's magnificent performance of 'My Way'. 

Note: Sid's firing of a gun blindly into the audience at the end of the song is a nod towards André Breton's idea of what constitutes the simplest act of Surrealism and is evidence of how the artistic and philosophical roots of the Sex Pistols lay in Paris as much as London and New York. 

For a related post to this one on Sid's Parisian adventures in 1978 as a kind of punk flâneur, click here.           

A Sex Pistol in Paris

One of the more amusing scenes in The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle features Sid Vicious wandering the streets of Paris in the spring of '78, confronting locals including a policeman, a prostitute, and a young female fan working in a pâtisserie.

One is tempted to describe it as a provocative form of punk dérive - a mode of experimental behavior, theorised by Guy Debord, in which individuals aimlessly stroll through the city and allow themselves to be seduced by the attractions of urban society and random encounters with strangers. 

I'm not saying that Sid gave a shit about psychogeography - or that he needed lessons from anyone on emotional disorientation - but, as a Sex Pistol, he was well-versed by Malcolm in the art of creating situations that challenge the predictable and monotonous character of everyday life and he cuts an undeniably unique figure as a spiky-haired flâneur, beer bottle in hand, and wearing his favourite swastika emblazoned red t-shirt ...

See: The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle, dir. Julien Temple, 1980: click here to watch the scenes of Sid drifting round Paris as discussed above. 

For a related post to this one on Sid's performance of 'My Way', click here. 

Jagger is a Punk

Mick Jagger as a Rolling Sex Pistol

One of the more interesting facts surrounding the death of Nancy Spungen in October 1978 and the immediate arrest of her boyfriend, Sid Vicious, who was charged with her murder, is the fact that it was Mick Jagger of all people who stepped up to pay for the Sex Pistols' legal fees and helped assemble a defence team.

Or at least that's so according to Johnny Rotten, who, I suppose, has no reason to lie, although he does use the revelation made in a 2013 press interview not only as an opportunity to praise the Rolling Stones frontman, but to take another predictable swipe at Malcolm, whom he remembers as being clueless and ineffectual at providing the necessary support (which might be true, but what, pray, did you do for your best friend Mr Lydon?).     

I suppose it shouldn't be that much of a surprise to discover that Jagger felt sympathy and affection for Vicious, as he is himself something of a punk at heart and responsible for writing one of the great nihilistic pop anthems in Paint it Black (1966).

Indeed, such was Jagger's fascination with the Sex Pistols that he even wore a Seditionaries Destroy shirt, as designed by McLaren and Westwood, whilst on tour with the Stones in America in the summer of 1978 and it's amusing to imagine what might have been if, after Rotten was exposed as a collaborator and thrown overboard, Malcolm had enlisted Jagger as the new lead singer instead of Ronnie Biggs ...


Afternote

I've been advised by Paul Gorman, McLaren's biographer, that Rotten's account of things isn't entirely accurate; that whilst Jagger did contact Malcolm with an offer to help financially, it was in fact never taken up. Further, Malcolm met with several lawyers and worked hard on Sid's behalf during this time. More details can be found by clicking here: paulgormanis.com 

As for the Destroy shirt, it was originally bought by Anita Pallenberg as a gift for Keith Richards. He refused to wear it, however, so Mick appropriated it into his own wardrobe. Again, many thanks to Paul Gorman for this titbit. 

Notes on A Glam-Punk Childhood

20th century boy (c. 1973)

I. 

1977 - the year of punk - may have been of crucial importance in shaping my tastes, attitudes, and ideas, but it certainly wasn't the beginning of my long love affair with pop culture. 

Thus, whilst the first album I ever bought may have been Never Mind the Bollocks, I'd been buying singles since 1971, when Benny Hill released Ernie (the Fastest Milkman in the West), an innuendo-laden comedy song that was the Christmas number one that year and which has remained a much-loved favourite with many of those who remember it, including former prime minister David Cameron.  

