Following their infamous December 1, 1976 appearance on Thames Television's Today show with host Bill Grundy, the Sex Pistols instantly became Britain's most notorious new band. The outrage which erupted in the wake of the show's transmission thrust punk rock rudely into mainstream consciousness in the UK and changed the lives of John Lydon, Steve Jones, Glen Matlock and Paul Cook forever.
Gigs on the group's newly-booked British tour were either pulled or picketed by Christians, workers at EMI's pressing plant refused to handle their debut single, Anarchy In The UK, and conservative politicians denounced the quartet as "the antithesis of humankind", and wished death upon them. All this furore generated decidedly unwelcome publicity for the band's respected and respectable record British label EMI, and by the end of January 1977, a decision was taken at boardroom level to tear up the Pistols' record contract and cut them loose. Bassist Matlock's exit from the group was announced the following month.
Despite the chaos and moral hysteria surrounding the band, or perhaps even because of it, the Pistols didn't lack for new suitors when their ties to EMI were severed, and their manager Malcolm McLaren swiftly negotiated a new deal for his young charges, with the American label A&M. On the morning of March 10, 1977, Lydon, Jones, Cook and new bassist Sid Vicious signed their new record contract outside Buckingham Palace, the official residence of Britain's royal family, and proceeded to get royally pissed, then verbally abused a number of A&M staff.
With their bad reputation now preceding them, days later the band got into a fistfight with mild-mannered Old Grey Whistle Test presenter Bob Harris and BBC recording engineer George Nicholson in a nightclub, which resulted in Nicholson requiring 14 stitches after a glass hurled at him cut open his forehead. When news of the incident reached A&M co-founders Herb Albert and Jerry Moss, they decided to terminate the band's freshly-inked contract with immediate effect, and production ceased on the pressing of their scheduled new single God Save The Queen. On March 16, the Pistols became an unsigned band once more.
For reasons best known to themselves, A&M's executives opted not to the publicly disclose the reason behind the group's dismissal. Instead, the British media were informed that the group were released after a number of the label's most high profile signings - among them Yes keyboardist-turned-solo star Rick Wakeman - threatened to tear up their own contracts in protest if the feral punks were not cast out into the wilderness once more.
This story, Wakeman stresses in a new interview with MOJO magazine, was and is "total bollocks".
“Basically," says Wakeman, "Derek Green, who was the [UK] head of A&M Records at the time, was told by America that they didn’t want them on the label. He’d already signed them, so he was looking for an excuse to get rid of them. So he used me and [The Carpenters’] Richard Carpenter, saying that we sent them letters saying that we’d leave the label. The press officer thought that I wouldn’t find out because I was living in Switzerland. But they forgot that people flew over all the time, and they brought newspapers. I went nuts.”
That's cleared that up then.
The Sex Pistols, now minus John Lydon, but with Glen Matlock restored to their ranks, are currently touring Europe, with Frank Carter as their frontman.
