Fact #117384

Steve Dior (musician/friend of Sid Vicious) : Sid and Nancy arrived in New York late summer in 1978. The first thing we did was enroll them at the Methadone clinic. They had acquired sizeable heroin habits in London.

They had checked in to the infamous Chelsea Hotel, a breeding ground for musicians, poets, lowlifes and wannabes. With the split up of the Sex Pistols Sid found himself unemployed and thinking of his next move.

Terry Ork : I was booking the groups at Max’s for a while. Sid and Nancy were living at the Chelsea Hotel and Nancy became Sid’s manager. They’d come by Max’s, Sid wanted to do a gig, they needed money, they were on heroin.

Neon Leon Webster (friend of Sid Vicious) : She was managing him now, trying to get him to play with people who weren’t too crazy. He wanted to go into the studio with some people he had jammed with at Max’s, but some old contractual agreements with Warners prevented him from doing so.

Tommy Dean (owner, Max’s Kansas City) : Sid’s condition was getting worse and worse, he shooting up larger amounts and stronger stuff. Sid wasn’t getting rich playing at Max’s, it was just a way to make some money to buy drugs. The gigs were more like adverts to anybody who had some good heroin to bring it round.

Terry Ork : I dealt with Nancy. She would come by and say, ‘Ork, we need some Tuinals. Sid’s sick. He can’t sing.’ So I’d go out and get some Tuinals for him.

Jeff Magnum (bassist, Dead Boys) : Sid and Cheetah (Chrome, guitarist of The Dead Boys) decided we were gonna play with Sid at Max’s, but the rehearsals were ridiculous. We went to Max’s and Sid’s face was in a bowl of salad. He was gone. I said, ‘Oh well, I guess our star for the evening is not shining too brightly’.

It never happened. I don’t even think we played two notes with the guy, then I got word that he told Cheetah that we played too good and he didn’t want us.

Steve Dior : I had my own band, The Idols, with former New York Dolls Jerry Nolan and Arthur Kane. It seemed only natural that we would help Sid back on his feet.

I think Sid felt some pressure to prove he was more than just an image and we agreed that if we were gonna play, it was gonna be good.

Originally we thought of Johnny Thunders for the other guitar role. I was there when Nolan called him up, "Listen Johnny, we're gonna be doing some shows with Sid! You wanna play?" - "Sure. Where?" - "At Max’s.” - “Now one thing Johnny! If you turn up looking the least bit silly I'm walking off! You got that?"

Needless to say Johnny never showed up for rehearsals.

Bob Gruen (rock photographer) : As it happened, The Clash were in town, recording London Calling at the Record Plant with Sandy Perlman, and I was down there doing some pictures of them in the studio.

Steve Dior : I told Sid that Mick Jones from The Clash was in town at the Record Plant. I could ask him. Sid said, “Right!”

I cabbed over to the Record Plant. Mick was there in all his glory in the middle of London Calling. He seemed suspicious and not at all convinced that it was good for his career! "So what songs are you doing?" "Sid's greatest hits."

The Clash had not yet played in New York and I could tell he was nervous! I appealed to his bravado! "Come on Mick it will be great, we'll make some money too!" We headed to the rehearsal.

Max’s agreed to book us for one show to see what would happen. It was a Thursday. We would do two shows - we knew most of the songs Sid wanted to do except My Way.

Mick Jones and I spent a couple of hours listening to the record trying to work it out. We gave up after the first chorus where it seemed to change key mysteriously. "Just tell them you've forgotten the rest!" I told Sid, thinking that was typically punk!

Bob Gruen : This wasn’t a gig that New York City was holding its breath and waiting for. I went along with my brother David because I knew Sid, through having done some work with the Pistols, so I went down to see him, but it wasn’t well-publicised and there wasn’t really a lot of interest.

Tommy Dean : Well, there was interest, but it was more in the fact that guys like Jerry Nolan and Arthur Kane from the Heartbreakers were playing with him.