The second single I remember spending my pocket money on was Crazy Horses, by the Osmonds, which reached number two in the UK charts in the autumn of 1972 and proved that even clean-living Mormons can rock out. Looking back, it's clear that the song was ahead of its time with its concerns to do with the environment and fume-spewing motor vehicles smoking up the sky. But even back then, I hated cars and knew that - like my father - I never wanted to drive.

It was the following year however - the year of glam - that I really started buying singles on a regular basis; by Slade, by Sweet, and - of course - by Gary Glitter, whom I adored and had a large poster of on my bedroom wall. I spent many, many happy hours stomping around in my older sister's platform boots and singing along to the smash hits released by the above in that golden year of 1973, including: Cum on Feel the Noize, Blockbuster, Ballroom Blitz, Do You Wanna Touch Me, Hello Hello I'm Back Again, I'm the Leader of the Gang (I Am), and I Love You Love Me Love.           

What was it about these artists and their songs that appealed so powerfully to the ten year old child (and, if I'm honest, still appeal even now) ...?


II.

Obviously, the outrageous clothes, make-up and hairstyles caught my eye and I was seduced also by the camp nature of their performance - even if I had no idea then what campness was. But, mostly, it was the music: loud, fast, tribal and ridiculously catchy - making you want to pogo up and down years before Sid Vicious was credited with inventing the dance.

There was also something distinctly British and working class about glam. Perhaps it was the fact that it didn't take itself too seriously; that, like punk, it seemed to be more in the theatrical tradition of music hall and even pantomime, rather than serious rock with its roots in rhythm and blues. It was about dressing up and messing up and having a laugh - not perfecting one's skills as a musician or soulful songwriter.

As "Whispering" Bob Harris sneered after a performance of Jet Boy by the New York Dolls on the Old Grey Whistle Test in November 1973, it was mock rock - sexy, stylish, superficial, and shiny - not something that real music lovers and old hippies such as himself needed to take seriously (the Dolls, of course, formed the bridge between glam and punk - as the fact that they were briefly managed by Malcolm McLaren in 1975, prior to his involvement with the Sex Pistols, perfectly illustrates).


III.

Those cunts who now sneer with politico-moral correctness and a sense of their own cultural superiority at the music, the fashions, the TV, and pretty much every other aspect of life in the 1970s need to be told (or in some cases reminded) that it was more than alright - it was better. 

Or, at any rate, despite all the boredom, blackouts and bullshit of the time, people were happier and I'm pleased to have been born (and to have remained at heart) a 20th century boy.    

Who Killed Bambi?

Gentle pretty thing / Who only had one spring 

You bravely faced the world / Ready for anything

Whilst it's true that Steve Jones in his role as an amateur detective is only interested in finding Malcolm and piecing together the clues that might explain where it all went wrong for him and his fellow band members (tragically so, in the case of Sid Vicious), there is, nevertheless, another question at the heart of The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle which transforms the movie from an amusingly mythologized history of the Sex Pistols into a profound murder mystery and morality tale: with one big shout we all cry out - who killed Bambi?

It is, of course, a rhetorical question: when McLaren screams it into the faces of the assembled reporters at Henley Airfield, he's not expecting an answer. And neither is he simply giving reference to an off-screen incident involving the shooting of a deer by a decadent rock star, although, clearly, this scene - which belongs to the originally proposed film to be directed by Russ Meyer - is a non-too-subtle visual metaphor.   

So what, if anything, do we learn from Lesson 10 of the Swindle?

That innocence is easily lost? That it's a good thing to be disillusioned and believe only in the ruins of belief? That we should never trust a hippie? That the spirit of punk will never die; or that Johnny Rotten was a collaborator and that big business will always find a way to assimilate and market youthful rebellion? It's probably a (qualified) yes to all of these ...


Note: The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle, directed by Julian Temple, was released in cinemas in 1980; probably you can now find it on YouTube, or elsewhere online. Those old punks and film-buffs who are particularly interested, might like to read the script written for Who Killed Bambi? by Roger Ebert, which he has kindly made available on his website: http://www.rogerebert.com/rogers-journal/who-killed-bambi-a-screenplay