No Sugarcoating & No Bullshit: October
Written by Jo Hayes
Saturday, 31 October 2015 04:00
Happy Halloween, Uber Rockers! (That’s if any of you give a damn it’s Halloween.) It seems more for the adults than the kids in the past few years, as more of my friends seem to be dressing up than their kids! I like having an excuse to dress up, although I can never be bothered to be that imaginative, so end up looking like a Goth.
Of course I need to write something suitably spooky, and I thought what about Rock Stars who have died on Halloween, but I couldn’t find any.
Last year on Halloween I wrote about what deceased bands would I bring back from the dead to hear one last time. This time I thought: what if some Rock Stars were still alive, what music could they have done? This isn’t scary at first thought, until you think how crap the music could have become, if they’d have lived to an average age. (Cynical? Me?)
My first thought is on Sid Vicious. We all know he died at the young age of 21, of a Heroin overdose, after being released on bail. Apparently he wasn’t much of a bass player, and Glen Matlock was the only bassist of the ‘Pistols who could actually play.
He tried recording his own stuff, more memorably ‘My Way’, which was a bit of fun, but can you imagine if he had lived and continued recording? Would his debatable bass playing skills improve, and he form a band which were better than the ‘Pistols?
Despite him being clean when he was released on bail, I can imagine him going down the path of further self-destruction. However, if he had stayed clean, become tee-total, maybe he’d have made, or be making, average punk rock, living off the fact he’d been in the Sex Pistols – I very much doubt he’d be the legend he became. People might not even remember him. One other scenario for Sid is him living, but being sentenced to murder in America, and coming out a born-again Christian, making Christian Rock, singing about how prison saved him, and how drugs are evil. This would be pretty scary, and an assault on our ears…
If Nancy Spungen hadn’t been murdered, I imagine her going further downhill, probably overdosing on Heroin herself at some point. Maybe even making music of her own (shudder!) or, if both have them had survived, them making music together (ugh), and probably leading each other down a dark road, and a double overdose. They could even have become clean and tee-total, preaching to others about not doing drugs, or try and be the new Yoko Ono and John Lennon (now that would be scary, although thankfully, laughable).
What if Kurt Cobain had lived? Aside from ‘Nevermind’, and some songs from ‘Incesticide’, after that, I went off Nirvana, ‘In Utero’ was a taste of things to come. I can imagine Kurt Cobain, and some reincarnation of Nirvana playing the hits live to please, but churning out depressing acoustic stuff (or just being depressing, and maybe sounding like Pearl Jam. That’s definitely a scary thought in my opinion…). Even more scarily, if Cobain and Courtney Love had stayed together, maybe they would have collaborated? Which in equal parts could have sounded great, or could have been shit. Maybe the Foo Fighters wouldn’t have been formed? Or at least later than they were formed.
Who knows, obviously this is all based on my impression of Sid Vicious, Nancy Spungen, and Kurt Cobain, and I could just be talking shit! However, I think it’s interesting, and also potentially worrying/scary (which is apt for a Halloween blog!)
Have a good Halloween if you’re doing anything, even if you’re sitting at home with the lights off, hoping the neighbourhood kids won’t bother you with Trick or Treating.
Until next time…
Jo