10 Most Disturbing Facts About Punk Rocker Sid Vicious

Robert Dixon
10 min readMay 17, 2020

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Sid Vicious, an individual from the unbelievable punk band the Sex Pistols, is as celebrated for his medication use and freakish conduct as his enrollment in the gathering. His over the point jokes included viciousness, outrageous and steady medication use, self-mutilation and the maltreatment of both animals and people.

Vicious carried on with his exciting and fun living and, in the same way as others who live comparable ways of life, he kicked the bucket youthful, therefore. While there keeps on being banter about whether his passing from a medication overdose was self-destruction or unplanned, neither would be astonishing given the very wildlife he drove.

Sid Vicious

1. Vicious Couldn’t Play the Bass

While Sid Vicious was in fact the bassist in the punk band the Sex Pistols, he couldn’t really play bass. Strangely, this was never actually an issue. During the account of one of the band’s collections, Vicious was in the emergency clinic accepting treatment for hepatitis gained from his intravenous medication use, so another performer remained in and provided the bass parts. He just at any point contributed a track to one melody, “Bodies” and his work on the tune is considered very poor and off-key.

Various different performers attempted to tell Vicious the best way to play his instrument accurately. Lemmy Kilmister of the speed metal gathering Motorhead endeavored to train Vicious yet allegedly said that he didn’t have the ability to focus or premium required to learn. Horrendous’ individual bandmate and guitar player Steve Jones supposedly put tape on the frets of his guitar, a technique usually utilized for kids learning instruments, yet asserted it didn’t help.

It is in no way, shape, or form unbelievable to have an individual from a band who can’t play their instrument. The Monkees were acclaimed for not having the option to perform with their own instruments, with the band emulating along to support tracks gave by studio artists. Numerous different gatherings have a feeble part or two who scratch alongside their capacity.

2. Vicious’ Mother Gave Him Heroin

Sid Vicious’ mom, Anne Beverly, was vigorously associated with unlawful medications as both a client and a dealer. It is maybe obvious that Vicious wound up someone who is addicted, given that his mom presented him to drugs as a small kid. She utilized the youthful Vicious as a donkey for hashish during his adolescence in Spain. She would stuff his little child attire with bundles of medications to carry them again into England.

John Lydon, also called Johnny Rotten, the lead artist of the Sex Pistols used to spend time with Vicious at his home that he imparted to his mom. They would drink lagers and tune in to music together. On one of these evenings, which was additionally Vicious’ birthday, his mom came over and, before Lydon, gave Vicious a baggie of heroin and a few syringes. Lydon expressed she commented “Glad Birthday, Sidney” after giving her child drugs.

Lydon was purportedly stunned by the trade, however, Vicious consoled him he mother had good intentions and realized that heroin helped him unwind. Indeed, even among hard rock and punk circles, the possibility of a mother giving her child heroin at a youthful is amazing. One can envision Vicious would have no familial help in getting clear and off of medications had he so wanted.

3. Vicious Injected Drugs Mixed With Toilet Water

Sid Vicious was famous, even in punk circles, for his productive medication misuse. This thought was never more apparent than in a well known story including Dee Ramone of the kindred punk band The Ramones. Horrible was constantly noted to appreciate spending time with The Ramones at whatever point they were visiting London. On one such event, Ramone and Vicious went to a gathering that was unreservedly offering speed, an injectable type of amphetamine.

Ramone and Vicious went to the washroom to discover water to blend in with the speed so as to have the option to infuse it. They found the restroom totally shrouded in upchuck from individual gathering goers. Resolute, Vicious stuck his syringe into a can brimming with regurgitation and drew water from it. Without “cooking” or warming the substance of the needle, he infused himself with the blend of medication and another person’s regurgitation.

Indeed, even to a Ramone sibling, who were likewise renowned for their medication use, this was a stunning moment. Allegedly, Vicious commented to the sickened Ramone “Man, where did you get this stuff?” Whether Vicious delighted in stun esteem or was in fact that subject to getting high isn’t clear. What is clear is that Vicious was fit for stunning even solidified underground rockers with his degrees of degeneracy.