Steve Dior : When we arrived at the club there was a large crowd gathered and a line around the block! Anticipation and nervous energy filled the air.

Lynne Leighting (musician in audience) : When Sid and Nancy walked in to Max’s, I remember thinking that I had never seen anyone so pale before in my life – it actually scared me.

Steve Dior : We ushered Sid and Nancy through the crowd and upstairs to the room where various VIP's would hang out and do drugs. It was perfect.

Sid and Nancy sat on the sofa, stoned. Mick Jones was looking nervous. Arthur ‘Killer’ Kane stood in the doorway chatting to anyone who would listen. Jerry Nolan, dressed to the nines, sat quietly smoking in the corner.

Lynne Leighting : Sid and Nancy sat on the couch together, completely mute for the better part of an hour just staring at me, or hanging on each other. I could see they were soooo very high.

Joe Stevens (punk photographer) : They alienated all the press who went to Max’s to get free drinks and fuck the waitresses. People like Lenny Kaye, other big shots, used to live in that nightclub and all of a sudden this little broad from Philadelphia is giving the shit at the top of the staircase. It was like trying to get into the White House.

Lynne Leighting : He didn’t have his instrument with him, there was no warming up, no tuning. I remember thinking at the time, ‘it’s amazing he can just go out there without warming up.’

Steve Dior : For a New York in-crowd, they were fairly hostile. The usual spitting, ashtrays and beer bottles rained down upon us when we hit Search and Destroy! I looked over at Sid. He was standing, he was singing and he was good!

Lynne Leighting : After watching a tune or two of the Sid jerk-around-in-your-face angry dance and hearing a few tunes that just wouldn’t sound the same without all that spit and spraying, I left, thinking, ‘I’ve seen this before and now it’s getting old.’

Bon Gruen (photographer) : Sid was stoned and pathetic. Arthur Kane was on bass, so all Sid had to do was just sing. They would start a song, but they hadn’t rehearsed, so they’d stop because Sid had forgotten the words, and then Nancy would hand him another drink and say, ‘Never mind, Sid, just sing another one.’

They played for about 20 minutes and Mick looked a bit lost - the band was so lame.

Mick Jones (guitarist, The Clash) : We just about managed about five songs. Five songs for five bucks. It was a nightmare between shows, it was full on. Sid was sort of semi there. It was a serious drug thing. Me and Joe kept looking at each other, because we couldn¹t believe it. The people there were as out of it as you can be without actually being dead. We weren¹t heavyweight drug guys, we had a lot more than that to share.

Bob Gruen : There weren’t that many people there, and there was no cheering. If anything, people were stunned at how inept it all was. I remember my brother David being mystified and asking, "What the hell was all that about?"

Roger Miret (vocalist, Agnostic Front) : My cousin and me knew someone who worked at Max’s and he got us in there one night. I had no idea who was on, but my cousin explained to me that it was Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols. Not long before, I’d seen Kiss play in Madison Square Garden, so I knew what a great rock show should be like, but Sid’s show was one of the worst things I’d ever seen. I couldn’t believe how bad it was, but it made me think, well, if he can get up there and do it, then I can too. About three months later I bought myself a bass guitar and that’s how I got started in music.

Mick Carlon (audience) : I was overjoyed to see that Sid’s band consisted of Clash’s Mick Jones and ex-Dolls Arthur Kane and jerry Nolan. They were solid but Sid was a mess, obviously far gone on a substance stronger than booze. He read the lyrics to several Eddie Cochran songs off a piece of paper and took off his jacket, rolling on the ‘stage’ shirtless, bits of floor-trash sticking to his sweaty, pale body. Disillusioned, I left early.
 
Lynne Leighting : Here was Sid Vicious and Nancy! Icons of a punk generation and they had nothing to say, which I guess in itself says volumes about how much his fans projected their own fantasies on Sid, filled him and framed him in their own minds.

Steve Dior : The following week we did six more shows. Max’s and the band cashing in on the hysteria that surrounded Sid Vicious.
(Extended version of a feature by Johnny Black)