John Simon Ritchie was
born May 10th 1957, lived for 21 years and died from a heroin overdose
following release from Riker's prison a long way from the formative
years he spent with his mother in Ibiza.
Returning to London from Ibiza in 1961 John ended up in a private school
after trying various other academic establishments, but it was
obvious to Anne that John was not a scholar and by age 15 he had left.
Having an aptitude for art his only real choice was to go to art
college, and so the renamed Simon John Beverley (His mother Anne
remarried in 1965) enrolled in Hackney College to study art and
photography, it was here he met and found someone he could actually
relate to; that person was John Lydon.
John Lydon had red hair and according to
Anne was incredibly introverted and shy. Simon at this time was a Bowie
fan who spent time spiking his hair and dying the front red. His new friend
John described him as a poseur and noted that he could laugh at
anything, and had a kind of innocence about him. Simon was initially
renamed Sid by John as reference to his hamster and Syd Barrett ex
guitarist of Pink Floyd. Sid and John were joined by John Wardle (Jah
Wobble) and John Grey, all collectively known as the 4 Johns. |
Sid or Syd Barrett?
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During this time Sid
was living between squats and his mother's home where he
found food and a comfortable bed. Then when Sid was 17, he was made effectively homeless
following an argument with his mother and lived full time
in a squat. Squats were a breeding ground for the first wave of Punk
bands, without them we may have never seen the Clash, the Slits or
the Damned. Sid's main source of income at this time was turning tricks under the
name "Hymie"; for a pretty boy in London this was not difficult. It
was during this period that Sid came across a shop at the wrong end of
the Kings Road called "Too Fast to Live, Too Young to Die."
This was
not what could be described as a normal shop selling as it did Teddy
Boy and Fetish gear with rock 'n' roll blaring from the Juke
Box all the time. |
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| The Shop at Kings
Road was re-launched as 'Sex', concentrating on rubber and BDSM gear.
Glen Matlock who worked there on Saturdays played bass and before
long was introduced to two regular shop visitors who had formed a
group; these were Steve Jones and Paul Cook. The band known as the Swankers were pressurising the shops manager Malcolm McClaren
(who had recently returned from New York following an ill fated
attempt to manage the disintegrating New York Dolls) to manage
them. Before long they had been rechristened the Sex
Pistols and the hunt was on for a singer.
Vivienne Westwood, Malcolm's partner
had noticed a tall lanky young man in the shop and he
was suggested as a possible singer. This was Sid. However another
member of the Johns who was by now sporting green hair, bad teeth
and a self made 'I hate Pink Floyd' T Shirt beat him to it. Following
a hastily arranged audition miming to 'I'm Eighteen' on the shops juke
box, John Lydon was rechristened Rotten, and the line up was
complete. |
Paul Cook, Wally Nightingale & Steve Jones |
Sid
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