Great Rock n Roll Swindle

An odd, occasionally hilarious, hodge-podge from those notorious yobs of the late seventies that transcends vulgarity and low brow humor and drifts into the realm of the truly bizarre. Certain tracks will raise questions of not only how much the band was involved, but how these tracks came into existence, but if your taste veers into warped humor, you'll probably have a lot of fun along the way. There's a handful of loud, gritty Pistol's type punk with Rotton's notorious scathing vocals. Some are covers, (e.g.) "Substitute", "(I'm not your) Stepping Stone", some are originals, "I Wanna Be Me", "Belson Was A Gas" (for bad taste fans), and there's also an alternate take, though not much different from the original version, of "Anarchy In the U.K.". Actually there are several different versions of Anarchy, and here is were things get weird, one is part of a disco medley and the other is the French accordion version. Who's responsible for this is unclear. Guitarist Steve Jones and drummer Paul Cook, who originally started the group and expected little more than your standard hard rock band, put in a couple of good originals. The songs "Silly Thing" and "Lonely Boy", not surprisingly, sound closer to standard, crude hard rock. Infamous dervish nitwit Sid Vicious does a trio of surprisingly great covers. He covers two Eddie Cochran numbers ("Something Else" and "C'mon Everybody") and his "singing" has an on target sly but energetic rockabilly delivery, which sounds great with Steve Jones' crude (but often under appreciated) guitar playing. Vicious also turns in a humorous parody of Paul Anka's "My Way". Another great track is Steve Jones' arrangement of an old sea shanty, complete with orchestral backing (Once again, we wonder, how and whom?) titled "Frigging in the Rigging". Be forewarned, the song is credited as traditional and if the lyrics are all original, amusingly, this centuries old sea shanty puts any of the Pistol's original material to shame in the vulgarity department. This track, along with Sid's "My Way", also shows Jones' thick Chuck Berry riff guitar style sounds great with a string section (Who'da thunk?). Also, there's a great track to annoy music "purists" with, a hilariously botched "Johnny B. Goode" and Modern Lovers "RoadRunner" medley recorded live in the studio, presumably from the early days. The best moments are when Jones stumbles over a generic Chuck Berry riff, Rotten exclaims "Oh god, I hate songs like that" and Rotten at one point forgetting the words starts screaming "Stop it, that's fucking awful! Torrtuure! Elsewhere on the album there's a version of "Rock Around The Clock" with hiccuping strangled unintelligible vocals. You'll probably surmise the album is going to be a bit unusual from the first track. A rasping voice claiming to be band manager Malcolm McLaren, though the voice sounds more like Gollum from Tolkien's "The Lord of The Rings", explaining how the Sex Pistols were a plot to swindle the Rock and Roll music industry. To top it off, a chamber orchestra plays "God Save the Queen" in the background. People expecting only the raging bile of the "Never Mind the Bollocks" album may be disappointed (as well as confused), but I always get a laugh out of it.


1. God Save The Queen (Symphony)
2. Rock Around The Clock - Tenpole Tudor
3. Johnny B Goode
4. Road Runner
5. Black Arabs - BLACK ARABS
6. Anarchy In The UK
7. Watcha Gonna Do About It
8. Who Killed Bambi? - Tenpole Tudor
9. Silly Thing
10. Substitute
11. Don't Gimme No Lip Child
12. I'm Not Your Stepping Stone
13. Lonely Boy
14. Something Else - Sid Vicious
15. L'Anarchie Pour Le UK - JERZIMY
16. Einmal War Belsen Bortrefflich
17. Einmal War Belsen Wirflich Bortrefflich
18. No One Is Innocent
19. My Way - Sid Vicious
20. C'Mon Everybody
21. EMI (Orchestral)
22. The Great Rock 'N' Roll Swindle
23. You Need Hands
24. Friggin' In The Riggin'