Never mind the bollocks, here’s my Sex Pistols credit card

If you remember, it was Virgin founder Richard Branson who signed the

Sex Pistols to his record label an unbelievable 39 years ago. Now it’s Sir

Richard Branson, of course, just as Malcolm McLaren’s missus and

partner in their punk shop, ‘Sex’, is now Dame Vivienne Westwood, the

fashion tsarina. How times and attitudes change.

But the Sex Pistols were always a fake, goes the Times’ argument, penned

by Ben Macintyre who wrote how he used to believe passionately in the

Johnny Rotten-led quartet, even though his mate said they could hardly

play their instruments and were just out to make money.

How would you like one of these for flashing?

When Sid Vicious killed his girl friend, Nancy, then overdosed on heroin at just 21, Ben felt vindicated about the purity of punk. It has been a long, slow path to disillusionment, he writes.

“The Pistols inspired hundreds of other punk bands proclaiming an assault

on consumerism and the old class values, but whether they made working-

class opinions central to the political debate, as Rotten claimed, is more

doubtful. “They certainly made money which was part of their point.”

 

The Sex Pistols manager, Malcolm McClaren, “Manufactured the Sex Pistols and moulded them into his own Situationalist art project ‘just the way a sculptor uses clay’. But the band was also a way ‘to sell trousers’, as McClaren put it, and extract maximum profit. The band’s name was always intended as a brand, rude enough to sell but not so offensive as to be unprintable on merchandise. Their very artificiality was always part of the joke.

“The profitability was ring-fenced with armour-plated irony: when your single is called ‘Flogging a Dead Horse’ and you reunite for a ‘Filthy Lucre’ tour, the charges of hypocrisy don’t stick. The promotional poster for the Pistols’ ‘The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle’ single featured a mocked-up American Express card warning that unscrupulous money-men in the record industry were out to make ‘unlimited cash’. The poster was withdrawn after American Express sued. Back in 1979 no respectable bank wanted to be linked to the Pistols. In 2015, we have a marriage between punk and a bank.”

In the end, Ben Macintyre’s mate was right, he says. “The Sex Pistols were heavily marketed poseurs out to make some fast cash from the kids. But I was right too. They were a hugely powerful cultural phenomenon, leaders of the rebellion that was fierce, transforming, lucrative and extremely funny.”

So, the final capitulation between punk and capitalism is upon us. The new credit card features artwork from ‘Never Mind The Bollocks’ and ‘Anarchy in the UK’ and is available at up to 18.9 per cent interest.

But such a moment has been coming for a long time. It was Malcolm McLaren who came up with that fabulous British Airways TV advertising campaign based upon the opera, ‘La Boheme’. Johnny Rotten now advertises Country Life butter on British television, and sales have gone through the roof. Iggy Pop, too, stars in British TV commercials (and the back of London buses) selling car insurance. You even get ‘The Ramones’ featured on cushions sold in high street stores.

And now we have Sir Van Morrison, knighted for his services to music and Northern Ireland tourism. The Belfast-born troubadour can now join Sir Mick, Sir Paul,  Sir Bob, Sir Elton, Sir Tom and Sir Cliff wherever Sirs go to mingle. Before we know it, Keith Richards will be getting a knighthood next. Wouldn’t that be something?

American Kevin Spacey has also been knighted in the UK

Incidentally, if you haven’t heard in the USA … American actor Kevin Spacey was also given a knighthood by the Queen. But before he calls himself Sir Kevin, the artistic director of London’s Old Vic theatre, will have to take out British citizenship, just like Sir Bob Geldof did.