Preface To Vacancy: Pretty Vacant

(image from Discogs)

Sadly I don't have a cool story about discovering the Sex Pistols. I was younger than ten when punk happened & even American punk bands like the Ramones weren't played on American radio, so my first impressions of punks were from the representations one might have seen in that Quincy episode.

Indeed, I imagined punk rock was more like the hardcore punk happening in the United States than what it actually was: just a raw reimagining or reassertion of rock & roll. & that was made clear to me in the fall of 1986, when I first saw Sid & Nancy.

As is often the case with me & music, I was very easily able to distance myself from the events portrayed (correctly or not) in the movie & the music itself. Once I got a copy of the only Sex Pistols record, I absorbed the music & lyrics separate from the movie. It's how I relate to music - pretty personally.

The point is, though, it wasn't a very cool way to be introduced to the Sex Pistols. The movie didn't contextualize the punk movement very well - I would learn more actually listening to the music, which I began exploring immediately afterward.

An interesting observation - I discovered postpunk before punk. I suppose it's much more confusing these days. Especially with sampling! But I just wanted to confess that the first time I heard "Pretty Vacant" wasn't on the radio or because I was somehow involved in the punk movie. It was in a biopic that is of dubious historicity. That's all.