The Sex Pistols mark the 50th anniversary of their 1977 album with a show at Hammersmith Apollo, with Frank Carter on vocals.
Sex Pistols with Frank Carter play Hammersmith Apollo on Sunday 20 December, one of two London dates this month. The other is at Brixton Academy on 18 December, so you've got a choice of west or south.
The occasion is the 50th anniversary of Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols, the only studio album they ever put out, which came out in 1977. It's the record that defined the whole punk era, and that's what they're marking here.
On vocals is Frank Carter, the frontman of Gallows and Rattlesnakes. He's stepping in for original singer John Lydon, also known as Johnny Rotten, who hasn't been part of the band since the acrimonious 2008 reunion tour. Behind him are guitarist Steve Jones and drummer Paul Cook, the two original members who've kept the name going. They've worked with other people since the split, too: Jones and Cook teamed up with former Generation X members Billy Idol and Tony James in Generation Sex, and Carter himself first sat in with Jones, Cook and bassist Glen Matlock at three charity shows to save London's Bush Hall before they took this out on the road across the UK and Europe.
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There's plenty of other history to the band if you're into that sort of thing. Matlock wrote the memoir Triggers, and there's the documentary I Was A Teenage Sex Pistol. Then there's the legendary 1978 US run, which ended with the infamous on-stage break-up at San Francisco's Winterland Ballroom. More recently, the 2019 Hulu series Pistol, adapted from Jones' memoir Lonely Boy and directed by Danny Boyle, drew both rave reviews and Lydon's ire. This run is the latest chapter in all that. The Hammersmith Apollo show is on Sunday 20 December.