4. Vicious’ Own Mother May Have Killed Him

Anne Beverly, Sid Vicious’ mom, was no more abnormal to empowering her child. She gave Vicious heroin as a youngster, in any event, giving him a baggie with the medication and syringes before companion John Lydon, better referred to later as Johnny Rotten — lead vocalist of the Sex Pistols. This propensity turned out to be a piece of a deep rooted design, with Beverly sneaking medications to her child at whatever point she could.

While Vicious was imprisoned at Riker Island in New York, Beverly carried drugs into the jail in her vagina so her child could have his fix. After he was rescued of the prison, she set up an opportunity party for her child. A companion, Peter Gravelle, appeared at the gathering with heroin he bought with Beverly’s cash. The heroin was purportedly 98% unadulterated, a unimaginably deadly virtue for anybody.

Gravelle cautioned Vicious not to take a significant part of the heroin because of its virtue, however Vicious despite everything overdosed. As the gathering got out, Gravelle left the heroin and Vicious in Beverly’s consideration. The following morning, Vicious was dead of a heroin overdose. The chief of the Sex Pistols, Malcolm McLaren, claims that Beverly gave Vicious the heroin to spare him from doing time in jail since she realized he’d abhor it.

5. Vicious Engaged In Self-Mutilation

Notwithstanding his medication misuse, Vicious additionally utilized self-mutilation to handle his evil spirits. During the Sex Pistol’s American visit, a cowpoke welcomed Sid Vicious to his table and put his cigarette out in his own hand and moved Vicious to do likewise. Horrendous reacted by cutting his hand and permitting blood to run down his hand and all over his food, which he kept on eating. He supposedly sickened everybody viewing, including the macho cowpoke.

After arriving at Dallas on their American visit, Vicious probably cut “gimme a fix” into his chest utilizing a mirror and a shard of glass. Cutting words or shapes into oneself with a sharp item is a typical quality among the individuals who practice self-mutilation. Such activities are the reason self-mutilation is regularly just alluded to as “cutting.”

Horrible’s conduct appeared to be especially enhanced during the American visit. While performing at the Longhorn Ballroom, additionally in Dallas, Texas, Vicious allegedly hollered “cowpokes are queers” again and again trying to provoke the crowd. He didn’t stop until a group of people part hurried the stage and punched him in the face. Rather than keeping an eye on his physical issue, Vicious played the remainder of the show shrouded in dribbling blood.

6. Vicious Was Suicidal From a Young Age

Sid Vicious had a disturbed and troublesome adolescence. While going to the Kingsway College, a school for troublesome and recently removed youth, a guide singled him out for one-on-one meetings after he heard Vicious discussing self destruction. The advisor approached Vicious to bring a companion for help, and he brought companion John Wardle, better referred to now as Jah Wobble of Public Image Ltd., along to the meeting.

The instructor revealed to Wardle that Vicious appeared to think about self destruction. Wardle, expecting it was a joke, answered that “Sid should end everything.” amazingly and awfulness, Vicious gestured intensely accordingly. Wardle later mirrored that he and Vicious both idea the directing meeting would be a giggle, however he left understanding that Vicious had a dim and profoundly broken side of him.

Wardle later remarked, after Vicious’ passing, that his home life was fundamentally a “dark gap” because of his mom’s way of life of medication misuse. She wasn’t associated with his life, and he had no good examples or oversight. He understood, sometime down the road, that Vicious was profoundly harmed and miserable with nobody ready to support him. This disclosure loans a fairly unfortunate tone to Vicious’ jokes.

7. Vicious Swung His Bass Better Than He Played It

Outside of his showy behavior and over-the-top way of life, Sid Vicious was additionally known for being completely unequipped for playing his bass. Rock and punk greats like Lenny Kilmister of Motorhead and his bandmates in the Sex Pistols purportedly endeavored to instruct Vicious to play yet discovered him uninterested and distracted. Be that as it may, in spite of not realizing how to play the bass, he unquestionably realized how to swing it — particularly at individuals.

Proceeding with Vicious’ heritage of awful conduct in Texas on the Sex Pistols’ American visit, he was egged on to savagery by a farmer. Brian Faltin, an individual from an unmistakable Texas farming family, went to a show in San Antonio planning to stir up some dust with the band, who he alluded to as “sewer rodents with guitars.” Faltin first endeavored to provoke Johnny Rotten however discovered him lethargic.

