Sunday, May 3, 2015

Sex Pistols Singer Johnny Rotten: "I Knew Sid Vicious Had No Aptitude For Music"


Sid Vicious is legend in punk rock for being one of the most notorious bassists in the genre while also having no musical talent whatsoever. Even Sex Pistols vocalist Johnny Rotten was aware of the lack of musical talent when he invited Vicious to join the band back in 1977, as he recently has admitted in a recent interview with Rolling Stone.

Rotten says:

"Sid was very, very lazy. He had no work ethic – he never learned anything, and by all accounts he had no aptitude for music at all. It’s curious why I brought him in. It must have been some kind of self-destructive element. But I never had any aptitude until I started. I thought, ‘That’s how it will work. You’ll find your way.’ He got all the postures dead right – he could stare into a mirror for ever."

Rotten elaborated more on what kind of person Vicious was and how fond of him he was by saying:

"He was very hilarious, sarcastic. He loved to imitate people and he could really put them down on it because he was very good at it. But all that went sour when the drugs came in. The personality changed and shifted into a selfish drug-hunting fucker."

Vicious ended up dying in 1979 after a heroin overdose. He had been very depressed; especially since he was the prime suspect for his girlfriend Nancy Sprungen's murder. Despite the tragedy, Rotten says he would not have changed anything about the situation; saying he found it "thrilling".

I guess since punk rock has never been about having an abundance of musical aptitude the choice to induct Vicious into the ranks of the Sex Pistols makes a bit of sense to me. He had the image and attitude down pat. Too bad he couldn't pick up on bass just enough to play through songs properly, though. Either way, Vicious's story is an intriguing one and will be told for years to come.

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