WATCH #SexPistols 'Today Show' #VIDEO from sexy #JanePauley and #JackPerkins - 1978
1978
NBC news segment on the horrors of The Sex Pistols coming to America
Everyone on the staff of NBC seems to be on Quaaludes in this
mind-numbing segment about the Sex
Pistols' US tour
The one exception is co-anchor Jane Pauley, whom I suspect to have been a secret
fan, judging from her overtly bright eyes and restrained giggling, as she
feigns disgust about Johnny Rotten, repeatedly blowing his nose while on
stage, and proving to her co-anchor that she knows God Save the Queen by
humming the melody.
Everyone else is freaked out in a weirdly restrained way (one reporter
says Johnny Rotten looks like a reincarnated Gary Gilmore, even though
Rotten bears zero resemblance to the infamous murderer).
In my vintage Today Show clip above, see how US viewers were introduced to British punk.
Perkins pretends it’s the first time anything like it had ever happened.
Cohen, a seasoned industry man who had previously managed the Fillmore East, predicts great things for the Sex Pistols.
But he expresses some skepticism about whether their savvy media
manipulation was a new phenomenon, citing the Beatles and the Stones as
having already broken such ground.
It’s depressingly easy to rile up millions of people these days with the click of a mouse.
Billion-dollar industries and political campaigns are built on such technology.
But before the empires of social media, there was television, a one-way medium and, prior to cable, an extremely limited one.
In those bygone days, you really had to put your back into it if you wanted widespread attention.
The Sex Pistols—including their manager and promoter, visionary
huckster Malcolm McLaren—worked hard to cultivate infamy, using
television as a primary means of generating shock value.
Although the band members, at least, never made any money, they were highly paid in notoriety on both sides of the Atlantic.
Their image as violent junkies who couldn’t play their instruments owed
mainly to Sid Vicious, who replaced competent bassist and songwriter
Glen Matlock in 1977, a move that boosted the band’s ability to freak
people out while simultaneously setting them on a course for certain
demise within the year.
The spectacular self-destruction occurred, as every fan knows well, on a
tour of the US South that McLaren booked with the wickedest of
intentions, springing the band on cowboy bars in Texas, for example, for
the sake of sheer provocation.
Their final show at San Francisco’s Interlard Ballroom was caught on
film, complete with the last song they ever played together, a cover of
the Stooges “No Fun.”
After the one-song encore, Johnny Rotten sneered “ever get the feeling
you’ve been cheated?” and dropped the mic, disgusted with the whole
“ridiculous farce,” he later wrote.
Before embarking on their comically disastrous US tour, the Pistols got
a heavy dose of free publicity from an American news media as eager
then as ever to chase after a sensation.
In the vintage Today Show clip above, see how US viewers were introduced to British punk.
“Whether naturally or calculatedly so,” says NBC’s Jack Perkins after
reporting on Vicious and drummer, Paul Cook’s refusal to grant an
interview unless they were each paid $10,
“the four young men are
outrageous.
They’re also vile and profane.”
Perkins then walks viewers through the hardly shocking details of
rudeness to hotel staff and a bit of a mess left in their room, shaking
his head sadly.
No band could hope to top Led Zeppelin when it came to this most cliched of rock and roll stunts.
But Perkins pretends it’s the first time anything like it had ever happened.
McLaren could not have scripted better finger-wagging outrage to
inspire American gawkiness (some of whom give brief post-concert
interviews) to come out and see the Pistols flame out on their final
tour.
Then there are the record execs Perkins gets on camera, including A&M's
Kip Cohen, who sized up the situation astutely:
“There’s a case of an
act and management and intelligence behind an act, brilliantly utilizing
the media, cashing in and creating a whole hype for itself.”
Cohen, a seasoned industry man who had previously managed the Fillmore East, predicts great things for the Sex Pistols.
But he expresses some skepticism about whether their savvy media
manipulation was a new phenomenon, citing the Beatles and the Stones as
having already broken such ground.
One could go back even further to Chuck Berry and Elvis, who pushed
many of the same outrage buttons for what constituted “clicks” in olden
times.
But as Perkins points out—shaking his head in disapproval, before
cutting back to a snickering Jane Pauley and very serious Tom Brokaw—the
Pistols pulled it off by looking like they couldn't possibly have cared
any less about being good at what they did, which took an entirely
different kind of talent.
The Sex Pistols Make a Scandalous Appearance & Introduce Punk Rock to the Very Last Concert (San Francisco, 1978), in Dallas' Longhorn Ballroom w/ Merle Haggard
(1978), and Johnny Rotten’s Cordial Letter to the Rock Hall and to the Sex Pistols, "You’re a Piss Stain," Malcolm McLaren, and The Quest
for Authentic Creativity by Josh Jones, a writer and musician based in
Durham, NC, as well as,
Mark Frauenfelder
Cory Doctorow
David Pescovitz
Xeni Jardin
Rob Beschizza