Faltin then directed his concentration toward Vicious, who would never be called lethargic. Subsequent to tossing his own bleeding swathe, applied to self-mutilation prior at night, into the group Vicious emitted into an attack of fury at Faltin and swung his 10-pound bass legitimately at Faltin. Fortunately, Vicious missed Faltin and just touched a close by roadie who was endeavoring to keep down the stirred up swarm.

Sid Vicious with Bass Guitar

8. Vicious Murdered a Cat

In one of the all the more appalling sections of Sid Vicious’ upset life, he tormented and executed a feline before companions. A companion who ran with the Sex Pistols group from before they framed the band all through its prosperity, Mark Helfond saw the episode and, in later years, said he wished he could return in time and stop the circumstance.

After Vicious was kicked out of his home, he and John Lydon, later known as Johnny Rotten, lived in squat pads where Vicious would discover and choke felines; also, self-disfigure with aluminum can covers. In one case, Helfond saw Vicious executing a feline. He folded a belt over the poor animal’s neck and held it there while the feline battled and gradually choked to death.

Lydon’s dad additionally saw a portion of these episodes and expressed he felt they were because of Vicious’ unquenchable requirement for consideration, which was never met by his medication someone who is addicted mother. He said of Vicious, “On the off chance that he was staying here and nobody was taking any notification of him, he’d slice his hand or something to stand out. You’d need to take your psyche off everything else and take a gander at him.” One feels for Vicious and the maltreatment he more likely than not endured as a youngster, however his torment and murder of creatures is really appalling.

9. Vicious Abused His Girlfriend When Depressed

Notwithstanding hurting creatures, it is accounted for that Sid Vicious manhandled people too. Horrible was acclaimed for his wild, mutually dependent and medication baffled connection with Nancy Spungen notwithstanding his job in the Sex Pistols. Spungen was a messed up and grieved individual, as Vicious. She was determined to have schizophrenia at 15 and was ousted from school, additionally like Vicious.

In the wake of showing up in London, the American Spungen got engaged with indistinguishable punk circles from Vicious and in the long run started dating him. The two purportedly had an amazingly undesirable relationship where she would lash out at him verbally in the event that he came to see her without drugs. She would keep on obnoxiously misuse him until he would lose his temper and react with physical brutality.

In the last call to her mom before her passing, Spungen conceded that she had been genuinely harmed in battles with Vicious, including a messed up nose and torn ear. She asserted that the successive beatings had halted for a period, however picked back up when Vicious got discouraged due to not having the option to look for some kind of employment after the Sex Pistols separated. It is obvious, given these confirmations, that Vicious was a suspect in her inauspicious cutting passing not long after the call.

10. Vicious Beat a Journalist With a Bike Chain

Sid Vicious’ violence was not just saved for himself. While he occupied with visit self-mutilation, Vicious was additionally equipped for critical brutality towards creatures and individuals. This propensity showed up during a show on the Sex Pistols’ notorious North American visit. At a stop in Nashville, Vicious mercilessly attacked a columnist with a bike chain.

The Sex Pistols, as was run of the mill with punk artists, had a bad tempered relationship with the press and music pundits. This conduct was uncommonly serious with Nick Kent, a journalist for the New Musical Express who was likewise a previous Sex Pistol. He had quickly played guitar with the band and practiced with Johnny Rotten and asserted he was the prevalent vocalist. Kent regularly abused Rotten in the press because of this contradiction.

At the 100 Club in Nashville, Kent apparently tapped Vicious on the shoulder and advised him to move over so Kent could show signs of improvement see. Awful is said to have reacted with a remark on how he didn’t care for Kent’s pants and snatched a bike chain out of his pocket, which he hit Kent over the head with multiple times. Blood was purportedly splattered everywhere throughout the divider behind Kent who, in evident punk style, expressed it didn’t do any harm and would not look for clinical consideration.

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Robert Dixon

I am a guitar player and a song writer. Here is my blog about guitars, guitar pedals, bass guitars and other music gear — https://www.guitarguide.xyz/